Famous Library Films is the title of a book of essays on silent film written more than 60 years ago. The book examines 22 classic movies, and even features a preface by Director Fritz Lang. But until recently, it was lost to history and had gone unpublished.
Now, the manuscript - like Lang's Metropolis (of which the author writes about) has been restored, and it has been published as a book on the internet.
The credit for bringing this pioneering appreciation of the silent cinema to light goes to Kevin Brownlow, a longtime friend of the book's author, H.A.V. Bulleid. "I was in touch with him as a correspondent but finally met him when a collector friend took me to meet him. From then on, we met regularly, and he always took me to an ancient pub near his Sussex home and he always insisted on paying!" recalled Brownlow in a recent email.
Credit also goes to film historian and biographer Lon Davis, whom Brownlow contacted to help to find a home for the book. Together, Brownlow and Davis edited the manuscript, and with the assistance of Tim Lussier, who formatted the work for the web, it was posted to Lussier's website, www.silentsaregolden.com, on a monthly basis.
The book's final chapter, fittingly on Stan Laurel's Old Soldier's Never Die (1924), was posted just a few days ago on May 1st.
Bulleid (pictured above), who died a year ago today at age 96, had the chance to see some of the early chapters posted to the web. He was "thrilled," according to Brownlow. It was a dream deferred. The story of how this book came to be published is told at examiner.com. The book itself can be read online at www.silentsaregolden.com
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