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Seven Gothic Tales

3.97 of 5 stars 3.97 · rating details · 1,118 ratings · 92 reviews

Originally published in 1934, Seven Gothic Tales, the first book by "one of the finest and most singular artists of our time" (The Atlantic), is a modern classic. Here are seven exquisite tales combining the keen psychological insight characteristic of the modern short story with the haunting mystery of the nineteenth-century Gothic tale, in the tradition of writers such a...more

Paperback, 448 pages

Published December 3rd 1991 by Vintage (first published January 1st 1934)

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May 27, 2010 Elizabeth rated it 5 of 5 stars

Recommended to Elizabeth by: Meryl Streep

Shelves: 2010, reviewed, victorians-and-wannabes, fey

Isak Dinensen is a storyteller of the old school; the one where Sheherazade taught and the bard who first conjured Beowulf studied. A school devoted to craft and the understanding that there is no difference between words and magic. A storyteller of this school evokes djinns and northern witches. The dead rise and do her bidding. She tells us, as I have lived I have lost the capacity of fear. When you know what things are really like, you can make no poems about them. She can shape a tale of th...more Isak Dinensen is a storyteller of the old school; the one where Sheherazade taught and the bard who first conjured Beowulf studied. A school devoted to craft and the understanding that there is no difference between words and magic. A storyteller of this school evokes djinns and northern witches. The dead rise and do her bidding. She tells us, as I have lived I have lost the capacity of fear. When you know what things are really like, you can make no poems about them. She can shape a tale of the wonderful. Her words are spells, weaving around you like sleeping beauty’s rose bushes. In your dream -- as she raises the moon and describes the sound of ice cracking in the bay while a ghost fades in front of you -- you wonder how someone can write like this. What school of magic created this simulacrum? For surely Isak Dinensen is the construct of a sorcerer and not of a woman who had seen a great deal of life and retired to her mother’s house to write about it.

My favorite stories have always been the ones that do not strip away the fantastic, whether they conjure djinns or not. The epic cannot be just running through the streets of the city, blind with jealousy, and bitter with the taste of a woman in your mouth. All of that is required plus a meeting in the woods: stumbling into the glade and watching a goddess rise from her rest, stringing her bow as she sights your frozen form. I am not actually talking about magical realism here. I love stories in which the author doesn’t need to destroy his reader or his characters. I have no doubt the author is smarter than they are. He doesn’t need to prove it to me by giving me every feeling and every detail. I would rather have what Dinensen does here; she gives us a moment in a room with the audience watching from the wall paper as an old woman battles a valkyrie – a woman who will not marry the man her family has chosen for her. Dinensen does not tell us everything; she creates the scene, that breath before the next word, when the valkyrie knows fear, when she realizes she may lose this battle and be trapped forever. There is no ordinary in these gothic tales, for what then would be the point then of telling them? They are of people she might have known in a village in her native Denmark or people she observed on the boat heading to Africa or characters she imagined reading of a far-off place she had never seen, but they all breathe like they are standing next to you. They are real but in no way ordinary. She suggests that to lose the ability to create a poem, you have lost all wonder in the ways of people. She creates her characters not to control them but to see where they will go.

I have a yellowing paperback copy of this book from the seventies that I picked up for a dollar when I was in high school. I still have it. It’s one of a dozen books I still have from before I left for college. I read it when I first bought it and not since although I’ve read her other books, all but one of the short story collections. I’ve now carried it about ten thousand miles over the years, based only on that first impression. All those times I’ve had to give books up to a new and deserving home, I’ve always kept this one, this yellowy, decaying paperback. Reading it now, I do not understand how I forgot the images that she created. All I remembered when I tracked down the exact same edition for a friend here was that they were like nothing else I had ever read then or have read since then. Reading these stories now was difficult because every paragraph gave me another image that I wanted to capture or an idea I wanted to write down and explore on my own. I don’t know how she didn’t collapse under the weight of what she was building.

