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Heart of Darkness-Part Four
Kurtz would seem an enigma. Despite all of his words--the great flow of his words, written and spoken, issuing from his heart of darkness--he remains a mystery. His last words--"The horror! The...
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Heart of Darkness-Part Five
Kurtz is mysterious, just as Africa is mysterious. Marlow penetrates into both mysteries. The title of Joseph Conrad's novella first appears in Marlow's description of his journey upriver: "We...
View ArticleHeart of Darkness-Part Six
Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad is a tale, an old form of which the weird tale is also an example. Heart of Darkness and weird tales have things in common, one of which is the use of intelligible...
View ArticleOoze & Abysses
I have been writing for a long time now about Weird Tales in its first year and in its 100th. Weird Tales began in March 1923 with a story called "Ooze" by Anthony M. Rud. In its current incarnation,...
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Stephen Bagby (1894-1969)
Pseudonym of Charles Meriwether StephensAuthor, Newspaper Editor, Advertising ManBorn August 28, 1890, Atlanta, GeorgiaDied December 11, 1969, Little Creek Hospital, Knoxville, TennesseeIn February...
View ArticleRobinson H. Harsh (1894-1968)
Aka Harold HarshAuthor, Inventor, Genealogist, Philatelist, Government Worker, Railroad Worker, Salesman, NewsboyBorn October 9, 1894, Dayton, TexasDied October 9, 1968, Leonardtown, MarylandAuthors...
View ArticleRobert G. Bowie (1880-1959)
Author, Schoolteacher, Government Worker, Railroad WorkerBorn November 2, 1880, Goresville, Loudoun County, VirginiaDied September 20, 1959, Washington, D.C.Like Robinson H. Harsh, Robert G. Bowie was...
View ArticleDick Heine (1897-1977)
Author, Clock & Watch Maker, MeteorologistBorn November 25, 1897, Talladega, AlabamaDied May 15, 1977, presumably in Talladega, AlabamaRichard Toole Heine, Jr., who wrote as Dick Heine, was born on...
View ArticleLawrence on Dostoevsky
Here is a quote for all authors, aspiring, beginning, well established, and otherwise, including those writing in Weird Tales:"As far as I'm concerned, in proportion as a man gets more profoundly and...
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Louise Garwood (1900-1980)
Poet, Author, Newspaper Feature Writer, TeacherBorn January 29, 1900, Houston, TexasDied March 21, 1980, Seton Medical Center, Austin, TexasLouise Ford Garwood had an admirable career as a poet,...
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Shakespeare in "The Eyrie"
Sometimes there was verse in "The Eyrie." The authors of that verse aren't credited in bibliographies. I can understand why. But for the sake of completeness, and for the sake of not missing out on...
View ArticleTellers of Weird Tales in The New Yorker
The first issue of The New Yorker was dated February 21, 1925, one hundred years ago today. Unlike Weird Tales, The New Yorker has been published continuously since its inception. Also unlike Weird...
View ArticleRobert W. Chambers & the Language of Cosmic Horror
Robert W. Chambers' name is the first to appear in the Cosmic Horror Issue of Weird Tales (#367, published in 2023). This is in "The Eyrie," which used to be a letters column but has become simply a...
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Robert W. Chambers & Lost Lands
One sub-sub-genre of fantasy and adventure fiction is the tale of lost cities, lost lands, and lost continents. Sometimes those places that are lost are sunken cities and submerged continents. Atlantis...
View ArticleFour Men-Part One
Two figures cast their long shadows over the Cosmic Horror Issue of Weird Tales. They are of course Edgar Allan Poe and H.P. Lovecraft. But it seems to me that there is more of Friedrich Nietzsche and...
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Four Men-Part Two
I'll set aside Edgar Allan Poe and H.P. Lovecraft before bringing them up again. The four men of the title are:German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900);French author Guy de Maupassant...
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100 Years of R'lyeh!
I have overlooked the 100th anniversary of the real-life earthquake that brought the fictional (we hope) Cthulhu Island to the surface of the South Pacific Ocean. It happened this past weekend,...
View ArticleFour Men-Part Three
God created the cosmos, thereby banishing the void and chaos that preceded it. For as long as God exists and reigns supreme, there can be no void, and nothing from the void can exist in or intrude upon...
View ArticleFour Men-Part Four
"The Horla" by Guy de Maupassant is in two versions. The first version is a short story or tale published in 1886. The second is a long short story or novelette published in 1887. If you can, you...
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What is it? What was it?
In "The Horla," by Guy de Maupassant, one of the narrators asks, "What is it?", this invisible being that has afflicted him. His question echoes the title of Fitz-James O'Brien's earlier short story...
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