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Cold Hand in Mine: Strange Stories
Cold Hand in Mine was first published in the UK in 1975 and in the US in 1977. The story Pages from a Young Girl's Journal won Aickman the World Fantasy Award in 1975. It was originally published in The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction in 1973 before appearing in this collection.
Cold Hand in Mine stands as one of Aickman's best collections and contains eight stories that show off his powers as a 'strange story' writer to the full, being more ambiguous than standard ghost stories. Throughout the stories the reader is introduced to a variety of characters, from a man who spends the night in a Hospice to a German aristocrat and a woman who sees an image of her own soul. There is also a nod to the conventional vampire story (Pages from a Young Girl's Journal) but all the stories remain unconventional and inconclusive, which perhaps makes them all the more startling and intriguing.
� The Swords
� The Real Road to the Church
� Niemandswasser
� Pages from a Young Girl's Journal
� The Hospice
� The Same Dog
� Meeting Mr. Millar
� The Clock Watcher
Cold Hand in Mine stands as one of Aickman's best collections and contains eight stories that show off his powers as a 'strange story' writer to the full, being more ambiguous than standard ghost stories. Throughout the stories the reader is introduced to a variety of characters, from a man who spends the night in a Hospice to a German aristocrat and a woman who sees an image of her own soul. There is also a nod to the conventional vampire story (Pages from a Young Girl's Journal) but all the stories remain unconventional and inconclusive, which perhaps makes them all the more startling and intriguing.
� The Swords
� The Real Road to the Church
� Niemandswasser
� Pages from a Young Girl's Journal
� The Hospice
� The Same Dog
� Meeting Mr. Millar
� The Clock Watcher
215 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1974
288 people are currently reading
10.2k people want to read
About the author
Robert Aickman
150books525followersAuthor of: close to 50 "strange stories" in the weird-tale and ghost-story traditions, two novels (The Late Breakfasters and The Model), two volumes of memoir (The Attempted Rescue and The River Runs Uphill), and two books on the canals of England (Know Your Waterways and The Story of Our Inland Waterways).
Co-founder and longtime president of the Inland Waterways Association, an organization that in the middle of the 20th century restored a great part of England's deteriorating system of canals, now a major draw for recreation nationally and for tourism internationally.
Grandson of author Richard Marsh.
Co-founder and longtime president of the Inland Waterways Association, an organization that in the middle of the 20th century restored a great part of England's deteriorating system of canals, now a major draw for recreation nationally and for tourism internationally.
Grandson of author Richard Marsh.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 359 reviews
April 2, 2020
Robert Aickman is the best modern writer of supernatural stories, as great as--perhaps greater than--the Master himself, M.R. James. Whereas the Master specialized in a few settings (the ancient English cathedral or university town, the rare book auction or library, the academic gentleman's holiday trip, etc.), Aickman is an expert at creating a wealth of distinct settings which he articulates with precision in order to elicit distinctive and disturbing atmospheres.
In this collection, for example, we take journeys to: a shabby little English town with a sleazy fair, an island off the Normandy coast with an odd ecclesiastical legend, a Ruritanian duchy with a mysterious lake, a Romantic glimpse of early 19th century Ravenna which displays at least one vampire (and in which Byron and Shelly make one brief appearance), an out-of-the-way English rehabilitation center with unorthodox rules, the back pathways of no-longer-rural Southern Surrey menaced by a yellow dog, and a couple of London neighborhoods, one urban and run-down and one lower-middle-class. The atmosphere of each of these tale rings true, and suggests a wealth of ancillary themes, but Aickman, although he develops his themes expertly, never loses track of his central duty: to dismay and disturb, to frighten and appall.
Some devotees of the classic ghost story may be disappointed by his denouements, for often his hauntings are vague, his endings inconclusive and puzzling. I find, however, that his refusal to rely on pat plot devices and easy climaxes make his stories all the more unsettling and harder to forget.
April 8, 2017
as far as my love for genre fiction goes, college did a number on me and for many years i scorned my old high school loves of fantasy, science fiction, and horror. silly me; i'm glad i came back to my senses. during college, only a couple authors escaped my new-found scorn - one of them being the amazing Robert Aickman. pre-college, i enjoyed his sinister tales of uncertain, indescribable menace. in college, i found to my surprise that Aickman was a literary horror writer, and both my snobby new self and my buried-deep genre-lover rejoiced. i could appreciate him with a complete absence of guilt; if my postmodern buddies happened to notice his books on my shelf, i could defend him with ease. his stories were multi-leveled: they existed as menacing tales of horror - but they were also ambiguous, psychologically adept metaphors and analogies for life in all of its strange, unsettling complexity. nowadays, snob years long behind me, i enjoy him for both his literariness and his ability to weave a scary tale filled with dread.
but it is that literariness that really sets him apart. if you are a reader who wants your horrors to be straight-up and visceral, look elsewhere. Aickman crafted stories that are elegantly written, slow-moving, rich in nuance and detail, short on blood and shocks. he crafts - simultaneously - old-fashioned, shivery ghost stories and subtle, cerebral tales that muse on our fears and uncertainties. he is the obvious antecedent of Thomas Ligotti.
The Swords could be about a sadly inhuman and monstrous marionette who plies her abilities in tawdry sideshows and in the sex trade. it could also be about the fear of sex, the literal commodification of flesh, the dehumanization of women.
The Real Road to Church could be about a lonely woman who purchases a home that lives on the path of the dead. it could also be about a life lived without living - and a second chance, a chance to reinvent that life, and live.
Niemandswasser could be about a haunted lake. it could also be about the decadence and emptiness of aristocratic life, a shallowness so complete that it almost assumes its own kind of sad, meaningful depth.
The Hospice could be about a comforting retreat - comforting as the womb, comforting as the grave - in which our predictability-loving hero finds himself terrifyingly ensconced. it could also be about the logical end result of such predictability, a hell that pretends to be heaven.
The Same Dog could be about a vicious animal, perhaps even a kind of were-beast, one that takes captive our protoganist's first love. it could also be a literalization of how paths part, about how life moves us apart, how time changes everything, always.
Meeting Mr. Millar could be about a residence haunted by a living ghost and by a company of beings whose terrible motives remain tantalizingly beyond reach. it could also be about, well, growing up - learning that life is full of terrible things that we will never truly understand.
The Clock Watcher could be about a strange bride, a loving cipher whose existence seems to rely on her enslavement to the many ticking little cuckoo clocks that are brought into her home. or it could be a mordantly comic parody of the supposedly uber-efficient German character. it could also be about the deep gaps that exist between us all, in marriage, in our own understanding of the people around us.
so if you are new to Aickman, don't come to him expecting easy answers. expect to have to think about the purpose and meaning of why you are being supplied certain details, why stories are being framed in a certain way. Aickman does follow the traditional format of horror short fiction. a few pages are devoted to developing the story's protagonist, perhaps more pages than is typical. then the disturbing ambiguity begins, the horror unfolds... and then the tale ends. Aickman endings usually have little resolution and are almost always without an explicit explanation of what the reader has just experienced. that lack of explication is a hallmark of Aickman's style. but just as important are all of the details, important or seemingly incidental, the offbeat bits of dialogue, the disconcerting moments when the reader learns something that seems to come out of nowhere but yet somehow fits into the theme of the story being told.
i'll use "The Swords" as an example. the narrator, an impressionable traveling salesman, starts his narrative with an off-putting but perhaps often true generalization on the nature of sex, the first time, and all subsequent times. but then there is much odd detailing of the mysterious flophouses that the narrator must stay at, places he's led to by an ambiguous uncle, places teeming with squalid sexuality. these flophouses actually have nothing to do with the horror itself. later, there is a creepy conversation with a shop owner, who practically drools at the prospect of the young man before him having sex - he wants details, he wants it described to him. again, this conversation has nothing to do with the thrust of the narrative. and yet both the flophouses and the conversation have everything to do with what i think the story is about; they are there to further illustrate the story's implicit meaning. although they have little narrative purpose, they are still all of a piece. mysterious events are continuously detailed that have little internal logic but which make perfect thematic sense.
a last word on the story Pages from a Young Girl's Journal. this is in many ways an atypical Aickman tale - a journal account of a young lady's travels abroad, encountering a mysterious stranger, embracing his vampiric nature, becoming something new and terrible. the story's horrors are clearly delineated; the reader is made to understand exactly what is happening. it definitely shows that if Aickman had been of a mind to write straightforward horror, he could accomplish that in spades. it also illustrates a key strength: Aickman's skill at establishing a character. throughout all of his stories, i was continually impressed by how each protagonist was uniquely differentiated and by the depth of their characterization. they lived and breathed. but back to "Pages". although this was my favorite story of Cold Hand in Mine, i'm glad that this was not the direction that Aickman chose to go in most of his tales. i like the uncertain resolution, the creeping ambiguity. it is a pleasure not having things explained, to have to figure things out on my own. i love being able to approach his stories on whichever level i choose.
____________________
musical accompaniment
Sigur Ros: ()
DJ Spooky: Songs of a Dead Dreamer
Andrea Parker: Kiss My Arp
but it is that literariness that really sets him apart. if you are a reader who wants your horrors to be straight-up and visceral, look elsewhere. Aickman crafted stories that are elegantly written, slow-moving, rich in nuance and detail, short on blood and shocks. he crafts - simultaneously - old-fashioned, shivery ghost stories and subtle, cerebral tales that muse on our fears and uncertainties. he is the obvious antecedent of Thomas Ligotti.
The Swords could be about a sadly inhuman and monstrous marionette who plies her abilities in tawdry sideshows and in the sex trade. it could also be about the fear of sex, the literal commodification of flesh, the dehumanization of women.
The Real Road to Church could be about a lonely woman who purchases a home that lives on the path of the dead. it could also be about a life lived without living - and a second chance, a chance to reinvent that life, and live.
Niemandswasser could be about a haunted lake. it could also be about the decadence and emptiness of aristocratic life, a shallowness so complete that it almost assumes its own kind of sad, meaningful depth.
The Hospice could be about a comforting retreat - comforting as the womb, comforting as the grave - in which our predictability-loving hero finds himself terrifyingly ensconced. it could also be about the logical end result of such predictability, a hell that pretends to be heaven.
The Same Dog could be about a vicious animal, perhaps even a kind of were-beast, one that takes captive our protoganist's first love. it could also be a literalization of how paths part, about how life moves us apart, how time changes everything, always.
Meeting Mr. Millar could be about a residence haunted by a living ghost and by a company of beings whose terrible motives remain tantalizingly beyond reach. it could also be about, well, growing up - learning that life is full of terrible things that we will never truly understand.
