Classic Horror

[j d worthington]

Edgar Allen Poe is one of my favorite. The way he writes is unique and plus the life he led was scary itself...Plus what about Stephen King the Shining??? That is a classic...Maybe my taste is off who knows?!?

I don't know as I'd say that (albeit it's been a very long time since I read The Shining), but the thread was more intended to tackle the earlier classics of the field, rather than more contemporary work. (Though it does feel a little strange to realize we're coming up on 32 years since the publication of that particular book....)

 

[Lobolover]

Sheesh! Make that "Das Gespensterbuch".....

I say, you better polish your german, or I will have you read Werther in the original unreadabely decorative "gothic" font !

 

[j d worthington]

I say, you better polish your german, or I will have you read Werther in the original unreadabely decorative "gothic" font !

Tell you what, Lobo... if I can ever get my German to a respectable level, you send me a copy, and I'll gladly read it. (I assume you're talking about the old "black letter" gothic font, in which case, I happen to have about as much of a fondness for that as I do for the "long s"... which fondness is considerable....)

 

[Lobolover]

Oh, but you'll go blind and die of boredom before long !

 

[GOLLUM]

Tell you what, Lobo... if I can ever get my German to a respectable level, you send me a copy, and I'll gladly read it. (I assume you're talking about the old "black letter" gothic font, in which case, I happen to have about as much of a fondness for that as I do for the "long s"... which fondness is considerable....)

Give me 6 months and I'll get you up to a reasonable standard I'm sure ..... Ah yes the good old long S..what we now call the Sharfes S.

 

[j d worthington]

Oh, but you'll go blind and die of boredom before long !

I rather doubt it. For one thing, I enjoy reading Goethe (at least, what I have read, at any rate); for another, as I said, I have a strong fondness for both black-letter editions and such other typographical oddities....

Mr. G... I may just take you up on that....

And now, back to our ostensible topic....

 

[GOLLUM]

Mr. G... I may just take you up on that....

Well, some time ago I did translate something from an old German book riddled with Gothic typescript and the double s for Alia who from memory sent me the book from the US, which was very nice of her.

There's a couple of classic SFF books I'm getting in German because they're simply too expensive or hard to get in English translation. Part of the final list for published works for my library.

Speaking of Goethe I have some of his works e.g. Faustus and Young Werther and other stories, which are very good. Have several German authors actually but mainly translations into English including Mann Sr. and Jr., Hesse, Grass etc...

 

[j d worthington]

As mentioned in the recent reading threads, I've been going through several works by Théophile Gautier, and have been quite impressed with his work. However, only a handful of the tales I've read can be qualified as "horror" or "supernatural terror tales" or the like, and of these, few seem available on the 'net (save, perhaps, through Internet Archive, but I seem to be having trouble accessing those lately).

Among them one of, if not the, best, is "Le Morte Amoureuse", or "Clarimonde", which is available, in Lafcadio Hearn's translation (which, looking at it, answers my question: yes, the one included in my Gautier volume is indeed his work). I highly recommend it to all who love tales of revenants, vampires, lamiae, and the like:

Clarimonde by Théophile Gautier - Project Gutenberg


Another, though rather lighter in tone (without lacking a certain eeriness nonetheless) is "The Mummy's Foot", which is also available:

The Mummy's Foot, by Théophile Gautier

Does anyone else out there know of any of the following as etexts:

Avatar
The Fleece of Gold
The Evil Eye (Jettature)
Spirite

If so, please bring in links to them, so that others may enjoy this man's (really quite remarkable) work....

 

[Lobolover]

Works Referenced in Supernatural Horror In Literature by H. P. Lovecraft

I just wish to state that this link ,which I have used myself in the past, is no longer active and has transformed into a generic search engine site, which no one ever uses or willingly wishes to visit, just as all the others P)

 

[j d worthington]

So I see. Well, I'll edit with a note so that people avoid having that problem....

Then comes the joy of trying to track down all these things again....

