Weird Tales by Women Writers

[cauldronbrewer]

Oct 1, 2012 10:17:08 GMT dem said:

Joanna Russ - My Dear Emily (Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, July 1962). I'd heard great things about this story, so on first reading, was sitting there expecting to be blown away and it was very much a case of "that's Ok, but can't really see what all the fuss is about." Second time around and "actually, I really like that!", third is "Maybe we'll have to include two Joanna Russ stories in our imaginary 'Rivals of the Women of Weird Tales' anthology."

My third go around was the one on which I actually managed to finish the story--I gave up on it the first two times. Maybe I should finish it a second time so that I can see what all of the fuss is about, too. ;D

[dem]

Here's an earlier attempt at a (mostly) 'Rivals of the Women Of Weird Tales collection'. Not so sure i'd bracket the first three as "science fiction" exactly, but the rest likely are.

Vic Ghidalia and Roger Elwood (eds.) - The Venus Factor (Nel, 1976. Originally McFadden, 1972: Manor, 1973, 1977: )

Cynthia Asquith - "God Grante That She Lye Stille” (When Churchyards Yawn, 1931)
Gertrude Atherton - The Foghorn (Good Housekeeping, Nov 1933)
Agatha Christie - The Last Séance (Ghost Stories, (Nov. 1926)
Miriam Allen deFord - Against Authority (MFSF, Feb. 1966)
Zenna Henderson - J-Line to Nowhere (MFSF, Sept. 1969)
Anne McCaffrey - The Ship Who Disappeared (If, March 1969)
Judith Merril - The Lady Was a Tramp (Venture SF, Juky 1957)
C. L. Moore - The Dark Land (Weird Tales, January 1936)

Blurb

A medium evokes a vision so real it threatens her very existence …

A dying woman is snatched into another time dimension ….

A long dead spirit fights to inhabit a living body ….

These are but a few of the chilling and gripping ideas contained in The Venus Factor, an anthology of science fiction stories written about women by some of the top women SF writers.

[ramseycampbell]

I'd say not the first three or the C. L. Moore!

[cauldronbrewer]

"The Dark Land" is a Jirel of Joiry story and is trippy even by C. L. Moore's usual standards.

[cauldronbrewer]

Two more potential additions to the Rivals of Weird Tales by Women Writers list, based on recent reading:

Donald Dale (Mary Dale Bruckner) - Art Class in Hell (Horror Stories, June/July 1937)
This doom-laden story featuring art fiend Prince Zagoul could serve as a genuinely supernatural substitute for Dale/Bruckner's "Bodies Born for Slaughter."

Dorothy K. Haynes - A Story at Bedtime (Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, June 1951)
A nifty little tale of how witchcraft runs in the family, at least from mother to daughter if not necessarily mother to son, by Scotland's master of bleakness.

Just to confuse matters, there's a poem in the July 1946 Weird Tales by a Dorothy Haynes Madle.

[dem]

Excellent you've found legit means to smuggle in a Dorothy K. Haynes story as she belongs, no question. Over the weekend I reread two Jessica D. "The Undying Monster" Kerruish Not At Night contributions, and it's just a shame The Wonderful Tune didn't see magazine publication. When three skiers are hideously mutilated in an avalanche, there's nothing for it but to store what's left of them at an Alpine hospice until morning. Unfortunately, this is the night when the famous violinist Einar Larssen finally remembers the exact chord structure of the Huldrasleet, the Elf King's tune, a melody so powerful it will raise the dead.

The Seven-Locked Room, another variation on the 'Monster of Glamis' legend, begins well before taking a detour into Sangrael bollocks. Kerruish wrote some supernatural fiction for The Weekly Tale-Teller and Jack Adrian revived The Swaying Vision for 1997's The Ash-Tree Press Annual Macabre , an all-women, between the wars selection featuring stories by Carola Oman, Patricia Wentworth and the improbably named Mollie Panter-Downes' The House of the Laburnums ("timid and insipid" was H. P. Lovecraft's considered verdict). Don't have a copy, mores the pity.

[dem]

Aug 7, 2012 20:08:53 GMT cauldronbrewer said:

Allison V. Harding
Truly one of the unsung contributors to WT, Harding (a.k.a. Jean Milligan) published numerous tales in the magazine--of which only a handful have ever been reprinted. Among the six I've seen, my top two are The Damp Man (1947) and The Underbody (1949). The former is great fun, with its comic book-style super-villain, but the latter gets the edge for packing a greater punch. A bleak tale about a dirt-covered, corpse-like mole man who entices young boys to "take a walk" with him, it would carry a nasty edge even without its supernatural overtones. It's never been reprinted, at least to my knowledge, but you can read it online at Unz.org.

For those who find reading Weird Tales' double columns from a screen too punishing on the eye, The Underbody as prepared for Vault Advent Calendar bonus material.