I don’t know that these stories are for everyone. The fantastic, which she draws out in each story, doesn’t always appeal to those who want grime, dirt, and bleeding emotion. I am not that type of reader. I do not like to be dictated to. Dinensen gives me choices. She shows me possibilities. She encourages me to question reality. She casts haunting enchantments before me and I am spellbound.
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Jun 21, 2010 Kelly rated it 5 of 5 stars

Recommended to Kelly by: Elizabeth

Shelves: fiction, goth-goth-baby, 20th-century-early-to-mid, identity-crisis, the-continent, owned, woundedsoulsandfragileflowers, grand-opera

“But as to names and places, and the conditions in the countries which it all took place, and which may seem very strange to you, I will give you no explanation. You must take in whatever you can, and leave the rest outside. It is not a bad thing in a tale that you understand only half of it.”
- Dinesen, “The Dreamers”

This is the attitude with which one must approach the stories of Isak Dinesen. It’s that or you’re never going to finish this book. As several of her characters protest to us: “To...more

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Mar 28, 2008 Capitu rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2008

These tales are like nothing I have read before. Isak Dinessen’s – nom de plume of Karen Blixen – narration feels like a walk through a labyrinth, where the unfolding story thread makes sharp turns, leads us into dead ends and dark corners, until finally we emerge on the other side a bit unsure of the place we have been. Like in a dream, one story merges into another, taking us along into deeper realms. And, with hypnotic powers, the narrator’s voice enchants and enslaves us.

I absolutely loved...more

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Aug 23, 2012 Alta added it · review of another edition

(Modern Library, 1994; 1st pub. 1934)

I owe my acquaintance with Isak Dinesen to Carmela Ciuraru’s Nom de Plume. This is how I found out that Dinesen is the pen name of Danish Baroness Blixen, who wrote in English and lived most of her life in Kenya (she is the author of the famous Out of Africa).

I haven’t read any other book by Dinesen, but Seven Gothic Tales is one of the most extraordinary collections of stories and novellas I have ever read. It is very rare for a writer to display such a mast...more

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Mar 21, 2011 Mazel rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: contes

partenariat blog-o-book...

Le raz de marée de Norderney
Le vieux chevalier errant
Le singe
Sur la route de Pise
La soirée d'Elseneur
Les rêveurs
Le poète

Empruntant un masque masculin, la baronne Blixen
avait d'abord publié les Sept Contes gothiques sous le nom d'Isak Dinesen en 1935. Le sortilège ici est d'une nature singulière, animé de personnages réalistes sur fond d'aventures vécues, mais où le naturel confine au délire, où le fantastique chevauche le réel, franchissant avec désinvolture des limites...more

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Aug 19, 2011 Rachel rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: scandinavia, the-romantic-agony, stories-within-stories

So interesting! I'm not quite sure what to make of this book yet - perhaps I never well. The nearest things I can compare it to, in density and beauty and strangeness, are the stories of Henrich von Kleist - Kleist and Blixen have a similar narrative voice, this way of talking of the odd and wondrous as though it is unremarkable, a similar, smooth, winding way of leading their plots. But Blixen sounds much more like the eighteenth century British gothics than Kleist does (interesting, since Klei...more

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Mar 31, 2012 Cody VC rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

3.5 stars. stand-outs were 'the old chevalier,' 'the roads round pisa,' and 'the poet.' honorable mention to 'the deluge at norderny.' reading these was a bit like looking through an old photo album where the people look familiar but their names are gone, and you wish you could talk with them because with faces like those they must have led interesting lives--only here you can talk with them, and they've got almost too many names for you to remember and each story they tell is taller than the la...more

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Jan 14, 2013 Jane rated it 5 of 5 stars

Traveling alone in a strange country, as you pass through a dark pine woods, you see an abandoned, half-ruined castle through the trees. Entering it, and walking through hallways hung with faded crimson and paved with black marble, you catch a glimpse of yourself in a tarnished mirror. But another face looks back at you, skeletal. In a great hall, upon a stage, tattered golden curtains are drawn back and many-coloured marionettes come forward. The story has begun. This is the world of Isak Dines...more

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Jun 19, 2012 Evelyn rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: fantasy, historical, realistic, 2012-summer

I wanted to like this collection a lot, since Winter's Tales made such an impression on me. Alas, these stories didn't appeal to me as much. The writing was still excellent, yes, though I took great issue with the passage in "The Monkey" where Boris thinks that women hate the sea. From her writing you can tell that Dinesen loves the sea - why would she write such a passage? Maybe I will find a reason to reconcile those blasphemous words. The ending of "The Old Chevalier" was legitimately creepy,...more

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Aug 17, 2012 D. Morgenstern rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: favorites, reviewed

This was an unexpected treasure, for unfortunately I always find literary soul mates amongst the dead, and I was surprised and pleased to find a female author who subtlety defies expected depictions of women.

