Dark Carnival, Ray Bradbury

   I can't recall where I picked up a copy of Ray Bradbury's collection of short weird fiction, Dark Carnival. In any case, I must say that I don't recall ever having read any of his fiction. This, despite his name being legendary in the golden age of science fiction. Despite my associating him with science fiction, here are a few lines from Wikipedia that describe his fiction:

Bradbury was once described as a "Midwest surrealist" and is often labeled a science-fiction writer, which he described as "the art of the possible." Bradbury resisted that categorization, however:

First of all, I don't write science fiction. I've only done one science fiction book and that's Fahrenheit 451, based on reality. Science fiction is a depiction of the real. Fantasy is a depiction of the unreal. So Martian Chronicles is not science fiction, it's fantasy. It couldn't happen, you see? That's the reason it's going to be around a long time -- because it's a Greek myth, and myths have staying power.^[35]

Certainly, there is nothing of science fiction in this collection of short stories. I would classify it as weird fiction. I am not an authority on anything except my opinion, of course.

   I'm not going to go over each of the short stories. I'm only going to mention the few that stood out for me.
   Death and the undead often come up as subjects or characters throughout many of the stories. There is a vampire who doesn't like to be a monster like the rest of his relatives. There is a story, "Uncle Einar", about psychic possession where a girl, to prove how awful she is, possesses a relative hated by the family until he kills himself. All the time he is looking for her to help him, completely unaware that it is she who has haunted him, leading him to his own extinction. There's another story, "There Was an Old Woman", of a woman who refuses to die. When death comes to her and separates her from her body, she manages to retake it from the funeral home which has already gutted and embalmed her. She has her blood replaced in her veins. She then goes home and from then on refuses to answer the door (perhaps to make sure that Death does not trick her again).
   The final story which stood out for me is "The Next in Line", which is about a couple who go to Mexico for a holiday. The woman is haunted by the tour of the unburied: the poor rent plots for a year but cannot afford a second year. So, the bodies are exhumed and left in a kind of cavern, standing. There is a series of macabre descriptions of the dead: one woman who is buried alive. Another who dies giving birth along with the baby. All of them held together and stiff with wire. She begs her husband to not leave her there. But, he refuses. On his way back to Texas, he seems quite happy that she is no longer beside her.
   If you're looking for a series of good horror tales, this is not a bad choice at all.

The Slayer of Souls, Robert W. Chambers

The Slayer of Souls(1920) is the second book of Robert W. Chambers' that I have read. It is available for free at Gutenberg.org and Feedbooks.com. The edition I am reading is from Feedbooks. The difference between the two is generally that the transcriptions on Gutenberg.org are better than that of Feedbooks.com. On the other hand, the Feedbooks edition has a preface. After having read it all, I highly recommend reading the Gutenberg edition, as the Feedbooks edition has so many errors in it. They don't often obscure much, but it's like listening to a great album with a lot of scratches on it. Sometimes I had to stop and look around to figure out what should have been written in Feedbooks' edition.

First, the preface: Included is a criticism of legendary writer H. P. Lovecraft's, in which is excerpted, "Chambers is like Rupert Hughes and a few other fallen Titans - equipped with the right brains and education but wholly out of the habit of using them." The preface also includes a criticism from Frederic Taber Cooper, which reads, "So much of Chambers's work exasperates, because we feel that he might so easily have made it better." Regarding Lovecraft: I have only read a few things of Lovecraft's stories, "At the Mountain of Madness" and "The Alchemist". So, perhaps I'm missing something. However, I see his work as significantly inferior to that of Chambers'.

Take The Slayer of Souls which I am reading as an example: the descriptions are vivid. There is good dialogue, which is something which feels so lacking in Lovecraft's writing. Further, in the types of literary exposition, there is what is called 'show' and 'tell.' Lovecraft's two stories I have to go by is mostly 'tell' with some 'show,' whereas Chambers' is skillfully described.

The story could occupy several genres: fantasy, speculative fiction (according to Wikipedia), weird fiction, and horror. In this world which is set in the real world is an older one with magic set in the period just after world war one.

The main character, Nan-Yang Maru, aka Tressa Norne, has a great deal of this magical power. She was forged in magical China where demons are worshiped. She is a very powerful female hero, which is considerably rare. In fact, I cannot recollect any books that I have read prior to 1920 or even around that period where women are the heroes and main characters in this kind of fiction. For this reason alone Chambers has invoked a great deal of respect from me.

