Arthur Machen

[singing flame]

I agree with you, both of these stories are excellent.

Generally I have the impression that Machen's later work is perhaps somewhat under-appreciated - here and elsewhere - although I am not sure I understand why.

Among my favourite stories by Machen is The Children of the Pool from the '30s which I would say compares favorably to many of his earlier, more well-known tales.

Much of his later work isn't very good, although he was still putting out the occasional great tale until the end. His story N is wonderful. Change and Ritual are good also.

The Green Round is a very meandering novel. As with many of Machen's later tales, it's too dry, unfocused and sedate to achieve its desired effect. As I have said before, he lived in the shadow of his earlier golden period of writing, which climaxed at around the time of WW1.

[singing flame]

I recently got the Tartarus edition of Ritual and Other Stories and plan to read my way through his late work when I have a quiet moment.

The Green Round might not be as polished as The Hill of Dreams, yet I would argue that its meandering or unsolved character is exactly what makes it so fascinating in the first place. It's basically written from a different aesthetics and with other criteria in mind. It's the only of Machen's longer novels that I've read more than once, and will probably read again at some point. I generally find books more interesting where perfection is not the aim. Hodgson's The House on The Borderland is a very flawed novel as well but nevertheless among my favourite horror novels.

[Sand]

"he lived in the shadow of his earlier golden period of writing"

That would have been my view too until lately, when I came to introduce the Tartarus edition of The Children of the Pool. Reading these stories anew, and those written in the same period, such as 'N' and 'Opening the Door', made me respect them better. I saw that, as Machen himself said, he was trying to strike out into new fields. In fact, I'd even suggest he was heading towards what later became Aickman territory.

[singing flame]

I think this is also what I have come to realize and what I mean when I talk about "other criteria" or a "different aesthetics".

[Ibrahim]

I find it highly interesting to imagine the projected novel of which A Fragment of Life & The White People are supposed to be fragments ( Machen admitted as much in some introduction or other if i recall correctly), not because i'd like to know how he would have solved that plot-wise ( i like my narratives with holes in them) but because
the idea of long-form weird fiction fascinates me. It's difficult, and i think that was probably what Machen found challenging; how to ensure that it would not be just a bunch of episodes strung together?

[singing flame]

Quote Originally Posted by Ibrahim

I find it highly interesting to imagine the projected novel of which A Fragment of Life & The White People are supposed to be fragments ( Machen admitted as much in some introduction or other if i recall correctly), not because i'd like to know how he would have solved that plot-wise ( i like my narratives with holes in them) but because the idea of long-form weird fiction fascinates me. It's difficult, and i think that was probably what Machen found challenging; how to ensure that it would not be just a bunch of episodes strung together?

It seems to me this is what T.E.D. Klein tried to do with his novel The Ceremonies. Essentially the book can be read as an elaboration upon the "white, green, and scarlet ceremonies", and other cryptic allusions, mentioned in The White People. Machen is a subtext in some of Klein's short stories as well.

[Ibrahim]

To my surprise & delight I just found a 1968 reprint of the John Baker edition of The Three Impostors in a 2nd hand book shop. Except for a Spanish translation i've never yet been able to read the book in physical format. Reading it that way gives one (quite literally) a different grasp on the material from scroling through e-texts.
Although it has become a commonplace to view the book as a patchwork of uneven parts (supported by the endless individual anthologizing of the white powder and the black seal), the work is best understood as a single gestalt, a work of artistry that best confers its intentions when taken as an indivisible unit. It is a book about Money- consider the central place accorded to the Gold Tiberius, then consider what it means to the protagonists; to Dyson it is a carrier of myth, an enticement to tales & mystery, a steppping stone towards the immaterial; to the impostors, it is a coin, sign of wealth and power, & never anything other than simple gold. Now look at the stories told by the impostors, which are invariably tales of the degradation of gross matter, of decay, and death & compare them to the accounts of Dyson's wanderings through the city, which transmute the sunsets and skies over the grimy metropolis into sublime vistas of unearthy beauty. Machen is insisting upon his usual anti-materialist philosophies here, and the facets of his argument are best read, i think, in tandem.

This printing curiously omits the tale of the iron lady, by the way; does anyone know if all the earlier printings did so? & when it was re-inserted?

[singing flame]

According to the Guide to Supernatural Fiction, The Novel of the Iron Maid was included in the original edition as well as in the 1923 reprint. Here is the table of contents with descriptions:

- Prologue: Three enigmatic characters discuss the conspiracy in which they are involved.
- Adventure of the Gold Tiberius: Dyson tells Phillipps of a violent chase he has witnessed, and how he picked up from the gutter a rare gold coin discarded by one of the men.
- The Encounter of the Pavement: Dyson meets Mr Wilkins who tells him the:
- Novel of the Dark Valley: Wilkins travels to the United States and is nearly killed in a case of mistaken identity.
- Adventure of the Missing Brother: Miss Lally has a premonition of danger when she sees her bother with a stranger with a mask-like face and a skeletal arm. She tells her story in:
- Novel of the Black Seal: Miss Lally works for Professor Gregg who is researching the little people who live underground in remote parts of the country. He goes to investigate them and does not return.
- Incident of the Private Bar: Dyson is told a story of gem-dealing by Burton.
- The Decorative Imagination: Burton prefaces his story of the:
- Novel of the Iron Maid: A man who collects curiousities is a victim in his own iron maiden.
- The Recluse of Bayswater: Dyson meets Miss Leicester who relates:
- Novel of the White Powder: her brother takes an ill-prepared drug which is inadvertantly the Vinum Sabbati that witches would have used to get them to their Sabbath.
- Strange Occurrence in Clerkenwell: Dyson discovers a notebook which reveals the:
- History of the Young Man With Spectacles: Dr Lipsius lures a man to his death.
- Adventure of the Deserted Residence: Dyson and Phillipps discover the fate of the young man in spectacles.

[singing flame]

My favourite version of The Three Impostors is probably this colourful, Hieronymys Bosch-like reprint from the 70s. The artist is Robert Logrippo who also did covers for the Ballantine editions of William Hope Hodgson.