Isak Diensen is the male pen name for Karen Blixen, a Danish woman who married a British man and owned an African coffee plantation for some years. This pastiche of cultures is present in the work as tales range from Demark to Northern Africa, though the tales are all focused on the gothic g...more

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May 05, 2009 Bruce rated it 3 of 5 stars

Who has not been charmed and haunted by the opening line of Isak Dinesen’s Out of Africa: “I had a farm in Africa, at the foot of the Ngong hills…”? That was the only work of Dinesen (the pseudonym of Karen Blixen) that I had previously read, and I was interested to read her earlier work, Seven Gothic Tales, which has long languished on my bookshelf. The latter is a collection of several long short stories, or short novellas, each with a surprising and even disconcerting twist. Each is well writ...more

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Dec 02, 2011 Birgit Alsinger rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Far too gothic for me, I loved "Babettes Feast" and "Out of Africa" but these seven story were really, really hard to finish, found my thoughts drifting away all the time.

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Dec 21, 2008 Val marked it as to-read · review of another edition

Shelves: literature, fiction, short-stories

I own a 1934 edition of the Modern Library edition published by Random House. VINTAGE!!!

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Jan 22, 2012 YiShun rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Any book that feels like it was "worth it in the end" isn't a good read during the actual reading. This was too layered for my taste: inset stories were everywhere; extraneous details and plots made my head spin; melodrama abounded. Potentially, these are hall,arks of the era in which Dinesen (Karen Blixen, she of _Out of Africa_ fame) was writing.
Am I glad I read it? Do I feel accomplished? Sure. Would I have been able to complete it on my own, if I didn't have a grade and a discussion for cla...more

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Aug 15, 2011 Bev Hankins rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: gothic, fiction

Seven Gothic Tales by Isak Dinesen (Karen Blixen) has been a very difficult read for me. Gothic novels are not, by rights, my usual reading fare but I was drawn to this book by the very intriguing Introduction written by Dorothy Canfield. So, I grabbed it right up at the Friends of the Library Booksale. And then, when I gave into temptation and signed up for the Gothic Reading Challenge, it seemed only natural to add this one to the list. My goodness, I didn't know what I was letting myself in f...more Seven Gothic Tales by Isak Dinesen (Karen Blixen) has been a very difficult read for me. Gothic novels are not, by rights, my usual reading fare but I was drawn to this book by the very intriguing Introduction written by Dorothy Canfield. So, I grabbed it right up at the Friends of the Library Booksale. And then, when I gave into temptation and signed up for the Gothic Reading Challenge, it seemed only natural to add this one to the list. My goodness, I didn't know what I was letting myself in for.

The seven tales are very uneven. The first, "The Deluge at Norderney," is brilliant. The descriptions of the flood and the plight of the people along the coast are very striking. The tales told by the small group left to their fate in the old barn draw the reader in and hold her captive. I was completely taken in by the final twist.

"The Monkey" is one of the tales that I would say is more gothic than most. It reminds me of some of Poe's best work. And there is an element of the supernatural involved. More spine-tingling than the others.

And then there is "The Supper at Elsinore"--a true ghost story that tells the tale of a lost brother and the two sisters who essential died when he did. The meeting of the three siblings is a very interesting take on the standard visit from the departed.

The final story that held any interest for me was "The Dreamers." Following the storyline was a bit rough...it was almost, but not quite like stream of consciousness writing. Lincoln would just start telling his tale and then he'd insert little asides. A more straight-forward telling would have been more to my taste, but the central nugget--who the mysterious woman was and what finally happened to her was worth a bit of wading in the "stream."

Dinesen is a very descriptive author. Sometimes too much so. But in the stories mentioned, she does her best job and the descriptions serve the tales well. The descriptions did not, however, produce quite the gothic feel that I was expecting--and this was particularly true in the remaining stories from the collection. She also is at her best when telling the story straight rather than following little side-stories as happens more often than necessary. I would love to be able to say more about this one, but I have been reading it off and on for so long that I've lost some of my earliest thoughts (that'll teach me to take notes). Not quite my cup of tea...three stars overall, with most of that rating being due to the four stories highlighted. (less)

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Dec 01, 2009 Erik Simon rated it 5 of 5 stars

