Christopher Tuthill's Blog, page 2

The Refugee by Jane Rice (1943)

Jane Rice wrote many science fiction and horror tales during the Golden Age of science fiction; The Refugee is one of them, first published in Unknown Worlds, a magazine edited by the legendary John Campbell, in October 1943.

Unknown Worlds, October 1943

This story has a real pulp feel to it—the heroine, Milli, is in some meager circumstances in wartime France, dreaming of better days, when a naked young man appears in her garden. She is intrigued by him, and befriends him when he reappears the next day, even after we learn that a mysterious and brutal murder of a neighbor has happened the night before. Sounds like a bad idea, but Milli is undeterred. The young man eyes her hungrily and Milli finds him quite appealing, leading to some sensual dialogue and imagery. Milli leads him inside and they have an encounter that is not what you might expect; the twist ending is comical and left me wanting to read more by Rice.

This is another one that I found in American Fantastic, the Library of America collection. Editor Peter Straub really outdid himself with this two volume set, it belongs in the library of every horror/fantasy reader. He brings together a real treasury of gothic tales, some quite well known, and others that deserve a wide audience.

Jeff Shaara in Poughkeepsie

Yesterday my son and I were lucky to see Jeff Shaara, the historian and novelist, speak on his book Rise to Rebellion, the first of his two novels of the American Revolution. The books are terrific reads centered around some of the main players in the revolution, including Franklin, Adams, Washington, Jefferson, and others. Like his father, Michael, who wrote the Pulitzer winning classic The Killer Angels about Gettysburg (and which Jeff continued in two gripping books to complete a civil war trilogy), Jeff does a lot of research for his books and uses painstaking historical details to tell the story through the point of view of these characters. It truly makes history come alive in a way that general readers as well as history buffs will savor. My son, who is a well-read thirteen-year-old, loves Shaara’s books as well, and has read a number of them, including one on World War II and his most recent book on the Cuban missile crisis. Shaara also said that his newest book, due next May, is told from the point of view of Lincoln, starting in 1861 and ending in 1863; I’m sure my son and I will be picking up that one as well.

After a lively talk in which Shaara went over some of the details of these historical figures, there were some great questions from the audience about his writing process, and his thoughts on various historical events. He pointed out that while he understood why no one really writes much in popular fiction about someone like Robert E Lee anymore, he felt that it is a mistake to simply ignore or try to erase such historical figures. In a book like Gods and Generals, he showed Lee as the flawed man he was, and Shaara does a great service with work like this. It’s unhelpful to simply view Lee as an evil traitor, or on the other hand, as a noble son of the South. Instead, Shaara paints a picture of an imperfect man who, while acting gallantly in the eyes of the south, committed treason in the eyes of the North. He certainly made some choices that led down a destructive path, for a cause that was indeed evil. Yet it helps to put these actions in the context of the events through which Lee lived, to better understand what happened. But these days, most of us in this country don’t want nuance.

Shaara was also asked his opinion of the current state of the United States, since this event was part of the celebrations that are taking place as part of the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence. He said what many in the auditorium were feeling, that we are in a very dark time, and that he feared what the future may hold.

If you enjoy history, or even if you don’t, you ought to read some of his books. You can start anywhere, but since we’re at that 250th anniversary, I’d suggest starting with Rise to Rebellion and the Boston massacre. It’s a great book, and a timely way to learn some things about our history that you may not know. It may even inspire you to do some things to help make sure this republic of ours survives through these perilous times for more anniversaries.

Thanks to the Poughkeepsie Public library for hosting this event. This was our second time seeing Mr. Shaara—he is usually at Gettysburg on every anniversary of the battle, and we saw him there last year on a family trip.

In Dark New England Days by Sarah Orne Jewett (1890)

Sarah Orne Jewett is a Maine writer known for tales like The Country of Pointed Firs, A White Heron, and numerous short stories and poems that bring the region to life. One of the really interesting things about reading her books is that not only do you get a sense of what Maine was like in the late 1800s, you also get to hear the way people spoke, the diction and accent that they had. If you’re traveling in Maine you will still hear an accent that differs from other regions of the country, and even other areas in New England and the northeast. As time goes on and people are more apt to move around, these kinds of accents are being lost, but you can still hear it when you travel off the beaten path.

“In Dark New England Days” is a gothic story with a deep sense of doom and foreboding from the beginning. We are introduced to the sad case of the three Knowles sisters, ‘Closed-mouth old maids’ who spent their lives taking care of their cruel old father who has now died of a stroke. Mercifully, from the sounds of the story, as one character declares: “The old Cap’n kept ’em child’n long as he lived, an’ then they was too old to l’arn different.” His body is on display in their home–quite macabre by today’s standards, but more commonplace when the story was written. Even so, it is enough to give you the creeps from the opening lines of the story.

