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Post by jamesdoig on Jun 19, 2010 23:00:59 GMT
The contents of Tales and the Mysterious and Macabre and Tales of the Uncanny and Supernatural are more complete in the editions I've got: Contents The Doll Running Wolf The Little Begger The Occupant of the Room The Man Who the Tress Loved The Valley of the Beasts The South Wind The Man Who Was Milligan The Trod The Terror of the Twins The Deferred Appointment Accessory Before the Fact The Glamour of the Snow The House of the Past The Decoy The Tradition The Touch of pain Entrance and Exit The Pikestaff Case The Empty Sleeve Violence The Lost Valley Tales of the Mysterious and Macabre Chinese Magic First Hate The Olive The Sacrifice The Damned Wayfarers The Sea Fit The Attic The Heath Fire The Return The Transfer Clairvoyance The Golden Fly Special Delivery The Destruction of Smith The Tryst The Wings of Horus Initiation A Desert Episode Transition The Other Wing By Water A Victim of Higher Space
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Post by Craig Herbertson on Jun 19, 2010 23:50:08 GMT
It's funny. I've got this edition and I must have read it about five times and I can't remember a single story. Must dig it out again as I'm a big fan
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Post by jonathan122 on Jun 20, 2010 2:40:27 GMT
There's a Penguin paperback from a few years ago which is still around in bookshops...
Ancient Sorceries and Other Weird Tales - Algernon Blackwood, edited by S. T. Joshi (Penguin, 2002)
Smith: An Episode in a Lodging-House The Willows The Insanity of Jones Ancient Sorceries The Man Who Found Out The Wendigo The Glamour of the Snow The Man Whom the Trees Loved Sand
I couldn't finish "Sand", which, from what I've read, appears to be an 80 page long essay about, um, sand. Not particularly interesting sand either. Perhaps it picks up after the first 60 pages... The other choices are pretty much spot on - "The Insanity of Jones" is a great reincarnation tale, a lot nastier than Blackwood usually gets, with a surprising streak of black comedy.
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Post by dem bones on Jun 20, 2010 6:43:13 GMT
Algernon Blackwood - The Willows & Other Queer Tales (Collins, n.d. [1932?]) Illustration for The Willows by Sidney Stanley The Willows Ancient Sorceries The Return Running Wolf The Man Whom The Trees Loved The Man Who Played Upon The Leaf The Tryst By Water The Occupant Of The Room The Decoy Dream TrespassAn early attempt at a 'greatest hits', first published in 1932. i'm not sure if my undated copy is a first or otherwise, but it's a tiny thing, approx six inches tall, notable for some rather gorgeous paintings and line drawings by Sidney Stanley. Also dug up a 'popular edition' of John Silence: Physician Extraordinaire (originally Nash, 1908) published by T. Fisher Unwin in 1922. A Victim Of Higher Space is yet to join the party but with three pages of ads for Dr. J. Collis Brown's Chlorodyne ("There is no substitute") and the like by way of compensation so you can't really grumble. Another character who appeared in at least three Blackwood stories to my knowledge - A Case Of Eavesdropping, Strange Adventure Of A Private Secretary In New York and The Empty House - was Jim Shorthouse. Did Blackwood ever devote a collection to his exploits?
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Post by Johnlprobert on Jun 20, 2010 7:47:56 GMT
I couldn't finish "Sand", which, from what I've read, appears to be an 80 page long essay about, um, sand. Not particularly interesting sand either. Perhaps it picks up after the first 60 pages... Meanwhile at Probert Towers our 'adventures in Blackwood' have covered: Secret Worship - The ghosts of German monk schoolteachers are worshipping Asmodelius at the out of the way castle-like boarding school our narrator decides to pay a visit to out of nostagia for the...er..discipline (at least that's what it say here). He's welcomed as a guest but not allowed to leave as it gradually becomes apparent that he's the next sacrifice. I wondered if this might have influenced Aickman (by God he gets everywhere) and Ramsey Campbell, actually. While the plotline is strictly Weird Tales material the bit with him in the room with the Brothers, as they start to behave more and more sinisterly is masterful & I found myself quite unnerved. Then the hero shows up and ruins it all by doing something and with one rubbish and hugely disappointing bound they're free. If John Silence had stayed out of it this story it might well have been a classic as well. Ancient Lights - A surveyor is asked to look over the 'Fairy Wood' with the intention of it being cut down so a nearby resident can get a better view. Only every time he goes in he finds himself being thrown out again by the spirits that reside therein. Short and fun, the reading of this benefited immensely from having read 'Willows' and 'Wendigo' first.
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Post by jamesdoig on Jun 20, 2010 9:29:04 GMT
And this old thing from Penguin: Selected Tales of Algernon Blackwood, Penguin, 1943, rep. 1948 Contents The Empty House Strange Adventures of a Private Secretary Keeping his promise The Woman's Ghost Story Ancient Sorceries The Camp of the Dog Also worth mentioning this fine biography by the excellent Mike Ashley. I got this copy at a remainder bookshop for $10.
