The fifteen groundbreaking essays contained in this book address the concept of adaptation in relation to horror cinema. Adaptation is not only a key cultural practice and strategy for filmmakers, but it is also a theme of major importance within horror cinema as a whole. Horror film's history is full of adaptations that have drawn from fiction or folklore, or that have assumed the shape of remakes of pre-existing films. The horror genre itself however, also abounds with its own myriad transformations and transmutations.
The essays within this volume engage with an impressive range of...

The Theatre du Grand-Guignol in Paris (1897-1962) achieved a legendary reputation as the 'Theatre of Horror, ' a venue displaying such explicit violence and blood-curdling terror that a resident doctor was employed to treat the numerous spectators who fainted each night. Indeed, the phrase 'grand guignol' has entered the language to describe any display of sensational horror. Since the theatre closed its doors forty years ago, the genre has been overlooked by critics and theatre historians. This book reconsiders the importance and influence of the Grand-Guignol within its social, cultural and...

Although the dramatic dimension to Joseph Conrad's fiction is frequently acknowledged, his own experiments in drama have traditionally been marginalized. However, in all of Conrad's plays we see a distinct effort to investigate seriously the dramatic form and some of his plays are startlingly ahead of their time. Furthermore, all of the plays are adaptations and comprise One Day More, based on Tomorrow, Laughing Anne, based on Because of the Dollars, Victory: A Drama and The Secret Agent . The creation of these reveals much about the history, theory and practice of this fascinating cultural...

London's Grand Guignol--a macabre theatre of naturalistic horror--was established in the early 1920s at the Little Theatre in the West End. Taking its cue from Le Theatre du Grand-Guignol in Paris, this high-profile venture enjoyed as much critical controversy as popular success. On its side were some of the finest actors of the English stage, such as Sybil Thorndike and Lewis Casson, as well as a team of extremely able writers, including the legendary Noel Coward. London's Grand Guignol and the Theatre of Horror considers the importance and influence of the Grand Guignol within its...

Basil Macdonald Hastings's dramatization of Joseph Conrad's Victory enjoyed a run of over eighty performances at London's Globe Theatre in 1919 with actor-producer Marie Lohr in the role of Lena. It remains the most successful stage adaptation of Conrad's fiction and Conrad himself was closely involved in the development of the script. This generously illustrated volume presents the complete script of Macdonald Hastings's play, the collected theatre reviews of the production, and the stage censor's confidential report on the script. The volume also features a substantial introduction placing...

Graham Greene was one of the most versatile writers of the 20th century, and he remains a figure of particular interest to those concerned with the relationship between literature and cinema. As well as being a skilled screenwriter in his own right, most famously with The Third Man, Greene's fiction has proved to be a perennially popular source for adaptation, appealing to the broadest range of filmmakers imaginable.
In this engaging and accessibly written study, Richard J. Hand and Andrew Purssell introduce adaptation studies and its relation to Greene's works. They present new...

A highly original and engaging study of the novels and adaptations of Graham Greene, one of the most prolific writers of the 20th century. Far-reaching but focused, the text offers an accessible introduction to adaptation studies and examines the industries in which Greene functioned as author, screenwriter, film critic and cultural figure.

Whether at a local, national, or international level, radio has played and continues to play a key role in nurturing or denying even destroying people s sense of collective identity. The essays in this volume provide a historical and contemporary overview of radio in small nations. A number of representative small nations are featured: some grappling with new postcolonial identities and others still operating under repressive regimes; some struggling to find a new common purpose in the postindustrial age and others unifying previously ignored ethnic or language groups. As a whole, the...

This groundbreaking book is the first full-length study of British horror radio from the pioneering days of recording and broadcasting right through to the digital audio cultures of our own time. The book offers an historical, critical and theoretical exploration of horror radio and audio performance examining key areas such as writing, narrative, performance practice and reception throughout the history of that most unjustly neglected of popular art forms: radio drama and 'spoken word' auditory cultures.

The volume draws on extensive archival research as well as insightful...