Thomas Brown's Blog, page 7
November 10, 2014
New Releases
“From the cool, bright confines of the conservatory, I might be watching a television screen, or peering through space into a different place where there is no glass, no pale spotlights, no lace doylies or marble Olympians; only blackness and heat and the savage light that comes when these two things collide. The paddocks that I have fenced off and knocked down and re-fenced for twenty years flicker ominously. Jumps and their poles cast long-legged silhouettes across the ground. The stable walls lose definition, sagging on their frames, slumping softly, cracking and becoming black before drifting hotly on the wind; new stars, made for a blacker, more noxious night…”
‘Shooting Stars’
RELEASE: NIGHT WALKERS��and TWISTED from fledgling Thirteen O’ Clock Press, featuring my short stories ‘Shooting Stars’ and ‘Do No Recycle’. Pick up a copy and support the press if dark fiction and short story collections are your thing.
NIGHT WALKERS: http://www.lulu.com/shop/thirteen-o-clock-press/night-walkers/paperback/product-21889933.html
TWISTED: http://www.lulu.com/shop/thirteen-o-clock-press/twisted/paperback/product-21886058.html
November 7, 2014
Black Widow
Originally posted on Pen of the Damned:
The street is alive with festivities but my house is sombre and silent. The neighbourhood knows I am a widow in mourning, that I want to be left in peace, but that doesn���t prevent those roaming little brats from ringing my bell.
���Trick or Treat!��� they shout, over and over again until I finally come to the door. In my black hooded cloak I look the part. No harm in playing along. I let out a deep evil laugh, throw handfuls of candy at them then slam the door as they plunge into a frenzy. I hope that is the last of them; it is close to midnight and I have work to do. The veil is thin.
I almost nodded off as I sat through your funeral; the monotonous voice of the priest was like a soothing lullaby. It is typical that you choose to be buried in���
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November 1 – Purple Hope and Saints
Originally posted on Author Joseph Pinto's Horror (and things not so horrible) Blog:
November 1 means a great deal to me.
It marks All Saints Day in honor of all the saints, known and unknown.
On November 1, 1966, my favorite football team came into existence ��� the New Orleans Saints.
It also marks the arrival of another saint to be. On November 1, 1946, Joseph C. Pinto was born.
My father.
He would have been 68 today.
Pancreatic cancer claimed him at the age of 60.
And yes, November 1 marks the beginning of Pancreatic Cancer Awareness Month.
I think you may have heard of this deadly disease. It���s been in the news quite often lately. A little too much, if you ask me.
Truth be told, I���d never heard of pancreatic cancer before my father was diagnosed. Maybe that makes me sound a bit ignorant, uneducated. I don���t know. Maybe I was & still am. Cancer, let alone pancreatic���
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November 4, 2014
November 3, 2014
Sublime Horror
This September marked my return to the University of Southampton, where I have finally enrolled on a part-time doctorate degree. This��is something that I have wanted to do for a number of years now, and certainly it marks the next step in my continuing education (don’t make me stop!) but for a number of mundane reasons it has taken this long to begin. I am not bitter about this;��there is no rush where learning is concerned, and nothing could have spoiled my excitement at actually returning to the University, registering and commencing my studies in those first few weeks.
I know that a lot of people don’t particularly enjoy learning. I’m not really sure why I feel differently. I know that in my brief stints between higher education I��felt as though I was stagnating. Perhaps this is telling of a need for guidance, structure, a visible goal towards which I can direct my efforts. Perhaps this is a good thing, perhaps not. All I do know for sure is that I am never happier than when working at a long-term project. I love having a task to which I can apply myself and focus on. It informs me, it drives me and it provides me with perspective; a lens through which I can view the world��around me.
The degree is a Creative Writing project. There is much controversy surrounding the subject of Creative Writing degrees, namely whether or not it is truly possible to teach a person how to write. I think it is possible to teach someone the technicalities of writing. I also think it is possible to point them towards good writing, whether this comes in the form of��majestic classics, sweeping epics, the late-night scribblings��of a lonely man, or the diary of the woman living in the flat below him, who could not tell you the first thing about punctuation or grammar but knows her heart and how best to express it in the A5 pages on her bedside table. Can creativity be taught? I am not so sure. But this is a subject for another day.
My chosen subject��is the exploration of the relationship between horror literature and the sublime. A month into what could amount to four years of research or more, I am only dipping my toes into the water, but already I am fascinated by what I am reading. Long before I had first heard of the sublime or actively read literary theory, I found myself indescribably moved by certain passages in horror fiction beyond the mere fear that I had expected to experience. This was undeniably horror, but not as I had encountered it before. At its simplest, the sublime��“refers to the moment when the ability to apprehend, to know, and to express a thought or sensation is defeated.” And yet, “through this very defeat, the mind gets a feeling for that which lies beyond thought or language.”
