Kurt Singer - Horror 2

[andydecker]

Kurt Singer (ed.) - Horror 2 (Wolfgang Krüger Verlag, 1969, hardcover in paperpack format, 264 pages)

Contents:
Allison V. Harding – The House Beyond Midnight (1947)
E. F. Russell – The Rhythm of the Rats (1950)
Robert Bloch – The Grinning Ghoul (1936)
H. P. Lovecraft – The Dreams in the witch House (1933)
Hugh Walpole – Mrs. Lunt (1926)
Frank Belknap Long – Two Face (1956)
Merle Prout – The House of the Worm (1933)
Marie Belloc Lowndes – The Duenna (1956)
August Derleth – Pott's Triumph (1950)
Thorp McClusky – The Graveyard Horror (1941)
Helen Weinbaum – The Valley of the Undead (1940)
Mildred Johnson – The Mirror (1950)
Algernon Blackwood – Chemical (1926)

This is one of the few random horror anthologies appearing in Germany in the late 60s/early 70s from mainstream publishers. Billed as "Classic and modern Tales out of the demonic realms" this went on for four volumes, putting stories from diverse Singer anthologies Ghost Omnibus, Weird Tales of the Supernatural, Gothic Reader, Horror Omnibus and Ghouls & Ghosts together without rhyme or reason. Basically this is a Weird Tales anthology from all the decades of the magazine.

Considering the editorial standards of its time this is surprisingly slipshod. The no introduction whatsoever style of the stories was rather common, but here the publisher seemed to go out of his way to conceal the origin or the age of the stories. The next story begins mid-page. The contents page omits the first names of the writers and the second story, Russell's The Rythm of the Rats. They even manage to misspell Lovecraft twice: On the contents page he is Levekraft, later Lovekraft. Embarrassing.

Two years later there was a reprint as a paperback at big paperback outfit Wilhelm Heyne, which sold very well.