Sudhir Mahadevan is Associate Professor in the Department of Comparative Literature, Cinema and Media at the University of Washington.

"Sudhir Mahadevan does the impossible in A Very Old Machine … He shows how various technologies that emerged in nineteenth-century India shaped its current cinema." — H-Net Reviews (Jhistory)"…methodologically and theoretically wide-ranging." — BioScope: South Asian Screen Studies"Sudhir Mahadevan's A Very Old Machine is a work of great theoretical sophistication and rigorous historical scholarship. A revisionist and definitive treatment of early Indian film, the book shows how prevailing attitudes toward technology, photography, empire, commodity, and mass culture made the cinema a socially and culturally distinct form in India. Drawing on a wealth of primary research, A Very Old Machine fills many gaps. Anyone who wants to know how Indian cinema became Indian will need to consult this book." — James Morrison, editor of Hollywood Reborn: Movie Stars of the 1970s

• List of IllustrationsAcknowledgmentsIntroductionPart I: Obsolescence 1. The Nineteenth-Century Indian Techno-Bazaar2. Traveling Showmen, Makeshift Cinemas: The Bioscopewallah and Early CinemaPart II: Mechanical Reproduction and Mass Culture 3. Copyright and Cultural Authenticity: The Politics of Mechanical Reproduction in South Asia4. The Cinema as Mass Culture: The Melodramas of Mechanical ReproductionPart III: Intermediality 5. The Emergence of Topicality: Snapshot Cultures and Newspaper Photojournalism6. Politics across Media: The Partition of Bengal (1905) and the Cinematic CityPart IV: Archives7. The Abundant Ephemeral: The Protocols of Popular Film Historiography in India8. PostscriptNotesWorks CitedFilmographyIndex

Sudhir Mahadevan is Associate Professor in the Department of Comparative Literature, Cinema and Media at the University of Washington.

"Sudhir Mahadevan does the impossible in A Very Old Machine … He shows how various technologies that emerged in nineteenth-century India shaped its current cinema." — H-Net Reviews (Jhistory)"…methodologically and theoretically wide-ranging." — BioScope: South Asian Screen Studies"Sudhir Mahadevan's A Very Old Machine is a work of great theoretical sophistication and rigorous historical scholarship. A revisionist and definitive treatment of early Indian film, the book shows how prevailing attitudes toward technology, photography, empire, commodity, and mass culture made the cinema a socially and culturally distinct form in India. Drawing on a wealth of primary research, A Very Old Machine fills many gaps. Anyone who wants to know how Indian cinema became Indian will need to consult this book." — James Morrison, editor of Hollywood Reborn: Movie Stars of the 1970s

• List of IllustrationsAcknowledgmentsIntroductionPart I: Obsolescence 1. The Nineteenth-Century Indian Techno-Bazaar2. Traveling Showmen, Makeshift Cinemas: The Bioscopewallah and Early CinemaPart II: Mechanical Reproduction and Mass Culture 3. Copyright and Cultural Authenticity: The Politics of Mechanical Reproduction in South Asia4. The Cinema as Mass Culture: The Melodramas of Mechanical ReproductionPart III: Intermediality 5. The Emergence of Topicality: Snapshot Cultures and Newspaper Photojournalism6. Politics across Media: The Partition of Bengal (1905) and the Cinematic CityPart IV: Archives7. The Abundant Ephemeral: The Protocols of Popular Film Historiography in India8. PostscriptNotesWorks CitedFilmographyIndex

Sudhir Mahadevan is Associate Professor in the Department of Comparative Literature, Cinema and Media at the University of Washington.

"Sudhir Mahadevan does the impossible in A Very Old Machine … He shows how various technologies that emerged in nineteenth-century India shaped its current cinema." — H-Net Reviews (Jhistory)"…methodologically and theoretically wide-ranging." — BioScope: South Asian Screen Studies"Sudhir Mahadevan's A Very Old Machine is a work of great theoretical sophistication and rigorous historical scholarship. A revisionist and definitive treatment of early Indian film, the book shows how prevailing attitudes toward technology, photography, empire, commodity, and mass culture made the cinema a socially and culturally distinct form in India. Drawing on a wealth of primary research, A Very Old Machine fills many gaps. Anyone who wants to know how Indian cinema became Indian will need to consult this book." — James Morrison, editor of Hollywood Reborn: Movie Stars of the 1970s

• List of IllustrationsAcknowledgmentsIntroductionPart I: Obsolescence 1. The Nineteenth-Century Indian Techno-Bazaar2. Traveling Showmen, Makeshift Cinemas: The Bioscopewallah and Early CinemaPart II: Mechanical Reproduction and Mass Culture 3. Copyright and Cultural Authenticity: The Politics of Mechanical Reproduction in South Asia4. The Cinema as Mass Culture: The Melodramas of Mechanical ReproductionPart III: Intermediality 5. The Emergence of Topicality: Snapshot Cultures and Newspaper Photojournalism6. Politics across Media: The Partition of Bengal (1905) and the Cinematic CityPart IV: Archives7. The Abundant Ephemeral: The Protocols of Popular Film Historiography in India8. PostscriptNotesWorks CitedFilmographyIndex