The Arts
Wartime cinema, Englishness and propaganda
Michael Powell and the ‘Pressburger Touch’
by Ina Habermann
Description
This book provides a fresh analysis of the wartime work of Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger and their team 'the Archers'. It argues that in their earlier work, Powell and Pressburger should be seen as middlebrow storytellers whose stories explore national identity in times of war. Their wartime work is discussed in four phases: While the first phase covers their contributions to the 'phoney war', the second traces their engagement with the 'people's war'. The third phase sees the Archers move beyond propaganda, towards memodramas of Englishness, cross-cultural alliances and quests for spiritual modernity. The fourth phase dramatizes post-war preoccupations with an increasing focus on memory and trauma. Following up these thematic concerns, the conclusion is devoted to Pressburger's later work, including his two published novels Killing a Mouse on Sunday and The Glass Pearls.
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Endorsements
This book provides a fresh analysis of the wartime work of Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger and their team 'the Archers'. It argues that in their earlier work, Powell and Pressburger should be seen as middlebrow storytellers whose stories explore national identity in times of war. The complexity of the Archers' negotiation of identity is largely due to the contribution of Emeric Pressburger, the Hungarian-Jewish immigrant scriptwriter. Situating the Archers' work in the context of the British media, propaganda and wartime cinema, the book offers innovative, detailed, and carefully contextualized readings of ten films made between 1938 and 1947. These films have the 'Pressburger Touch' (similar to the 'Lubitsch Touch'), a Continental flavour due to techniques of paradox and inversion, ellipsis, characteristic play with language and imagery, ironically romantic gestures and an element of whimsy, deployed by Pressburger to explore national identity in a context of transnational exchange and cultural translation. Powell and Pressburger's wartime work is discussed in four phases: While the first phase covers their contributions to the 'phoney war', the second traces their engagement with the 'people's war'. The third phase sees the Archers move beyond propaganda, towards memodramas of Englishness, cross-cultural alliances and quests for spiritual modernity. The fourth phase dramatizes post-war preoccupations with an increasing focus on memory and trauma. Following up these thematic concerns, the conclusion is devoted to Pressburger's later work, including his two published novels Killing a Mouse on Sunday and The Glass Pearls.
Reviews
This book provides a fresh analysis of the wartime work of Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger and their team 'the Archers'. It argues that in their earlier work, Powell and Pressburger should be seen as middlebrow storytellers whose stories explore national identity in times of war. The complexity of the Archers' negotiation of identity is largely due to the contribution of Emeric Pressburger, the Hungarian-Jewish immigrant scriptwriter. Situating the Archers' work in the context of the British media, propaganda and wartime cinema, the book offers innovative, detailed, and carefully contextualized readings of ten films made between 1938 and 1947. These films have the 'Pressburger Touch' (similar to the 'Lubitsch Touch'), a Continental flavour due to techniques of paradox and inversion, ellipsis, characteristic play with language and imagery, ironically romantic gestures and an element of whimsy, deployed by Pressburger to explore national identity in a context of transnational exchange and cultural translation. Powell and Pressburger's wartime work is discussed in four phases: While the first phase covers their contributions to the 'phoney war', the second traces their engagement with the 'people's war'. The third phase sees the Archers move beyond propaganda, towards memodramas of Englishness, cross-cultural alliances and quests for spiritual modernity. The fourth phase dramatizes post-war preoccupations with an increasing focus on memory and trauma. Following up these thematic concerns, the conclusion is devoted to Pressburger's later work, including his two published novels Killing a Mouse on Sunday and The Glass Pearls.
Author Biography
Ina Habermann is Professor of English Literature at the University of Basel
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Manchester University Press
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View all titlesBibliographic Information
- Publisher Manchester University Press
- Publication Date September 2025
- Orginal LanguageEnglish
- ISBN/Identifier 9781526179500 / 1526179504
- Publication Country or regionUnited Kingdom
- FormatPrint PDF
- Pages352
- ReadershipGeneral/trade
- Publish StatusPublished
- Dimensions216 X 138 mm
- Biblio NotesDerived from Proprietary 6221
- Reference Code16480
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