Carmilla, The House of the Vampire, The Were-Wolf, The Turn of the Screw, The Shadow Out of Time,The Great God Pan, The Black Cat, Manuscript Found In a Bottle

Stories 10-18/31

This past week has been really really busy. And I haven't been able to post regularly like I wanted to. So this post is going to play catch up. These stories are mostly the shorter, more obscure ones: the type I probably wouldn't have heard of if I hadn't been exploring "The Classics" (Like Frankenstein, Dracula, The Picture of Dorain Gray, The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde...which I will will be talking about later this week!)

Carmilla

By Sheridan Lefanu

Link: https://librivox.org/carmilla-by-sheridan-lefanu/

Listening Time: 3 hours 27 minutes

Themes: Sexual consent, disclosure

I started reading a bit about this one early in the year, and then decided to put it off for a long bit because I'm really not too thrilled by the idea of lesbian vampires (or romanticized vampires in general) and it sounded like that's what this story was about. 

Fortunately, there's a bit more to it then that. There are the parts that read like bits of Twilight (with Carmilla being all creepy and stalkerish, and the main character being all adoring and naive)  but it also deals with the concept of consent.

It's explained that, on some level, vampires want consent from their victims. Getting their victims to like them, and convincing themselves that their victims want them to do it, makes them feel less guilty about hurting them. Of course, they won't disclose the fact that they're vampires, or that what they really want from you isn't just love and affection. 

But it's not like they'll take "no" for an answer either... If they can't seduce you, they'll just wait till you fall asleep. 

(Because ignorance is consent, apparently...)

I really liked that, ultimately they're not trying to humanize Carmilla. Or rather, giving this monster emotions doesn't make her less of a monster. It's not like she's a sociopath who lacks capacity to feel guilt, she'll just rationalize herself out of it every time. 

Rating: 3/5 (I liked it)

The House of the Vampire

By George Sylvester Viereck

Link: https://librivox.org/the-house-of-the-vampire-by-george-sylvester-viereck/

Listening Time: 2 hours 48 minutes

Theme: Talent

I went into this story expecting there to be an actual really, blood-sucking type vampire. And there is some paranormal phenomenon going on, but he's not a "real" vampire he's a psychic vampire. He steals thoughts and ideas, and if he tries hard enough whole personalities from people's minds. Once I figured that out the whole story got much less exciting because I knew exactly how the story was going to end. (and unfortunately I was right) there were no surprises, except for the way Reginald Clarke rationalizes his way out of feeling guilty.

(A vampric trait Professor Clarke shares with 

his blood-sucking cousins, apparently)

Reginald refers to himself as a Shakespeare and makes out that he's actually doing the world a favor: as a conduit for all of this talent and art and knowledge to reach the public. But he's just saying that to make himself feel better because what he really is is a talentless hack with no original ideas!!

(I really don't like him, can you tell?)

Rating: 2/5 (It was OK...)

The Were-Wolf

By Clemance Housman

Link: https://librivox.org/werewolf-five-pieces-by-saki/

Listening Time: 1 hour 51 minutes (in two parts)

Theme: Family, community

I got into this story because I wanted to see how the were-wolf myth evolved from folklore to popular culture (Like, "I Was a Teenage Werewolf"-type thing). 

Welll...

This story really doesn't really have much in in that pertains to that. Or if it does, it acts more on the folklore aspect of the werewolf spectrum.

My notion of werewolves, that I've just picked up from popular culture, is that most of them are male and that they became werewolves by accident. Most of them are pretty decent as humans but when they transform they loose control and become monsters.

White Fell is the complete opposite of that. She's a wolf all the time, even when she looks and acts like a human.

She's also one of the most compelling female villains I've read in a long time, partly because she is so universally likable; and yet her motives are so unsympathetic. I don't really know how to explain it, except if you're familiar of the character of Hans from the movie Frozen, she's kind of like that. She doesn't bank on just being attractive to the opposite sex. She banks on being a mirror: on being whatever you want her to be:

• Small children would want to look at her as a big sister.
• Elderly people want to see her as a daughter or a granddaughter.
• Young men want to see her as a love interest.

