American Supernatural Tales (Penguin Horror) Read online
AMERICAN SUPERNATURAL TALES
It takes an unusual caliber of writer to deliver readers into the terrifying beyond—to conjure tales that are not only unsettling, but unnatural, with elements and characters that are all the more disturbing for their impossibility. From Edgar Allan Poe to Stephen King, American authors have excelled at journeying into the supernatural. You’ll find them here, including H. P. Lovecraft, Shirley Jackson, Ray Bradbury, Nathaniel Hawthorne, and others. An unprecedented anthology of phantasmagoric, spectral, and demonic writing, American Supernatural Tales celebrates our enduring need to be spooked and horrified.
Penguin Horror is a collection of novels, stories, and poems by masters of the genre, curated by filmmaker and lifelong horror literature reader Guillermo del Toro. Included in the series are some of his favorites: Frankenstein by Mary Shelley, The Raven: Tales and Poems by Edgar Allan Poe, The Thing on the Doorstep and Other Weird Stories by H. P. Lovecraft, The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson, Haunted Castles: The Complete Gothic Stories by Ray Russell, and American Supernatural Tales, edited by S. T. Joshi and featuring stories from Ray Bradbury, Joyce Carol Oates, Robert E. Howard, and Stephen King, alongside many others. Penguin Horror reminds us what del Toro writes in his series introduction: “To learn what we fear is to learn who we are.”
PENGUIN BOOKS
AMERICAN SUPERNATURAL TALES
S. T. JOSHI is a freelance writer and editor. He has edited Penguin Classics editions of H. P. Lovecraft’s The Call of Cthulhu and Other Weird Stories and The Thing on the Doorstep and Other Weird Stories, as well as Algernon Blackwood’s Ancient Sorceries and Other Strange Stories, Arthur Machen’s The White People and Other Weird Stories, and American Supernatural Tales. He has also written critical studies on Lord Dunsany and H. P. Lovecraft; edited works by Ambrose Bierce, Clark Ashton Smith, and H. L. Mencken; and has completed a two-volume history of supernatural fiction entitled Unutterable Horror.
GUILLERMO DEL TORO is a Mexican director, producer, screenwriter, novelist, and designer. He cofounded the Guadalajara International Film Festival, and formed his own production company—the Tequila Gang. However, he is most recognized for his Academy Award-winning film, Pan’s Labyrinth, and the Hellboy film franchise. He has received Nebula and Hugo awards, was nominated for a Bram Stoker Award, and is an avid collector and student of arcane memorabilia and weird fiction.
AMERICAN
SUPERNATURAL
TALES
Edited with an Introduction
by S. T. Joshi
PENGUIN HORROR
Series Editor Guillermo del Toro
PENGUIN BOOKS
Published by the Penguin Group
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First published in Penguin Books 2007
This edition with a series introduction by Guillermo del Toro published 2013
Introduction and selection copyright © 2007 by S. T. Joshi
Series introduction copyright © 2013 by Necropia, Inc.
Penguin supports copyright. Copyright fuels creativity, encourages diverse voices, promotes free speech, and creates a vibrant culture. Thank you for buying an authorized edition of this book and for complying with copyright laws by not reproducing, scanning, or distributing any part of it in any form without permission. You are supporting writers and allowing Penguin to continue to publish books for every reader.
Pages 8–9 constitute an extension to this copyright page.
ISBN: 978-1-101-66275-5
CIP data available
Cover art and design: Paul Buckley
These selections are works of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
he author and publisher are grateful for the following parties for permission to reprint the following copyrighted works:
H. P. Lovecraft, “The Call of Cthulhu.” Copyright © 1928 by Popular Fiction Publishing Company. Reprinted by permission of Lovecraft Properties LLC.
Clark Ashton Smith, “The Vaults of Yoh-Vombis.” Copyright © 1932 by Popular Fiction Publishing Company. Reprinted by permission of Arkham House Publishers, Inc. and its agents, JABberwocky Literary Agency Inc., 24-16 Queens Plaza South, Suite 505, Long Island City, NY 11101.
