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Torture
Arthur Machen (1863-1947) was a Welsh author and mystic, best known for his influential supernatural, fantasy and horror fiction.
'Torture' is a horror story about a schoolboy with a dangerous secret fantasy.
'Torture' is a horror story about a schoolboy with a dangerous secret fantasy.
1 pages, Audible Audio
Published January 17, 2018
6 people want to read
About the author
Arthur Machen
1,055 books983 followersArthur Machen was a leading Welsh author of the 1890s. He is best known for his influential supernatural, fantasy, and horror fiction. His long story The Great God Pan made him famous and controversial in his lifetime, but The Hill of Dreams is generally considered his masterpiece. He also is well known for his leading role in creating the legend of the Angels of Mons.
At the age of eleven, Machen boarded at Hereford Cathedral School, where he received an excellent classical education. Family poverty ruled out attendance at university, and Machen was sent to London, where he sat exams to attend medical school but failed to get in. Machen, however, showed literary promise, publishing in 1881 a long poem "Eleusinia" on the subject of the Eleusinian Mysteries. Returning to London, he lived in relative poverty, attempting to work as a journalist, as a publisher's clerk, and as a children's tutor while writing in the evening and going on long rambling walks across London.
In 1884 he published his second work, the pastiche The Anatomy of Tobacco, and secured work with the publisher and bookseller George Redway as a cataloguer and magazine editor. This led to further work as a translator from French, translating the Heptameron of Marguerite de Navarre, Le Moyen de Parvenir (Fantastic Tales) of Béroalde de Verville, and the Memoirs of Casanova. Machen's translations in a spirited English style became standard ones for many years.
Around 1890 Machen began to publish in literary magazines, writing stories influenced by the works of Robert Louis Stevenson, some of which used gothic or fantastic themes. This led to his first major success, The Great God Pan. It was published in 1894 by John Lane in the noted Keynotes Series, which was part of the growing aesthetic movement of the time. Machen's story was widely denounced for its sexual and horrific content and subsequently sold well, going into a second edition.
Machen next produced The Three Impostors, a novel composed of a number of interwoven tales, in 1895. The novel and the stories within it were eventually to be regarded as among Machen's best works. However, following the scandal surrounding Oscar Wilde later that year, Machen's association with works of decadent horror made it difficult for him to find a publisher for new works. Thus, though he would write some of his greatest works over the next few years, some were published much later. These included The Hill of Dreams, Hieroglyphics, A Fragment of Life, the story The White People, and the stories which make up Ornaments in Jade.
At the age of eleven, Machen boarded at Hereford Cathedral School, where he received an excellent classical education. Family poverty ruled out attendance at university, and Machen was sent to London, where he sat exams to attend medical school but failed to get in. Machen, however, showed literary promise, publishing in 1881 a long poem "Eleusinia" on the subject of the Eleusinian Mysteries. Returning to London, he lived in relative poverty, attempting to work as a journalist, as a publisher's clerk, and as a children's tutor while writing in the evening and going on long rambling walks across London.
In 1884 he published his second work, the pastiche The Anatomy of Tobacco, and secured work with the publisher and bookseller George Redway as a cataloguer and magazine editor. This led to further work as a translator from French, translating the Heptameron of Marguerite de Navarre, Le Moyen de Parvenir (Fantastic Tales) of Béroalde de Verville, and the Memoirs of Casanova. Machen's translations in a spirited English style became standard ones for many years.
Around 1890 Machen began to publish in literary magazines, writing stories influenced by the works of Robert Louis Stevenson, some of which used gothic or fantastic themes. This led to his first major success, The Great God Pan. It was published in 1894 by John Lane in the noted Keynotes Series, which was part of the growing aesthetic movement of the time. Machen's story was widely denounced for its sexual and horrific content and subsequently sold well, going into a second edition.
Machen next produced The Three Impostors, a novel composed of a number of interwoven tales, in 1895. The novel and the stories within it were eventually to be regarded as among Machen's best works. However, following the scandal surrounding Oscar Wilde later that year, Machen's association with works of decadent horror made it difficult for him to find a publisher for new works. Thus, though he would write some of his greatest works over the next few years, some were published much later. These included The Hill of Dreams, Hieroglyphics, A Fragment of Life, the story The White People, and the stories which make up Ornaments in Jade.
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
March 2, 2023
How far does an introverted, dreamy schoolboy with a dangerous secret fantasy go to execute his ideas?
Arthur Machen tries to discuss the outré and macabre ways the minds of teenagers work in bizarre situations through this story.
“He hated other boys. He cared nothing for the printed matter of any kind.”
Arthur Machen tries to discuss the outré and macabre ways the minds of teenagers work in bizarre situations through this story.
November 16, 2022
3.5⭐
Torture is one of ten literary vignettes contained in Machen's Ornaments in Jade volume. These short narratives are considered by most as prose poems which begin and end in medias res where a character is introduced in the midst of a scene emphasizing magical instances, spiritual experiences, and fleeting moments where the veil between worlds becomes thin this being a major theme in most of Machen's work.
This was a real scary one depicting the makings of a young psychopath. Thank goodness the young girl out tricked him since from his description I cannot see her really in love with him unless she also was a kindred outcast.
Torture is one of ten literary vignettes contained in Machen's Ornaments in Jade volume. These short narratives are considered by most as prose poems which begin and end in medias res where a character is introduced in the midst of a scene emphasizing magical instances, spiritual experiences, and fleeting moments where the veil between worlds becomes thin this being a major theme in most of Machen's work.
This was a real scary one depicting the makings of a young psychopath. Thank goodness the young girl out tricked him since from his description I cannot see her really in love with him unless she also was a kindred outcast.
June 16, 2020
This was dark...
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews