Basil Copper - Not After Nightfall

[dem bones]

Basil Copper - Not After Nightfall (Four Square Horror, 1967)

Photo: Michael Busselle

Foreword

The Spider
Camera Obscura
The Cave
The Grey House
Old Mrs Cartwright
Charon
The Great Vore
The Janissarries of Emilion

In the wake of Poe, Lovecraft and M. R. James comes a brilliant new talent - Basil Copper.

Here are stories gruesome, macabre, horrifying. You'll never go near another cobweb after reading The Spider. You'll feel the icy grip of fear as you meet the unknown horror in The Cave.

And you'll realise the frightening power of Black Magic in The Great Vore.

Still not easily frightened?

A word of warning. These stories should be read during the hours of daylight - NOT AFTER NIGHTFALL. You may regret it.

Photo: Mike Champion

The Big Baz Booklaunch (Fleet Street, London, Feb 23rd) is nearly upon us hence this cursory dip into his back catalogue. Not After Nightfall was his very first collection, published 41 years ago (that A Life In Books title isn't overstating the matter) by Peter Haining at FourSquare, and contains some of his finest shorts.
Many of the stories were revived for the When Footsteps Echo and Here Be Daemons collections.

The Grey House: Phillip, like Copper a successful author of crime and horror fiction, and wife Angela renovate a Burgundy mansion, former residence of the unspeakably sadistic de Menevals. As the extensive repairs to the Grey House near completion, the vampire de Menevals begin to make their presence felt.

[David A. Riley]

I remember buying this from a stall on Accrington market (which always stocked the latest paperbacks and I spent a small fortune with the guy who ran it in those days). This book made a big impression on me at the time, especially Camera Obscura, which is still one of my favourite horror stories, which I reread only a few weeks ago. The lovingly described walk up the hill through the decaying town, with its strange, down-at-heel inhabitants, is more Lovecraftian than Lovecraft. It's doom-laden ending still leaves me with a chill to this day.

I don't think any of Copper's later books made anything like the same impression on me, though.

David

[weirdmonger]

That version of 'Night After Nighfall' had a similar effect on me as it did on David.
Think it took a part in my readings aloud of Horror Stories to PFJ at University in 1967?

[dem bones]

My copy is signed, rather poignantly:

Clarence Paget - all best wishes - Basil Copper October 6-1967


I was thinking that, if I make it to the A Life In Books launch, I might ask Baz to add a second dated dedication underneath to Vault of Evil.

[David A. Riley]

I wonder if that led to The Janissaries of Emilion being published in the 8th Pan Book of Horror Stories?

The publication dates are very close, so I'm not sure which appeared first.

There could be an interesting story attached to it, since Paget probably had a bigger hand in selecting the stories to go into the Pan series by that stage than Van Thal.

By the way, that photo of Basil Copper from the back cover certainly dates it with the old typewriter. Few writers will have used one of those for quite a few years now, I would think.

David

[dem bones]

Well, The Spider was used way back in Pan Horror #5 (1964), and was his first published story so either Van Thal or Paget could claim to having 'discovered' him. With Clarence Paget, I know absolutely nothing about him beyond the fact that he edited the Pan Horrors after Van Thal's death, but he must have landed the job for some reason? Was he Herb's uncredited assistant editor or talent-spotter or similar?

[David A. Riley]

I had a story in the 11th Pan Book and all the correspondence I had from Pan was from Clarence Paget. Disappointingly I never received even one letter from Van Thal. So I think in reality Paget was the true editor of the series for quite some time before Van Thal's death. Van Thal was probably little more than a figurehead

David

[dem bones]

I think you're probably onto something there, David. When Van Thal died, the Pan Horrors were still selling phenomenally well and it's hard to see Pan handing over editorship of such a prestige series to an untried novice. By the mid-seventies, HVT was also editing strange story collections for his Arthur Baker imprint, so that would have been another drain on his time, along with his work as a literary agent for Chetwynd-Hayes and his notorious London Management stable.

[David A. Riley]

his notorious London Management stable.

By that stage, when virtually every story came from London Management, I had stopped firing stories off to Pan. I didn't write the kind of stuff that seemed favoured by the series then. And I'd found more discerning editors like Dave Sutton.

David

[dem bones]

I always blamed the London Management crew for the steep decline in quality, and they're the main reason why I passed on picking up the later volumes when they were relatively easy to find. Now, of course, I'm fond of several of the LM authors (not all of them, you understand. Even I'm slightly more discerning than a vacuum cleaner) and regret being so bloody fussy. Funny how the volumes I really didn't care for never seen anything like as bad when I read them now.

I think your work was always better suited to a Dave Sutton collection over a Van Thal or Paget. Similarly, Lock-In is right at home in The Black Book Of Horror but it's simply too good for the Paget Pans (or so it seems to me)!

[hugegadjit]

Oh yeah, always loved this book - picked it up first in the early 80s at mum's village fete book stall, that one fell apart and took me 10 years to find another copy. But then thru a work colleague, I was introduced to Basil, who was very nice and signed that and my copy of 'new tales of the c. mythos' (oh, is there a thread on THAT too?). I think he told me Janissaries arose from being on some beach with his wife, looking across the sands, and the whole thing just came to him. He, er, seemed to enjoy a drink!

[allthingshorror]

Doing a few enquiries into the photographers who worked at NEL for Justin at the moment, and came across this obituary for Busselle who did the front cover for Not After Nightfall.

www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/1524890/Michael-Busselle.html

[David A. Riley]

Just got a DVD boxed set of the entire second series of the American TV show from the early seventies, Rod Serling's Night Gallery, which featured a dramatisation of Basil Copper's Camera Obscura - and a good dramatisation it is too!

The boxed set, by the way, is pretty good value, with over 18 hours of viewing. Spent all last night watching just one disc - the one with Camera Obscura on it, of course. There were also dramatisations of HP Lovecraft's Cool Air and Pickman's Model, though these were not as successful, unfortunately. Pickman's Model, in particular, took quite a few liberties with the original. They were both well worth watching, though, with Brad Dillman as Pickman, would you believe.

[Johnlprobert]

That IS a good box set, although beware some of the episodes that are frighteningly like Little House on the Prairie with a ghost.

The Camera Obscura episode is one of the highlights. A shame they didn't do a better job of Harry E Turner's Hells Bells

[David A. Riley]

Alas I have already watched that Little House on the Prairie with a ghost episode.

Not seen Hell's Bells yet.

Yes, some of the episodes are a little weak. But, while not Hammer House of Horror, they were certainly better than the alternative on live TV last night.

And worth it if only for Camera Obscura alone.