Call for Chapters – ReFocus: The Films of Don Siegel
Don Siegel is the rare Hollywood director who worked successfully in both classic Hollywood of the 1930s and 40s and, after the studio system reinvention, New Hollywood into the 1980s. From his start in classic Hollywood as a montage director on Casablanca, through genre work in film noir, science fiction, westerns, and war films, Siegel acted as director, and often producer, to generate a versatile collection of iconic films including Invasion of the Body Snatchers, the remake of The Killers, Dirty Harry, Charley Varrick, and Escape from Alcatraz. Yet, for all his successes, in particular in the five films he made with Clint Eastwood, there is a near absence of critical writing on Siegel
As this volume will be the first comprehensive study in Don Siegel’s work we seek to contextualize, problematize and theorize his entire canon. We welcome essays from a variety of theoretical, historical, and methodological approaches, and are especially interested in essays that discuss Siegel’s work from a feminist and/or critical race perspective while situating the relevance of his film work in the contemporary moment. Topics may include, but are not limited to, a single film, group of films, his work with Clint Eastwood, his direction on John Wayne’s last film The Shootist, themes and topics that pervade his work, and/or his television directing or influence, the critical and commercial reception of his films especially during the 1970s.
We are currently soliciting abstracts of approximately 350 words for essays to be included in a book-length anthology on Don Siegel’s cinema, including his work in television, to appear in 2024. The Films of Don Siegel will be a scholarly volume published in the University of Edinburgh’s ReFocus series, examining American film directors. Series editors are Robert Singer, Gary D. Rhodes, and Frances Smith. ReFocus features a series of contemporary methodological and theoretical approaches to the interdisciplinary analyses and interpretations of the work of these American directors, from the once-famous to the ignored, in direct relationship to American culture –its myths, values, and historical precepts.
Essays accepted and included in the refereed anthology should be approximately 6,000 to 8,000 words and referenced in Chicago endnote style.
Include a link to the series: https://edinburghuniversitypress.com/series-refocus-the-international-directors-series
Please send a 350-word proposal and a short bio to both editors: Doctor Jamie Popowich (jamie.popowich@ntu.ac.uk) & Aaron Tucker (artucker@yorku.ca)
About the editors
Jamie Popowich is a writer and filmmaker. His next book, Punch Lines (Potential Books, 2023) examines the thin line between jokes and tears. He is currently working on a book about the politics of prank comedy. He holds a doctorate from the University of Hertfordshire and teaches at the University of Surrey.
Aaron Tucker is the author of two film studies monographs, Interfacing with the Internet (2014) and Virtual Weaponry (2017), both with Palgrave Macmillan. His current research utilizes film theory to analyze and critique the cinema of facial recognition technologies. In addition, he is a poet and novelist, whose second novel, Soldiers, Hunters, Not Cowboys, will be published by Coach House Books in Spring 2023.
