"A certain atmosphere of breathless and unexplainable dread of outer, unknown forces must be present; and there must be a hint, expressed with a seriousness and portentousness becoming its subject, of that most terrible conception of the human brain - a malign and particular suspension or defeat of those fixed laws of Nature which are our only safeguard against the assaults of chaos and the daemons of umplumbed space." Thus spake S. T. Joshi as to what qualifies as a tale of the supernatural.
American Supernatural Tales - a treasure for lovers of great literature of the dark weird variety. S. T. Joshi has collected twenty-six bone chillers penned by American masters of the craft, from Washington Irving, Edgar Allan Poe, Henry James, H. P. Lovecraft, Clark Ashton Smith to Shirley Jackson, Stephen King and Joyce Carol Oats. Mr. Joshi has also included a most informative Introduction providing historical and cultural context.
As a way of sharing what a reader is in store for, I will pull back the purple satin curtain to reveal the book's unique rasa by focusing on one selection I found among the most hair-raising: Vastarien by Thomas Ligotti (born 1953).
VASTARIEN
In the very first short paragraph Thomas Ligotti establishes the atmosphere of dread so essential for a tale of the supernatural: "Within the blackness of his sleep a few lights began to glow like candles in a cloistered cell. Their illumination was unsteady and dim, issuing from no definite source. Nonetheless, he now discovered many shapes beneath the shadows: tall buildings whose rooftops nodded groundward, wide buildings whose facades seemed to follow the curve of the street, dark buildings whose windows and doorways tilted like badly hung paintings. And even if he found himself unable to fix his own location in this scene, he knew where his dreams had delivered him once more."
The author's unique voice in writing his fiction is all about precision - subtle shades of character, nuanced images and foreshadowing, impeccable timing to build mystery, suspense, surprise and, of course, horror. Every word counts. This to say, as much as I attempt to capture the tale's flavor, for the full impact and encounter with Vastarien, you must read for yourself.
Back to the main character's dream: although he sees the distorted buildings propagate, he not only possesses a sense of intimacy with each of the many buildings but also the spaces within the buildings and the streets coiling around the buildings. Similar to previous occasions, he knows a good bit relating to particulars: how deep their foundations, the location of specific inhabitants, "a secret civilization of echoes flourishing among groaning walls."
But, alas, as he examines the interiors of the buildings more closely, difficulties present themselves: stairways lead nowhere, caged elevators give the impression they are traps, ladders "ascending into a maze of shafts and conduits, the dark valves and arteries of a petrified and monstrous organism." Such descriptions bring to mind the etchings of Piranesi or M. C. Escher's graphic enigmas - a stroke of Ligotti dusky foreboding.
Moving about in his dream, a myriad of choices and questions press upon him, foremost among these queries: should he leave or remain with the occasional manikin he finds sitting in a plush chair starring back at him? And once outside on the streets, what is he to think when he looks up at one of the towers and sees "vague silhouettes that moved hectically in a bright window, twisting and leaning upon the glass like shadow-puppets in the fever of some mad dispute."
This dream continues until he encounters two figures standing beneath a street lamp, figures whose faces are "a pair of faded masks concealing profound schemes." The dreamer awakens and it is only here we learn his name: Victor Keirion - a nice authorial touch since the question arises: in all the many dreams we have had in our lifetime, how many times have we heard our own name? If your experience is similar to mine, the answer is unambiguous: never. We only return to our name when we wake up.
The creepiness progresses and we come to know much more about Victor Keirion, a name befitting his personality since Keirion and carrion are homonyms and Victor means victory, thus our main character is victorious carrion. What?! What is meant by this? Ah, mystery.
Victor enters a bookstore in the shape of a ten sided polygon and is approached by a crow-man which eventually leads to Victor's obsession with one book in particular and a certain hallucinated world. "Each day thereafter he studied the hypnotic episodes of the little book; each night, as he dreamed, he carried out shapeless expeditions into its fantastic topography."
The tale takes even darker, more maddening turns but I've written enough. I encourage you to hunt down this Penguin edition for Thomas Ligotti's onyx gem as well as the other tales included in this fine collection.
S. T. Joshi, Born 1958 - American scholar and literary critic, a lover of weird and fantastic fiction
“Who knows what wonders, what horrors, may have transpired in the dim past, before our race stood erect? Who can guess at the mysteries of the future, when we and all our works are passed away and the sun itself grows old?"
― S.T. Joshi
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