Weird Murmur

Arthur Machen, "The Happy Children" in The Masterpiece Library of Short Stories , ed. J. A. Hammerton (Educational Book Co: 1920). Read for free here Through its tone and use of description, this story delivers a unique kind of weird creepiness. In addition, the central horror is simultaneously terrifying and non-threatening—a great example of how the very existence of something can horrify even when the thing itself is recognized as something that means no harm. It is worth noting the inspiration that Lovecraft took from this story. Not to diminish Lovecraft, but, in some ways, “The Happy Children” does Lovecraft better than Lovecraft before Lovecraft ever did it!   The description of the old town and the procession to the abbey on the hill is certainly reminiscent of Lovecraft’s “The Festival.” Machen’s story also features impossible geometries folded into architecture and even a gambrel roof makes an appearance!  

  Nebachadnezzar, William Blake (1795) Marcel Schwob, "The Death of Odjigh" in The King in the Golden Mask  translated by Kit Schluter   (Wakefield Press, 2017). Schwob's story can be read through the lens of Thomas Ligotti or Peter Wessel Zapffe, that is, as a work of philosophical pessimism. As the dying world comes to its end, the wolf slayer Odjigh faces his own personal crises of an emerging conscience. Odjigh, by gaining a kind of self-awareness, regrets his role as a hunter and positions himself as an observer and critic standing outside of nature. As he sees the violence around him and pities the suffering of living creatures, he laments existence itself: "Odjigh, deep in his heart, regretted the jigging of the nacreous fish in the meshing of the nets, the serpentine swimming of the conger eels, the heavy gait of the tortoises, the sidelong trot of the gigantic wall-eyed crabs, and the lively yawns of the earthly beasts, hairy beasts decked in scales, beasts...

Meghan Arcuri, "Going, Going" and Adrian Ludens, "Resistant to Change" in  Where the Silent Ones Watch , ed. James Chambers (Hippocampus Press: 2024). In William Hope Hodgson’s novel  The House on the Borderlands , little is said of the Recluse’s sister, Mary, and, in part, it is this absence of information that makes her a fascinating character. The reader can’t help but wonder about the old man’s sister. Two short stories from the James Chambers edited anthology  Where the Silent Ones Watch  pick up on themes of Mary’s story, albeit in two different ways. In her short story “Going, Going,” Meghan Arcuri takes the strange and awkward background role that Mary plays in Hodgson’s work as an opportunity to explore the psychological horror of not being seen. The protagonist of Arcuri's story gives a little away and those around her, particularly her partner, take much, much more. She slowly loses herself and disappears from the view of those around her. It is a cre...