I confess: I had avoided her because of the movie OUT OF AFRICA. I didn't hate the movie, but I did have difficulty imagining that I'd appreciate anything written by a woman whose novel fostered a Redford/Streep love story. But goodreads friend Mike Emmons, a man with impeccable taste, spoke so highly of this book that I thought I'd give it a shot. It is difficult for me to put into words just how imaginative, intelligent and beautifully written these stories are. I shall be reading more and mor...more

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Apr 30, 2013 Clare rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I suspect that this is a book I will have to re-read in the future. I had to put it down many times just to try and remember all the twisting and turning threads that spilled over from one story to another. Don't be mislead by the title - this isn't simply seven gothic yarns but rather a great coiling mass of tales coiled up upon one another. As soon as you are consumed by one you will find yourself chewed up and spat out by others. Tales within tales within tales within tales - it can be a litt...more I suspect that this is a book I will have to re-read in the future. I had to put it down many times just to try and remember all the twisting and turning threads that spilled over from one story to another. Don't be mislead by the title - this isn't simply seven gothic yarns but rather a great coiling mass of tales coiled up upon one another. As soon as you are consumed by one you will find yourself chewed up and spat out by others. Tales within tales within tales within tales - it can be a little dizzying.

I suppose that this is a book about reading, writing and story telling - echoes flit between one story and another. A girl may be observed in a mirror in one story before observing herself in the same mirror in another entirely different tale - out of time and space. A character may stalk between different narrators and narratives each where they have cast themselves the hero where they are surely walk on parts. Nobody is who they say they are. No story is what it says it is - notably in "The Monkey" where uproariously the real story begins just as the narrative ends. Hamlet seems to ink up the margins as if all stories live cheek by jowl with one another bleeding over into one another's business - a courtier named Guildenstern may appear or a ghost story set in Elsinore will wryly announce itself before deciding it is something else entirely. Goethe is paraphrased and borrowed - "The Poet" seems to walk into scenery just vacated from Elective Affinities. Even, and surely Dinesen is playing with us here, the story of Echo and Narcissus will be, well yes, echoed.

Gothic? I suppose they are in the manner that a fairground mirror reflects back a distorted and disturbed reality. These are fairy tales and yet they are utterly prosaic. They are about witches and sorceresses or simply confused madmen suffering delusions of grandeur. Pragmatic magic or magical pragmatism - whatever it is it is confusing, frustrating, disorientating and absolutely marvellous.(less)

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Aug 19, 2012 William rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: 20-ce, denmark, fiction, stories

1. The first story, "The Deluge at Norderney," proceeds largely by way of monologues. It is set in the 1830s at a resort island off the northern coast of Germany, Norderney. A once in a hundred years storm occurs which requires the evacuation of the spa and surrounding farmsteads. Eventually we find ourselves with four characters in the loft of a farmhouse where they must await rescue with the water ever rising. Will they survive until morning when a boat is expected to rescue them? It is in thi...more 1. The first story, "The Deluge at Norderney," proceeds largely by way of monologues. It is set in the 1830s at a resort island off the northern coast of Germany, Norderney. A once in a hundred years storm occurs which requires the evacuation of the spa and surrounding farmsteads. Eventually we find ourselves with four characters in the loft of a farmhouse where they must await rescue with the water ever rising. Will they survive until morning when a boat is expected to rescue them? It is in this context that everyone's convoluted history is revealed. Some of the writing here is cryptic, I should say opaque, such as the early musings of Miss Nat-og-Dag, "a maiden lady of great wealth." The old Cardinal, Hamilcar von Sehestedt, a favorite of the pope in his youth, is loaded with wisdom of an all too undoctrinal nature. The two young people in the loft, Calypso and Jonathan, each have their own rich stories to tell, too.

2. "The Old Chevalier" is told by an elderly yet still fashionable gentleman at some evening gathering of a group of younger men. It is the winter of 1874; the chevalier, a young man then, emerges onto a Parisian boulevard in the rain after his lover has tried to poison him. One can guess at his startled and benumbed state of mind. On the street he is approached by a "young drunken woman" who he proceeds to take home, viewing her as some Gift of Providence meant to get him through a rough patch. Slowly he undresses her. As he does so the narrative is interrupted by an ever so elegant disquisition on the changing nature of women during his adult years--not just changes in their dress, which is vividly discussed , that's only the point of departure, but their roles as "keeper of the mystery" that is Woman, too. Beautifully told and my favorite of the two stories so far.

3. "The Monkey" is set in the early 1800s in a "Lutheran country of Northern Europe." A young officer, Boris, in trouble with certain ecclesiastics at court for his libertine ways, travels in haste to a cloister run by an aunt to seek her help in getting married. The Prioress recommends a nearby woman, one Athena, daughter of Count Hopballehus. Yes, the intended's name does foreshadow somewhat her athletic rejection of the nephew, but it does not--cannot--prepare us for the wild scenes that follow in which both the aunt and nephew press their suit. The aunt's pet monkey, which has been away from the cloister for some weeks on an annual lark, returns at the height of negotiations to turn matters on their ear. Hints of Ovid.

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Apr 28, 2008 Dfordoom rated it 5 of 5 stars

I read the first four stories in Isak Dinesen’s Seven Gothic Tales several years ago. I have no idea why I then put the book aside, since I liked those stories quite a bit. I’ve now read the last three tales, and I’m even more impressed. Isak Dinesen is probably better known today under her real name, Karen Blixen, thanks to the success of the movie version of her book Out of Africa. Seven Gothic Tales, published in 1934 when she was 49 years old, was her first book. Oddly enough, although she w...more I read the first four stories in Isak Dinesen’s Seven Gothic Tales several years ago. I have no idea why I then put the book aside, since I liked those stories quite a bit. I’ve now read the last three tales, and I’m even more impressed. Isak Dinesen is probably better known today under her real name, Karen Blixen, thanks to the success of the movie version of her book Out of Africa. Seven Gothic Tales, published in 1934 when she was 49 years old, was her first book. Oddly enough, although she was Danish she wrote in English. She then translated them herself into Danish. Even more confusingly, her books were published in some countries under the name Isak Dinesen and in other countries under her own name.

Although they are described as gothic tales don’t expect the usual gothic clichés (although ghosts do make an occasional appearance). In some ways her writing resembles that of the magic realists, but it’s a very subtle kind of magic realism. Odd things sometimes happen, but they’re never bizarre or spectacular odd things. They’re just enough to let you know that Dinesen has no interest in the kinds of naturalism or social realism that were approved by literary critics at the time she started writing. Her plots are intricate and often involve stories within stories, or in the case of The Dreamers stories within stories within stories. She is fascinated by the stories we tell about ourselves, and the way we define our personalities according to the way others perceive us. The Supper at Elsinore tells of two sisters and the brother who disappeared many years before. From time to time they hear tales of him, tales which may or may not be true. In his absence he dominates their lives to a greater extent than he could ever have done by his presence. The Poet is the story of a man who, when young, had literary ambitions of his own. He has now abandoned ideas of writing and seeks to fulfil those ambitions by nurturing a young poet, and by creating this young man as his own invention, as a kind of work of art. The Dreamers, a magnificent story, unfolds like a series of Chinese nested boxes, and tells the story of a woman who may or may not be three other women. Seven Gothic Tales was a stunning literary debut, and I can’t recommend it too highly.
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Aug 06, 2007 Larissa added it

Shelves: scandinavian-nordic, short-stories, 2007, danish

Having read the first few stories in Seven Gothic Tales, I'm happy to report that the hype around Dinesen is well deserved. Relating her tales as well-wrought tangents--elliptical anecdotes nested inside one another, ever expanding to the bigger picture--Dinesen not only provides a conversant fabric and background for her characters, but also taps into the spontaneous, memory-triggering quality of oral storytelling.

"The Chevalier's Tale" is particularly indicative of this: The storyteller (who...more

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Jul 10, 2010 DoctorM rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: short-story-collections, modern-lit

People do forget--- Dinesen had a life and career of which "Out of Africa" and the legendary farm at the foot of the Ngong Hills was only a part. "Seven Gothic Tales" collects a range of her short stories, most set in mid-19th-c. Denmark, though with excursions ("The Dreamers", "The Roads Around Parma") to the coasts of Kenya and Italy just after 1848... The writing is intricate, lovely, haunting. There are few clear endings here, few easily-solved problems. The atmosphere is one of melancholy a...more

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Oct 01, 2011 Ingrid rated it 3 of 5 stars

Read for my Danish Bookclub. Karen Blixen is a very talented and intelligent writer. The difficulty for me lay in that I do not understand French nor have I read the vast majority of the classics. She refers to these often and phrases that seemingly are key are written in French. Like the last sentence in the Deluge ... French ... what was the punch line? Beautiful prose and haunting insights and subtle nuances ...

