The mystic bell
Sep. 16th, 2008 08:46 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
randy_byersLately I've been reading Austin Hall and Homer Eon Flint's "different" novel, The Blind Spot, originally published in Argosy All-Story in 1921. I've also just watched William Cameron Menzies' 1932 adventure film Chandu the Magician, which is very pulpy in its own right. Both stories are heavily influenced by a hoaky Eastern mysticism, and both make use of the trope of a bell sound accompanying a mystic event. This is used to very dramatic effect in the movie, where it always signals the mystic arrival of a yogi. Look out behind you!
Does anybody know where this trope comes from? Is it just a pulp invention, or is it based on actual mythology or religious belief?
Does anybody know where this trope comes from? Is it just a pulp invention, or is it based on actual mythology or religious belief?
