Elegant Nightmares: The English Ghost Story from Le Fanu to Blackwood

by Jack Sullivan (Editor)

Elegant The English Ghost Story from Le Fanu to Blackwood

Genres: Horror, Literature, Literary Criticism, Nonfiction

Paperback

First published January 1, 1978

Reviews

[Jed Mayer · Rating 4 out of 5]

Though I can't really see why "ghost story" is the genre name of choice here, this is a nuanced, insightful analysis of the evolution of a certain kind of modern horror narrative that one might equally call "weird fiction." Sullivan is a remarkable close reader, and helped me to gain a new appreciation for Le Fanu: a great piece of scholarship from a more laid-back time when one could get away with a dozen or so footnotes a chapter.

[Melody · Rating 3 out of 5]

The opening chapters on Le Fanu could have been better....was way too much summary of plots and portions of stories. The discussion on M.R.James and his followers was interesting...Not the most in depth analysis but was a nice introduction to a few writers I didn't know.

[Fraser Burnett · Rating 4 out of 5]

With massive thanks to Jay Rothermel.

[Mengxing Fu · Rating 4 out of 5]

The author clearly favors Le Fanu too much, and is almost blind to the large group of women writers of ghost story. But the conclusion chapter is interesting though short.

[Katherine Addison · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is good, thoughtful, appreciative literary criticism of ghost stories by Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu, M. R. James, and Algernon Blackwood. It is also very short (154 pages with notes and index and very generous margins). Since M. R. James is one of my favorite writers, I am naturally inclined to look kindly on Dr. Sullivan's project, and I think he is very smart about what makes James so good at what he does. There's less to say about Blackwood, who is not as good at writing ghost stories---although I was sorry Sullivan didn't say more about "The Wendigo," which I think is successful almost despite itself---and while I very much enjoyed the chapters on Le Fanu, I have never been able to get into his writing and so can't say whether they were illuminating of their subject.

Not surprisingly, there are almost no women in this book, either as characters or as critics, though he does mention Elizabeth Bowen's The Cat Jumps favorably, which means I will have to find it.

[Jay Rothermel · Rating 5 out of 5]

A superb and economical pioneering study. Sullivan focuses on Le Fanu, MRJ, and Blackwood. He refutes the banalities of psychological and theological explainers of the ghost story's popularity, from Edmund Wilson to Philip Van Doren Stern and Russell Kirk. Sullivan: "The difference between 'Green Tea' and Edmund Wilson's version of The Tum of the Screw is that this inner darkness is a sinisterly accurate measure of the outer world rather than a neurotic projection. Like the madness of Lear, the derangement of Jennings's mind is a mirror image of a derangement in the cosmos, although Jennings has neither the insight nor the catharsis of Lear."

[James · Rating 5 out of 5]

A short but interesting and critical overview of the genre of English ghost story. Sullivan focused primarily upon Sheridan Le Fanu, M. R. James, and Algernon Blackwood. Despite other reviews here, I found Sullivan’s engagement with these works to be far from dry. Though a literary scholar, he exhibits a fan-like love for these sorts of stories. Most of the chapters deal with particular stories and writers but I found his introductory and concluding chapters to be the most insightful. This is not really a popular read though—more for the academically-minded.

[Hal · Rating 4 out of 5]

Engagingly written, not too dryly academic. I found the opening roughly half of the book on Le Fanu the most interesting. Le Fanu seems considered a significant and influential writer now, Sullivan seems to spend some effort to place him at the start of the English ghost story, I was left wondering if Le Fanu wasn't always so well known or regarded. I perhaps like Blackwood more than Sullivan does, but some of the tensions he points out in the final chapter are interesting still.

[Barbara · Rating 3 out of 5]

An interesting topic. But could've been better. And kinda dry. I don't know how ghost stories can be dry, but it is. Some of them were interesting. But, meh.