Robert E. Howard, “Old Garfield’s Heart.” Copyright © 1933 by Popular Fiction Publishing Company. Reprinted from The Black Stranger and Other American Tales by Robert E. Howard, edited and with an introduction by Steven Tompkins, by permission of the University of Nebraska Press. Copyright © 2005 by Robert E. Howard Properties, LLC.
Robert Bloch, “Black Bargain.” Copyright © 1942 by Popular Fiction Publishing Company. Reprinted by permission of the Estate of Robert Bloch by arrangement with Richard Henshaw Group LLC.
August Derleth, “The Lonesome Place.” Copyright © 1948. Reprinted by permission of Arkham House Publishers, Inc. and its agents, JABberwocky Literary Agency Inc., 24-16 Queens Plaza South, Suite 505, Long Island City, NY 11101.
Fritz Leiber, “The Girl with the Hungry Eyes.” Copyright © 1949 by Avon Books, Inc. Reprinted by permission of Richard Curtis Associates.
Ray Bradbury, “The Fog Horn.” Copyright © 1951 by The Curtis Publishing Company, renewed 1979 by Ray Bradbury. Reprinted by permission of Don Congdon Associates, Inc.
Shirley Jackson, “A Visit” (also titled “The Lovely House”). Copyright 1952 by Shirley Jackson, from Come Along with Me by Shirley Jackson. Reprinted by permission of Viking Penguin, a member of Penguin Group (USA) LLC and Linda Allen Literary Agency.
Richard Matheson, “Long Distance Call.” Copyright © 1953 by Galaxy Publishing Corporation, renewed 1981 by Richard Matheson. Reprinted by permission of Don Congdon Associates, Inc.
Charles Beaumont, “The Vanishing American.” Copyright © 1955 by Fantasy House, renewed 1983 by Christopher Beaumont. Reprinted by permission of Don Congdon Associates, Inc.
T. E. D. Klein, “The Events of Poroth Farm.” Copyright © 1972 by T. E. D. Klein. Reprinted by permission of the author.
Stephen King, “Night Surf,” from Night Shift by Stephen King. Copyright © 1974 by Cavalier. Night Shift copyright © 1976, 1977, 1978 by Stephen King. Used by permission of Doubleday, a division of Random House, Inc. Any third party use of this material, outside of this publication, is prohibited. Interested parties must apply directly to Random House, Inc. for permission. Reprinted by permission of Hodder & Stoughton Limited.
Dennis Etchison, “The Late Shift.” Copyright © 1980 by Dennis Etchison. Reprinted by permission of the author.
Thomas Ligotti, “Vastarien.” Copyright © 1987 by Thomas Ligotti. Reprinted by permission of The McIntyre Agency. All rights reserved.
Karl Edward Wagner, “Endless Night.” Copyright © 1987 by Karl Edward Wagner. Reprinted by permission of the Karl Edward Wagner Literary Group.
Norman Partridge, “The Hollow Man.” Copyright © 1991 by Norman Partridge. Reprinted by permission of the author.
David J. Schow, “Last Call for the Sons of Shock.” Copyright © 1994 by David J. Schow. Reprinted by permission of the author.
Joyce Carol Oates, “Demon.” Copyright © 1996 by The Ontario Review, Inc. Reprinted
by permission of the author.
Caitlín R. Kiernan, “In the Water Works (Birmingham, Alabama 1888).” Copyright © 2000 by Caitlín R. Kiernan. Reprinted by permission of the author.
CONTENTS
Acknowledgments
Haunted Castles, Dark Mirrors: On the Penguin Horror Series by GUILLERMO DEL TORO
Introduction by S. T. JOSHI
AMERICAN SUPERNATURAL TALES
Washington Irving (1783–1859)
The Adventure of the German Student (1824)
Nathaniel Hawthorne (1804–1864)
Edward Randolph’s Portrait (1838)
Edgar Allan Poe (1809–1849)
The Fall of the House of Usher (1839)
Fitz-James O’Brien (1828–1862)
What Was It? (1859)
Ambrose Bierce (1842–1914?)