The Clock Watcher could be about a strange bride, a loving cipher whose existence seems to rely on her enslavement to the many ticking little cuckoo clocks that are brought into her home. or it could be a mordantly comic parody of the supposedly uber-efficient German character. it could also be about the deep gaps that exist between us all, in marriage, in our own understanding of the people around us.
so if you are new to Aickman, don't come to him expecting easy answers. expect to have to think about the purpose and meaning of why you are being supplied certain details, why stories are being framed in a certain way. Aickman does follow the traditional format of horror short fiction. a few pages are devoted to developing the story's protagonist, perhaps more pages than is typical. then the disturbing ambiguity begins, the horror unfolds... and then the tale ends. Aickman endings usually have little resolution and are almost always without an explicit explanation of what the reader has just experienced. that lack of explication is a hallmark of Aickman's style. but just as important are all of the details, important or seemingly incidental, the offbeat bits of dialogue, the disconcerting moments when the reader learns something that seems to come out of nowhere but yet somehow fits into the theme of the story being told.
i'll use "The Swords" as an example. the narrator, an impressionable traveling salesman, starts his narrative with an off-putting but perhaps often true generalization on the nature of sex, the first time, and all subsequent times. but then there is much odd detailing of the mysterious flophouses that the narrator must stay at, places he's led to by an ambiguous uncle, places teeming with squalid sexuality. these flophouses actually have nothing to do with the horror itself. later, there is a creepy conversation with a shop owner, who practically drools at the prospect of the young man before him having sex - he wants details, he wants it described to him. again, this conversation has nothing to do with the thrust of the narrative. and yet both the flophouses and the conversation have everything to do with what i think the story is about; they are there to further illustrate the story's implicit meaning. although they have little narrative purpose, they are still all of a piece. mysterious events are continuously detailed that have little internal logic but which make perfect thematic sense.
a last word on the story Pages from a Young Girl's Journal. this is in many ways an atypical Aickman tale - a journal account of a young lady's travels abroad, encountering a mysterious stranger, embracing his vampiric nature, becoming something new and terrible. the story's horrors are clearly delineated; the reader is made to understand exactly what is happening. it definitely shows that if Aickman had been of a mind to write straightforward horror, he could accomplish that in spades. it also illustrates a key strength: Aickman's skill at establishing a character. throughout all of his stories, i was continually impressed by how each protagonist was uniquely differentiated and by the depth of their characterization. they lived and breathed. but back to "Pages". although this was my favorite story of Cold Hand in Mine, i'm glad that this was not the direction that Aickman chose to go in most of his tales. i like the uncertain resolution, the creeping ambiguity. it is a pleasure not having things explained, to have to figure things out on my own. i love being able to approach his stories on whichever level i choose.
____________________
musical accompaniment
Sigur Ros: ()
DJ Spooky: Songs of a Dead Dreamer
Andrea Parker: Kiss My Arp
July 26, 2021
I'll admit, summer probably wasn't the best time to read these stories. Particularly this summer in Vancouver, which was recently punctuated by record high heat waves. Let me tell you, in 46 degrees Celcius, there's nary a cold hand to be found (or air conditioner, if you're living in my miserable house).
Maybe that's why I was seldom comfortable in these pages? It's surprising I didn't like this more, given the reader that I am. There are many stars in the dark sky for this 1975 collection. All my gothic-loving friends give it high marks, and the lovely folks at the Backlisted podcast are agog over it, too. Plus, I struck gold and scored a first edition copy, with cover art by the fascinating Edward Gorey.
What Aickman's admirers seem to like about his work is the ambiguity of it. His refusal to explain. The fact that the stories end on an unusual note, with little in the way of clarity. I can get on board with that, to a certain degree, but I found this leans a little further towards postmodernism than I typically like, with several stories whose conclusions led me to feel non-plussed and underwhelmed. The descriptor facile came to mind after reading 'The Same Dog', long winded and pointless after 'Meeting Mr Millar'.
At his worst ('The Real Road to the Church' and 'Niemandswasser', two stories I can only describe as tedious and melodramatic), I suffered PSTD flashbacks from my experience reading Isak Dinesen's Seven Gothic Tales which, I have to say, I almost wholly detested.
One that doesn't seem to fit his usual style is 'Pages from a Young Girl's Journal', which has a much more straightforward lean, is well executed and somewhat entertaining, but at the end, struck me as predictable and unidimensional.
What Aickman did impress me with is his consistent creation of tension and atmosphere. Each story begins with a situation that seems normal and everyday, but quickly becomes bewildering and nightmarish. I also enjoyed, in a few instances, the symbolism he employs, which turns those stories into far more than their literal tellings:
'The Swords' - perhaps my favourite of the collection, using some rather sharp imagery to depict the violence of sex (or at least the perceived violence) from the point of view of someone who has little experience.
'The Hospice' - a strong story of a travelling salesman who happens upon a type of Hotel California in which some guests are chained to the dining table while they are force fed copious amounts of British food (ahhhhh!!! get me out of here!). It gave me the same disturbing feeling portrayed in the film "Eyes Wide Shut", and I believe has a similar staying power.
'The Clock Watcher' - a little heavy handed in its allegory, but nonetheless got my attention, especially for one devastating pronouncement: There are no beautiful clocks. Everything to do with time is hideous.
My recommendation if you plan to read this, is do so without ice packs on the back of your neck and fans blasting from all directions, and make sure you're armed with a healthy appetite for bizarre, unresolved narratives. Never know, it might make all the difference.
2.5 stars
Maybe that's why I was seldom comfortable in these pages? It's surprising I didn't like this more, given the reader that I am. There are many stars in the dark sky for this 1975 collection. All my gothic-loving friends give it high marks, and the lovely folks at the Backlisted podcast are agog over it, too. Plus, I struck gold and scored a first edition copy, with cover art by the fascinating Edward Gorey.
What Aickman's admirers seem to like about his work is the ambiguity of it. His refusal to explain. The fact that the stories end on an unusual note, with little in the way of clarity. I can get on board with that, to a certain degree, but I found this leans a little further towards postmodernism than I typically like, with several stories whose conclusions led me to feel non-plussed and underwhelmed. The descriptor facile came to mind after reading 'The Same Dog', long winded and pointless after 'Meeting Mr Millar'.
At his worst ('The Real Road to the Church' and 'Niemandswasser', two stories I can only describe as tedious and melodramatic), I suffered PSTD flashbacks from my experience reading Isak Dinesen's Seven Gothic Tales which, I have to say, I almost wholly detested.
One that doesn't seem to fit his usual style is 'Pages from a Young Girl's Journal', which has a much more straightforward lean, is well executed and somewhat entertaining, but at the end, struck me as predictable and unidimensional.
What Aickman did impress me with is his consistent creation of tension and atmosphere. Each story begins with a situation that seems normal and everyday, but quickly becomes bewildering and nightmarish. I also enjoyed, in a few instances, the symbolism he employs, which turns those stories into far more than their literal tellings:
'The Swords' - perhaps my favourite of the collection, using some rather sharp imagery to depict the violence of sex (or at least the perceived violence) from the point of view of someone who has little experience.
'The Hospice' - a strong story of a travelling salesman who happens upon a type of Hotel California in which some guests are chained to the dining table while they are force fed copious amounts of British food (ahhhhh!!! get me out of here!). It gave me the same disturbing feeling portrayed in the film "Eyes Wide Shut", and I believe has a similar staying power.
'The Clock Watcher' - a little heavy handed in its allegory, but nonetheless got my attention, especially for one devastating pronouncement: There are no beautiful clocks. Everything to do with time is hideous.
My recommendation if you plan to read this, is do so without ice packs on the back of your neck and fans blasting from all directions, and make sure you're armed with a healthy appetite for bizarre, unresolved narratives. Never know, it might make all the difference.
2.5 stars
June 25, 2019
The Swords (3 stars)
Although the worst story in this collection, creates a vivid atmosphere.
The Real Road to the Church (3 stars)
Atmospheric, but ending is heavy-handed.
Niemandswasser (5 stars)
Haunting and utterly brilliant, one of Aickman’s finest stories.
Pages From a Young Girl’s Journal (4 stars)
Pastiche of early 1800s gothic fiction, well written and slyly humorous.
The Hospice (4 stars)
Surreal and grotesque portrait of a dead soul in purgatory.
The Same Dog (5 stars)
Haunting meditation on Time.
Meeting Mr. Millar (5 stars)
More sly humour (yes Aickman had a sense of humour, though not everyone will pick up on it) in a story that could be regarded as an anti-Semitic parable, like Peake’s ‘Gormenghast� books (although I doubt Aickman consciously intended it that way).
The Clock Watcher (5 stars)
‘There are no beautiful clocks. Everything to do with time is hideous.� More of Aickman’s ambivalent feelings towards the Third Reich, in a supremely realised tale of creeping horror. (Aickman’s admiration for fascism, hinted at in several of his stories, was presumably offset by the fact that he had Jew friends, which conflicted his feelings.)
Although the worst story in this collection, creates a vivid atmosphere.
The Real Road to the Church (3 stars)
Atmospheric, but ending is heavy-handed.
Niemandswasser (5 stars)
Haunting and utterly brilliant, one of Aickman’s finest stories.
Pages From a Young Girl’s Journal (4 stars)
Pastiche of early 1800s gothic fiction, well written and slyly humorous.
The Hospice (4 stars)
Surreal and grotesque portrait of a dead soul in purgatory.
The Same Dog (5 stars)
Haunting meditation on Time.
Meeting Mr. Millar (5 stars)
More sly humour (yes Aickman had a sense of humour, though not everyone will pick up on it) in a story that could be regarded as an anti-Semitic parable, like Peake’s ‘Gormenghast� books (although I doubt Aickman consciously intended it that way).
The Clock Watcher (5 stars)
‘There are no beautiful clocks. Everything to do with time is hideous.� More of Aickman’s ambivalent feelings towards the Third Reich, in a supremely realised tale of creeping horror. (Aickman’s admiration for fascism, hinted at in several of his stories, was presumably offset by the fact that he had Jew friends, which conflicted his feelings.)
January 27, 2019
Good gravy, where do I start? So it’s taken me, on and off, nearly three months to get through this relatively ordinary-sized short story collection - and that ain’t a good sign! Of the eight stories here, one is really good and one is half decent - the others? Holy guacamoleshit - you need the patience of a fucking saint to get through those!
The Hospice is the really good story. A traveller is stranded in the middle of nowhere, stumbles across a strange inn, and stays the night there - except the staff and guests are all weirdos! When you can read a story straight and enjoy it on its surface level, that’s great, but if it also contains layers to appreciate and read another way, then that’s quite something. And The Hospice certainly has layers - it’s essentially a metaphor for death/the afterlife. Wonderfully creepy and unsettling - how I wish the entire collection had been like this!
The half decent story is The Swords where a man watches a bizarre fetish/freak show of a woman getting stabbed with swords on stage but somehow doesn’t die or sustain any lasting injuries. It’s the same as above where the story is entertaining enough but you could also interpret it another way, in this instance as a metaphor for sexual maturity/awakening.
Then we’re firmly into the dregs. A woman witnesses a strange ceremony in The Real Road to the Church (snore), a German aristocrat gets scared on a lake in Niemandswasser (zzz), a man sees a lost love in The Same Dog (sigh), and a woman into cuckoo clocks goes, hoho, cuckoo herself in The Clock Watcher (wakka wakka)!
I have to single out both Pages from a Young Girl’s Journal and Meeting Mr Millar for being extraordinarily tedious, made all the worse for being the two longest stories as well. I had almost no idea what was happening in Meeting Mr Millar beyond the dull narrator being cheesed off with the dude who lived above him for carrying on with booze and women. I think Millar was an Aleister Crowley type, or something to do with the dead, but fucked if I know. I definitely hated it immensely!
And then Pages from a Young Girl’s Journal which is about a boring little girl who becomes a vampire in early 19th century Italy. Which sounds promising but is so one-note and skull-crushingly dreary once you figure out early on that she’s a vampire. If you want to read a far better female vampire story, check out Sheridan Le Fanu’s Carmilla.
Robert Aickman’s writing in general is much too laborious to read and he has almost no idea how to pace a story. He’s far too subtle for his own good so it’s hard to understand what he’s driving at half the time and he is the worst at endings.
Having read another of his collections, Dark Entries, I’d say this is a writer who’s probably best read piecemeal - that is, single out a couple stories in a collection or two (Ringing the Changes from Dark Entries, The Hospice from this book), and ignore the rest. Pig-headed as I am, I got through Cold Hand in Mine but it wasn’t worth it, even for the two stories that I enjoyed.
The Hospice is the really good story. A traveller is stranded in the middle of nowhere, stumbles across a strange inn, and stays the night there - except the staff and guests are all weirdos! When you can read a story straight and enjoy it on its surface level, that’s great, but if it also contains layers to appreciate and read another way, then that’s quite something. And The Hospice certainly has layers - it’s essentially a metaphor for death/the afterlife. Wonderfully creepy and unsettling - how I wish the entire collection had been like this!
The half decent story is The Swords where a man watches a bizarre fetish/freak show of a woman getting stabbed with swords on stage but somehow doesn’t die or sustain any lasting injuries. It’s the same as above where the story is entertaining enough but you could also interpret it another way, in this instance as a metaphor for sexual maturity/awakening.
Then we’re firmly into the dregs. A woman witnesses a strange ceremony in The Real Road to the Church (snore), a German aristocrat gets scared on a lake in Niemandswasser (zzz), a man sees a lost love in The Same Dog (sigh), and a woman into cuckoo clocks goes, hoho, cuckoo herself in The Clock Watcher (wakka wakka)!
I have to single out both Pages from a Young Girl’s Journal and Meeting Mr Millar for being extraordinarily tedious, made all the worse for being the two longest stories as well. I had almost no idea what was happening in Meeting Mr Millar beyond the dull narrator being cheesed off with the dude who lived above him for carrying on with booze and women. I think Millar was an Aleister Crowley type, or something to do with the dead, but fucked if I know. I definitely hated it immensely!
And then Pages from a Young Girl’s Journal which is about a boring little girl who becomes a vampire in early 19th century Italy. Which sounds promising but is so one-note and skull-crushingly dreary once you figure out early on that she’s a vampire. If you want to read a far better female vampire story, check out Sheridan Le Fanu’s Carmilla.
Robert Aickman’s writing in general is much too laborious to read and he has almost no idea how to pace a story. He’s far too subtle for his own good so it’s hard to understand what he’s driving at half the time and he is the worst at endings.
Having read another of his collections, Dark Entries, I’d say this is a writer who’s probably best read piecemeal - that is, single out a couple stories in a collection or two (Ringing the Changes from Dark Entries, The Hospice from this book), and ignore the rest. Pig-headed as I am, I got through Cold Hand in Mine but it wasn’t worth it, even for the two stories that I enjoyed.
January 9, 2018
Robert Aickman writes seriously weird fiction. You enter his stories expecting it to take you somewhere frightening. They do, but it is not the familiar, comfortable frights that you meet - the map goes weird in the middle, and you are left stranded in a landscape designed by Kafka and M. R. James as a sort of joint venture.
The story which impressed me most, "The Hospice", is a perfect metaphor for Aickman's tales. A travelling salesman, taking a shortcut, lands up in an unfamiliar location. Taking shelter at a sort of inn - the "Hospice" of the title - he has such a weird evening and night that you start expecting ghosts to jump out at you from every page. But the author so skillfully pilots the story that all your expectations are belied - yet he succeeds in disturbing you much more than he would have had he used the usual ghoulies and ghosties.
"Yellow Dog" is another story which gave me the chills. It could be a frightening childhood incident, coupled with coincidence - or it could be something else totally. Here, the horror resides firmly in the reader's perception.
The first story, "Swords", wins the prize for total weirdness. It introduces us to a carnival where one of the main attractions is sticking swords into a woman - then kissing her afterwards! For a bit of extra, the woman will also come to your room to cater to your fantasies which may go a bit further than impaling a live person... brrr. This story was unbelievably kooky.
There are five more stories here - but to me, they were only mildly interesting. All readable, but nothing of the class of the above three.
This is well worth a read.
The story which impressed me most, "The Hospice", is a perfect metaphor for Aickman's tales. A travelling salesman, taking a shortcut, lands up in an unfamiliar location. Taking shelter at a sort of inn - the "Hospice" of the title - he has such a weird evening and night that you start expecting ghosts to jump out at you from every page. But the author so skillfully pilots the story that all your expectations are belied - yet he succeeds in disturbing you much more than he would have had he used the usual ghoulies and ghosties.
"Yellow Dog" is another story which gave me the chills. It could be a frightening childhood incident, coupled with coincidence - or it could be something else totally. Here, the horror resides firmly in the reader's perception.
The first story, "Swords", wins the prize for total weirdness. It introduces us to a carnival where one of the main attractions is sticking swords into a woman - then kissing her afterwards! For a bit of extra, the woman will also come to your room to cater to your fantasies which may go a bit further than impaling a live person... brrr. This story was unbelievably kooky.
There are five more stories here - but to me, they were only mildly interesting. All readable, but nothing of the class of the above three.
This is well worth a read.
January 17, 2008
Robert Aickman's term for his stories is "strange," and indeed they are, but I tend to think of them as "disquieting." His fiction takes me places that are not merely macabre or frightening; I find myself as adrift as his characters, not quite sure what is real. Much is left to my own imagination, and the most disquieting part is how I choose to fill in the gaps.
I am a great fan of weird and unsettling fiction. Things that don't fall into neat categories please me. And Aickman's ability to render atmosphere -- what I'd consider the essence of weird fiction -- is incomparable.
A favorite story in this collection is ""Niemandswasser." Though I'm writing this review some years after having read it, I can still recall the story vividly, and as I do so, the sense of dreamlike disquiet returns. Anyone who has rowed a small boat over an expanse of cold, dark, deep water will feel the pull of this somewhat fanciful tale, set in Austria before the first world war. The title translates as "No Man's Water," and it has touches of the seafarer's tale to it, but it also reminded me a bit of Dinesen's Seven Gothic Tales, at least in terms of time and aristocratic setting.
Reading Aickman requires a good deal of patience, or should I say a somewhat passive approach. When I read Aickman in a "normal" manner, marching along sentence by sentence, trying to connect things rationally, I grow impatient. When I allow the sentences to weave themselves around me, like tendrils, I find myself entrapped in Aickman's universe. Perhaps there is something essentially masochistic in this process. It doesn't feel particularly healthy, but like any addict, I come back for more.
There are sexual undertones, but there's far more at work than a dark yearning or frisson of the taboo. There is no trace of the sneering goth or woozily sexy vampire story about Aickman. As previously mentioned, there are touches of Dinesen-like grotesqueness, but most of Aickman's effect is achieved very quietly. His stories seem to work mostly on a subconscious level, and understanding why they work is quite beyond me. Or perhaps I simply don't want to examine the why too closely. It's like seeing something in the periphery of my vision, but dreading to turn my head and look at whatever it is directly.
I am a great fan of weird and unsettling fiction. Things that don't fall into neat categories please me. And Aickman's ability to render atmosphere -- what I'd consider the essence of weird fiction -- is incomparable.
A favorite story in this collection is ""Niemandswasser." Though I'm writing this review some years after having read it, I can still recall the story vividly, and as I do so, the sense of dreamlike disquiet returns. Anyone who has rowed a small boat over an expanse of cold, dark, deep water will feel the pull of this somewhat fanciful tale, set in Austria before the first world war. The title translates as "No Man's Water," and it has touches of the seafarer's tale to it, but it also reminded me a bit of Dinesen's Seven Gothic Tales, at least in terms of time and aristocratic setting.
Reading Aickman requires a good deal of patience, or should I say a somewhat passive approach. When I read Aickman in a "normal" manner, marching along sentence by sentence, trying to connect things rationally, I grow impatient. When I allow the sentences to weave themselves around me, like tendrils, I find myself entrapped in Aickman's universe. Perhaps there is something essentially masochistic in this process. It doesn't feel particularly healthy, but like any addict, I come back for more.
There are sexual undertones, but there's far more at work than a dark yearning or frisson of the taboo. There is no trace of the sneering goth or woozily sexy vampire story about Aickman. As previously mentioned, there are touches of Dinesen-like grotesqueness, but most of Aickman's effect is achieved very quietly. His stories seem to work mostly on a subconscious level, and understanding why they work is quite beyond me. Or perhaps I simply don't want to examine the why too closely. It's like seeing something in the periphery of my vision, but dreading to turn my head and look at whatever it is directly.
December 2, 2016
Knjiga "Hladna ruka u mojoj" Roberta Ejkmena je objavljena u okviru edicije Poetika strave. Orfelin je nastavio sa nizom sjajnih naslova u okviru ove edicije, te i ovaj put imam samo reči hvale. Pored priče "Mačevi", iz koje je izvučen naslov, knjiga broji ukupno osam priča.
