Lost Tales by Mary Shelley and Bram Stoker: New Chapbooks

  

Withnail Books of Penrith, Cumbria, have just announced pre-orders for the latest in their series of limited edition chapbooks of rare literary works. This offers two lost tales: one, 'The Ghost of the Private Theatricals', is attributed to Mary Shelley and has been published before by the press in an edition of only 100 copies; the other, newly issued, is 'Gibbet Hill', a scarce story by Bram Stoker. 

'The Ghost of the Private Theatricals' is described as "a chilling short story, originally printed in the literary annual The Keepsake, credited simply to 'M.S.' ", and is accompanied by an afterword by Adam Newell presenting the case that this may be Mary Shelley.

 'Gibbet Hill' is 'an eerie short story by Bram Stoker, which was originally published in an Irish newspaper in 1890, but then forgotten until its recent rediscovery' by amateur researcher Brian Cleary in the National Library of Ireland.

Both chapbooks are in a limited edition of 250 copies on high quality stock and are accompanied by prints of scenes by J.M.W. Turner of the places that may have inspired the stories.

Publication is scheduled for week commencing 28 April, but orders are accepted now. Withnail's issues are not usually around for very long. 

 

The Centenary of 'The Great Gatsby': A Guest Post by John Howard

‘In my younger and more vulnerable years my father gave me some advice that I’ve been turning over in my mind ever since. “Whenever you like criticizing anyone,” he told me, “just remember that all the people in this world haven’t had the advantages that you’ve had” (7).’ This is Nick Carraway, the (then nameless) narrator, musing at the opening of The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896-1940). How the paternal advice was to influence Carraway’s thoughts and actions in adulthood permeates the rest of the novel, which was first published one hundred years ago in April 1925.

Fitzgerald had previously written This Side of Paradise (1920) and The Beautiful and Damned (1922), both commercially successful novels that helped to establish him as a celebrity author as well as the voice of a generation that had experienced the Great War, embraced the ‘Jazz Age’, and was being forced to endure (and frequently evade) Prohibition. Fitzgerald had considered several titles before settling on The Great Gatsby. Possibilities had included The Gold-Hatted Gatsby and The High-Bouncing Lover – both deriving from a poem by Thomas Parke D’Invilliers. Although the stanza lost its function as title provider, it survived as the novel’s epigraph. Covering all bases, Fitzgerald had written that as well.

Nick Carraway came to New York from the Middle West to work in the ‘bond business’. For reasons of economy he rented a weather-beaten house in the Long Island village of West Egg, not far from where his distant cousin Daisy, married to Carraway’s old college friend Tom Buchanan, lives in East Egg. The house next to Carraway’s bungalow, a ‘colossal affair by any standard’, is inhabited by Jay Gatsby, who regularly gives large and boisterous parties, but seems to want to avoid all contact with his neighbour. However, eventually Carraway is invited to one of Gatsby’s parties and finds his host courteous and affable. They have things in common, having both originated in the West and fought in France. But it turns out there was an underlying reason for Gatsby wishing to get on friendly terms with Carraway: Daisy Buchanan.

From the outset The Great Gatsby offers a vivid evocation of a swiftly changing and unstable society. The story takes place over some three months during a hot summer; moving through a luminous, often dreamlike, sense of place, characters and settings alike are bathed in heat and light. Colour and sensation are heightened with an almost childlike uncontrived sharpness; and when a storm or brief spell of dull weather interrupts the sunshine, it is a welcome contrast that reinforces the apparent idyll. Night scenes, darkness and the effects of moonlight are equally deftly handled. All of which demonstrates how closely and carefully Fitzgerald wrought his novel. In truth, artlessness demands effort.

Having created an apparently simple and natural background and context, Fitzgerald conceived a suitably similar central character to fit. Of the titles Fitzgerald could have chosen for his book, they rightly included Gatsby himself, whether referred to by name, description, or quality, because he is the novel’s heart and he feeds it as everything revolves around him. The Great Gatsby is the story of the man and his ‘soul’.

