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Post by dem on Jul 2, 2011 21:33:47 GMT
J. J. Strating (ed.) – Oriental Tales Of Terror (Fontana, 1971) Introduction – J. J. Strating
W. Somerset Maugham – The Taipan
Rudyard Kipling – The Mark Of The Beast
A. B. Mitford – The Forty-Seven Ronins
Psu Sung-Ling – The Magistrate Of Hu-Nan
Psu Sung-Ling – The Inn At Ts’ia-Tien
Akutagawa Ryunosuke – Hell Screen
Feng Meng-Lung – The Canary Murderers
Tom Kristensen – The Vanished Faces
August Derleth – The Adventure Of The Intarsia Box
John D. Keefauver – Kali
Manuel Komroff – Siamese Hands
Francis King – The Puppets
Lafcadio Hearn – The Story Of Ming-y
Kushwant Singh – Death Comes To Daulat Ram
Kathleen Wallace – The Head
Edogawa Rampa – The Hell Of Mirrors
Algernon Blackwood – The Man Who Was Milligan
About The Authors.Blurb The Orient: land of mystery and mystics, demons and devil-dancers, hara-kiri and thuggee, Mandarins and Samurai.
CHINA: The headless corpse of Hangchow.
INDIA: The blood-crazed goddess of Calcutta.
JAPAN: The hell-ridden painter of Horikawa.
MALAYA: Vengeance from Malacca – by ritual murder.
THAILAND: The gruesome tale of the severed hands
And many more tales of the Mysterious East by such experts in terror as Somerset Maugham, Kushwant Singh, Rudyard Kipling, Edogawa,Rampo and Lafcadio Hearn.includes W. Somerset Maugham – The Taipan: He’s the head man in a major China-based company. Today he walks past the cemetery congratulating himself that he has not gone the way of his fellows who made a fortune and drank themselves to death before they reached thirty. Presently he encounters three Chinese digging a fresh grave. But surely, nobody has died recently or he’d have been informed …? Pu Sung Ling - The Inn At Ts’ia-Tien: China. Four weary travellers arrive at the village of Yang Shin seeking shelter for the night. The landlord is only able to offer a room wherein lies the corpse of his daughter who died earlier that day. The boarders are so exhausted they fall asleep without even noticing the dead girl, all but one who, hearing a rustling and creaking coming from across the room, looks up to see the body "rising stiffly from the bier, dim light revealing the ghastly pallor of her lifeless face." Horrified, he can only watch as the girl leans over the beds of each of his sleeping friends in turn and exhales on them with her foul breath before approaching his bed and doing the same to him. When this is repeated he makes a run for it into the night, pursued by the vampire girl. He arrives at the monastery, shrieking for admittance but "the priests knew not what to make of the unexpected tumult and would not open the door. By now the corpse was only yards away ..." Rudyard Kipling – The Mark Of The Beast: Fleete, new to India, gets drunk with the Brit ex-pats on New Years Eve and, staggering home past the Temple of Hanuman defaces the image of the monkey god by stubbing his cigar out on its forehead. As his friends Strickland and the narrator try to placate the worshippers, a leper slips from a recess and lays his hand on Fleete’s chest. He rapidly degenerates into a were-leopard …. until his mates torture the leper until he lifts the spell. The narrator at least has the grace to admit “we have disgraced ourselves as Englishmen for ever.” John D. Keefauver – Kali: “Terrible things give me happiness ..”: Calcutta. An American tourist falls for a beautiful tour guide who lures him to the temple of her namesake. He finds himself possessed of an insatiable appetite for sacrificing goats to the Goddess, one a night for the rest of his life. see also: Edogawa Rampa
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Post by franklinmarsh on Feb 2, 2017 21:28:25 GMT
Heh! This one's bound to be a bit dodgy in our PC times, but it's not the Black & White Minstrels or Love Thy Neighbour, and the estimable J J Strating has the good grace to include some of yer actual Oriental authors.