Zajednički element koji objedinjuje priče u celinu jeste opisivanje osoba za koje se do kraja ne zna pripadaju li svetu živih ili mrtvih, te pobližem opisivanju i predstavljanju duhova kao element jezovitosti. Uz to, protagonisti se stavljaju u poziciju konstantnog preispitivanja događaja oko sebe i sebe samih. Posebno su mi zanimljiva mesta koje Ejkman opisuje - ona su iluzije koje mogu navesti čoveka da skrene sa pameti. Ništa manje zanimljivo jeste i dramsko vreme, koje je najčešće smešteno oko ratova ili neposredno po njihovom završetku.
O Ejkmanu nisam ništa znala dok nisam počela da čitam ove priče i umnogome mi je pomogla kratka biografija u razumevanju napisanog. Činjenica da je rođen na samom početku I sv. rata nam kroz priče govori koliko su ga ratna razaranja obeležila u mladosti. Takođe, tu je i porodična istorija - rezervisan otac, majka više nego upola mlađa od oca, njihovi međusobni odnosi i neminovan razlaz. Ipak, motiv koji se provlači kroz priče jeste motiv ljubavi, čežnja za ljubavlju i čežnja za razumevanjem i prihvaćenosti.
Ovom prilikom bih volela da izdvojim dve priče, "Isti taj pas" i "Konačište", iako su mi se sve priče podjednako svidele. U priči "Isti taj pas" pratimo dečaka koji sa drugaricom jednog dana uočava nešto neobično, a kasnije se, kao muškarac na to mesto vrać u potrazi za odgovorima. "Konačište" je priča o snazi volje i upornosti, protkana prilično jezivim motivima usisavanja životne energije.
Zajednički element koji objedinjuje priče u celinu jeste opisivanje osoba za koje se do kraja ne zna pripadaju li svetu živih ili mrtvih, te pobližem opisivanju i predstavljanju duhova kao element jezovitosti. Uz to, protagonisti se stavljaju u poziciju konstantnog preispitivanja događaja oko sebe i sebe samih. Posebno su mi zanimljiva mesta koje Ejkman opisuje - ona su iluzije koje mogu navesti čoveka da skrene sa pameti. Ništa manje zanimljivo jeste i dramsko vreme, koje je najčešće smešteno oko ratova ili neposredno po njihovom završetku.
O Ejkmanu nisam ništa znala dok nisam počela da čitam ove priče i umnogome mi je pomogla kratka biografija u razumevanju napisanog. Činjenica da je rođen na samom početku I sv. rata nam kroz priče govori koliko su ga ratna razaranja obeležila u mladosti. Takođe, tu je i porodična istorija - rezervisan otac, majka više nego upola mlađa od oca, njihovi međusobni odnosi i neminovan razlaz. Ipak, motiv koji se provlači kroz priče jeste motiv ljubavi, čežnja za ljubavlju i čežnja za razumevanjem i prihvaćenosti.
Ovom prilikom bih volela da izdvojim dve priče, "Isti taj pas" i "Konačište", iako su mi se sve priče podjednako svidele. U priči "Isti taj pas" pratimo dečaka koji sa drugaricom jednog dana uočava nešto neobično, a kasnije se, kao muškarac na to mesto vrać u potrazi za odgovorima. "Konačište" je priča o snazi volje i upornosti, protkana prilično jezivim motivima usisavanja životne energije.
November 29, 2011
I've been looking forward to reading something by Aickman for quite a while now. From what I had heard about his writing it seemed that his style of weird horror was just the kind of thing I'm looking for now. My anticipation and expectations having built up so high, I almost expected to be disappointed. I wasn't.
Each and every story in this collection was powerful, interesting and strange. "The Hospice" was a quintessential example of a weird tale as I've ever read. "The Same Dog" probably one of the most heart-breaking and terrifying I've ever read. "Pages from a Young Girl's journal" was quite different, portraying a young English girl, travelling abroad, as she gets turned into a vampire.
Aickman's eloquent yet plain and precise prose made the stories a pleasure to read. The characters are usually quite restrained, reserved and very British. Explanations as to what exactly is going on are never explicitly spelled out, it is left to the reader to put the clues together and interpret them as they will.
If you don't like a healthy dose of ambiguity with your stories, you'd probably do best to steer clear. If like me, that's precisely what you're looking for, you'll be wondering what to read next after finishing this fine collection.
Each and every story in this collection was powerful, interesting and strange. "The Hospice" was a quintessential example of a weird tale as I've ever read. "The Same Dog" probably one of the most heart-breaking and terrifying I've ever read. "Pages from a Young Girl's journal" was quite different, portraying a young English girl, travelling abroad, as she gets turned into a vampire.
Aickman's eloquent yet plain and precise prose made the stories a pleasure to read. The characters are usually quite restrained, reserved and very British. Explanations as to what exactly is going on are never explicitly spelled out, it is left to the reader to put the clues together and interpret them as they will.
If you don't like a healthy dose of ambiguity with your stories, you'd probably do best to steer clear. If like me, that's precisely what you're looking for, you'll be wondering what to read next after finishing this fine collection.
July 3, 2012
The does a nice job of capturing the dual flavor of Aickman's short stories, configured as they are so that the bizarre, eerie and discomfiting events that transpire within—ofttimes to a superficially normal middle-aged bloke whose average, workaday life comes to be seen as bearing its own (submerged) peculiarities, debilitations, and tensions—can be viewed through the lens of either supernatural visitation or psychological implosion, and may be interpreted as a grotesque theatre of uncanny occurrences or an earthly one endowed with modern symbolism. Excepting the fourth tale, that is�
Pages From a Young Girl's Journal
, in which Aickman abandons his trademark ambiguity and equivocality in order to directly access the otherworldly and its effect upon a young and naive English lass of aristocratic stock that is rapidly falling in value. Interestingly, I find myself in agreement and disagreement with Mark's take upon the tale: while I share with him an appreciation for the fact that Aickman opted therein to stretch and flex his writerly muscles by breaking away from his normal style while yet eschewing to otherwise delineate his Strange Stories so directly, I'm at the opposite end of his appreciation for the piece itself. Mark deemed it to be the best of the eight that comprise Cold Hand in Mine; I hold it to be the least of the lot. While Aickman's talents readily lend themselves to capturing the nuances and flavors of a narrative voice so distinct from his natural one, Pages... brought about the heretofore unrealized (and unheard of) situation wherein I began to skim through the final pages in order to be done with it. Not a bad piece of work by any means, but unable to capture my attention like so much of his other material.
Speaking of which, IMO the high point of the collection is what immediately follows upon PFAYGJ, the pitch perfect The Hospice , in which, as so often proves the case with this author, his greatest strength lies in his subtlety, and how the tautened measure of the quotidian unfolding in a mode that is just slightly askew can, upon the introduction of a single sentence, inflate to a level of sheer malevolence that nearly takes one's breath away. There exists, at the least, a superficially plausible explanation for each individual tic of the worrisome weirdness that Mr. Maybury experiences inside of this horrific hospice—but really, when you add it all up, the only plausibility remaining is that of getting the hell out of there, pronto. Furthermore, though its ending also differs from the Aickman norm, it is nonetheless brilliantly conceived and effected. The Hospice is one of my very favorites amongst the two dozen by the man that I've now had the pleasure of reading.
Cold Hand in Mine also continued with the trend—discernible in all three books of his that I've made it through—of having the final four stories be markedly stronger than those of similar number comprising the opening half. The Same Dog , in which the sallow and unnaturally shimmering titular canine—whose grotesque presence apparently lingers across the decades like a stain on time itself—serves as the harrowing marker point for an individual life rent in twain, only yields to The Hospice in a photo finish; whereas Meeting Mr. Millar , which summons forth pornography and prostitutes, phantoms and infidelities, gangrene ghosts and vengeance like a stopped heart from the loosened morality of interwar London, builds momentum in Döppler fashion. This leaves The Clock Watcher , a postwar fantasy fueled by black comedy as much as dark mystery, to close things out in appropriately off-kilter fashion—what with a spectral Mr. Peanut, all bedecked in Teutonic sprockets, gears, and pulleys beneath a top hat carved from the arboreal heart of the Black Forest, bedeviling the thoroughly English narrator and his timepiece-obsessed German wife, for whom the scarcely restrained hostility of neighbors loathing all things Axis-axised serves only to heighten the tensions of a household in which there are dozens of noisy, creepy clocks that rarely share agreement about what constitutes the correct time and yet harbor a vitality that can impart (or detract) from the very measure of one's span of life upon this world.
Speaking of which, IMO the high point of the collection is what immediately follows upon PFAYGJ, the pitch perfect The Hospice , in which, as so often proves the case with this author, his greatest strength lies in his subtlety, and how the tautened measure of the quotidian unfolding in a mode that is just slightly askew can, upon the introduction of a single sentence, inflate to a level of sheer malevolence that nearly takes one's breath away. There exists, at the least, a superficially plausible explanation for each individual tic of the worrisome weirdness that Mr. Maybury experiences inside of this horrific hospice—but really, when you add it all up, the only plausibility remaining is that of getting the hell out of there, pronto. Furthermore, though its ending also differs from the Aickman norm, it is nonetheless brilliantly conceived and effected. The Hospice is one of my very favorites amongst the two dozen by the man that I've now had the pleasure of reading.
Cold Hand in Mine also continued with the trend—discernible in all three books of his that I've made it through—of having the final four stories be markedly stronger than those of similar number comprising the opening half. The Same Dog , in which the sallow and unnaturally shimmering titular canine—whose grotesque presence apparently lingers across the decades like a stain on time itself—serves as the harrowing marker point for an individual life rent in twain, only yields to The Hospice in a photo finish; whereas Meeting Mr. Millar , which summons forth pornography and prostitutes, phantoms and infidelities, gangrene ghosts and vengeance like a stopped heart from the loosened morality of interwar London, builds momentum in Döppler fashion. This leaves The Clock Watcher , a postwar fantasy fueled by black comedy as much as dark mystery, to close things out in appropriately off-kilter fashion—what with a spectral Mr. Peanut, all bedecked in Teutonic sprockets, gears, and pulleys beneath a top hat carved from the arboreal heart of the Black Forest, bedeviling the thoroughly English narrator and his timepiece-obsessed German wife, for whom the scarcely restrained hostility of neighbors loathing all things Axis-axised serves only to heighten the tensions of a household in which there are dozens of noisy, creepy clocks that rarely share agreement about what constitutes the correct time and yet harbor a vitality that can impart (or detract) from the very measure of one's span of life upon this world.