On the evening he dies, the sisters, Betsy, Hannah, and Susan, pull out an old chest belonging to their dead father, who had been a seafaring man, and learn that he’d been hoarding gold his whole life, though they lived in abject poverty. They are ecstatic with their new wealth and for the first time in many years they seem to have hope. Yet even as they stare at their gold: “He stopped to listen, came nearer, stopped again, and then crept close to the old house. He stepped upon the banking, next the window with the warped shutter; there was a knot-hole in it high above the women’s heads, towards the top. As they leaned over the chest, an eager eye watched them.”

The next morning, the money is gone: “The sisters had been rich for one night; in the morning they waked to find themselves poor with a bitter pang of poverty of which they had never dreamed.” They blame a neighbor with whom their father had a feud: Enoch Holt, and take him to court. He escapes without a guilty verdict, but not before Hannah Knowles stands before the court and declares: “Curse your right hand, then!” cried Hannah Knowles, growing tall and thin like a white flame drawing upward. “Curse your right hand, yours and all your folks’ that follow you! May I live to see the day!”

It is a chilling scene, and an awful declaration. The misery with which the sisters lived under their tyrant of a father is only made worse by the cruelty of the theft. But as in any good gothic tale, there are some fates worse than death, some things worse even than a sad, lonely life of poverty. I don’t wish to give away the ending, so I highly recommend reading this story and some others by Jewett.

Today we are not without plenty of so-called horror movies, gore-fests and plenty of over-the-top films and television to give us superficial scares. In my view, stories like this one do the job in a much more convincing, chilling fashion. The tale sets you up and gets its hooks in and doesn’t let go.

Interview With the Vampire by Anne Rice (1976)

“God kills, and so shall we; indiscriminately He takes the richest and the poorest, and so shall we; for no creatures under God are as we are, none so like Him as ourselves, dark angels not confined to the stinking limits of hell but wandering His earth and all its kingdoms.”

Anne Rice’s achievement in this book, among other things, was to bring vampires into a more modern context. It’s also such a well-written book that even people who don’t normally care for horror will find themselves up late turning the pages of this tale. The story of Louis and Lestat is well known by genre fans by now, but in 1976, it was something new and different. What would it be like if a vampire were stalking modern day America? How would such a creature survive? They’re immortal, after all, so what would a vampire’s life trajectory look like? How would it navigate society without causing alarm?

Rice set out to answer these and many other questions about her antihero, and readers responded to the tune of eight million copies sold; Rice has sold over 100 million copies of her other works, including the rest of the Vampire Chronicles, which this book spawned.

I really enjoyed the way this one got into the details of vampire life and the day-to-day troubles of such creatures. For example, when unable to find human prey, they’ll kill whatever small animals are at hand, including rats. Gross, and also not something I would have considered.  But what really made this book work for me was the relationship between Louis and Lestat. Since vampires live forever, they eventually have disagreements with one another and fall out, which makes perfect sense. In a way they are tragic figures, though they’re predators. Doomed to live forever and have no one truly know them, they form intense bonds with each other, but eventually things go wrong. Immortality in this world is more like a curse.

Interview was made into a successful movie, and more recently, a television show, as well as comic adaptations. Rice went on to write many more books in her Vampire Chronicles until her death in 2021.

Coheed and Cambria

I’m an old RUSH fan super excited by their recent reunion announcement, and so I’m the perfect audience for a band like Coheed and Cambria. A friend of mine has been raving about them for years, but it was only a couple of months ago that I finally took the plunge and started listening. I’ve bought two albums and will eventually get them all. It is so cool to see a progressive band like this doing so well.

I have very limited time, and so I usually stick to my favorite bands from earlier eras, (Jethro Tull, RUSH, YES, Led Zeppelin, The Who, ELP, King Crimson, Dylan and Tom Petty and The Kinks and so on) with a few newer ones sprinkled in here and there. Sometime around the birth of my children, and having the demands of family and my job, I kind of lost the ability to know much about new music, but these guys are so good. The epic science fiction story of The Amory Wars, (for the uninitiated, every album is set in this universe) the amazing riffs and energy of these albums, it’s fantastic. I feel like there should be some kind of rare band act passed by congress to protect these guys. They’re so great. I’m glad younger people have a modern day Rush they can follow. My kids are already singing along in the minivan.