 

[Lobolover]

I copied it before, so here it is :

• Unknown/Anonymous
  • Arabian Nights
  • Beowulf
  • Dr. Faustus
• Adam, Villiers de l'Isle
  • Torture by Hope
• Ansky
  • The Dyhbuk
• Balzac, Honoré de (1799-1850)
  • Louis Lambert
  • Melmoth Reconciled
  • Seraphita
  • The Wild Ass's Skin
• Barbauld
  • Sir Bertrand
• Barrett, Francis
  • The Magus
• Beckford, William
  • Episodes of Vathek
  • History of the Caliph Vathek
• Benson, E. F.
  • Visible and Invisible
    • Negotiam Perambulans
    • The Horror-Horn
    • The Man Who Went Too Far
  • The Face
• Bierce, Ambrose Gwinett (1842-1914)
  • Can Such Things Be?
    • The Death Of Halpin Frayser
    • The Secret Of Macarger's Gulch1
    • One Summer Night1
    • The Moonlit Road1
    • A Diagnosis Of Death1
    • Moxon's Master1
    • A Tough Tussle1
    • One Of Twins1
    • The Haunted Valley1
    • A Jug Of Syrup1
    • Staley Fleming's Hallucination1
    • A Resumed Identity1
    • A Baby Tramp1
    • The Night-Doings At 'Deadman's'1
    • Beyond The Wall1
    • A Psychological Shipwreck1
    • The Middle Toe Of The Right Foot
    • John Mortonson's Funeral1
    • The Realm Of The Unreal1
    • John Bartine's Watch1
    • The Damned Thing
    • Haita The Shepherd1
    • An Inhabitant Of Carcosa1
    • The Stranger1
  • In the Midst of Life
  • The Spook House
  • The Suitable Surroundings
• Blackwood, Algernon
  • An Episode in a Lodging House
  • Incredible Adventures
  • Jimbo
  • John Silence -- Physician Extraordinary
    • A Psychical Invasion
    • A Victim of Higher Space
    • Ancient Sorceries
    • Secret Worship
    • The Camp of the Dog
    • The Nemesis of Fire
  • The Centaur
  • The Listener
  • The Wendigo
  • The Willows
• Biss, Gerald
  • The Door of the Unreal
• Brontë, Emily
  • Wuthering Heights
• Brown, Charles Brockden
  • Arthur Mervyn
  • Edgar Hunily
  • Ormond
  • Wieland; or, the Transformation
• Browning
  • Childe Roland
  • Childe Roland to the Dark Tower Came
• Buchan, John
  • Skule Skerry
  • The Green Wildebeest
  • The Wind in the Portico
  • Witch Wood
• Bulwer-Lytton, Edward
  • A Strange Story
  • The House and the Brain
  • Zanoni
• Burger
  • Lenore
  • Wild Huntsman
• Burns
  • Tam O'Shanter
• Byron
  • Manfred
• Chambers, Robert W.
  • In Search of the Unknown
  • The Maker of Moons
  • The King in Yellow
    • The Repairer of Reputations1
    • The Mask1
    • In the Court of the Dragon1
    • The Yellow Sign
    • The Demoiselle D'Ys1
    • The Prophets' Paradise1
    • The Street of the Four Winds1
    • The Street of the First Shell1
    • The Street of Our Lady of the Fields1
    • Rue Barrée1
• Cline, Leonard
  • The Dark Chamber
• Coleridge, Samuel Taylor (1772-1834)
  • Rime of the Ancient Mariner
  • Christobel
• Cobb, Irvin S.
  • Fishhead
• Cram, Ralph Adams
  • The Dead Valley
• Crawford, F. Marion
  • Wandering Ghosts
    • The Blood Is the Life
    • The Dead Smile
    • The Upper Berth
• Dacre
  • Zofloya; or, the Moor
• Defoe, Daniel
  • Apparition of Mrs. Veal
• Dickens, Charles
  • The Signalman
• Doyle, A. Conan
  • Lot No. 249
  • The Captain of the Pole-Star
• Drake, H. B.
  • The Shadowy Thing
• Dunsany, Lord (Edward John Moreton Drax Plunkett) (1878-1957)
  • A Dreamer's Tales
  • A Night at an Inn
  • The Book of Wonder
  • The Gods of the Mountain
  • The Laughter of the Gods
  • The Queen's Enemies
• Erckmann-Chatrian
  • The Invisible Eye
  • The Man-Wolf
  • The Owl's Ear
  • The Waters of Death
• Everett, H. D.
  • The Death Mask
• Ewers, Hanns Heinz
  • Alrune
  • The Sorcerer's Apprentice