Attachments:

[jamesdoig]

These arrived today courtesy of the excellent Mike Ashley



The Darker Sex: Tales of the Supernatural and Macabre by Victorian Women Writers, edited by Mike Ashley (Peter Owen, 2009)

Contents
Introduction
Emily Bronte, The Palace of Death
Elizabeth Gaskell, The Old Nurse's Story
Mary E. Braddon, The Shadow in the Corner
Charlotte Riddell, Nut Bush Farm
Mary E. Penn, The Tenant of the Cedars
Louisa Baldwin, Sir Nigel Otterburne's Case
Mary Wilkins Freeman, Luella Miller
Violet Quirk, The Three Kisses
Edith Nisbet, The Third Drug
George Elliot, The Lifted Veil
Elizabeth Stuart Phelps, The Presence



The Dreaming Sex: Early Tales of Scientific Imagination by Woman, edited by Mike Ashley (Peter Owen, 2009)

Contents
Introduction
L.T. Meade, The Blue Laboratory
Mary Shelley, The Mortal Immortal
Harriet Prescott Spofford, The Moonstone Mass
Alice W. Fuller, A Wife Manufactured to Order
Mary Elizabeth Braddon, Good Lady Ducayne
Mary Wilkins Freeman, The Hall Bedroom
G.M. Barrows, The Curious Experience of Thomas Dunbar
Roquia Sakhawat Hossein, The Sultana's Dream
Edith Nisbet, The Five Senses
Clotilde Graves, Lady Clanbevan's Baby
Muriel Pollexfen, Monsieur Fly-by-Night
Greye La Spina, The Ultimate Ingredient
Clare Winger Harris, The miracle of the Lily
Adeline Knapp, The Earth Slept: A Vision

[cauldronbrewer]

Jan 22, 2013 18:19:49 GMT dem said:

Over the weekend I reread two Jessica D. "The Undying Monster" Kerruish Not At Night contributions, and it's just a shame The Wonderful Tune didn't see magazine publication. When three skiers are hideously mutilated in an avalanche, there's nothing for it but to store what's left of them at an Alpine hospice until morning. Unfortunately, this is the night when the famous violinist Einar Larssen finally remembers the exact chord structure of the Huldrasleet, the Elf King's tune, a melody so powerful it will raise the dead.

I finally had a chance to read "The Wonderful Tune" and loved it--I've always been intrigued by Scandinavian folklore, and Kerruish uses it to fine effect in this tale.

Now I want to track down a copy of her werewolf novel, The Undying Monster (though not this edition, I think), perhaps as part of a double bill with Franklin Gregory's The White Wolf.

[zaraath]

Jan 22, 2013 18:19:49 GMT dem said:

Over the weekend I reread two Jessica D. "The Undying Monster" Kerruish Not At Night contributions, and it's just a shame The Wonderful Tune didn't see magazine publication.  Kerruish wrote some supernatural fiction for The Weekly Tale-Teller and Jack Adrian revived The Swaying Vision for 1997's The Ash-Tree Press Annual Macabre , an all-women, between the wars selection featuring stories by Carola Oman, Patricia Wentworth and the improbably named Mollie Panter-Downes' The House of the Laburnums ("timid and insipid" was H. P. Lovecraft's considered verdict). Don't have a copy, more's the pity.

The Swaying Vision was the best story in it.  A man purchases two semi-detached houses with the intention of living in one and renting out the other, but one first-floor room in his home is haunted by a phosphorescent image of a corpse lying on its back and rocking or swaying, along with an odor of decay.  The flesh seems to have been partially removed from some of the limbs.   His family cannot live in the home (apparently they never thought of walling off that room) and tenants are afraid to rent the adjoining building, even with a brick wall intervening.  He engages the services of a psychic detective (not Miss Bartendale) to uncover the reason for the Vision.

The only other story I remember was Wentworth's A Wedding Day, a non-supernatural story about a British couple caught in the Mutiny.  A lot of those Annual Macabre stories were better off lost, although each one does have some gems.

[dem]

Thanks for the info, zaraath. The Swaying Vision sounds every bit as good as The Wonderful Tune!

It's probably the subject for a separate thread but Mr. Brewer willing, i'm thinking maybe we should try for a Weird Tales By Women Writers of the present day (Grand-daughters of the Women of Weird Tales?) as there's some seriously brilliant stuff being published in the here and now which, to my mind at least, belongs to the tradition. Maybe if we took a starting date of 1999?

[cauldronbrewer]

Oct 1, 2014 8:20:12 GMT dem said:

It's probably the subject for a separate thread but Mr. Brewer willing, i'm thinking maybe we should try for a Weird Tales By Women Writers of the present day (Grand-daughters of the Women of Weird Tales?) as there's some seriously brilliant stuff being published in the here and now which, to my mind at least, belongs to the tradition. Maybe if we took a starting date of 1999?

I heartily approve of this idea.

[randy]

Seconded. Or, I guess, thirded.


Randy M.

[claytwisted]

I don't know why I'm posting this here when I could probably pitch this anthology and actually sell it, but what the heck... Let me dial back to 1990 if I may...

Strays - Mehitobel Wilson

Stephen - Elizabeth Massie

Precious - Roberta Lannes

Calcutta, Lord of Nerves - Poppy Z. Brite

The Family Underwater - Lucy Taylor

Sticks - Christa Faust

Rats Live on No Evil Star - Caitlin Kiernan

"Whatever Happened To?" - D.G.K. Goldberg

Two Demons--Or Three? - Mary Elizabeth Counselman

A Bottle of Egyptian Night - Jessica Amanda Salmonson

Wasting - Lauren Fitzgerald

Dread in the Beast - Charlee Jacob

And of course I know that there has to be an unpublished story or two by Mary Dale Buckner (Donald Dale) that we could include, but I've yet to see her files... I should probably include something by K.K. Ormond as well... I'm sure I'm forgetting a ton of great material and I apologize to anyone I've inadvertently snubbed.

[cauldronbrewer]

I would buy that book.