Carraway’s connection with Daisy and her husband makes him useful to Gatsby as a go-between and excuse. Entering and experiencing the world that Gatsby has built, Carroway eventually realises that Gatsby is every bit as artificial: he is self-made, his own creation. Over time, Carraway assembles his story – or perhaps myth – from several sources, including Gatsby himself, who is not so much an unreliable narrator as an incomplete one.

We learn with Carraway that in the beginning a teenager named James Gatz left a farm in North Dakota and as Jay Gatsby had been ‘beating his way along the south shore of Lake Superior’ when he did a good turn for the owner of a yacht. He found himself working for multi-millionaire Dan Cody, who in effect adopted him. Gatsby turned his good nature and willingness to adapt to advantage. He learned how to be social and to please; how to make connections and be useful. The boy was formed into a man of the world. Swindled out of a legacy after Cody’s death, the penniless Gatsby started anew – and years later, has come to move in circles which he can never decisively reveal to those he wishes to impress and wants to accept him. And in one particular case, to love him. Carraway uncovers Gatsby’s one great vulnerability: not his associations with criminality, but his obsessive love. That was the reason Gatsby had continued to build up what he had already started, developing his ‘great’ persona in order to regain Daisy – and what it was she had symbolised for him.

In The Great Gatsby everyone and everything turns out unfaithful, one way or another. Gatsby had conjured for himself a great illusion – which could endure only as long as everyone was willing to acquiesce to it. Tragedy overwhelmed it because nothing was as it had seemed – except for the dreams of a driven, striving personality who wished for nothing more than to return to his lost Eden.

(John Howard)

A Charlotte Brontë First Edition from Tartarus Press

 

In August 2022 I was delighted to be present at a touching ceremony at the Parsonage Museum, Haworth, when a remarkable literary discovery was returned to the home where it had been written. 

It was A Book of Ryhmes (sic), a manuscript book of verses written by a youthful Charlotte Brontë that had vanished from view but had now come onto the market for the first time for over a century. It had been acquired for the Brontë Society to join the other treasures they already own and preserve.

Now Tartarus Press and the Society have produced a jointly published first edition of the book, showing both the original pages in facsimile, in their actual size and in enlargement, and a transcription of the text. 

The publication gives readers the opportunity to own a Brontë first edition, share in the wonder of the survival of a genuine literary rarity, and to appreciate the charming and enthusiastic beginnings of Charlotte's writings.

There is an Introduction by Patti Smith, and essays by Barbara Heritage and Henry Wessells, and the book is available simultaneously in both hardback and paperback editions.

(Mark Valentine)

 

A Checklist of Haunted Library Booklets

Haunted Library, founded in 1979, is the imprint of Rosemary Pardoe for her journals Ghosts & Scholars and The Ghosts & Scholars M.R. James Newsletter, and for a series of booklets of Jamesian stories or essays. The checklist of the booklets given below has been compiled by Rosemary.

1. Eye Hath Not Seen: Supernatural Anecdotes from the Reminiscences of Father D. O'Connor (David  G. Rowlands, 1980)

2. 99 Bridge Street (William Fairlie Clark, 1982)