  • The Spider
• Flaubert
  • Temptation of St. Anthony
• Forster, E. M.
  • The Celestial Omnibus
• Gautier, Theophile
  • Avatar
  • Clarimonde
  • One of Cleopatra's Nights
  • The Foot of the Mummy
• Gilman, Charlotte Perkins
  • The Yellow Wall Paper
• Godwin, William
  • Caleb Williams (The Iron Chest)
  • St. Leon
• Goethe, Johann Wolfgang von
  • Bride of Corinth
  • Faust
• Gorman, Herbert S.
  • The Place Called Dagon
• Grosse, Marquis von
  • Horrid Mysteries
• Haggard, Sir H. Rider
  • She
• Hall, Leland
  • Sinister House
• Hartley, L. P.
  • A Visitor from Down Under
• Hawthorne, Nathaniel
  • A Wonder Book
  • Dolliver Romance
  • Dr. Grimshawe's Secret
  • Edward Randolph's Portrait
  • Ethan Grand
  • Legends of the Province House
  • Septimius Felton
  • Tanglewood Tales
  • The Ambitious Guest
  • The Ancestral Footstep
  • The House of the Seven Gables
  • The Marble Faun
  • The Minister's Black Veil
• Hearn, Lafcadio
  • Fantastics
  • Kwaidan
• Hodgson, William Hope
  • Carnacki, the Ghost-Finder
    • The Gateway of the Monster1
    • The House Among the Laurels1
    • The Whistling Room1
    • The Horse Of The Invisible1
    • The Searcher Of The End House1
    • The Thing Invisible1
    • The Hog1
  • The Boats of the Glen Carrig
  • The Ghost Pirates
  • The House on the Borderland
  • The Night Land
• Hogg, James
  • Kilmeny
• Holmes, Oliver Wendell
  • Elsie Venner
• Housman, Clemence
  • The Werewolf
• Hugo, Victor
  • Hans of Iceland
• Irving, Washington
  • Tales of a Traveler
    • The German Student
    • The Money Diggers
• Jacobs, W. W.
  • The Monkey's Paw
• James, Henry
  • The Turn of the Screw
• James, Montague Rhodes (1862-1936)
  • Ghost Stories of an Antiquary (1904)
    • Canon Alberic's Scrap-book (1895)1
    • Lost Hearts (1895)1
    • The Ash Tree (1904)1
    • Count Magnus (1904)
    • The Mezzotint (1904)1
    • Number 13 (1904)1
    • Oh, Whistle, and I'll Come to You, My Lad (1904)
    • The Treasure of Abbot Thomas (1904)
  • More Ghost Stories of an Antiquary (1911)
    • The Stalls of Barchester Cathedral (1910)
    • Casting the Runes (1911)1
    • Mr. Humphreys and His Inheritance (1911)1
    • Martin's Close (1911)1
    • The Rose Garden (1911)1
    • A School Story (1911)1
    • The Tractate Middoth (1911)1
  • A Thin Ghost and Others (1919)
    • The Story of a Disappearance and an Appearance (1913)1
    • An Episode of Cathedral History (1914)
    • The Diary of Mr Poynter (1919)
    • The Residence at Whitminster (1919)
    • Two Doctors (1919)
  • A Warning to the Curious (1925)
    • The Haunted Dolls' House (1923)1
    • A Neighbour's Landmark (1924)1
    • An Evening's Entertainment (1925)1
    • The Uncommon Prayer-Book (1925)1
    • A View from a Hill (1925)1
    • A Warning to the Curious (1925)
  • The Five Jars
    (M. R. James comments on Supernatural Horror in Literature here.)
• Karl, Friedrich Heinrich
  • Undine
• Keats, John (1795-1821)
  • Lamia
• Kipling, Joseph Rudyard (1865-1936)
  • The Finest Story in the World
  • The Mark of the Beast
  • The Phantom Rickshaw
  • The Recrudescence of Imray
• Lee, Sophia
  • The Recess
• Lewis, Matthew Gregory
  • Tales of Terror
  • The Castle Spectre
  • The Monk
  • The Tales of Wonder
• Long, Frank Belknap
  • On Reading Arthur Machen
• Macdonald, George
  • Lilith
• Machen, Arthur
  • Chronicles of Clemendy
  • The Three Impostors
    • The Novel of the White Powder
    • The Novel of The Black Seal
  • The Bowmen - Machen, Arthur
  • The Great God Pan
  • The Great Return
  • The Hill of Dreams