November 27, 2019
Čudno je kako neke stvari kao da nepostoje kada ih susretne jedna osoba, a onda kao da ipak postoje ako ih susretne druga.
Ejkmanova proza tako istančano klizi po svojoj unutrašnjosti gdje su sve priče nekako neprimjetne. Poslije svake priče zaista se dobija na utisku da se želi izvesti neki trik kojeg bi čitaoca trgnuo i uveo u neku novu zamisao. Hladna ruka u mojoj predstavlja čudne priče obojene nesigurnošću i antagonizmom, pri čemu se horor doživljavao uzgred kao neka nuspojava. Ono malo više čudnijeg od čudnog dovodi do nekog takvog nagovještaja. Često postoji jaz između onoga što jeste, što bi moglo biti i što će biti. U pričama je sve nekako tu, prisutno je, nagovještaji su primamljivi i imate osjećaj neke čvrstine, a opet, sve to nekako prohuja kao vjetrom oduvano. Dok je Blekvud atmosferu gradio kroz guste šume i rijeke, sa minimalnom konverzacijom, dotle Ejkman kroz razgovore među likovima, njihovim ponašanjima, pristupa jednih s drugima, unosi neku vrstu škakljive jeze. Kod njega su ljudi sasvim prijatni, kulturni, izlaze u suret ako treba nekome da se pomogne i to čak poželjno, dakle nema nikakve naznake bilo kakvog neprijatnog dijelovanja prema bilo čemu. Možda je upravo to što čini suptilnost u onom nebivstvujućem koje se prožima kroz aktere. Nema čak ni borbe među nekim silama bilo da se radi o dobru i zlu ili slično. Priče sa sobom nose jednu duboku tajnovitost gdje nakon njihovog nominalnog završetka one i dalje traju. Čitalac se može pitati: zašto baš ovako; a šta da je bilo drugačije; s obzirom da su priče upotpunosti nedorečene ili neobjašnjene. U njima je stalno prisutna bojazan, slabost da se bilo šta prekine kako bi se moglo krenuti naprijed.
November 24, 2014
Robert Aickman defined his own work as as 'strange stories', avoiding terms relating to ghosts, horror or the supernatural because his fiction tends to be rooted in reality, with the exact source of the 'strangeness' often remaining ambiguous. They are frequently unnerving but rarely provide the reader with a clear resolution, which only serves to increase the effect.
This collection sets out its stall with the opening story, The Swords, which to me felt like a bit of a test; I can imagine a lot of people not making it past the beginning of it, and if I'd been in a different mood, I might have abandoned the book here myself. In a particularly distinctive, not exactly pleasant narrative voice, we are introduced to the protagonist, a young man (or a man remembering his youth) who promises to relate the story of his 'first experience' - although it seems to take him a while to get around to it, because first he talks about his job as a travelling salesman, and a visit to a circus in a strange, dank town. When he first meets the woman with whom this experience will end up taking place, the circumstances are nothing the reader could possibly have guessed at. 'The Swords' demonstrates Aickman's ability to take a seemingly ordinary scenario, something that might even be boring, and turn it into something unexpectedly bizarre and queasy.
In The Real Road to the Church, Rosa, a woman living alone on an island where she understands little of the local dialect, comes to understand that her house has a certain reputation - it's where the 'changing of the porters' takes place. This phrase means nothing to her until she meets a wandering cleric, who gives her some advice about how to manage the unusual location of her home, and this leads to a very odd confrontation. 'The Real Road to the Church' seems to inspire a whole spectrum of reactions, which perhaps tend to say more about the reader than the story - some find it depressing, others have said it's one of the most hopeful and upbeat of Aickman's stories. I didn't think it was depressing at all, but there is certainly an unsettling air to the tale, and it's true that almost any conclusion could be drawn from the ending.
Niemandswasser is a confusing story, and for me, the least successful in this collection. It's about a haunted piece of 'no man's land' in the middle of a lake - the brother of Elmo, the aristocratic protagonist, is injured there, and it's where Elmo will later meet his own fate. But stuff about the characters' wider family, the properties they own, their neighbours, and Elmo's totally ridiculously melodramatic response to the end of a relationship is all thrown in, too, and the end result was that it seemed a mess and I didn't really care what happened.
Despite the fact that it won the World Fantasy Award in 1975, Pages from a Young Girl's Journal is often derided in reviews of this book. Unlike the others, its events and the source of its evil are not ambiguous; it uses many themes and devices familiar from typical vampire stories and gothic fiction; it has a historical setting, and is written in the form of a diary. It owes something of a debt to , and initially, as the narrator and her family arrive at a dilapidated villa to stay with a contessa and her young, disconcertingly intense daughter, I thought it was going to go in the exact same direction. However, it takes turns that are predictable and yet feel entirely new. At the beginning, the girl is so immature and pompous she reads like a sort of female Adrian Mole; I laughed out loud a few times at some of her choices of words, and at the hilarious repetition of 'farcical'. But her voice changes a great deal over the course of the story (though subtly enough that it doesn't seem different in any obvious way from entry to entry), with the end result that the shift in her character and power becomes palpable. An exceptional example of well-worn themes updated and manipulated to fantastic effect - I immediately wanted to read it again.
The Hospice is both very good and extremely disturbing. After the historical setting of 'Pages from a Young Girl's Journal', it also represents an impressive shift in tone, showing the versatility of Aickman's style. And it is a perfect example of the ambiguity of these stories, as nothing is ever really explained and the ending is rather abrupt after such effective building of tension. On the drive home, a man named Maybury finds himself out of petrol and attacked by a 'cat'; seeking refuge for the night, he stumbles across the deeply sinister 'Hospice'. There follows some of the most nightmarish, dread-filled imagery I've come across in any story - one can imagine this being turned into a very powerful film.
The Same Dog has a great deal of promise, but doesn't come to anything much in the end. A man remembers a childhood meeting with a sinister dog, which left him ill and led to the disappearance, and apparent death, of his friend Mary. In adulthood, he returns to the scene of the incident and encounters - you guessed it - the same dog. The most disturbing thing about this, I thought, was the fact that the descriptions of the protagonist and Mary's behaviour as very young children was described in such a sensual way that it almost seemed to imply a sexual relationship between them, or at least a sexual charge even if they didn't understand what this was at the time - another example of the general aura of oddness and uncomfortable suggestions pervading these stories.
Meeting Mr. Millar might not actually be about anything weird; it might just be about very mundane, though probably illegal, goings-on in a London building. It's hard to tell. The narrator, an editor who's having a rather slow-moving affair with a neighbour's wife, certainly seems to have an overactive imagination, but it's never revealed what exactly it is that the peculiar Mr. Millar - the occupant of a downstairs office in the same building - is up to. (Aforementioned neighbour's suggestion of some kind of time travel is the most intriguing and unnerving thing in the story.) Of course, what happens to Millar in the end is horrible by anyone's reckoning.
The Clock Watcher details the life of a man whose wife has an obsession with clocks. At least, it seems like an obsession, though the events that unfold imply that her very existence relies upon them. There are similarities between this and 'The Swords' - the narrator has a similarly, er, 'unique' voice and, if anything, is even more unlikeable, with blatant displays of racism and sexism peppering his story. It's also similar in that the 'strangeness' relates entirely to the woman - the man is left to observe helplessly, ultimately being abandoned. The fact that the wife is German, and the story takes place in the aftermath of WWII, adds an extra dimension of meaning and suggests the whole thing can be seen as an allegory.
My favourite stories by far were 'Pages from a Young Girl's Journal' and 'The Hospice'. Both of them were genuinely excellent, but the others were such a mixed bag, the overall experience was average. There are definitely things I love about Aickman's style, and unlike many reviewers who have had lukewarm reactions to the book, I consider that ever-present ambiguity to be a strength. If his other story collections contain tales as good as the two I loved, I'll certainly read them, but the problem is that this can't be guaranteed... so if I do get round to them, it probably won't be for a while.
This collection sets out its stall with the opening story, The Swords, which to me felt like a bit of a test; I can imagine a lot of people not making it past the beginning of it, and if I'd been in a different mood, I might have abandoned the book here myself. In a particularly distinctive, not exactly pleasant narrative voice, we are introduced to the protagonist, a young man (or a man remembering his youth) who promises to relate the story of his 'first experience' - although it seems to take him a while to get around to it, because first he talks about his job as a travelling salesman, and a visit to a circus in a strange, dank town. When he first meets the woman with whom this experience will end up taking place, the circumstances are nothing the reader could possibly have guessed at. 'The Swords' demonstrates Aickman's ability to take a seemingly ordinary scenario, something that might even be boring, and turn it into something unexpectedly bizarre and queasy.
In The Real Road to the Church, Rosa, a woman living alone on an island where she understands little of the local dialect, comes to understand that her house has a certain reputation - it's where the 'changing of the porters' takes place. This phrase means nothing to her until she meets a wandering cleric, who gives her some advice about how to manage the unusual location of her home, and this leads to a very odd confrontation. 'The Real Road to the Church' seems to inspire a whole spectrum of reactions, which perhaps tend to say more about the reader than the story - some find it depressing, others have said it's one of the most hopeful and upbeat of Aickman's stories. I didn't think it was depressing at all, but there is certainly an unsettling air to the tale, and it's true that almost any conclusion could be drawn from the ending.
Niemandswasser is a confusing story, and for me, the least successful in this collection. It's about a haunted piece of 'no man's land' in the middle of a lake - the brother of Elmo, the aristocratic protagonist, is injured there, and it's where Elmo will later meet his own fate. But stuff about the characters' wider family, the properties they own, their neighbours, and Elmo's totally ridiculously melodramatic response to the end of a relationship is all thrown in, too, and the end result was that it seemed a mess and I didn't really care what happened.
Despite the fact that it won the World Fantasy Award in 1975, Pages from a Young Girl's Journal is often derided in reviews of this book. Unlike the others, its events and the source of its evil are not ambiguous; it uses many themes and devices familiar from typical vampire stories and gothic fiction; it has a historical setting, and is written in the form of a diary. It owes something of a debt to , and initially, as the narrator and her family arrive at a dilapidated villa to stay with a contessa and her young, disconcertingly intense daughter, I thought it was going to go in the exact same direction. However, it takes turns that are predictable and yet feel entirely new. At the beginning, the girl is so immature and pompous she reads like a sort of female Adrian Mole; I laughed out loud a few times at some of her choices of words, and at the hilarious repetition of 'farcical'. But her voice changes a great deal over the course of the story (though subtly enough that it doesn't seem different in any obvious way from entry to entry), with the end result that the shift in her character and power becomes palpable. An exceptional example of well-worn themes updated and manipulated to fantastic effect - I immediately wanted to read it again.