I’ve read a couple of the omnibus comics and am getting into the story a bit, as well. I love how the comic books enhance the whole experience; it’s incredibly ambitious and also such a cool thing for fans to get into. As a teen, one of my favorite things to do was to get a new album by RUSH or some other progressive rock band and spend hours listening, reading the lyrics, looking at the artwork, all of that. I still do that when Jethro Tull or some other favorite band of mine releases a new album, or re-re-releases old ones with dozens of unearthed tracks. It’s more than just listening to songs; it’s an entire experience, and Coheed and Cambria is carrying on this glorious tradition.

I may not have been able to get Rush tickets, but I’ll be sure and try to see these guys the next time they’re touring near me.

A Good Man is Hard to Find by Flannery O’Connor (1953)

“You can do one thing or you can do another, kill a man or take a tire off his car, because sooner or later you’re going to forget what it was you done and just be punished for it.”

One of the most anthologized and well-regarded short stories of the last century, A Good Man is Hard to Find, like some of the other stories on this list, deserves its towering reputation. O’Connor was a master of the short story, and this tale is one of the most shocking gothic stories I’ve ever read. I can still recall the palpable dread I felt as I first read it many years ago in a college class on the short story.

This tale involves a family that is out for a drive when unspeakable violence occurs, but there is plenty of foreshadowing, with the grandmother mentioning the ‘loss of values’ in the modern world; she also points out a graveyard filled with slaves from a bygone era. She remembers that there was a plantation in the area, and convinces her son, Bailey, to take a turn onto a deserted road, where the family has a sudden accident, flipping their car, and are met by the “Misfit,” a terrifying killer.

This tale is suffused with the south, and with notions of God and the possibilities of salvation and grace. The grandmother attempts to placate the Misfit, who clearly means the family harm, saying he is one of her ‘babies,’ and touches his shoulder. But there’s no salvation here for anyone, it seems.

I think it is best to read something like this, with such a well-known reputation, with an open mind. It’s better not to seek out or think too much about any of the criticism of it at first, just read it. It will probably leave you feeling desolate, as some of the very best horror stories tend to do.

Flannery O’Connor wrote two novels and thirty-one short stories and is considered one of the great American writers of the 20th century. Sadly, she was ill with Lupus and died at just 39. Who knows what she may have achieved had she lived longer; as it is, she left behind an amazing legacy.

The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman (1892)

“I really have discovered something at last. Through watching so much at night, when it changes so, I have finally found out. The front pattern does move – and no wonder! The woman behind shakes it! Sometimes I think there are a great many women behind, and sometimes only one, and she crawls around fast, and her crawling shakes it all over. Then in the very bright spots she keeps still, and in the very shady spots she just takes hold of the bars and shakes them hard. And she is all the time trying to climb through. But nobody could climb through that pattern – it strangles so; I think that is why it has so many heads.”

This story has been analyzed in myriad ways and is considered an important work of feminist literature. It’s a chronicle of a mental breakdown; a woman is suffering from ‘a slight hysterical tendency’ according to her physician husband, following the birth of her child. She spends the story confined to an upstairs room at a country estate and comes to believe that a woman is trapped behind the yellow wallpaper in the room.

On reading the story, you end up infuriated by the woman’s husband, and sympathetic toward her plight, but the way Gilman describes her experience through a series of journal entries also makes the story quite memorable. Her slow descent into madness is told with convincing, disturbing detail.

Gilman suffered from postpartum depression, so this story has been read with this in mind. At the time, a ‘rest cure’ was administered for treatment, which only made things worse for her, so she stopped the treatment and resumed writing, later saying that she feared a mental breakdown had she continued to follow the doctor’s cure. Gilman instead followed the advice of a female doctor, Mary Putnam Jacobi, who argued against such rest. Much has been written about Gilman and her pioneering story, for those interested, your local library will have plenty of information about her life.

The Turn of the Screw, by Henry James (1898)

“The summer had turned, the summer had gone; the autumn had dropped upon Bly and had blown out half our lights. The place, with its gray sky and withered garlands, its bared spaces and scattered dead leaves, was like a theater after the performance–all strewn with crumpled playbills.”

The Turn of the Screw is one of the most influential, classic horror tales ever written; everyone ought to read it. It’s a gothic story of a haunting at a British country estate, and the reader is never sure whether the ghosts are real or imagined. The story is told through a frame of a man reading a manuscript of a governess who believes that the children in her charge are being haunted by the ghosts of two former employees of the estate.