  • The Red Hand
  • The Shining Pyramid
  • The Terror
  • The White People
• Malory, Sir Thomas. (c. 1470)
  • Morte d'Arthur
• Mare, Walter de la
  • A Recluse
  • All-Hallows
  • Mr. Kempe
  • Out of the Deep
  • Seaton's Aunt
  • The Listeners
  • The Return
  • The Tree
• Marryat, Capt. Frederick (1792-1848)
  • The Phantom Ship
  • The Werewolf
• Marsh, Richard
  • The Beetle
• Maturin, Charles Robert
  • Melmoth, the Wanderer
  • The Fatal Revenge; or, the Family of Montorio
• Maupassant, Guy de
  • He
  • Horror
  • On the River
  • The Diary of a Madman
  • The Horla
  • The Spectre
  • The White Wolf
  • Who Knows?
• Maurier, Du
  • Trilby
• Meinhold, Wilhelm
  • The Amber Witch
• Melville, Lewis
  • Life and Letters of William Beckford
• Merimée, Prosper
  • Venus of Ille
• Metcalfe, John
  • The Bad Lands
  • The Smoking Leg
• Meyrink, Gustave
  • The Golem
• Moličre, Jean Baptiste Poquelin (1622-1673)
  • Don Juan
• Moore, Thomas
  • Alciphron
  • The Epicurean
  • The Ring
  • The Venus of Ille
• O'Brien, Fitz James
  • Diamond Lens
  • What Was It?
• Paracelsus, Philippus Aureolus (1493-1541)
  • Treatise on Elemental Sprites
• Phlegon
  • On Wonderful Events
  • Philinnion and Machates
• Poe, Edgar Allan. (1809-1849)
  • Ligeia
  • M. Valdemar
  • Metzengerstein
  • MS. Found in a Bottle
  • Narrative of A. Gordon Pym
  • Shadow, a Parable
  • Silence, a Fable
  • The Tell Tale Hart
  • The Fall of the House of Usher
  • The Man of the Crowd
  • The Masque of the Red Death
• Polidori
  • The Vampyre
• Radcliffe, Ann Ward (1764-1823)
  • A Sicilian Romance
  • Gaston de Blondeville
  • The Castles of Athlin and Dunbayne
  • The Italian
  • The Mysteries of Udolpho
  • The Romance of the Forest
• Ransome, Arthur
  • The Elixir of Life
• Reeve, Clara
  • The Old English Baron
• Reynold, George W. M.
  • Faust and the Demon
  • Wagner the Wehr-Wolf
• Roche
  • Children of the Abbey
• Scott, Sir Walter (1771-1832)
  • Letters on Demonology and Witchcraft
  • Redgauntlet
    • The Tapestried Chamber
    • Wandering Willie's Tale
• Shakespeare, William (1564-1616)
  • Hamlet
  • Macbeth
• Shelley, Mary Godwin Wollstonecraft (1797-1851)
  • Frankenstein; or, the Modern Prometheus
  • Last Man
  • St. Irvine
  • Zastro
• Shiel, Matthew Phipps
  • The House of Sounds
  • The Purple Cloud
  • Xelucha
• Sinclair, May
  • Uncanny Stories
    • The Token1
• Smith, Clark Ashton
  • The Double Shadow and Other Fantasies
  • The Hashish-Eater
• Smollett, Tobias George (1721-1771)
  • Adventures of Ferdinand, Count Fathom
• Stevenson, Robert Louis Balfour (1850-1894)
  • Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde
  • Markheim
  • The Body Snatcher
• Stoker, Abraham "Bram" (1847-1912)
  • Dracula
  • The Jewel of Seven Stars
  • The Lair of the White Worm
• Wakefield, H. R.
  • Blind Man's Buff
  • He Cometh and He Passeth By, And He Shall Sing
  • Look Up There
  • Others Who Return
  • The Cairn
  • The Red Lodge
  • The Seventeenth Hole at Duncaster
  • They Return at Evening
• Walpole, Horace or Horatio, Fourth Earl of Orford (1717-1797)
  • The Castle of Otranto
• Walpole, Hugh Seymour (1884-1941)
  • Mrs. Lunt
• Ward, Arthur Sarsfield
  • Brood of the Witch-Queen
• Wells, Herbert George (1866-1946)
  • The Ghost of Fear
  • Thirty Strange Stories
• White, Edward Lucas
  • Lukundoo
  • The Snout
  • The Song of The Siren
• Wilde, Oscar (Fingal O'Flahertie Wills) (1854-1900)
  • Picture of Dorian Gray
• Wilkins, Mary E.
  • The Wind in the Rosebush
    • The Shadows on the Wall
• Young, Francis Brett
  • Cold Harbour