The Hospice is both very good and extremely disturbing. After the historical setting of 'Pages from a Young Girl's Journal', it also represents an impressive shift in tone, showing the versatility of Aickman's style. And it is a perfect example of the ambiguity of these stories, as nothing is ever really explained and the ending is rather abrupt after such effective building of tension. On the drive home, a man named Maybury finds himself out of petrol and attacked by a 'cat'; seeking refuge for the night, he stumbles across the deeply sinister 'Hospice'. There follows some of the most nightmarish, dread-filled imagery I've come across in any story - one can imagine this being turned into a very powerful film.
The Same Dog has a great deal of promise, but doesn't come to anything much in the end. A man remembers a childhood meeting with a sinister dog, which left him ill and led to the disappearance, and apparent death, of his friend Mary. In adulthood, he returns to the scene of the incident and encounters - you guessed it - the same dog. The most disturbing thing about this, I thought, was the fact that the descriptions of the protagonist and Mary's behaviour as very young children was described in such a sensual way that it almost seemed to imply a sexual relationship between them, or at least a sexual charge even if they didn't understand what this was at the time - another example of the general aura of oddness and uncomfortable suggestions pervading these stories.
Meeting Mr. Millar might not actually be about anything weird; it might just be about very mundane, though probably illegal, goings-on in a London building. It's hard to tell. The narrator, an editor who's having a rather slow-moving affair with a neighbour's wife, certainly seems to have an overactive imagination, but it's never revealed what exactly it is that the peculiar Mr. Millar - the occupant of a downstairs office in the same building - is up to. (Aforementioned neighbour's suggestion of some kind of time travel is the most intriguing and unnerving thing in the story.) Of course, what happens to Millar in the end is horrible by anyone's reckoning.
The Clock Watcher details the life of a man whose wife has an obsession with clocks. At least, it seems like an obsession, though the events that unfold imply that her very existence relies upon them. There are similarities between this and 'The Swords' - the narrator has a similarly, er, 'unique' voice and, if anything, is even more unlikeable, with blatant displays of racism and sexism peppering his story. It's also similar in that the 'strangeness' relates entirely to the woman - the man is left to observe helplessly, ultimately being abandoned. The fact that the wife is German, and the story takes place in the aftermath of WWII, adds an extra dimension of meaning and suggests the whole thing can be seen as an allegory.
My favourite stories by far were 'Pages from a Young Girl's Journal' and 'The Hospice'. Both of them were genuinely excellent, but the others were such a mixed bag, the overall experience was average. There are definitely things I love about Aickman's style, and unlike many reviewers who have had lukewarm reactions to the book, I consider that ever-present ambiguity to be a strength. If his other story collections contain tales as good as the two I loved, I'll certainly read them, but the problem is that this can't be guaranteed... so if I do get round to them, it probably won't be for a while.
April 9, 2015
Robert Aickman writes exceptionally British horror stories. I read many many Brits who don't strike me with their Britishness, in particular, but Aickman's just so urbane and mannered about how he puts his tales forth (okay, so I'm obviously operating on a stereotype of Britishness, rather than the wider-ranging actuality provided by those other authors). This occasionally offers a perfect or even hysterically understated turn of phrase, othertimes it just makes them drag on. All of the stories here are rather on the longer side, and often not so much happens, as far as action. When the story stays on a relatively predictable trajectory, as in one of the longest, his vampire tale "Pages from a Young Girl's Journal", which offers little beyond traditional vampiric lore, long established by the 70s, conveyed in a reservedly aristocratic holiday setting -- in such cases, they can grow rather tiresome. In fact, this was the case with most of the first half of the book, for me, after the excellent (and atypically queasy) coming-of-age opener, "The Swords". I almost gave it up at that point. Fortunately, I stuck it out, as the latter half immediately shifted into a much less predictable terrain, in which Aickman builds up a slow crescendo of vaguely mundane yet baffling circumstances into an eerily ambiguous climax, as in "The Hospice" and "The Same Dog". That these stories offer no clear explanation for their strange brushes with fate (fatedness here, in Ligotti's sense of "the weird encounter", perhaps, but with a welcome lack of Ligotti's histrionics) only makes them that much more strange and gripping. (This ambiguity and subtly also makes up the best traits of some of the earlier stories, as well, I should add). And though a resolution of "Meeting Mr. Miller" offers an explanation of sorts, its strength is that it can also be interpreted entirely as uninteresting (and probably wide-spread) post-war business practices being over-analyzed by an anxious mind.
February 17, 2019
3,6*/5*
1. Mačevi 4,5*
2. Pravi put ka crkvi 3*
3. Niemandswasser 4*
4. Stranica iz dnevnika jedne mlade devojke 5*
5. Konačište 4*
6. Isti taj pas 3*
7. Upoznati gospodina Milara 2*
8. Čuvar časovnika 3,5*
1. Mačevi 4,5*
2. Pravi put ka crkvi 3*
3. Niemandswasser 4*
4. Stranica iz dnevnika jedne mlade devojke 5*
5. Konačište 4*
6. Isti taj pas 3*
7. Upoznati gospodina Milara 2*
8. Čuvar časovnika 3,5*
May 14, 2012
"In the end, it is the mystery that lasts, not the explanation."
SO reads the quote that begins this anthology of tales by Robert Aickman. Although I didn't find all of the stories here to be equally engrossing, the impact this book had upon me was enormous. I can read a good horror tale, or watch a gripping horror movie, many times over, but the genre is usually quite visceral in nature, and usually the greatest impact comes with that initial experience. Subsequent visitations can still be powerful, but with few exceptions, it is unlikely I'll feel the same stomach-dropping dread and disquiet as the first time I tasted the experience.
Aickman is different. His stories actually seem to grow in power and inject greater unease with each reading. They suggest visceral horrors rather than show them outright, but the suggestions work on the mind like some kind of awful subliminal trick. When I read "The Hospice", I imagine some horrible kind of body horror, the likes of which might even make a Cronenberg balk, but which Aickman never actually spells out. No matter though; the notion is there, if you find yourself inclined to find it, and the fact that not everybody will get the same feeling from the tale is part of what makes it so utterly potent. I say that "The Hospice" is one of the most spine-chillingly creepy, unnerving weird tales I've ever read, but this only really hit me after I'd read it a second time.
There's a deep, all-pervading sense of loneliness that populates most of these stories. People move through drab, mostly post-WWII english landscapes and encounter strange things that their minds can hardly process. Most of the tales are told in first person, and the narrators recount events as best they can, without the omniscient wisdom of the authorial observer to clarify things for you, the reader. Don't think for a moment that the person telling you the story has any better understanding of events than you do. Realise that they might be very wrong about a great many things. Know that the tales they are telling might not necessarily go deep enough, but open your mind and work a little, and maybe your imagination will bridge the gaps. aickman's skill of presenting ambiguity that is as plain or obscure as you can make it borders on the genius here, and the notions I have about a few of these stories are so fantastic that I don't think I would ever share them with anyone.
"The Swords" might be a young man's rite of passage gone horribly wrong. "The Real Road to the Church" seems a rustic, noble lady's individual way of facing death. "The Clockwatcher" is so crushingly sad that I had to sit outside in stillness for an hour after reading. "The Same Dog" made me feel queasy and ill-at-ease, and I can't exactly say why, as the ending is actually one of the more conventional in the book. "Meeting Mr. Millar" was so quiet and subtle but suggestive of all kinds of filthy horrors gloating beneath the surface of everyday life.
Obviously, this isn't for everyone. It's cryptic, subtle to a degree that's unique and which can only be approached by a very few authors and readers. Give it a try.
SO reads the quote that begins this anthology of tales by Robert Aickman. Although I didn't find all of the stories here to be equally engrossing, the impact this book had upon me was enormous. I can read a good horror tale, or watch a gripping horror movie, many times over, but the genre is usually quite visceral in nature, and usually the greatest impact comes with that initial experience. Subsequent visitations can still be powerful, but with few exceptions, it is unlikely I'll feel the same stomach-dropping dread and disquiet as the first time I tasted the experience.
Aickman is different. His stories actually seem to grow in power and inject greater unease with each reading. They suggest visceral horrors rather than show them outright, but the suggestions work on the mind like some kind of awful subliminal trick. When I read "The Hospice", I imagine some horrible kind of body horror, the likes of which might even make a Cronenberg balk, but which Aickman never actually spells out. No matter though; the notion is there, if you find yourself inclined to find it, and the fact that not everybody will get the same feeling from the tale is part of what makes it so utterly potent. I say that "The Hospice" is one of the most spine-chillingly creepy, unnerving weird tales I've ever read, but this only really hit me after I'd read it a second time.
There's a deep, all-pervading sense of loneliness that populates most of these stories. People move through drab, mostly post-WWII english landscapes and encounter strange things that their minds can hardly process. Most of the tales are told in first person, and the narrators recount events as best they can, without the omniscient wisdom of the authorial observer to clarify things for you, the reader. Don't think for a moment that the person telling you the story has any better understanding of events than you do. Realise that they might be very wrong about a great many things. Know that the tales they are telling might not necessarily go deep enough, but open your mind and work a little, and maybe your imagination will bridge the gaps. aickman's skill of presenting ambiguity that is as plain or obscure as you can make it borders on the genius here, and the notions I have about a few of these stories are so fantastic that I don't think I would ever share them with anyone.
"The Swords" might be a young man's rite of passage gone horribly wrong. "The Real Road to the Church" seems a rustic, noble lady's individual way of facing death. "The Clockwatcher" is so crushingly sad that I had to sit outside in stillness for an hour after reading. "The Same Dog" made me feel queasy and ill-at-ease, and I can't exactly say why, as the ending is actually one of the more conventional in the book. "Meeting Mr. Millar" was so quiet and subtle but suggestive of all kinds of filthy horrors gloating beneath the surface of everyday life.
Obviously, this isn't for everyone. It's cryptic, subtle to a degree that's unique and which can only be approached by a very few authors and readers. Give it a try.
March 25, 2015
I feel a little dishonest giving this 4 stars because I frequently felt a bit bored reading it and had to make myself go on. However, almost all the stories were genuinely creepy and I was impressed by how different they were from one another. "Pages from a Young Lady's Journal" was my favorite.
