Chris Baldick - Oxford Book Of Gothic Tales

[dem]

Chris Baldick (ed) - The Oxford Book Of Gothic Tales (OUP, 1992)

T. C. Gotch, 1854-1931: Death the Bride

Introduction - Chris Baldick

Mrs. Anna Laetitia Aiken - Sir Bertrand: A Fragment (1773)
Richard Cumberland - The Poisoner Of Montremos (1791)
Anon - The Friar's Tale (1792)
Juvenis' - Raymond: A Fragment (1799)
Anon - The Parricide Punished (1799)
Anon - The Ruins Of The Abbey Of Fitz-Martin (1801)
Isaac Crookenden - The Vindictive Monk: Or, The Fatal Ring (1802)
Anon - The Astrologers Prediction, or The Maniac's Fate (1826)
Petrus Borel - Andreas Vesalius The Anatomist (1833)
J. Wadham - Lady Eltringham Or The Castle Of Ratcliffe Cross (1836)
Edgar Allan Poe - The Fall Of The House Of Usher (1839)
Sheridan Le Fanu - A Chapter In The History Of A Tyrone Family (1839)
Nathaniel Hawthorne - Rappaccini's Daughter (1844)
Bret Harte - Selina Sedilia (1865)
Jean-Ah Poquelin - George Washington Cable (1875)
Robert Louis Stevenson - Olalla (1885)
Thomas Hardy - Barbara Of The House Of Grebe (1891)
Marcel Schwob - Bloody Blanche (1892)
Charlotte Perkins Stetson - The Yellow Wall-Paper (1892)
Arthur Conan-Doyle - The Adventure Of The Speckled Band (1892)
E. Nesbit - Hurst Of Hurstcote (1893)
Ambrose Bierce - A Vine On A House (1905)
Ellen Glasgow - Jordan's End (1923)
H. P. Lovecraft - The Outsider (1926)
William Faulkner - A Rose For Emily (1930)
Clark Ashton Smith - A Rendezvous In Averoigne (1931)
Isak Dinesen - The Monkey (1934)
F. M. Mayor - Miss De Mannering Of Asham (1935)
Frederick Cowles - The Vampire Of Kaldenstein (1938)
Eudora Welty - Clytie (1941)
Ray Russell - Sardonicus (1961)
Alejandra Pizarnik - The Bloody Countess (1968)
Jorge Luis Borges - The Gospel According To Mark (1970)
Angela Carter - The Lady Of The House Of Love (1979)
Joyce Carol Oates - Secret Observations Of The Goat-Girl (1988)
Patrick McGrath - Blood Disease (1988)
Isabel Allende - If You Touched my Heart (1991)

Notes.

could've sworn we had a thread for this beauty already but evidently not. whoever came up with the idea of using the gorgeous [i[Death And The Maiden[/i] for the cover has my eternal gratitude - it's the ideal match for the collection. We already put Sir Bertrand and The Yellow Wallpaper under the microscope on the ace Gothic Short Stories thread - it's to David Blair's credit that, despite having several authors in common, his popular Wordswoth Edition replicates just the two items - and there are comments on the likes of Sardonicus, The Outsider, A Rose For Emily & other famous titles lurking in some unlikely corners of the board. To make a start:

Frederick Cowles - The Vampire Of Kaldenstein: can't help but love his cheek. outrageously derivative of the Lugosi Dracula but with added Hammer Films clichés twenty years early! Cowles even has the audacity to slip in an "I don't drink .... wine." The narrator, travelling in Germany in 1933, arrives at a hamlet in the shadow of a centuries old castle. At the Inn he encounters the usual miserable locals who dutifully groan and cross themselves at mention of the name Count Ludwig Kaldenstein, warn him against making good on his intention to pay the noble a visit. Ignoring their advice and that of the local priest, he sets off the next morning and persuades Kaldenstein's half-blind servant to give him the guided tour. This gloomy creature murmurs that it is safe here by daylight but should the traveller return after dark then he does so at his own risk. Not being a great one to heed the credulous, our fellow awaits nightfall. Count Ludwig is charm itself - he even introduces the Englishman to his ancestors Augustus and Feodor (who died in 1645 but looks well on it). Enter, stake-handed, the Priest and the Innkeeper, just as the vampires bare their drooling fangs in anticipation of a slap up blood-feast.

Alejandra Pizarnik - The Bloody Countess: In which the author condenses Valentine Penrose's terrifying biography of Erzsébeth Bathory down to just the eleven pages, giving it a thorough Gothic Horror makeover in the process, although it's debatable whether any were required. That said, it's an engrossing read. Chapter headings like The Iron Maiden, The Lethal Cage, Classical Torture and Blood Baths should give you some idea of what's on offer and also the huge debt the more visceral exercises in macabre fiction owes to her deplorable activities.

