The Mummy's Foot' is a gothic short story written by French writer, Théophile Gautier, author of 'Clarimonde'. The plot follows a man who buys a mummified foot in an antiques shop. It once belonged to an Egyptian princess, and it transpires that she wants it back. He is forced to make a deal. This is a classic short story in the genre and we a republishing it with a brand new introductory biography of the translator of the work, Lafcadio Hearn.

In this quirky and surprising history, Alan Krell addresses the absurd and abject, the banal and the nastily subversive, and the romantic and the fetishistic, as he describes the appearance of the foot in literature, photography, art, sport and film. Discover the gothic tales of French writer Théophile Gautier, the disturbing photographs of Jacques-André Boiffard and the religious paintings by Giotto, Tintoretto and Caravaggio that exalt the foot. Marvel at the sporting exploits of the elite runners such as Abede Bikila and Zola Budd, and the surprising representation of the foot in film such as The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and Kill Bill: Volume 1. Presenting new images and ideas of the foot in a tantalizing way, The Mummy's Foot and the Big Toe is for all those with an interest in the humanities, languages, social sciences and anthropology. --From front flap.

A chilling tale from French literature, "The Mummy's Foot" is a masterful short story that delves into the realm of horror. Gautier's storytelling, offers readers a haunting journey into the unknown, showcasing the timeless allure of classic horror tales.

Romantic provocateur, flamboyant bohemian, precocious novelist, perfect poet—not to mention an inexhaustible journalist, critic, and man-about-town—Théophile Gautier is one of the major figures, and great characters, of French literature. In My Fantoms Richard Holmes, the celebrated biographer of Shelley and Coleridge, has found a brilliantly effective new way to bring this great bu too-little-known writer into English. My Fantoms assembles seven stories spanning the whole of Gautier’s career into a unified work that captures the essence of his adventurous life and subtle art. From the erotic awakening of “The Adolescent” through “The Poet,” a piercing recollection of the mad genius Gérard de Nerval, the great friend of Gautier’s youth, My Fantoms celebrates the senses and illuminates the strange disguises of the spirit, while taking readers on a tour of modernity at its most mysterious. ”What ever would the Devil find to do in Paris?” Gautier wonders. “He would meet people just as diabolical as he, and find himself taken for some naïve provincial…” Tapestries, statues, and corpses come to life; young men dream their way into ruin; and Gautier keeps his faith in the power of imagination: “No one is truly dead, until they are no longer loved.”

Mummified explores the curious, unsettling and controversial cases of mummies held in French and British museums. From powdered mummies eaten as medicine to mummies unrolled in public, dissected for race studies and DNA-tested in modern laboratories, there is a lot more to these ancient remains than first meets the eye. This book takes you on a journey from Paris to London, Leicester and Manchester, from the apothecaries of the Middle Ages to the dissecting tables of the eighteenth century, and finally behind the screen of today’s computers, to revisit the stories of these bodies that have fascinated Europeans for so long. Mummified investigates matters of life and death, of collecting and viewing, and of interactions – sometimes violent and sometimes emotional – that question the essence of what makes us human.

In this early work of science fiction, the author explores the idea of reanimation and its consequences. The Mummy: A Tale of the Twenty-Second Century is a gripping and thought-provoking adventure. This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work is in the "public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.

These 23 chilling tales tell of the returning dead, haunted places, weird creatures, and the supernatural in "The Return of the Soul" by Robert Hichens, "The Mummy's Foot" by Theophile Gautier, Lafcadio Hearn's "Of a Promise Broken," as well as spine-tinglers by Algernon Blackwood, J. Sheridan LeFanu, Sir Arthur Quiller-Couch, Lord Dunsany, and other masters.

Pierre Jules Theophile Gautier was a French poet, dramatist, novelist, journalist, and literary critic. He was a contributor to various journals, most notably to "La Presse." He was director of "Revue de Paris" from 1851-1856. During this time, Gautier left "La Presse" and became a journalist for "Le Moniteur Universel." Gautier acquired the editorship of influential review "L'Artiste" in 1856. In 1862 he was elected chairman of the Societe Nationale des Beaux-Arts. During the Franco-Prussian war, Gautier made his way back to Paris. He remained with his family throughout the invasion and the aftermath of the Commune, eventually dying in 1872 of a cardiac disease. "The Mummy's Foot" -- the title story in this collection -- is a gothic tale, published in French as "Le Pied de Momie." It relates the adventures of a man who buys the 3,000 year old foot of Princess Hermonthis in a Parisian curio shop. Gautier has a fascination with Ancient Egypt as well as an obsession with mortality, decay, and the passage of time. When Princess Hermonthis takes him to her time and place of burial, he asks for her hand from her father, who flatly refuses because of his concern for durability, and the transience of the young man's existence compared to that of a three-thousand year old girl.