ABSTRACT
Fu-Manchu, the Chinese master criminal invented by Sax Rohmer in 1912, is an elusive and untraceable figure; he is everywhere at once and at the same time impossible to locate. This intangibility extends well beyond the plotlines of the Fu-Manchu narratives; it seems to be intricately interlinked with the character’s very mode of production: the serial form of appearance in which short stories evolved into novels and novels into sequels which quickly were taken up in other media—film, comics, television. In addition, the fact that Rohmer’s novels appeared simultaneously in British and American print editions with different titles marks the transatlantic character of Fu-Manchu’s career. The figure’s almost instantaneous international popularity augmented the effects of omnipresence and evanescence, suggesting a phenomenon in constant flux and yet unchanging. In many instances, a Chinese malefactor of a particular type did not even need to be named Fu-Manchu in order to invoke his blueprint: “Fu Manchu,” writes Robert G. Lee, “was the first universally recognized Oriental and became the archetype of villainy” (1999: 114).