And she's happy to oblige all of them, but in her heart she sees them all in one way: as prey. 

And the only one who can see through her facade is Christian.

 I really loved the antagonism between these two, it gave the story a lot of tension and really epic feeling to it. 

Great atmosphere, a compelling villain, a compelling hero, and a gut-wrenching, intense confrontation. 

Rating: 5/5 (I loved it! It was awesome!)

The Turn of the Screw

by Henry James

Link: https://librivox.org/the-turn-of-the-screw-by-henry-james/

Listening Time: 5  hours 43 minutes

I listened to the version with Elizabeth Klett, and even though she is one of my favorite readers I think she did the voices poorly, so the link leads to the alternate version.

This story has an urban myth feel about it, like the kind of story you'd hear around the campfire. It isn't so much scary to me as it is really really sad. It just leaves me with a bad feeling in the pit of my stomach. 

There are two explanations for what happens in the story and both of them are distasteful.

I'm going to outright spoil the story here, so skip this section if you're planning on reading the book soon and don't want to know what happens:

OK, so either

1) The governess is a complete kook...hallucinating everything (as you do, when you're a repressed Victorian woman)

OR

2) she is legit fighting a paranormal battle against the evils spirits

Ultimately it doesn't really matter which one is real. The real scary-ness of the story is that she finds out by asking questions that the children were molested by their prior caregivers. It's really, really sad. 

END OF SPOILERS****

I rated it 3/5 I'm not really sure why, maybe because it was intense and spooky as a story. (I liked it..but it's nothing all that great.)

The Shadow Out of Time

By Howard Phillips Lovecraft

Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-CAgu-IgJgs

Listening Time: 2 hours 29 minutes

One of the few not on librivox.

The premise of this one sounds pretty similar to "The Host" by Stephanie Meyers. Only if Melanie and The Wanderer swapped bodies instead of both of them inhabiting the same one.

Unlike most of Mr Lovecraft's stories, there is a lot of adventure in this one, it's kind of sweet, and it ends happy (comparatively).

The professor who this is all happening to; his whole family gives up on him because he's changed so much. Except for his youngest kid, and this kid knows that this person is not his dad but he believes his dad may come back. 

And, he does! And he doesn't go completely crazy, or kill anyone, or die.

It's awesome!

Rating 4/5 (I really liked it)

The Great God Pan 

by Arthur Machen

Link: https://librivox.org/the-great-god-pan-by-arthur-machen/

Listening Time: 1 hour 59 minutes

This one is basically a sexified version of The Dunwitch Horror. Except instead of their being and old one/human hybrid there's a greek god/human hybrid. 

On a side note, it really bugs me that people can't get their greek mythology right: Pan is not involved with insanity, Bacchus is. 

Congrats Mr Machen, you look like an idiot.

Rating: 3/5 (I liked it. very comforting, good to fall asleep to)

The Black Cat

By Edgar Allan Poe

Link: https://librivox.org/the-works-of-edgar-allan-poe-raven-edition-volume-2-by-edgar-allan-poe/

Listening Time: 27 minutes

If you've read The Tell-Tale Heart, also by Mr Allan Poe, this story is very similar. But it also involves cats. So I kind of like it better. The main cat's name is Pluto (It's funny because Pluto is Micky Mouses' dog. I'm thinking, though that the cat is meant to reference the greek/roman god of war.)

I played the Dark Tales: Edgar Allan Poe Hidden Object Game based on this story, it was a lot of fun. I like how they make all of the games feature Detective Dupin, even though he was only in three of Poe's stories. He's a fun character.

Rating: 3/5 (I liked it!)

Manuscript Found In a Bottle

By Edgar Allan Poe

Link: https://librivox.org/the-works-of-edgar-allan-poe-raven-edition-volume-1/

Listening Time: 36 minutes

The whole time I was listening to this, Pirates of the Caribbean-movie music was going through my head. It was so, so fun.

Rating 4/5 (I really liked it!)