Isaac Crookenden - The Vindictive Monk Or, The Fatal Ring: For twenty years, Signor Calini has raised our hero as his own flesh and blood, but now is the time for the deception to end. Out in his gondola late one night, Calini spotted a bundle on the shore within a foot of the waves. The infant wore a curious ring, engraved with a peculiar name underneath. Calini, having recently lost his own boys, took the child as a substitute son and no-one else is any the wiser.

Shortly after this startling revelation, the young man is on his way to meet his intended, the fair Lady Alexa, when he's set upon by rogues and taken to a ruined castle where he's chained up in a dungeon. "Here is your habitation until you resign all pretensions to Lady Alexa!" warns his jailer. This is Sceloni, the vindictive monk of the title, "of a gloomy character, and who was never once seen to smile. He was dependent on a nobleman, and had, from motives of self-interest, engaged to administer his lewd proposition. The nobleman was enamoured of the very same lady our hero loved."

With "our hero" starving in his cell, the nobleman, Holbruzi, is free to pursue Alexa, but she spurns him for the rotter he is so he has his band of inhuman monsters - led by the monk - kidnap her and bring her to his mansion. Still she's having none of it and, when Sceloni picks this inopportune moment to ask for a pay rise, Holbruzi reminds him he's already been paid overmuch for his services. This proves to be Holbruzi's undoing and finally the Monk gets to show some vindictiveness.

As rip-offs of The Monk go, this one is pretty weedy and a spot of torture here, some heavy duty grief for Lady Alexa there would have been welcome. At least there's a cunning murder. Did you guess the youth's real father?

Anon - The Astrologers Prediction, or The Maniac's Fate: It is feared that the madness that afflicts the male line of the Di Venoni family is hereditary, which is bad news for young Reginald. After the death of his lunatic father, he passes his days in the gloomy chateau on the borders of the Black Forest, brooding on his unhappy lot. Eventually a dying hermit comes to live in the ruined tower of Rudstein. This wizened old man, an Astrologer, warns Reginald that we will perpetrate a terrible deed of blood before he is done with this life, unless he follows his instructions. "In three days return, and under the base of this ruin inter the corpse that you will find mouldering within." Reginald keeps the first part of his promise, but the sight of the Astrologer's ghastly remains so unnerves him that he flees from the scene, his mission unfulfilled.

Years later, now settled in Venice, Reginald meets and marries the love of his life, Marcelia, the Doge's beautiful seventeen year old daughter. All is well until he receives word of his mother's illness and, together with his bride, returns to his former home to comfort her on her deathbed. Once again, he finds himself drawn to the crumbling tower ...

[julieh]

Oh my goodness!!! Selina Sedilia!


I was looking over your list and had to go and look that one up, since I don't think of Bret Harte and gothic in the same breath, generally (he's more "westerns")

It's just BEAUTIFUL.
Oh. My. Goodness.

[also was a wee bit confused by Charlotte Perkins' married name... Just recorded The Yellow Wallpaper, which I know has been discussed elsewhere - but when you read it, pay attention to the things described about the room itself, and the contents of the room. SERIOUSLY. very subtle...]

[Dr Strange]

Anyone seen this? Not sure if it's been released in the UK.

www.theyellowwallpaper.net/


Later edit: It's not out anywhere yet, but due for release this year around Halloween (according to its "Facebook" page).

[julieh]

Looks interesting, but the clips aren't working.

At least it looks like they kept it in the right time period.

[Dr Strange]

Seems the Facebook page is now the "official" website for the film. It also seems that the film has been in "post-production" for quite a few years, which is usually a very bad sign.

[dem]

Angela Carter - The Lady In The House Of Love: An English soldier on leave in Romania prior to the outset of WWI, is lured into the web of the local Countess, a beautiful, self-loathing vampire, forever attired in her late mother's wedding dress, awaiting love and redemption. The Countess despises her condition and spends long hours consulting the tarot for an indication of some change in her destiny but until now it has always been the same cards, the same fate, "wisdom, death, dissolution." But the arrival of the soldier offers hope. Now, the cards indicate she will be shown "a hand of love and death." The Countess has her aged crone of a governess invite the soldier to the castle where she awaits him in her gloomy bed-chamber ....

will leave it there save to say that what happens next is possibly not what you'd expect and the last line is an absolute choker.

The bulk of the stories in The Bloody Chamber are dark reworking of fairy stories and folk legends but this one is apparently a retelling of a Vampirella radio play (!). A gorgeous by product of The Lady of the House of Love is the short film ('rock video' would do it an injustice) which compliments Daisy Chainsaw's masterpiece Hope All Your Dreams Come True. It is a very beautiful adaptation, rich on atmosphere and Gothic imagery, and i am not joking. watch it here and fall in love. With who is all up to you.