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Jun 29, 2012 Eaycrigg rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: 501

This may be my favorite book. Dinesen has an unparalleled imagination that keeps the reader's boredom at bay through all seven stories. Many of the seven stories had a twist ending, something that I didn't necessarily feel they needed to be good but it convinced me of Dinesen's artistry. What I found most charming about her writing style, however, was the metaphysical musings sprinkled throughout.

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Jun 03, 2011 Florence rated it 5 of 5 stars

This author brilliantly captures the power of the imagination. Each tale contains suspense, intrigue, violence and a strong, unconventional woman. The narrative contains many twists and turns and a close reading is required to absorb the full beauty of the words. At times, I felt at a loss, not being schooled in Greek mythology, Italian, German or French. Blixen is remarkable erudite.

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Oct 22, 2009 David rated it 5 of 5 stars

Each tale is like a polished jewel, very gothic and yet very modern at the same time, and much food for thought. 'The Supper at Elsinore' I enjoyed the most. I finished the book late last night, with a bottle of red wine, in front of the fire, in an empty house (S is off on a field trip), before going to bed.

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Aug 04, 2011 Raphaël added it · review of another edition

très inégal, je n'ai pas réussi à aller au bout de certains contes, l'écriture m'a ennuyé, mais quand même de beaux passages qui transmettent bien une atmosphère particulière que certains considéreront peut-être comme gothique (pas évident pour ma part...)

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Jan 16, 2010 Anna rated it 2 of 5 stars

Shelves: college, short-stories, scandinavia

Actually I only read one of the short stories in this book which is called "The monkey", but as it was not published separately, I thought I'd add the whole thing.

I doubt, that I'll read the complete book any time soon, though - I didn't particulary like "The Monkey"...

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Nov 25, 2011 Laura rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: folklore, ghost-stories, short-stories, mythology

This book is a tidy collection of magical stories steeped in folklore and myths...fairy tales with an edge, yet there is a poetic tenderness in the telling, even where there is brutality. I filtered through this book, one story at a time, using them as a passage between novels, the seven pieces tucked in between books like Janet Frame's "Scented Gardens for the Blind" and Paula Fox's "Desperate Characters", Cristina Garcia's "Dreaming In Cuban" and Vanessa Veselka's "Zazen"; Kio Stark's "Follow...more

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Nov 12, 2011 Nancy rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: scandinavia, horror, anthology, short-stories, fiction

***1/2
With the popularity of supernatural books right now, this one first published in 1934, fits right in. I became interested in the author after seeing Meryl Streep portray her in the film “Out Of Africa,” and read this book shortly after seeing the movie.

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Jan 26, 2011 Mely rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: historical-fiction, contemporary-fiction, sff, short-stories

I think I'd like to be Isak Dinesen when I grow up. Well, without the racism, the weird gender issues, and the syphilis. And I can pass on the African farm. But the stories. Oh, yes. I'd like those.

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About Karen Blixen

Karen Christence Dinesen, Baroness Blixen-Finecke - wrote as Isak Dinesen, Pierre Andrézel, other pseudonyms: Tania Blixen, Osceola, etc.
A Danish writer, who mixed in her work supernatural elements, aestheticism, and erotic undertones with an aristocratic view of life, Blixen always emphasized that she was a storyteller in the traditional, oral sense of the word. She drew her inspiration from the...more

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Quotes from Seven Gothic Tales

“Do you know a cure for me?"

Why yes," he said, "I know a cure for everything. Salt water."

Salt water?" I asked him.

Yes," he said, "in one way or the other. Sweat, or tears, or the salt sea.” — 276 people liked it

“The cure for anything is salt water - tears, sweat, or the sea.” — 145 people liked it

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title link	preview: Seven Gothic Tales
avg rating	preview: Seven Gothic Tales Goodreads rating: 3.97 (1118 ratings)
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BBCode	[url=http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/669305.Seven_Gothic_Tales?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_book][img]http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1348531032l/669305.jpg[/img][/url] [url=http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/669305.Seven_Gothic_Tales?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_book]Seven Gothic Tales by Karen Blixen[/url]

Seven Gothic Tales

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