November 22, 2022
There’s two outstanding stories in this collection.
The Swords
Absolutely tremendous. Very in its incorporation of carnivals and 'freak-shows'.
A young traveling salesman, perhaps 16, is bored when working away from home and goes looking for adventure. He stumbles upon a decrepit town carnival that has long seen better days. Hidden away, he finds a side-show that becomes an infatuation: men paying to stab a woman with swords.
Strange as of course it is, it has a meaning - a boy coming of age and experiencing something like sex for the first time, but dreading it, and indulging in it because its what everyone else does, rather than any drive from within.
The woman is as inexpressive and impassive as the boy.
Aickman is making a statement here, whether it is about the act of prostitution, or the blindly copying the behaviour of others / elders without querying it.
And, The Hospice which is a genuinely scary horror tale.
Another travelling salesman (this time much older) called Maybury takes the wrong turn on a road somewhere in the west Midlands and finds himself lost, and low on fuel. Amidst solitary Victorian detached houses separated by a forest he stumbles upon ‘The Hospice�, which offers ‘good food, some accommodation�. He decides to try it out, hoping to stay the night.
There are vast portions of everything, and the residents are tucking in with what seems unending appetites. Maybury finds the food stodgy and overcooked, and struggles to get through a fraction of what the rest are.
Looking around he notices..
It’s all twin rooms at the Hospice as the residents cannot stand to be alone. When Maybury gets to his room he finds the heating turned up full, he tries to open a window, but behind the curtains is only a bricked wall. His roommate steps outside for a few minutes. When he returns Maybury thinks it may ne a different person.
This is classic horror; a tremendous author at the height of his powers. There’s no gruesome murders, no monsters, no sudden shock moments, the terror is achieved by misdirection.
At its heart it is about paranoia, people who see threat all around them, and who are so terrified of what could happen to them they will do anything to avoid it.
The Swords
Absolutely tremendous. Very in its incorporation of carnivals and 'freak-shows'.
A young traveling salesman, perhaps 16, is bored when working away from home and goes looking for adventure. He stumbles upon a decrepit town carnival that has long seen better days. Hidden away, he finds a side-show that becomes an infatuation: men paying to stab a woman with swords.
There was a burly chap standing on the low platform, giving the spiel, in a pretty rough delivery. He had tight yellow curls, the colour of cheap lemonade but turning grey, and a big red face, with a splay nose, and very dark red lips. The ears didn’t seem exactly opposite one another.
On the chap’s left a girl lay spread out facing us in an upright canvas chair, as faded and battered as everything else in the outfit. She was dressed up like a French chorus, in a tight and shiny black thing, cut low, and black fishnet stockings, and those shiny black shoes with super high heels that many men go for in such a big way. But the effect was not particularly sexy, all the same. The different bits of costume had all seen better days, like everything else, and the girl herself looked more sick than spicy.
Strange as of course it is, it has a meaning - a boy coming of age and experiencing something like sex for the first time, but dreading it, and indulging in it because its what everyone else does, rather than any drive from within.
The woman is as inexpressive and impassive as the boy.
Aickman is making a statement here, whether it is about the act of prostitution, or the blindly copying the behaviour of others / elders without querying it.
And, The Hospice which is a genuinely scary horror tale.
Another travelling salesman (this time much older) called Maybury takes the wrong turn on a road somewhere in the west Midlands and finds himself lost, and low on fuel. Amidst solitary Victorian detached houses separated by a forest he stumbles upon ‘The Hospice�, which offers ‘good food, some accommodation�. He decides to try it out, hoping to stay the night.
There are vast portions of everything, and the residents are tucking in with what seems unending appetites. Maybury finds the food stodgy and overcooked, and struggles to get through a fraction of what the rest are.
Looking around he notices..
something most curious. A central rail ran the length of the long table a few inches above the floor. To this rail, one of the male guests was attached by a fetter round his left ankle.
It’s all twin rooms at the Hospice as the residents cannot stand to be alone. When Maybury gets to his room he finds the heating turned up full, he tries to open a window, but behind the curtains is only a bricked wall. His roommate steps outside for a few minutes. When he returns Maybury thinks it may ne a different person.
This is classic horror; a tremendous author at the height of his powers. There’s no gruesome murders, no monsters, no sudden shock moments, the terror is achieved by misdirection.
At its heart it is about paranoia, people who see threat all around them, and who are so terrified of what could happen to them they will do anything to avoid it.
May 16, 2016
The Little Free Library in my neighborhood had, to my surprise, two books by Robert Aickman: Painted Devils and Cold Hand in Mine .
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I would describe Robert Aickman's short fiction as uncanny--strange or mysterious in an unsettling way. Lines from his story "The Real Road to the Church", which is in this volume, seem to describe well his fiction:
" Daily life is entirely a matter of the pattern men and women impose upon it: of style, as the artist calls it. And the character of that pattern is very important, as day follow day. None the less, reality lies far behind, and is unchangeable: is ritual in fact.....Reality is often dangerous...And of course be prepared for a big change; something indescribable, unpredictable. "
In the story "The Swords" a travelling salesman, in a tent at a shabby fair, watches men paying to stab a woman with swords on a rickety stage. The salesman would have none of it. Later, the salesman gets a "private show" with the woman, which turns out freaky. As I reflect on the story, it just occurred to me that perhaps the woman is not quite human, she seemed to act too mechanical in the story. This brings up another aspect of Robert Aickman's fiction: a story is open to interpretation.
The next two stories in this volume "The Real Road To The Church" and "Niemandswasser" reminded me of Winter's Tales by Isak Dinesen. Melancholy supernatural stories set in Northern Europe.
"Pages from a Young Girl's Journal" is an exception to Aickman's general approach. Its a straight forward story, written in diary form, of an adolescent girl's transformation into a vampire. The narrator is amusing at times too. For those who like to read vampire romance, I suggest to give this story a try. Hands down, its vastly superior in plot and prose that the Twilight novels.
"The Hospice" is perhaps Aickman's most famous story. Maybury is a married man and traveling salesman who, in the midst of his lengthy drive home, is forced to stop at an unfamiliar lodge. The stuff related in this story is sometimes strange, sometimes disturbing, and might even be illegal.
At first, I considered this story mimetic. Nothing supernatural about it. I had stayed in a hospital for over a week following an operation, and I experienced some unusual stuff. Then, I decided to sleep on it--I put this story in my subconscious while I slept. That was an interesting experiment. I had a dream comprised of scenes from this story. At the end of this dream, I thought "Undead."
"The Same Dog" Two children, Hilary and Mary, who are boyfriend/girlfriend , come upon a house with a large wall and gate, and see a strange yellow dog which mesmerizes Mary. Sometime later, after a long illness, Hilary is told that Mary died, mauled. Hilary, now an adult, visits the house with an adult friend, and sees the same yellow dog and an adult Mary.
"Meeting Mr. Millar" In a house, the narrator lives in one flat, a married couple with kids lives in another flat, and Mr. Millar moves into a third flat, where he conducts business. As to what exactly Mr. Millar, and the people who work and visit him do, is ambiguous. Perhaps shady, perhaps supernatural.
"The Clock Watcher" The narrator is a British veteran who married a German woman, named Ursula. Ursula brings a lot of clocks into the house, and is very concerned about their functioning. It appears that her existence is tied to these clocks.
/photo/user/...
I would describe Robert Aickman's short fiction as uncanny--strange or mysterious in an unsettling way. Lines from his story "The Real Road to the Church", which is in this volume, seem to describe well his fiction:
" Daily life is entirely a matter of the pattern men and women impose upon it: of style, as the artist calls it. And the character of that pattern is very important, as day follow day. None the less, reality lies far behind, and is unchangeable: is ritual in fact.....Reality is often dangerous...And of course be prepared for a big change; something indescribable, unpredictable. "
In the story "The Swords" a travelling salesman, in a tent at a shabby fair, watches men paying to stab a woman with swords on a rickety stage. The salesman would have none of it. Later, the salesman gets a "private show" with the woman, which turns out freaky. As I reflect on the story, it just occurred to me that perhaps the woman is not quite human, she seemed to act too mechanical in the story. This brings up another aspect of Robert Aickman's fiction: a story is open to interpretation.
The next two stories in this volume "The Real Road To The Church" and "Niemandswasser" reminded me of Winter's Tales by Isak Dinesen. Melancholy supernatural stories set in Northern Europe.
"Pages from a Young Girl's Journal" is an exception to Aickman's general approach. Its a straight forward story, written in diary form, of an adolescent girl's transformation into a vampire. The narrator is amusing at times too. For those who like to read vampire romance, I suggest to give this story a try. Hands down, its vastly superior in plot and prose that the Twilight novels.
"The Hospice" is perhaps Aickman's most famous story. Maybury is a married man and traveling salesman who, in the midst of his lengthy drive home, is forced to stop at an unfamiliar lodge. The stuff related in this story is sometimes strange, sometimes disturbing, and might even be illegal.
At first, I considered this story mimetic. Nothing supernatural about it. I had stayed in a hospital for over a week following an operation, and I experienced some unusual stuff. Then, I decided to sleep on it--I put this story in my subconscious while I slept. That was an interesting experiment. I had a dream comprised of scenes from this story. At the end of this dream, I thought "Undead."
"The Same Dog" Two children, Hilary and Mary, who are boyfriend/girlfriend , come upon a house with a large wall and gate, and see a strange yellow dog which mesmerizes Mary. Sometime later, after a long illness, Hilary is told that Mary died, mauled. Hilary, now an adult, visits the house with an adult friend, and sees the same yellow dog and an adult Mary.
"Meeting Mr. Millar" In a house, the narrator lives in one flat, a married couple with kids lives in another flat, and Mr. Millar moves into a third flat, where he conducts business. As to what exactly Mr. Millar, and the people who work and visit him do, is ambiguous. Perhaps shady, perhaps supernatural.
"The Clock Watcher" The narrator is a British veteran who married a German woman, named Ursula. Ursula brings a lot of clocks into the house, and is very concerned about their functioning. It appears that her existence is tied to these clocks.