I find that the presence of children in fiction will usually increase the tension, and in a well written story like this one, you feel quite concerned for the children, worried that they are either being haunted, or being cared for by someone who is unstable and not up to the task. Either way, the sadness of these children, who are seemingly ignored by their parents, is something I couldn’t shake when I read this story. It was such a disturbing tale because of everything left to the reader’s imagination. In my opinion, this is usually the way to scare the reader far more than the usual genre tropes.

James was as prolific and famous as an author can be, and his reputation rests on a number of well known works, including Daisy Miller, Wings of the Dove, Portrait of a Lady, and The Golden Bowl, to name just a few. But it is Turn of the Screw that I always think of first, and I think this is likely true of other readers. It has been adapted no less than twenty-eight times, with numerous film versions, an opera by Benjamin Britten, various stage adaptations, and new adaptations still being made today. There’s something about this unsettling story that has deeply resonated with readers for more than a century.

Frankenstein by Mary Shelley (1818)

‘Hateful day when I received life!’ I exclaimed in agony. ‘Accursed creator! Why did you form a monster so hideous that even you turned from me in disgust? God, in pity, made man beautiful and alluring, after his own image; but my form is a filthy type of yours, more horrid even from the very resemblance. Satan had his companions, fellow-devils, to admire and encourage him; but I am solitary and abhorred.’

The first ever horror and science fiction novel, first published in 1818, when Mary Shelley was just twenty years old, Frankenstein has a reputation that has been as long lasting as it is deserved. A beautifully written tale that began as a legendary writing contest between Shelley, her husband Percy, Byron, Dr. John Polidori, and others who were spending a summer together in Geneva, Frankenstein bears little resemblance to the monster most of us recognize from the many film adaptations that we’ve seen through the decades.

The monster is philosophical and brilliant, almost superhuman, and the real villains are those in the story who judge him by his ghastly appearance. There are as many interpretations of the work as there are film adaptations: a warning against humans playing God, the irresponsible Victor whose thirst for knowledge leads to catastrophe, the humans who judge the creature by how hideous he is. Several chapters in the book deal with a family of poor, blind people who treat Frankenstein with care and respect because they cannot see him. It’s written in a beautifully poetic style, was immediately successful, and still finds new and enthusiastic readers today.

There are a few different versions of the book, which Shelley revised in 1831, but most scholars prefer the earlier edition. Shelley had a very difficult early life, losing her famous mother when she was just a few weeks old. Her father, also a well-known intellectual, remarried a woman with whom Mary had a very difficult relationship. Under these circumstances it seems a miracle she was able to write such a classic. Her husband, the famous Romantic poet, also caused a scandal when he left his wife for Mary, and had numerous affairs.

I could write a lengthy essay about this book and its influence and various interpretations, but I’m by no means an expert on her; countless scholars have already done that better than I could, and the purpose of my blog this month is to offer a few thoughts on some of my favorite horror novels. This is an essential one that everyone ought to read. It’s one of the great novels in literary history, a book that will help you understand where the genre came from.

I Am Legend by Richard Matheson (1954)

Richard Matheson’s I Am Legend is a book that may be overlooked by fans of vampires and zombies, but it’s one of the originals of the genre, inspiring three direct adaptations in addition to an entire industry dedicated to post-apocalyptic monster stories. Written in 1954, and set in 1976, it’s the story of Robert Neville, one of the last humans left alive after a pandemic that has killed most of the world population and turned the survivors (aside from him) into vampire-like creatures, complete with aversions to sunlight, garlic, and crucifixes. He becomes a vampire slayer, a legend to the remaining zombies, who are terrified of him. Eventually he learns more about the disease that has claimed so many lives, and befriends a woman whom he thinks may be immune to the disease, as he is.

Like some of the other books on this list, I Am Legend is a highly influential novel, and its stature has only increased with time. I read it after having seen Charlton Heston in the campy ‘Omega Man’ and Vincent Price’s excellent depiction of Neville in The Last Man on Earth. The most recent adaptation starred Will Smith, and of course there are dozens of other movies and television shows that have been inspired by Matheson.

Matheson’s other stories and novels are also well worth reading. I greatly enjoyed The Shrinking Man, a tale inspired by fears of radioactivity. Matheson had a long and successful career writing for TV and film, including some of the best-known episodes of The Twilight Zone and Star Trek, as well as screenplays for Roger Corman’s entertaining adaptations of Poe stories, which have delighted horror fans since the 1960s. Many of his works have been adapted for film as well. He had an incredible career and influenced a whole generation of writers, filmmakers and fans. If you’ve not yet read Matheson, don’t delay–start with I Am Legend.