3. Saints & Relics (David G. Rowlands, A.F. Kidd, Roger Johnson, Darroll Pardoe, 1983)

4. Hag's Tapestry (Jessica Amanda Salmonson, 1984)

5. Watch the Birdie (Ramsey Campbell, 1984)

6. A Graven Image and Other Essex Ghost Stories (David G. Rowlands, Roger Johnson, Mary Ann Allen, 1985)

7. When the Door is Shut and Other Ghost Stories by 'B' ([A.C. Benson], 1986)

8. An Empty House and Other Stories (Ron Weighell, 1986)

9. Angles of Coincidence: Rennes le Chateau and the Magdalen Mystery (Ron Weighell, 1987)

10. The Moon-Gazer and One Other ('DNJ', 1988)

11. Binscombe Tales (John Whitbourn, 1989)

12. Harmless Ghosts (Jessica Amanda Salmonson, 1990)

13. Rollover Night: More Binscombe Tales (John Whitbourn, 1990)

14. Absences: Charlie Goode's Ghosts (Steve Rasnic Tem, 1991)

15. The Reluctant Ghost-Hunter (Rick Kennett, 1991)

16. The James Gang: A Bibliography of Writers in the M.R. James Tradition ([Rosemary Pardoe], 1991)

17. Spirits of Another Sort: Ghostly Tales of Tompion College (Alan W. Lear, 1992)

18. Popes & Phantoms (John Whitbourn, 1992)

19. Supernatural Pursuits (William I.I. Read, 1993)

20. A Binscombe Tale for Christmas (John Whitbourn, 1994)

21. The Greater Arcana (Ron Weighell, 1994)

22. A Binscombe Tale for Summer (John Whitbourn, 1996)

23. Call of the Tentacle (William I.I. Read, 1997)

24. The Fenstanton Witch and Others: M.R. James in Ghosts & Scholars (1999)

25. Occult Sciences (M.R. James, 2004)

26. Tales from Lectoure (M.R. James, 2006)

27. A Bibliography of the Writings of M.R. James (Rosemary Pardoe, 2007)

28. Ex Libris: Lufford (Daniel McGachey, 2012)

29. Ting-a-Ling-a-Ling (Daniel McGachey, 2017)

30. The Bishop's Inventory (Jane Jakeman, 2019)

No’s 25-30 were issued as supplements to Ghosts & Scholars or The Ghosts & Scholars M.R. James Newsletter. In addition, Jacqueline Simpson's Where are the Bones? and Other Stories (2019) was a joint Haunted Library/Supernatural Tales production. There are also a few other booklets such as The Cropton Lane Farm Murders, and those issued alongside subsequent issues of Ghosts & Scholars under guest editors, which didn't have the Haunted Library imprint.

 

Ghosts & Scholars 48

 

Ghosts & Scholars 48, co-edited by Rosemary Pardoe and Katherine Haynes, has just been published. The latest issue of the M R James journal includes two long, new stories from Steve Duffy and David Longhorn.

In non-fiction, Jim Bryant continues his series on MRJ’s travels, with ‘In the Tracks of M R James, No 9: Sweden’, Loretta Nikolic looks at ‘Potential inspirations for “The Uncommon Prayer-Book”’, and Iain Smith celebrates the centenary of James’ book Abbeys.

Rosemary Pardoe contributes an essay-review on Casting the Runes: The Letters of M R James. Rick Kennett surveys podcasts of MRJ interest, and there are five reviews of recent books and events also of James interest.

Ghost and Scholars 48 is available for £6 (UK), $15 (overseas), or as part of a one year, two-issue subscription for £12 (UK), ($30) (overseas), including postage.

Orders and enquiries may be sent to Mark Valentine at: lostclub[at]btopenworld[dot]com

All subscriber copies have been posted.

(Mark Valentine)

Dark Runs the Road by Evangeline Walton

I've just published a new book, a restored edition, under its original title, of a novel by Evangeline Walton. Her manuscript was cut by one-third by the original publisher (presumably to reach a standard page count), and published under a different title, which the author did not approve. This edition restores the text that was haphazardly chopped out, and restores the novel's original title, Dark Runs the Road. 

In 1956 it had been called The Cross and the Sword when published in New York by Bouregy & Curl. In 1957 it was called Son of Darkness when published in England by Hutchinson. It has long been out of print.

The new edition is available in trade paperback (ISBN 979-8304520089) and in Kindle format at the various Amazon incarnations. I couldn't resist using two of the Lewis Chessmen on the cover; see below. The rear cover, with the descriptive blurb, appears below that. (Click on the illustrations to make them larger.)

I think this is one of Walton's finest novels, and it's great to see it available again, allowing modern readers the chance to see if they agree with me. 

