Souls for Sale: Rupert Hughes and the Novel Hollywood Religion - Paperback

by Terry Lindvall (Author)

The beginning of the twentieth century evolved out of an era of Freethinking atheists and agnostics who challenged the Protestant hegemony of the day. Key among these mavericks was author and filmmaker Rupert Hughes, uncle to Howard Hughes. In 1922, Hughes published Souls for Sale, his wickedly playful satire of the Bible belt and Hollywood, offering a mischievous snapshot of the film industry as it struggled against a conservative Zeitgeist. The novel follows the prodigal adventures of a clergyman's daughter as she stumbles into the movie industry and finds it to be a new and liberating moral universe. Hughes's adaptation of his sly work challenged the religious hierarchy of his day, but ultimately fell by the wayside, even with the support of Hollywood icons like Eric von Stroheim and Charlie Chaplin. Souls for Sale offers a glimpse into the emerging Jazz age of moviemaking against the backdrop of a country moving from its traditional roots into the kinetic ways of Hollywood.

Author Biography

Professor of film, Terry Lindvall, occupies the C. S. Lewis Chair of Communication and Christian Thought at Virginia Wesleyan University and has authored a dozen books, including The Silents of God (2001), Sanctuary Cinema (2007), Divine Film Comedies (2015), and God Mocks (2016). He is presently producing a feature documentary film on his God on the Big Screen: A History of Prayer from the Silent Cinema to Today (2019).