Jesse’s Reviews > Collected Fiction Volume 1: Tales of Psychological and Supernatural Horror > Status Update
Jesse
is on page 137 of 360
“A Watcher by the Dead”
Two men bet that a third can’t stay in a room for a period of time with a corpse. Except, the corpse is a doctor who is only playing. Things Go Badly, but with Bierce’s clever twists, which - once the final segment is revealed, like a Poirot novel - elevates the tale.
— Jun 25, 2024 08:51PM
Two men bet that a third can’t stay in a room for a period of time with a corpse. Except, the corpse is a doctor who is only playing. Things Go Badly, but with Bierce’s clever twists, which - once the final segment is revealed, like a Poirot novel - elevates the tale.
Like flag
Jesse’s Previous Updates
Jesse
is on page 347 of 360
The Appendix here isn’t nearly as useful as the appendices of the Clark Ashton Smith stories, presumably because Bierce supervised a more or less definitive collection of his works. The first Appendix is, uh, single versions of the ghost stories found in the early-middle of this volume. I don’t get a lot of value over the minor differences.
— Jun 29, 2024 07:10PM
Jesse
is on page 312 of 360
“An Untitled Tale”
Oh wow. This is a short sketch that describes a man who may be hallucinating but may also be a man’s repeated brushes with some kind of cosmic horror, bridging the gulf between dimensions with experiences that are beyond any describable human emotion. I don’t know if this story was available to Smith or Lovecraft but it is uncanny how this relates to what other authors danced around.
— Jun 29, 2024 06:54PM
Oh wow. This is a short sketch that describes a man who may be hallucinating but may also be a man’s repeated brushes with some kind of cosmic horror, bridging the gulf between dimensions with experiences that are beyond any describable human emotion. I don’t know if this story was available to Smith or Lovecraft but it is uncanny how this relates to what other authors danced around.
Jesse
is on page 308 of 360
“The Stranger”
The core of the story is similar to “Two Lives” but it’s very clear to the reader, if not the genre-ignorant soldiers, that the dude they are talking to is a ghost. It’s a miserable story on his part, with the four prospectors opting for a suicide pact rather than give way to the siege on the cave.
— Jun 29, 2024 05:25PM
The core of the story is similar to “Two Lives” but it’s very clear to the reader, if not the genre-ignorant soldiers, that the dude they are talking to is a ghost. It’s a miserable story on his part, with the four prospectors opting for a suicide pact rather than give way to the siege on the cave.
Jesse
is on page 303 of 360
“Beyond the Wall”
This is a tragic romance with just a shade of a ghost story thrown into the ending. The Bierce format is in full effect, here. The narrator, visiting an old friend, hears a supernatural knock on the wall, after which he hears the story behind the knock. It’s bittersweet and a bit too weighted with age to be maudlin.
— Jun 29, 2024 05:02PM
This is a tragic romance with just a shade of a ghost story thrown into the ending. The Bierce format is in full effect, here. The narrator, visiting an old friend, hears a supernatural knock on the wall, after which he hears the story behind the knock. It’s bittersweet and a bit too weighted with age to be maudlin.
Jesse
is on page 295 of 360
“The Moonlit Road”
This is the first Bierce that I know for sure I read before, collected in B&N’s Classic Ghost Stories collection. This story is awesome and it’s mostly due to Julia Hetman’s testimony from beyond the veil, because the point of view of the ghost is incredibly well-written. Bierce’s format, as expressed through the son, the father, and the spirit of the wife, feels quite organic.
— Jun 29, 2024 04:16PM
This is the first Bierce that I know for sure I read before, collected in B&N’s Classic Ghost Stories collection. This story is awesome and it’s mostly due to Julia Hetman’s testimony from beyond the veil, because the point of view of the ghost is incredibly well-written. Bierce’s format, as expressed through the son, the father, and the spirit of the wife, feels quite organic.
Jesse
is on page 286 of 360
“John Mortonson’s Funeral”
WHAT
A DUDE HAS AN OSTENTATIOUS FUNERAL IN A GLASS COFFIN AND RIGHT BEFORE HE IS SUPPOSED TO BE BURIED HIS WEEPING WIFE DISCOVERS THAT HIS CAT IS IN THS COFFIN, EATING THE BODY?????!?
What the HELL Bierce
— Jun 29, 2024 03:49PM
WHAT
A DUDE HAS AN OSTENTATIOUS FUNERAL IN A GLASS COFFIN AND RIGHT BEFORE HE IS SUPPOSED TO BE BURIED HIS WEEPING WIFE DISCOVERS THAT HIS CAT IS IN THS COFFIN, EATING THE BODY?????!?
What the HELL Bierce
Jesse
is on page 284 of 360
“One Summer Night”
More grotesque, dark humor from Bierce. A man is buried alive but dug up by two medical students and their hired labor, resurrection men. When they open the coffin, he sits up, scaring the students away. The laborer ensures that he gets his pay for the body.
— Jun 29, 2024 03:42PM
More grotesque, dark humor from Bierce. A man is buried alive but dug up by two medical students and their hired labor, resurrection men. When they open the coffin, he sits up, scaring the students away. The laborer ensures that he gets his pay for the body.
Jesse
is on page 282 of 360
“An Arrest”
Another anecdote. This time a murderer kills his jailer in order to escape but gets turned back by the man’s ghost, who “arrests” him, basically cowing the criminal into returning to the jail with no additional malfeasance.
— Jun 29, 2024 03:35PM
Another anecdote. This time a murderer kills his jailer in order to escape but gets turned back by the man’s ghost, who “arrests” him, basically cowing the criminal into returning to the jail with no additional malfeasance.
Jesse
is on page 280 of 360
“A Wireless Message”
This is one of those supernatural anecdote-type stories. A man gets a bizarre vision while he is out walking and it’s some kind of psychic link between himself and his wife, who is - unbeknownst to him at the time - in mortal peril from a fire along with their child.
— Jun 29, 2024 03:13PM
This is one of those supernatural anecdote-type stories. A man gets a bizarre vision while he is out walking and it’s some kind of psychic link between himself and his wife, who is - unbeknownst to him at the time - in mortal peril from a fire along with their child.
Jesse
is on page 277 of 360
“A Man With Two Lives”
Supernatural, and something of a tall tale because it breaks so many basic rules of Bierce’s fictions that it’s hard to take seriously. An army courier is ambushed by Native Americans and can’t remember how the fight ended. He ends up unscathed but completely naked in the wilderness, and when he finally makes it to his destination it appears that he has already been buried…
— Jun 29, 2024 02:56PM
Supernatural, and something of a tall tale because it breaks so many basic rules of Bierce’s fictions that it’s hard to take seriously. An army courier is ambushed by Native Americans and can’t remember how the fight ended. He ends up unscathed but completely naked in the wilderness, and when he finally makes it to his destination it appears that he has already been buried…
Comments Showing 1-2 of 2 (2 new)
date
newest »
newest »
Bierce exercises a lot of trust in the reader in these stories. He isn’t one to spell out the psychological factors in the misadventures of his subjects. It’s tough to relate to his characters in the modern age because the result of the trauma that he unleashes on his subjects is usually death or insanity, which is harder to square away in today’s age.
The two dudes in on the bet get to the scene late only to find that their subject has gone stark raving mad, with their doctor buddy dead. They scupper off to Europe.
The initial setup is changed when the doctor / corpse decides to have a bit of fun with the subject and accidentally scares him to death. He changes places with the corpse, but now HE is locked in a room with a strange man who HE scared to death and Bierce lets the imagination do a lot of heavy lifting because the presumption is that the doctor is driven temporarily insane by the thought of the corpse really doing something that he had just pretended to do.