 

[Lobolover]

And no, those links do not work .

 

[j d worthington]

That was rather the point, really -- to provide links to the works mentioned, as the titles and such can easily be found in Lovecraft's essay or otherwise.

At any rate, I'll be listing them in the order he has them in the essay, so it won't be alphabetical, but rather historical/thematic (the latter, for instance, involving the original -- an ancient Greek tale -- and its later adaptations, such as Goethe's "Bride of Corinth" and Irving's "Adventure of the German Student". I'll be skipping over those listed in the "Introduction" in the piece, as they will largely be mentioned later on, with very few exceptions....

And, rather than splitting them up into several threads, I'll start a companion thread to this, just for the listings and links....

 

[dask]

Hey j.d., here's something that might interest you if you haven't already heard of it (somehow I suspect you have). Read the first hundred pages or so about 30 years ago but gave up. Just didn't do anything for me. But I'm going to give it another try after I catch up on my comic reading which was put on hold for Halloween thrills.

 

[j d worthington]

Ah, yes... Poe Must Die. Hmmm... Well, I read a bit of it back when it was first published (in paperback, at least -- I don't know about hardback publication), and was less than impressed. My (now ex-)wife made it all the way through, and found it... meh. The man has been the focus of many a novel, play, and short story, but few of them have been all that worthwhile, I'm afraid.

By all means, if your experience with it this time around has you feeling it is better than that, please let me know. I never mind being pleasantly surprised... and at the very least, thanks for bringing it to the discussion.

 

[j d worthington]

In that email I got from Hippocampus today (see the Ligotti Conspiracy thread), it is mentioned that H. B. Drake's The Shadowy Thing will also be published soon (scheduled for this month, in fact) as a part of the "Lovecraft's Library" series. This was a novel which almost certainly influenced Lovecraft to some degree; he had good things to say about it in SHiL, and it has been long out of print. So for those interested in classic horror at a reasonable price....

Related items (not necessarily classic in the usual sense) are a collection of stories by Donald R. Burleson, Lovecraftian critic (who has a very different approach in both criticism and fiction): Wait for the Thunder: Tales for a Stormy Night; and the release of Dead Reckonings No. 6 (a review journal of the horror field), which would help those interested to track down what is and is not worth spending their money on:

Dead Reckonings No. 6 - Hippocampus Press

 

[GOLLUM]

I have no idea if the following stories in my recent Gautier collection from NYRB classics fits under the supernatural banner, although that seems to be what the back cover is possibly indicating. Can you briefly expand on these at all J.D., remembering I'm yet to read them and don't want to read the book's Intro as that can oft prove to be a genuine spoiler?

The Adolescent
The Priest
the Painter
The Opium Smoker
The Actor
The Tourist
The Poet

P.S. If they're not of this Genre I'm confident I'll still enjoy them as Gautier appears to be quite well regarded within the Canon of European Literature and this collection intended to span his entire working career.

 

[j d worthington]

Actually, these are not among those I have read at this point -- or at least, I haven't read any published under those titles (varying translations often used quite different titles). So I'm afraid I can't help there... but this also means I need to push this one up the priority list and get a copy soon.....

 

[GOLLUM]

Actually, these are not among those I have read at this point -- or at least, I haven't read any published under those titles (varying translations often used quite different titles). So I'm afraid I can't help there... but this also means I need to push this one up the priority list and get a copy soon.....

Thanks all the same.

If I get a chance to read it soon, I'll post a review here as well as the usual places....

 

[Connavar]

I just finished reading Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde novella and i wonder one thing. Is it written like a Gothic novel like the critics say ? Not read any of the famous Gothic stories so i woulndt know how a story like that is. Only a few EAP stories.

I liked how it started like a mystery and then went very weird,fantastical. More complex,disturbing than the story that is in the collective consciousness. All the movies,comics,tv shows are not fascinating as the story was.