From the beginning, Chambers gives a taste of her power as she faces her most powerful nemesis: Sanang. Sanang breaks into her room on a boat headed to San Francisco from China, using psychokinetic powers, "(She) saw the double locked door opposite the foot of her bed slowly opening of its own accord." She holds a pistol at him. She uses some of her magical power and throws at him a yellow snake which terrifies him.

The first attempt at her assassination comes from a tough character, Gutchly Kan. He plots her dath, deriding Sanag's love for her and his fear. But Gutchlug instead is killed by one of her snakes, sent psychically from below his own room.

Senang and his surviving assassins are refereed to as Yezidees, and the demon they worship is Erlik.

When Tressa Norne finds herself in the US, she is unable to provide for herself. She tries to become a magician to entertain. But rather than using the typical setups of a magical show, she uses real magic instead. However, this does not amuse the audience, and she cannot make a living. There is no family for her, and she is extremely vulnerable.

Physically, she is described as boyish, her breasts being 'undecided.'

To survive, she is prepared to sell herself as a prostitute. But this is implied and never explicitly said. She is given an alternative: work for the US government for 3x what she was receiving before as a magician. Of course she agrees, despite knowing that by doing so she violates her promise to never reveal the inner workings of the Chinese assassins' guild, the Yezidees.

She was brought to China by her father. But, it would prove fatal to her father when the Yazidees "took Yian in 1910, threw him into a well in his own compound and filled it up with imperial troops" when she was 13. Some years later, her mother is killed, and she is forced to become a temple sorceress.

Her biggest problem is that she believes her soul is already dead. As soon as her body dies, she dies with it. For this reason, she will do anything to survive, as long as she can. The man she meets that recruits her is Victor Cleves, who ends up marrying her to save her reputation. A couple living together unmarried, apparently, would harm her reputation. She consents. As time goes on, however, it becomes clear that they are quickly falling in love with one another. Perhaps it is this love which helps her overcome the sorcerer-assassins.

Tressa is a remarkable character: horribly weak in some ways, and in others, perhaps, the most powerful person in the world. She defeats one after another of those who would kill her and subvert America into communism, but sees herself as completely unworthy of Cleves.

The prose is often poetic. It is well written, even romantic at times. I am very impressed with this novel and highly recommend it. I can't help but wonder if Chambers' harsh critics were jealous of his obvious talent.

The Great God Pan, Arthur Machen

The Great God Pan (1894) is a novella by Arthur Machen (1863-1947). There are several sources for the text: Gutenberg.org and Manybooks.com, to name but two. There is also a Youtube.com movie available, presumably because the movie is in the public domain.

I think I found this novella when searching for famous older horror stories or weird fiction a few months back. This was one of the novellas mentioned. The reception for this novella is a bit inexplicable for me. I found the text to be dull. Yet, Stephen King is on record for saying, "Maybe the best [horror story] in the English language." I would love to inquire from him why he thinks so. What have I missed?

The article on Wikipedia.org states, "On publication it was widely denounced by the press as degenerate and horrific because of its decadent style and sexual content, although it has since garnered a reputation as a classic of horror." I didn't find it degenerate, but nor did I find it particularly decadent in style or particularly sexual. I feel like everyone has read a different story than I have. John Lane wrote, "Why should he be allowed, for the sake of a few miserable pounds, to cast into our midst these monstrous creations of his diseased brain?" Yet, how monstrous can these evil characters be? H. P. Lovecraft writes, "No one could begin to describe the cumulative suspense and ultimate horror with which every paragraph abounds." Perhaps I'm not sensitive?

It all begins with a ruthless scientist who cuts a portion of the brain that blinds people to the horrors of some underworld, so that they might see Pan. The girl upon whom this surgery is conducted becomes essentially brain dead. To take care of her, she's sent to a farmer. Though it isn't explicitly pointed out that the farmer raped her, at the end of the story it becomes evident that the accused for instigating suicides is her daughter, and there was no one else to have gotten her pregnant I imagine. Pan himself is hinted to be the impregnator, however. Both Pan and the farmer were in her life at roughly a close enough interval that either could have been the father. Further, if she had been pregnant, why was this not discovered at an earlier point? Surely it must have been intentionally hidden.