The Death of Halpin Frayser (1891)
Robert W. Chambers (1865–1933)
The Yellow Sign (1895)
Henry James (1843–1933)
The Real Right Thing (1899)
H. P. Lovecraft (1890–1937)
The Call of Cthulhu (1928)
Clark Ashton Smith (1893–1961)
The Vaults of Yoh-Vombis (1932)
Robert E. Howard (1906–1936)
Old Garfield’s Heart (1933)
Robert Bloch (1917–1944)
Black Bargain (1942)
August Derleth (1909–1971)
The Lonesome Place (1948)
Fritz Leiber (1910–1992)
The Girl with the Hungry Eyes (1949)
Ray Bradbury (1920–2012)
The Fog Horn (1951)
Shirley Jackson (1916–1965)
A Visit (1952)
Richard Matheson (b. 1926)
Long Distance Call (1953)
Charles Beaumont (1929–1967)
The Vanishing American (1955)
T. E. D. Klein (b. 1947)
The Events at Poroth Farm (1972)
Stephen King (b. 1947)
Night Surf (1974)
Dennis Etchison (b. 1943)
The Late Shift (1980)
Thomas Ligotti (b. 1953)
Vastarien (1987)
Karl Edward Wagner (1945–1994)
Endless Night (1987)
Norman Partridge (b. 1958)
The Hollow Man (1991)
David J. Schow (b. 1955)
Last Call for the Sons of Shock (1994)
Joyce Carol Oates (b. 1938)
Demon (1996)
Caitlín R. Kiernan (b. 1964)
In the Water Works (Birmingham, Alabama 1888) (2000)
Sources
HAUNTED CASTLES, DARK MIRRORS
ON THE PENGUIN HORROR SERIES
There is no god but this mirror that thou seest, for this is the Mirror of Wisdom. And it reflecteth all things that are in heaven and on earth, save only the face of him who looketh into it. This it reflecteth not, so that he who looketh into it may be wise.
—Oscar Wilde, “The Fisherman and His Soul”
To learn what we fear is to learn who we are. Horror defines our boundaries and illuminates our souls. In that, it is no different, or less controversial, than humor, and no less intimate than sex. Our rejection or acceptance of a particular type of horror fiction can be as rarefied or kinky as any other phobia or fetish.
Horror is made of such base material—so easily rejected or dismissed—that it may be hard to accept my postulate that within the genre lies one of the last refuges of spirituality in this, our materialistic world.
But it is a fact that, through the ages, most storytellers have had to resort to the fantastic in order to elevate their discourse to the level of parable. Stevenson, Wilde, Victor Hugo, Henry James, Marcel Schwob, Kipling, Borges, and many others. Borges, in fact, defended the fantastic quite openly and acknowledged fable and parable as elemental forms of narrative that would always outlive the much younger forms, which are preoccupied with realism.
At a primal level, we crave parables, because they allow us to grasp the impossibly large concepts and to understand our universe without and within. These tales can “make flesh” what would otherwise be metaphor or allegory. More important, the horror tale becomes imprinted in us at an emotional level: Shiver by shiver, we gain insight.
But, at its root, the frisson is a crucial element of this form of storytelling—because all spiritual experience requires faith, and faith requires abandonment: the humility to fully surrender to a tide of truths and wills infinitely larger than ourselves.
It is in this abandonment that we are allowed to witness phenomena that go beyond our nature and that reveal the spiritual side of our existence.
We dislocate, for a moment, the rules of our universe, the laws that bind the rational and diminish the cosmos to our scale. And when the world becomes a vast, unruly place, a place where anything can happen, then—and only then—we allow for miracles and angels, no matter how dark they may be.
Penguin has a particularly important place in my own relationship with the fantastic. When I was a child—roughly seven years old—I started purchasing and collecting fantastic literature. My first purchases were paperbacks, and the two main purveyors of my collection were, almost inevitably, Editorial Bruguera in Spanish and Penguin Books in English. As a kid, I was so grateful to have these short story collections and novels in an affordable—albeit fragile—format. Reading these tales at such an early age most definitely shaped me into whatever manner of creature I am today.