August Derleth – The Adventure Of The Intarsia Box
Solar Pons ! I've always associated August Derleth with H P Lovecraft and his legacy, but it seems he had other strings to his bow, such as this riotous Sherlock Holmes pastiche. Pons is a consulting investigator, wears a deerstalker, resides at 7B Praed Street, has a landlady called Mrs Johnson (who's use of 'to be sure' may betray her origins), and has a narrator/assistant called Parker, prone to muttering 'Elementary' and consequently being chided by Solar as 'reading too many of Sir Arthur's stories.' This blatant rip off is visited by a young lady, bearing an Intarsia Box, received by her uncle/guardian from Malaya. It's contents caused him to faint, make a will when conscious again and generally start preparing for death. His niece/ward has managed to sneak said box from the house, and wants Pons to look into it. He does, and discovers a mummified severed hand. There was also a warning note. Soon there follows very bloody murder leaving the Yard baffled, and Pons to uncover the Malayan connection. This was a terrific tongue in cheek tale.
John D. Keefauver – Kali
Dem 'Mr Spoiler' Bones has rather given this away above, and it's about as authentic in its depiction of India as any episode of The Man From UNCLE or The Persuaders were in their overseas jaunts, but Keefauver does invest it with a ghastly, sweaty atmosphere of increasing insanity and dreadful inevitability.
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Post by dem on Feb 4, 2017 10:23:52 GMT
August Derleth – The Adventure Of The Intarsia Box Solar Pons ! I've always associated August Derleth with H P Lovecraft and his legacy, but it seems he had other strings to his bow, such as this riotous Sherlock Holmes pastiche. Pons is a consulting investigator, wears a deerstalker, resides at 7B Praed Street, has a landlady called Mrs Johnson (who's use of 'to be sure' may betray her origins), and has a narrator/assistant called Parker, prone to muttering 'Elementary' and consequently being chided by Solar as 'reading too many of Sir Arthur's stories.' This blatant rip off is visited by a young lady, bearing an Intarsia Box, received by her uncle/guardian from Malaya. It's contents caused him to faint, make a will when conscious again and generally start preparing for death. His niece/ward has managed to sneak said box from the house, and wants Pons to look into it. He does, and discovers a mummified severed hand. There was also a warning note. Soon there follows very bloody murder leaving the Yard baffled, and Pons to uncover the Malayan connection. This was a terrific tongue in cheek tale. I find Derleth's outrageous Holmes rip offs way more engaging than much of his Cthulhu Mythos stuff (especially the Lovecraft "collaberations"). Off the back of your commentary I just dug out Brian J. Frost's Book Of The Werewolf for a rematch with The Adventure of the Tottenham Werewolf - that's Tottenham in Yorkshire, obviously. Barking goings on at Grayle Old Place and this time it's Pons' turn to say "elementary." The solitary collection to come this way, The Return Of Solar Pons is consistently entertaining. |
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Post by franklinmarsh on Feb 4, 2017 10:41:12 GMT
that's Tottenham in Yorkshire, obviously. Obviously. One of the great things about the Pons tale is August almost gets it perfectly English - Pons riding around on the underground to Watford Junction. He only lets the side down once with Solar investigating 'out back' of the house. |
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Post by dem on Feb 4, 2017 10:52:37 GMT
that's Tottenham in Yorkshire, obviously. Obviously. One of the great things about the Pons tale is August almost gets it perfectly English - Pons riding around on the underground to Watford Junction. He only lets the side down once with Solar investigating 'out back' of the house. For this we can thank the masterpiece of cartography that is 'The London Map of Solar Pons', as reproduced in the aforementioned Return of Solar Pons. Better than SatNav. |
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Post by Michael Connolly on Feb 4, 2017 14:18:51 GMT
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Post by dem on Feb 5, 2017 6:57:38 GMT
The Solar Pons Gazette for December 2013 includes a two page article, Solar Pons & Sarob(bery) Press, an atypically angry rant in print from regular contributor Bob Byrne. Mr. Byrne is unhappy with Sarob for publishing pricey, limited editions of two Basil Copper originals, Solar Pons & The Devil’s Claw (2004. 250 copies. $45 regular edition, $95 deluxe), and the six story Solar Pons: The Final Cases (2005: 275 copies. $49.50 regular edition, $115 deluxe). As is almost invariably the case with collectables, both sold out pre-publication, ensuring that only the most affluent Pons fans have had opportunity to read them. But .... fear not, help is at hand! ... at a "competitive" price.