The style is clumsy, as is noted by Stephen King who wrote, "surmounts its rather clumsy prose and works its way relentlessly into the reader's terror-zone. How many sleepless nights has it caused? God knows, but a few of them were mine. I think 'Pan' is as close as the horror genre comes to a great white whale." I promise I shall not lose a night's sleep over it. I will just shake my head in wonderment over the sensation that it caused in its day and the reception it continues to receive from a writer of King's caliber.

The Wizard's Son (Volume 3), Margaret Oliphant

This is the third volume of Margaret Oliphant's trilogy, The Wizard's Son. It is available freely on Gutenberg.org.

While the books are not bad, this will be the last book of Oliphant's that I read. It was closer to a romance than it was much of a fiction about the occult.

The Warlock himself never seems so terrible. He has certain powers of being able to appear and disappear within a certain distance of the ruined castle. He does push Walter to marry for money. However, none of this is worse than a father doing the same for his son. He seems to hold no malice. An accident years before befell the previous lord and his love interest, however it would appear that it was an accident and that the warlock had not really meant for that to happen.

The scene during the climax of the story takes place in the tower. The setting itself has a vestige of interest to me:

A great telescope occupied a place in the centre of the room, and various fine instruments, some looking like astronomical models, stood on tables about. The curtained walls were hung with portraits, one of which she recognised as that of the last Lord Erradeen. And in the centre of all supported on a table with a lamp burning in front of it, the light of which (she supposed), blown about by the sudden entrance of the air, so flickered upon the face that the features seemed to change and move, was the portrait of Walter.

 These instruments seem to be that of science. Like how the Catholics of Galileo's day shut him up in a tower to gaze at the stars. This is contrasted with religion later on about how God basically saves them and they live happily ever after with generous hearts to serve the poor and needy.

The warlock himself disappears from the area at the end, and really does very little to fight against the couple. He does resist, but no more so than any other parent might want to when a couple wants to get married that is not of their choosing. What's more, considering that he has a portrait of Walter on the wall, it would seem that he had some care for him and that he never intended him any harm. Indeed, throughout the three books, there was never a sense that the warlock wanted evil for him or wished any harm to him. In volume two, he even said that he appreciated the good that Walter had done for the poor on his estate, and that he wanted Walter to be the face of good for him.

I think if I had been in Walter's shoes, I would have been fascinated with such a warlock. I would have loved to discuss his philosophies, learned his interests, competed (perhaps poorly) in a good game of chess. In any case, the end is that Oona sets fire to the castle tower, and there must have been some kind of explosives to cause such a big explosion. By pure 'luck' or 'grace of God' they both manage to survive the blast.

I am disappointed with this story, even if it was fairly well written. It would be like ordering a spicy meal only to discover that a mere sprinkle of spice was added. It just didn't meet my expectation. I do not recommend it. I say that despite the fact that Oliphant was a skilled narrator.

The Metamorphosis, Franz Kafka

image from metamorphosisonfilm.com

I haven't read a lot of Kafka's work. But what I have read has been quite impressive. I am rereading "The Metamorphosis." I think this is my third or fourth reading of it. It is my first reading of it on my Kindle. It can be found freely at Gutenberg.

If Kafka had written "The Metamorphosis" and published a decade later, and perhaps better in English than in German (due to his Jewishness in an antisemitic country), he would have developed a following and been better encouraged in his art. But, perhaps it might be said that it is because of stories such as "The Metamorphosis" that there came Weird Tales magazine. It is a shame that his works should have remained in Germany, considering how much was lost, courtesy of the Gestapo, the 20th century's most famous and vicious intolerance.

"The Metamorphosis" is a masterpiece. It's true that I have an English literature background, and many of us are like stinky cheese eaters: we only make sense to one another. However, I detest James Joyce as a drunken buffoon who would have saved students countless wasted hours trying to comprehend that monstrous pile of steaming kak, Shakespeare was a cheating hack (though, such plagiarism was no crime in his day), and Hemingway brought about the death of good journalism. So, I do not subscribe to the general consensus of belongs on the list of greats and what does not. I suppose this should already be clear considering that most of what I read is not academic literature.

So the basic story is that one day, this salesman who has an otherwise very uninteresting life, wakes up and discovers he's at the end stage of being transformed, or metamorphosed into a caterpillar or other many legged creature.