The discovery of the horror tale at such an early age was fortuitous for me. This sort of tale serves, in many ways, the very same purpose as fairy tales did in our childhood: It operates as a theater of the mind in which internal conflicts are played out. In these tales we can parade the most reprehensible aspects of our being: cannibalism, incest, parricide. It allows us to discuss our anxieties and even to contemplate the experience of death in absolute safety.
And again, like a fairy tale, horror can serve as a liberating or repressive social tool, and it is always an accurate reflection of the social climate of its time and the place where it gets birthed.
* * *
In the eighteenth century, Romanticism—and with it, the Gothic tale—surged as a reaction against the suffocating dogmas of the Enlightenment. Empiricism weighed heavily upon our souls so, as the age of reason went to sleep, it produced monsters. Reason and science were being enthroned when the Gothic Romance exploded full of emotion and thrills. “The great art of life is sensation, to feel that we exist, even in pain,” said Lord Byron, enunciating a basic Romantic idea and, perhaps, hoping that goblins, ghosts, and demons provided some necessary release to a puritanical society.
The Gothic has its sights planted firmly in the past because it is there that ghosts reside. Romanesque ruins evoke, with their incomplete grandeur, the will that built them and the echoes they left behind. The innate necrophilia subjacent in the Gothic spirit is made manifest as a tribute to the eternal notion of love.
The enormous popularity of this genre produced a deluge of inferior titles and sub-Minerva Press imitations; its elements became so well-known as to be somewhat parodied in Jane Austen’s Northanger Abbey (created in direct response to Ann Radcliffe’s Gothic novels) or, more obliquely, in the Don Quixote of the Gothic genre: The Monk, by Matthew G. Lewis.
Toward the end of its run, the Gothic’s resistance to modernity gave way to a new set of devices—it began to utilize the shiny artifices of science, psychology, and other avant-garde tools to lend plausibility to its phantoms.
And it is at this point that the modern horror tale, in the hand of young, skillful, and powerful writers, starts evolving from its Gothic roots and delivers bold, very experimental works that shape the language in exciting and innovative ways.
* * *
Much like Matthew G. Lewis, who was twenty years old when he wrote The Monk, Mary Shelley was painfully young—a teenager, in fact—when she first published Frankenstein, or the Modern Prome
theus and into the monster and his tale she was able to pour all her contradictions and her questions—her essential pleas and her feelings of disfranchisement and inadequacy. The tale spoke about such profound, particular feelings that, irremediably, it became universal.
While reading the novel as a child, I was arrested by the epistolary form Shelley had chosen (and which Dracula would use to good effect many decades later), because it felt so immediate. I was overtaken by the Miltonian sense of abandonment, the absolute horror of a life without a reason. The tragedy of the tale was not dependent on evil. That’s the supreme pain of the novel—tragedy requires no villain.
Just as Poe will prefigure the ambiguities of psychiatry, Shelley utilizes the most cutting-edge science and philosophy to drive her existential discourse home. Galvanism, chemistry, and surgery provide the alibi for the monster to gain life and to arise and question all of us.
The Faust-like thirst for knowledge and the arrogance of science are embodied in the character of Victor. He becomes an uncaring god who can force dead flesh to be reanimated but cannot calculate the consequences of his creation. This leads to the infinite sorrow of his creation, who will experience the hunger, the loneliness, and the burden of existence, far removed from its creator.
And the Creature, like the wolf of St. Francis, wanders through the world, encounters mostly evil and hatred, and learns of rage and pain. He becomes hardened and lonely. And I, at age ten, in a comfortable house in a suburb, felt exactly the same way. Shelley goes deeper than many authors by refusing to impose a pattern of good and evil only as discourse (like Stevenson’s “Markheim” or Poe in “William Wilson”), but by actually weaving it into the plot.
The unnatural essence of the Creature is defined by his origins—by the god that gave him life—because Victor usurps not only the divine function of God, but also that of intercourse. Victor is barren and alone when he creates the Creature, and their final encounter brings it all full circle—they finally meet in a desolate, frozen landscape, which provides the perfect theater for the colloquy between the arid God and the abandoned Man.