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Post by Dr Strange on Jun 20, 2010 9:43:33 GMT
And this old thing from Penguin: Selected Tales of Algernon Blackwood, Penguin, 1943, rep. 1948 Contents The Empty House Strange Adventures of a Private Secretary Keeping his promise The Woman's Ghost Story Ancient Sorceries The Camp of the Dog That's the one I've got - the 1943 edition, complete with stirring patriotic ads.
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Post by cw67q on Jun 20, 2010 9:44:44 GMT
John, spot on with Secret Worship. The better John Silence tales tend to be those where he stays out of the story. The only one I really don't care for though is A Psychic Invasion. Secret Worship could have been a great story, but then the cavalry turn up to save the day and spoil the tale From James' expanded contents of Tof the M&Ms I'd add the following smarties (sorry) to my earlier list: Tales of the Mysterious and Macabre First Hate The Sea Fit The Transfer The Destruction of Smith The Wings of Horus The Other Wing And I'll single out A Sea Fit and the other Wing for special mention. Stay clear of "the Damned" though it is a nice idea but torturously slow and as is repeatedly ststed in the text : nothing happened. I confess that from both of these monster collections though (ToM&M and ToU&S) these are some titles that I can't recall. Jonathan, I belong to a small minority of readers who actually likes Sand. Yes it is drawn out and repetitive in a similar manner to The Damned which I disparage above. But I find both Sand and A Descent into Egypt hypnotic. Reading these two long Egyptian tales almost feels like participating in a rite of cermonial magic. I can sypathise with those who find them prolix and static though. - Chris
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Post by cw67q on Jun 20, 2010 9:49:32 GMT
Since we're on Blackwood, here's a little teaser question: the following quote is from Blackwood's mystical novel The Centaur...
""Of such great powers or beings there may be conceivably a survival… a survival of a hugely remote period when… consciousness was manifested, perhaps, in shapes and forms long since withdrawn before the tide of advancing humanity… forms of which poetry and legend alone have caught a flying memory and called them gods, monsters, mythical beings of all sorts and kinds…"
...but if you haven't read Blackwwod's novel, why does the above seem so familiar?
I have The Centaur as an old orange covered Peguin pb. The back has an advert for underwear for real men, complete with line drawing of rugged outdoor-type modeling the clothing in question.
- chris
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Post by Dr Strange on Jun 20, 2010 10:19:27 GMT
Since we're on Blackwood, here's a little teaser question: the following quote is from Blackwood's mystical novel The Centaur... ""Of such great powers or beings there may be conceivably a survival… a survival of a hugely remote period when… consciousness was manifested, perhaps, in shapes and forms long since withdrawn before the tide of advancing humanity… forms of which poetry and legend alone have caught a flying memory and called them gods, monsters, mythical beings of all sorts and kinds…" ...but if you haven't read Blackwwod's novel, why does the above seem so familiar? - chris It is vaguely familiar, and I haven't read "The Centaur". There is a suggestion of something Lovecraftian about it?
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Post by Jojo Lapin X on Jun 20, 2010 10:21:08 GMT
It is the epigraph that opens "The Call of Cthulhu."
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Post by jonathan122 on Jun 20, 2010 22:29:51 GMT
Jonathan, I belong to a small minority of readers who actually likes Sand. Yes it is drawn out and repetitive in a similar manner to The Damned which I disparage above. But I find both Sand and A Descent into Egypt hypnotic. Reading these two long Egyptian tales almost feels like participating in a rite of cermonial magic. I can sypathise with those who find them prolix and static though. - Chris I should probably give it another go... If nothing else, it seems bad form to disparage a story that I didn't even finish. Do you have any views on "The Regeneration of Lord Ernie", from Incredible Adventures? That was the other well-regarded Blackwood tale that I just couldn't finish. I take your point about the hypnotic effect of much of Blackwood's work - I must confess, I very rarely find his stories dull whilst I'm actually reading them, but if I get to a point where I set them to one side, I find it very hard to come back. That's probably why I tend to prefer the stories which can be finished in one sitting.
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Post by Johnlprobert on Jun 24, 2010 20:10:47 GMT
The Glamour of the Snow - Hibbert stays in a tiny village in the Alps & finds himself seduced by the night, the quiet moments when he can get away from the others tourists, and most of all by the bewitching spirit of the snow itself - a gorgeous girl who tries to drag him off to his death. Another of Blackwood's 'Nature - Beautiful But Deadly' tales has some incredibly beautiful and at the same time alluringly sinister descriptions of the snow-covered mountains that Hibbert finds so enticing and which nearly cause his death. Good stuff
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Post by monker on Jun 25, 2010 2:47:21 GMT
Yep, that one was good stuff but there was something that prevented it from pushing into greatness, kind of a slightly didactic passivity.
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Post by Johnlprobert on Jun 25, 2010 7:12:35 GMT
Yep, that one was good stuff but there was something that prevented it from pushing into greatness, kind of a slightly didactic passivity. Yes I'd agree with that. I'm presuming I've read the two 'greats' now so my expectations are lowered for anything else of his & you're right - this was very good, but not a classic.
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