There is some debate I ran into about whether or not Kafka was gay. If he was, then I can see the parallel here. In those days, gays were the scourge of the world. Germany in particular was intolerant towards those it saw as inferior or degenerate. Gays were definitely on their list of degenerates.As such, if the case can be made that Kafka was gay, I can see how this story is really about waking up and realizing that you're gay.

Both the character of Gregor Samsa and Kafka are of the same age. Samsa was 31 in the story, which was published when Kafka was 32 (so let's assume it was written the year earlier.) Samsa also sounds very similar to the name Kafka with obvious rhymes between the two names. Kafka also had a stint as a salesman which he quit out of hate for the work. Finally, while Samsa dies at 31, Kafka moves out of his family's home to live on his own at 31 (see Wikipedia's article). The story on where his family lived after he left the apartment, however, is not in the article and I doubt if I can find any information to answer that question. Suffice it to say that there are too many parallels between the story of Samsa and the story of Kafka to walk away from the assertion that Samsa is in fact Kafka, and that it is a kind of Twilight-Zonesque cross between a parable and a fable. Whether or not the physical change of being turned into a many legged monster is a result of his sexuality is a guess. The following will be my interpretation of how turning into a bug was actually a metaphor into his becoming a homosexual. Yes, I am aware of the theory that homosexuality is something people are born into, not constructed (there are good arguments for both theories). However, this could very well be the defining moment, these months of transfiguration in his room, between when he realizes he is homosexual and when he accepts that he is homosexual. The death of the bug itself might in fact be when he himself has accepted it and has moved on.

Gregor Samsa must have felt great pressure to provide for his family despite the fact that he detested his work.

Image from greatbookstudy.blogspot.com.

...he felt a great pride that he was able to provide a (quiet) life... But what now, if all this peace and wealth and comfort should come to a horrible and frightening end?

A metaphor for his increasing alienation from the family and his anxiety about the change:

He spent the whole night (under the couch). Some of the time he passed in a light sleep, although he frequently woke from it in alarm because of his hunger.

Optimism, or a positive way to interpret his sister's fear of him,

Then, out of consideration for Gregor's feelings, as she knew that he would not eat in front of her, she hurried out again and even turned the key in the lock so that Gregor would know he could make things as comfortable for himself as he liked.

Obviously, she locked the door so that he could not get out of the room and terrorize the family, not out of consideration for himself. For, she is free to lock or unlock it, as is anyone else who chooses to enter. But he cannot.

The only family who cares enough about him to feed or otherwise take care of him, is disgusted enough that she cannot touch any of the food that he could not eat. She sweeps it all into the trash.

Nobody wanted to be left home by themselves and it was out of the question to leave the flat entirely empty.

They hold onto the hope that one day Gregor will return to them the way he was before. He rarely mentions, however, wishing that he could return back to his 'human' form. Is this because he knows he cannot? His family wants him to change back.

Towards the end, the sister has reached the limit of her tolerance for her brother's change. She seems either ready to turn him out or kill him.

I don't want to call this monster my brother, all I can say is: we have to try and get rid of it.

As Samsa is dead, and we never do discover what is done with the body: perhaps the maid has something important to say, but she is cut off and we never learn what she had done with it. She is furthermore fired as well as everyone else that knew of their relation to the bug.

The way the family treats Samsa is in fact a big clue as to how Samsa is in fact still a human being. That is to say, they know it's their son/brother even though there was never a reason to see the similarity between the bug and Samsa. What it is in fact, I suspect, is that they know about Samsa/Kafka's homosexuality, and are no longer treating him like a human being. He doesn't feel like a human being. As such, he wastes away and they all try to avoid him as best as they can. When the father throws the apple at him and hits him, the injury never heals and in fact the apple is stuck on him until Samsa's death. In fact, this is not a physical thing so much as it is an emotional thing. The fact that things are thrown at him, at Kafka, even long after the apple is thrown away or eaten, the emotional injury never leaves.

This book is excellent and really addresses the feelings of anxiety associated with being different. It's not just homosexuals who are different. However, they of course have had some very rough treatment at the hands of the intolerant as a result. What I mean is that being a homosexual, especially in Kafka's when and where, would have been a mountain, whereas most of us have to deal in hills.

I wish more of Kafka's work was available freely online. However, since they are translations, one must exercise patience. Kafka's short stories are among my favorite and he is among my most admired writers.