The Malayan Emergency in Film, Literature and Art

Examining film, literature and art produced during and after the Malayan Emergency, the guerrilla war fought between the Malayan National Liberation Army and the military forces of the British Commonwealth, this collection demonstrates how art functions as a record of cultural memory that both reinforces and challenges official histories. Beyond that, it also brings new understandings of the Malayan Emergency itself, and Malaysia''s subsequent development as a postcolonial nation.The first section of the book focuses on films and writings produced during the period of the Emergency to capture the socio-political circumstances of the time and understand its effect on the people. The second section goes on to explore representations of the Emergency generated after the event, highlighting how it was reimagined or reevaluated by later artists, and what ideological ends they served. Offering a comparative methodological approach, it investigates works that account for a range of perspectives, including British, Communist and Malayan/Malaysian. Bringing together the personal and political within individual and collective histories, this collection offers a new understanding of how the Emergency contributed to the formation of postcolonial Malaysia, and demonstrates the central role that film, literature and art play in the creation of cultural memory.>

Préface
This collection examines film, literature and art produced during and after the Malayan Emergency to demonstrate how art functions as a record of cultural memory that both reinforces and challenges official histories.

Auteur

Jonathan Driskell is Lecturer of Film, Television and Screen Studies at Monash University, Malaysia, and is the author of two books Marcel Carne (2012) and The French Screen Goddess (2015). He is also the editor of Film Stardom in Southeast Asia (2022) and has written a number of articles and book chapters.

Marek W. Rutkowski is an independent historian specializing in the Cold War in Asia. His research interest include the history of the Vietnam War, middle power diplomacy and the Soviet Bloc's developmental initiatives in Asia.

Andrew Ng Hock Soon is Associate Professor of Literature and Chair of Postgraduate Studies at Monash University, Malaysia. His research includes horror and the Gothic, postcolonial literature and literary and film aesthetics. He is the author or editor of six books.

Contenu

Introduction: The Malayan Emergency in Cultural Memory - Film, Literature, and Art as Historical Other, Jonathan Driskell, Marek Rutkowski and Andrew Hock Soon Ng (Monash University, Malaysia) Part I: The Emergency during the Emergency: Filmic and Literary Representations 1. The Melodrama of Race in Emergency-era Singapore Cinema, Rosalind Galt, (King's College London, UK) 2. Cinematic Representation of the Malayan Emergency in the Films of the Malayan Film Unit, Hassan Abd. Muthalib (Independent Scholar) 3. The British Reception of Two 1950s Films on the Malayan Emergency, Jon Cowans (Rutgers University, USA) 4. Representations of the Malayan Emergency: Reading Han Suyin, Mary McMinnies and Anthony Burgess, Anne Wetherilt (Open University, UK) 5. Writing from the Other Side: Partisan Literature as Palimpsest of the Malayan Emergency and the Cold War', Yingxin Show (Australian National University, Australia) Part II: In Retrospect: Looking Back at the Malayan Emergency 6. Age and Experience in British Films about the Malayan Emergency, Kevin Flanagan (George Mason University, USA) 7. Bukit Kepong: The Emergency in Mainstream Malaysian Cinema, Jonathan Driskell (Monash University, Malaysia) 8. [Re]Representing the Batang Kali Massacre, Chrishandra Sebastiampillai (Monash University, Malaysia) 9. The Marginalization of the Malayan Emergency in Beth Yahp and Tan Twan Eng's Novels, Eugene Kee Hong Chua (University of Malaya, Malaysia) 10. Methods of Memory: Artistic Legacies of the Malayan Emergency, Sim Chi Yin (King's College London, UK) List of Fiction and Films About the Malayan Emergency Bibliography Index