 

 

Meeting Corvo and Weeks in Georgetown: A Guest Post by Fogus

  

Frederick William Serafino Austin Lewis Mary Rolfe, better known as Frederick Rolfe, or better yet still Baron Corvo, was a British writer, artist, photographer, and eccentric. Born in London in 1860 and passing away in Venice in 1913, he's discussed more frequently for his flamboyant lifestyle and often outrageous behavior than for his literary works. However, his undeniable talent as a writer continues to captivate readers. His flamboyance alone, nor even the strength of his writing, could fully explain the century-long fascination by a "Corvo Cult" with the minutest details of his life and works. This fascination, explored in depth by Robert Scoble in The Corvo Cult (2014), has attracted many intriguing figures, but few of them pursued their quests for the Corvine as obsessively as Donald Weeks (1921–2003).

Weeks penned the biography Corvo: Saint or Madman? (1972), an exasperating read in my experience. Donald Weeks (né Norman Donald Jankens) was also a writer and artist who worked in graphic design, and lived the first part of his life in Detroit, Michigan, before eventually moving to London to live out his final days as a researcher for Gale Publishing, eclectic writer for The Tragara Press, and bibliophile. Like many before and after him, Weeks' obsession with Rolfe germinated from a read of A.J.A. Symons' seminal experiment in biography, The Quest for Corvo (1934).

Recently, I had the good fortune to examine the “Frederick W. Rolfe, Baron Corvo Collection” (Identifier: GTM-141102.1) held in the Georgetown University Booth Family Center for Special Collections located in Washington, DC. The collection included 4 document cases filled with various photographs, drawings, letters, and ephemera related almost entirely to Baron Corvo collected by Donald Weeks. Although Georgetown doesn't hold Weeks' entire collection related to Baron Corvo, the cases available offer a fascinating exhibit of a life-long obsession. Myself a bibliophile, I was immediately struck by the 2-page typewritten inventory that Weeks created, indexed by "Woolf numbers" — the entry numbers in Cecil Woolf's A Bibliography of Frederick Rolfe, of which I have the 2nd edition published in the Soho Bibliographies series (1972). It's unclear when Weeks created the inventory, but his collection continued to grow beyond the confines of the typewritten page onto a further 2-pages of hand-written items. While the collection at Georgetown held a few of the items listed in the inventory, a bulk of the material is ephemera related to various Corvine functions and Weeks' own correspondence to friends and family regarding his quests.

I'll avoid going into exquisite detail about the contents of the collection in this post, but will instead briefly describe a couple items of particular interest. First, the collection contained an announcement and order form dated in 1967 for a Victim Press publication entitled Corvo's Venice by Victor Hall, having an introduction by Timothy d'Arch Smith, priced at $6 plus $0.25 postage. The marketing copy states that the book had three parts: a sequence of captioned prints, or sketches from photographs by Corvo of Venice, followed by a reprinting of the prose piece "Venetian Courtesy", and concluded by 16 photographs of Corvo's place of death in October 1913 and relevant environs near the Palazo Marcello, Venice. 

 

 

I was unable to find much information about this publication beyond this announcement, but I'm struck by the macabre possibilities in the concluding section of the book. In that same macabre spirit, also in the collection is a hand-drawn map by Weeks of San Michele Island, Rolfe's final burial site. The drawing is made for maximum utility for visitors and belies the gravity of that monument to human mortality. The scrawled rectangular box containing the letter "A" does little to express the foreboding "boat landing" used to receive visitors to the small island crypt. As a matter of practical course, Weeks recommends that visitors present the island attendants with a piece of paper having only the name "ROLFE, F W" rather than attempting to ask after the burial site's location in broken Italian. Useful advice indeed!

The collection is fascinating and it compelled me to spend numerous days in the Georgetown reading room, despite the beautifully sunny December weather in DC. There are many more items of interest to Corvines and bibliophiles, but I'll defer further explorations for another day.

(Fogus)