It is a difficult concept to grasp. By its definition, the sublime is undefinable. It��has evolved many times over the centuries, depending on its context and applications, but��the concept of sublimity as unfathomable is always key. One of the best examples I can currently��give is Barker’s short story ‘In the Hills, the Cities’,��in which our protagonists, holidaying in Eastern Europe, find themselves witness to a traditional battle fought in the hills between two neighbouring cities. Sublimity begins when readers and protagonists alike realise that this battle is not fought with armies but with two titanic effigies; the entire populace of each city bound together with harnesses and straps into the figure of a vast, organic giant, striding across the hills to do ritual battle with its twin. I cannot do the story justice here, or hope to begin to recreate the conditions necessary to suggest the sublime, but try to imagine – really imagine – a giant made up of thousands of men, women and children joined together by leather and metal, its skin seething, rippling with faces and limbs as it marches on human feet, head in the clouds, screaming with the choral voice of a city stretched to breaking point -
This is horror fiction at its most poignant, its most powerful and affecting. I am spell-bound and horrified and moved to wonder with every reading. (Interestingly, so are the story’s protagonists.)
Throughout the course of my studies I intend to blog about places I have visited or books I have read. My thesis will take the form of a short story collection and a critical component, so perhaps I will share thoughts surrounding these as they develop. I won’t bombard you with updates, but they will come when I feel suitably inspired.
I have picked a subject that will keep me busy for a few years, at least.
Consolation of Horror
“…it is the ultimate, that is, the only consolation: simply that someone shares some of your own feelings and has made of these a work of art which you have the insight, sensitivity, and – like it or not – peculiar set of experiences to appreciate.”
He goes on��to say: “The consolation of horror [...] actually intensifies our panic, loudens it on the sounding-board of our horror-hallowed heart, turns terror up full blast, all the while reaching for that perfect and deafening amplitude at which we may dance to the bizarre music of our own misery.”
For me, this LYNNWOOD review is just that:
“There seems to be a rise of primordial themed horror recently with The Ritual, Memory of Trees, the Darkening and I like it! LYNNWOOD is a beautifully crafted tale of what is left when you strip away civilisation – primal instinct. Gorgeously descriptive, poetic and eloquent the author masterfully builds an atmosphere of creeping dread leading as Midwinter approaches. The reader, inside the head of Freya, experiences the conflict between living by the rules or fulfilling base desires.
LYNNWOOD left me pondering is the primal instinct of savagery that exists within all of us more fundamental to the human psyche than we dare imagine. It is a book to be savoured���.”
http://www.amazon.co.uk/review/R2JCRMXC8ASQ21/ref=cm_cr_pr_perm?ie=UTF8&ASIN=1907230386
November 1, 2014
Horror melts in your mouth not in your hand #art #horrorweek #fiction #Halloween
Originally posted on Moondustwriter's Blog:
In my art and art history studies, we often compared and contrasted the work of different artists. When you compare an artist against himself, you deal more with his style than differences. If you look at the two pieces there are many similarities: the visual tension, the use of black and white to create an abysmal feeling, and an inability of the subjects to speak. One thing I thought curious, as Kubicki tends to deal with the darker, captive images, is the direction or flow of the two images. On the top image do feel the eyes trying to grasp what is beyond? I thought of a child staring out of a window on a rainy day ��� the pathos is so thick. Now look at the movement in the second image: There is a tense inner struggle. The bound figure is fighting and the more he fights the more���
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October 30, 2014
Cursed by Fire Cursed by Stalker #horror #art
Originally posted on Moondustwriter's Blog:
If you look at the contrasts of the two artists (Bosch and Kubicki), you see many. One is black and white and one is color. There���s alot of movement in Bosch���s The Harrowing of Hell as well as symbolism in this rendition of Hell. ��Do you hear the flames licking at the pleading souls? People are looking for an escape from the worst part only to find a new horror.
There is a different kind of horror in the Kubicki something akin to an inability to run. Look at the strands of hair; they closely resemble glass broken at a harsh angle. Is there a way out? No! Is the skin drying out (starting to melt) from a similar heat?
Symbolism in art is rich. As you look deeper you will see more even if you wish you had not delved into the dark.
���When the Birthday boy or���View original 463 more words
October 27, 2014
The Art of Horror #horrorweek #art #pen #horrorwriters
Leslie Moon muses over the relationship between horror and art.
Originally posted on Moondustwriter's Blog:
This week is set aside for the darker edge of life. Why not combine the two disciplines of art and writing to see what gets dug up!!!
What is horror for writers and artists? Darkness is in the air, it suspends one against its will, ��it hides in the shadows, but it doesn���t stay there. Darkness awakens the sleeper casting him into a delusional dream or awakens��the dreamer into a place he tries to claw away from.
Why write it? why paint it? I ask this question often. There are too��many answers and none the same (and some darker than others.)
Is horror just about Monsters?
���[Horror fiction] shows us that the control we believe we have is purely illusory, and that every moment we teeter on chaos and oblivion.���
��� Clive Barker
���Tired. So tired��� Confusion and disorientation numbed his mind like cotton wrapped���
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October 21, 2014
‘The Art of Gothic: Britain’s Midnight Hour’
Loving BBC 4‘s ‘The Art of Gothic: Britain’s Midnight Hour’. Liberty, diversity, depravity… the Gothic as social commentary … horror as personal expression … The ideals that inspired my LYNNWOOD are traced to their roots in eighteenth century Britain. A must-watch for those wishing to learn more about the Gothic, or brush up on the basics:
