Arthur Machen

[marioneta]

"And if one looks a little more closely into the nature of things it will become pretty plain, I think, that all that really matters and really exists is ineffable; that both the world without us-The tree and the brook and the hill-and the world within us do perpetually and necessarily transcend all our powers of utterance, whether to ourselves or others."
- Arthur Machen
Far off Things

The ecstatic as the unnamable, the unnamable as the world within and without, as above so below, a whole philosophy encapsulated and likewise implying to see the sacred in the horrific and the horror in the sacred. Which also leads to the realization that these worlds are languages that we barely know how to speak much less understand, thus our estrangement and the subsequent damage we inflict. All of which opens the door to the universe (both worlds) being an algorithm we've yet to de cipher, the Kabbalah being one attempt as well as the Tarot.

[Whispers of Sorrow]

YouTube

pretty good reading, though it seems that only a same couple of his stores ever get an audio treatment, again and again, be it a free librivox & youtube one or the commercial audiobooks...

Machen's horror work is his most marketable and accessible, but he didn't write much of it, so I'm not surprised to see Novel of the Black Seal, Novel of the White Powder, The Great God Pan, The White People, The Inmost Light, The Shining Pyramid and The Terror over and over and over. The Lovecraft boom means they have a wide audience now whom would be alienated by A Fragment of Life, The Great Return or N, sadly.

[marioneta]

James, in total agreement, and I would add The Secret Glory. Machen is characterized as a writer of supernatural horror yet there is so much more to his oeuvre. This seems to be due to the Lovecraft circle's praise and his indirect association with them, among other factors. In a way it's similar to Lovecraft being locked into the genre of cosmic horror while being blind to his excellence as an epistlatory writer.

Arthur Machen, Shirley Jackson, Elizabeth Jane Howard and Walter de la Mare only wrote a very small selection of horror stories compared to Blackwood and Lovecraft, but I can reread them endlessly. It's so hard to even write three or four exceptional, visionary ghostly tales. That Aickman and Ligotti managed to write at such a high visionary level consistently throughout their careers is unfathomable.

[marioneta]

Ah, Shirley Jackson, just saying her name gives me chills. She tells of being inspired to write The Haunting of Hill House by a "hideous " tenement building that she saw from the 125th street subway station during a trip to New York. This was around 1957. I lived in a tenement building near that subway station during the 50's and it gives me goose bumps to think I might have been living in the same "hideous " building Jackson saw, especially since I had two weird experiences there, but that is another story.
How about a thread for Shirley Jackson? The Lottery is prescient of the Trump era. Also one of my favorite adaptations of a horror novel is that great black and white classic film , The Haunting with the great Julie Harris.

A Jackson thread would be good. The Lottery, The Summer People, The Haunting of Hill House and We Have Always Lived in This Castle are masterworks of horror. Her other work is sorely neglected and quite brilliant.

Wouldn't mind a reading of Machen's Change. Great little horror story. Maybe no White People or Pan, but I think it compares well with Shining Pyramid or Inmost Light.

[marioneta]

Last night I read The Exalted Omega. I had to read it twice and I'm still not sure of how to process the story. It is a Chinese puzzle box. There seems to be a "transference" experience involved that shows the limits of ordinary ways of thinking about time and thought. There is so much to ponder in this story, it seems to be about the debunking of a medium and spiritualism, but there is much more. Machine's take on the "paranormal" is unique to say the least.

[Patrick G.P]

Just finished reading the Snuggly edition of Machen's N, thought I'd post my review of it here:

Three friends gather to sip spiced rum in front of a warm fireplace to discuss London of yesteryear, of places fondly remembered and of a time sadly passed by, when one of them recounts the tale of a park outside London than almost no-one seems to have seen. The three friends slowly venture into a discussion of things that may or may not be, of places hinted at and of weird occurrences. When later, one of them finds a book with the musings of an old reverend recounting the wonderful hidden place, the search for the beautiful and ethereal park outside of London becomes a journey into the shadowy realm of the past.

As with many of Machen’s other tales, N deals with the unseen world, an opening of the veil that some people are susceptible to, and able to view extraordinary wonders in our modern, mundane world. Anyone familiar with Machen’s autobiographies will find recurring themes here of the walks around unknown parts of London, the lament of seeing old neighborhoods were torn down and new architecture spring up in old haunts one once considered special. The anti-materialism is as evident here as with most of Machen’s tales.

The tale reminded me most of A Fragment of Life, and as with that story, Machen tries to outline some peculiar, hidden mysticism, and a longing to behold something magical, wonderful and otherworldly. I enjoyed Machen’s poorly disguised nod to himself and his biographical book; The London Adventure or the Art of Wandering, or as he chose to call it here: A London Walk: Meditations in the Streets of the Metropolis by Reverend Thomas Hampole. The atmosphere and mood in the tale are just superb and goes to show that he certainly hadn’t lost his keen sense of the uncanny and beauty even at the age of 70. N is one of Machen’s finer strange tales.