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Post by Michael Connolly on Feb 6, 2017 12:49:21 GMT
I've only ever read one volume of Basil Copper's Solar Pons stories. They were so unmemorable that I can only say that I think it was The Dossier of Solar Pons (Pinnacle, 1979).  |
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Post by andydecker on Feb 6, 2017 19:17:24 GMT
I once bought The Memoirs of Solar Pons. A Pinnacle edition. I love Holmes, even re-read him sometimes. But I couldn't get into Pons. Frankly I stumble every time over the stupid name,which just kills my suspense of disbelief. Silly,I know.
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Post by dem on Feb 10, 2017 12:36:48 GMT
I once bought The Memoirs of Solar Pons. A Pinnacle edition. I love Holmes, even re-read him sometimes. But I couldn't get into Pons. Frankly I stumble every time over the stupid name,which just kills my suspense of disbelief. Silly,I know. Crazy name, crazy guy. Am wondering if the popularity of Seabury Quinn's Jules de Grandin adventures came into Derleth's thinking? "If he can rip off Hercule Poirot, I'll go one better." |
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Post by franklinmarsh on Mar 6, 2017 20:22:24 GMT
Rudyard Kipling – The Mark Of The Beast
Very strange tale of the Raj. Fleete, a solitary type of chap, joins the ex-pats for a New Years Eve all-nighter and as the narrator and Strickland (Empire Old Bill) escort him home he gets out fa order at a local temple. A mewling leper-hug and some hours rest later, and Fleete seems none the worse for showing his colleagues up...but...he's grown a strange birthmark....he's demanding his pork chops rarer and rarer....he's grubbing about on all fours in the garden...our sober types have to tie him down when his old mucker the leper comes a-calling, bothe cursed and curser howling like mad. Can the straight-laced Englishmen cure Fleete's bestial tranformaton? And if they can, what effect will it have on them? Interesting tale a tad marred by self-censorship.
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Post by helrunar on Mar 6, 2017 22:08:46 GMT
I have a stash of old Solar Pons paperbacks on one of my shelves... will have to see if the Tottenham Werewolf story is in there. That sounds about right for my mood now.
I think it was in one of these as a teenager that I first came upon the expression "he was in a brown study" and was very confused as to how two men were talking to one another while occupying separate rooms in a Victorian rooming house...
cheers, H.
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Post by franklinmarsh on Mar 7, 2017 12:18:47 GMT
Fun With Rudyard - the press rave about Mark Of The Beast -
Athenaeum - "Mr. Kipling passes, as he occasionally does, the bounds of decorum, and displays a love of the crudely horrible in its disgusting details; but the fascination of the story is incontestable."
The Spectator - "this story may be curious, but it is also loathsome, and shows Mr. Kipling at his very worst."
The Pall Mall Gazette - "As a tale of sheer terror (this story ) could not easily be surpassed."
Courtesy of the exceedingly good Kipling society.
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Post by dem on Mar 7, 2017 12:38:37 GMT
Fun With Rudyard - the press rave about Mark Of The Beast - Athenaeum - "Mr. Kipling passes, as he occasionally does, the bounds of decorum, and displays a love of the crudely horrible in its disgusting details; but the fascination of the story is incontestable." The Spectator - "this story may be curious, but it is also loathsome, and shows Mr. Kipling at his very worst." The Pall Mall Gazette - "As a tale of sheer terror (this story ) could not easily be surpassed." Courtesy of the exceeding good Kipling society. A favourite passage from Peter Penzoldt's The Supernatural In Fiction (Humanities, 2nd edition, 1955) "Before I conclude, some mention should be made of the worst type of horror tale: that containing descriptions of sadism. These stories may appear with or without the element of the supernatural, but in any case it is never more than a pretext for introducing the cheapest kind of horror. The Most famous example is probably Kipling's The Mark Of The Beast with its realistic descriptions of torture. Others are Thomas Burke's The Bird, Carl Tanzler von Cosel's Helena's Tomb, Mark Channing's The Feet and Marjorie Bowen's disgusting stories in The Bishop Of Hell
How such tales can be constantly republished in the face of the laws against pornographic literature is an unsolved mystery." |
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Post by helrunar on Mar 7, 2017 12:44:21 GMT
Pace the Penzoldt quote, have I mentioned that prudes are one of my least favorite types of human depravity? We have far too many of them on the loose in these glorious United States of Idiocy.
cheers, H.
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