July 3, 2019
It's curious how in a few of these stories Aickman maintains such a taut level of suspense paired with impeccable pacing, while in others he drones on and on, drowning the reader in an abundance of dry detail, thus diluting the fog of unease that makes the former stories so strong. The longer stories in particular bottom out with weak narrative force and little of interest to distract from how slow the pacing has become. I did appreciate Aickman's humor, dry and restrained as it is, though even that was at times too muted and/or infrequent to keep me engaged. Although in general I enjoyed his style, there were only a few stories that particularly moved me. Rating breakdown below:
The Swords - 4
The Real Road to the Church - 3
Niemandswasser - 4
Pages from a Young Girl's Journal - 3
The Hospice - 4
The Same Dog - 3
Meeting Mr Millar - 3
The Clock Watcher - 2
(Overall rating: 3.25)
The Swords - 4
The Real Road to the Church - 3
Niemandswasser - 4
Pages from a Young Girl's Journal - 3
The Hospice - 4
The Same Dog - 3
Meeting Mr Millar - 3
The Clock Watcher - 2
(Overall rating: 3.25)
December 7, 2019
2.5/5. I think the fact that it took me nearly two months to finish this speaks for itself. There's an intriguing element to all of his stories, but it's never enough to keep me interested when everything else about his writing is pretty dull. Aickman's writing feels quite distanced from his characters and he's not always able to create a tangible atmosphere in his descriptions. I like stories that navigate the unexplained or the weird and leave lots of things open for interpretation, but I need something else to hold onto while reading � atmosphere, characterisation, something that catches my attention. Since lots of these stories didn't have that something to hold onto (with the exception of the first story The Swords maybe, I don't think I'll ever forget that ending), I was never excited to pick this back up again.
April 18, 2023
Decidí releer esta antología porque fue mi primer contacto con Aickman, un escritor que puede resultar tremendamente desconcertante (como así fue) y al que no le pillé el punto hasta el segundo libro que leí de él, la edición de "Cuentos de lo extraño" de Atalanta. Así que me pareció buena idea revisar unos relatos que quizá no había apreciado porque simplemente no los había entendido. El resultado en esta revisitación es que sigo manteniendo mi flipamiento con los dos mejores relatos del libro, que además son dos de los mejores relatos que he leído en mi vida, el tremendamente grimoso "The Swords", el mejor cuento jamás escrito sobre perder la virginidad a cambio de dinero en una pensión de Cuenca y el famoso "The Hospice" la maravillosa historia cuyo desconcertante efecto sobre el lector se logra contando un sueño, su extraña lógica y los conflictos cotidianos flotando por el subconsciente, como si el protagonista te contara en el pub una movida un poco rara que le pasó el otro día. Se me ha caído un poco "Pages from a young girl´s journal", un relato vampírico visto desde el punto de vista de la víctima, que aunque está muy bien escrito (como todos los cuentos de la antología), con humor e ironía, resulta quizá demasiado largo para tan escasa peripecia. He leído por ahí que el mérito de este relato es contar un cuento gótico con herramientas modernas (el narrador no fiable, la ambigüedad, etc) pero considero que tener que ser un estudioso de la literatura para disfrutar de un cuento no es que le sume puntos positivos.
En el resto hay un poco de todo. "The Real Road to the Church" es el típico relato Aickman que responde a conflicto interior expresado a través de situación sobrenatural, aunque ninguno de los dos, ni conflicto ni acontecimiento sobrenatural sean especialmente interesantes, "Niemandswasser", es un cuento sobre una feroz ondina, aunque el relato es un poco rollo, entre la parodia inglesa del carácter alemán y ecos subterráneos de la I Guerra Mundial, "The Same Dog", es un cuento sobre la llegada a la madurez sexual, sexualidades problemáticas (y posiblemente un episodio de violación) que se ve devorado por las imágenes simbólicas que acaban por comerse un poco el relato, aunque no está mal. "Meeting Mr Millar", parece centrarse en la llegada a la madurez y el mundo adulto de un joven en el Londres de entreguerras, cuyo ambiente lo domina todo. Su propuesta de una oficina loquísima me tuvo intrigadísimo durante la mayor parte de su lectura, pero la resolución lo echa en parte por tierra. Y finalmente "The Clock Watcher", es otro cuento sobre secretos familiares nazis, conflictos sexuales y una visión pesimista de la vida matrimonial, pero que a pesar de tener algún buen momento se hace también excesivamente largo y algo pesado, sobre todo por su desagradable protagonista masculino. A este respecto es muy interesante el posfacio que completa este volumen en edición de Faber, "Memories of a Friend", escrito por la autora de libros infantiles y amiga personal de Aickman, Jean Richardson, en el que aparte de revelar su carácter de señor inglés chapado a la antigua (vaya, qué sorpresa), cultísimo, encantador y gran conversador, nos proporciona algunas claves sobre las ideas de Aickman acerca del amor, las mujeres y su visión pesimista del matrimonio y las relaciones, que explican bastante bien este último cuento.
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Escribía hace poco M. John Harrison en su blog que "The Swords", el relato que abre esta antología, era su cuento grotesco favorito. Y comparto totalmente su fascinación con este relato, "The Swords", una historia sobre la pérdida de la inocencia que podría ir firmado por el propio Harrison (el de los cuentos de "El mono de hielo" o el de "El curso del corazón"), o incluso por un Thomas Ligotti, o un Charles Burns; esa atmósfera, ese mundo que parece habitado por sombras o fantasmas, esa sordidez, esa sexualidad inquietante, sudorosa y culpable, ese argumento difuso típico de Ligotti; "iba dando una vuelta por la ciudad y me encontré con una feria, y en la feria un tenderete, entré y.... PUM!"
El resto de historias que conforman "Cold Hand in Mine" van desde la excelente historia vampírica "Pages from a Young Girl's Journal", muy en la onda de Angela Carter, o el rarísimo y excepcional "The Hospice" donde te birla el clímax terrorífico de la manera más loca posible, a lo un poco coñazo en "The Real Road to the Church" o "The Clock Watcher" donde la fórmula de "kitchen sink drama" gótico resulta algo aburrida, en las que mayor parte de la historia transita por los cerros de Úbeda regodeándose en un detallado pero ambiguo análisis psicológico de los personajes que (aparentemente) resultan irrelevantes una vez has leído la historia, y en los que Aickman se resiste a introducir el elemento fantástico, convertido en una ausencia. Pero no importa, aunque sólo tuviera un cuento por antología a la altura de "The Swords", merecería la pena.
En el resto hay un poco de todo. "The Real Road to the Church" es el típico relato Aickman que responde a conflicto interior expresado a través de situación sobrenatural, aunque ninguno de los dos, ni conflicto ni acontecimiento sobrenatural sean especialmente interesantes, "Niemandswasser", es un cuento sobre una feroz ondina, aunque el relato es un poco rollo, entre la parodia inglesa del carácter alemán y ecos subterráneos de la I Guerra Mundial, "The Same Dog", es un cuento sobre la llegada a la madurez sexual, sexualidades problemáticas (y posiblemente un episodio de violación) que se ve devorado por las imágenes simbólicas que acaban por comerse un poco el relato, aunque no está mal. "Meeting Mr Millar", parece centrarse en la llegada a la madurez y el mundo adulto de un joven en el Londres de entreguerras, cuyo ambiente lo domina todo. Su propuesta de una oficina loquísima me tuvo intrigadísimo durante la mayor parte de su lectura, pero la resolución lo echa en parte por tierra. Y finalmente "The Clock Watcher", es otro cuento sobre secretos familiares nazis, conflictos sexuales y una visión pesimista de la vida matrimonial, pero que a pesar de tener algún buen momento se hace también excesivamente largo y algo pesado, sobre todo por su desagradable protagonista masculino. A este respecto es muy interesante el posfacio que completa este volumen en edición de Faber, "Memories of a Friend", escrito por la autora de libros infantiles y amiga personal de Aickman, Jean Richardson, en el que aparte de revelar su carácter de señor inglés chapado a la antigua (vaya, qué sorpresa), cultísimo, encantador y gran conversador, nos proporciona algunas claves sobre las ideas de Aickman acerca del amor, las mujeres y su visión pesimista del matrimonio y las relaciones, que explican bastante bien este último cuento.
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Escribía hace poco M. John Harrison en su blog que "The Swords", el relato que abre esta antología, era su cuento grotesco favorito. Y comparto totalmente su fascinación con este relato, "The Swords", una historia sobre la pérdida de la inocencia que podría ir firmado por el propio Harrison (el de los cuentos de "El mono de hielo" o el de "El curso del corazón"), o incluso por un Thomas Ligotti, o un Charles Burns; esa atmósfera, ese mundo que parece habitado por sombras o fantasmas, esa sordidez, esa sexualidad inquietante, sudorosa y culpable, ese argumento difuso típico de Ligotti; "iba dando una vuelta por la ciudad y me encontré con una feria, y en la feria un tenderete, entré y.... PUM!"
El resto de historias que conforman "Cold Hand in Mine" van desde la excelente historia vampírica "Pages from a Young Girl's Journal", muy en la onda de Angela Carter, o el rarísimo y excepcional "The Hospice" donde te birla el clímax terrorífico de la manera más loca posible, a lo un poco coñazo en "The Real Road to the Church" o "The Clock Watcher" donde la fórmula de "kitchen sink drama" gótico resulta algo aburrida, en las que mayor parte de la historia transita por los cerros de Úbeda regodeándose en un detallado pero ambiguo análisis psicológico de los personajes que (aparentemente) resultan irrelevantes una vez has leído la historia, y en los que Aickman se resiste a introducir el elemento fantástico, convertido en una ausencia. Pero no importa, aunque sólo tuviera un cuento por antología a la altura de "The Swords", merecería la pena.
April 12, 2018
Ocekivao sam jedno,vrlo se pozitivno iznenadio stilom i ritmom svake od priča.Pisac koji dosta toga kaže nenapisanim.Oprema,štampa prevodi i sve ostale tehničke stvari vezane za knjigu besprekorni, kao i do sad u Orfelinu
October 30, 2022
Чудна прича као непежоративни пород неретко презрене жанровске књижевности. Читалац као са-читалац, са-чинитељ, попуњава места неодређености огледалећи се у таквом процесу опалесценције. Заиста остављен у чуду, на двомеђи рационализације и спиритуализације, пребире по путоказима и домаштава, нашта га позива не само минус поступак (изостављање поароовског расплета), већ и опипљиви свет на стожерима брушеног стила. (Идиосинкразија: очијукање са прозаидом коју на концу жетвара спремих за Ноћ вештица/Велеса. 🎃)
4.5 �
4.5 �
February 28, 2011
I owned this book back in the "olden days" (back in the 70s). I wasn't real taken with Aickman (as evidenced by the fact that I'd forgotten a book I once owned). I got this from the library, and it came back to me.
I would hesitate to call these "horror" stories. I might call them macabre stories, despairing stories, even dark stories. They carry in them a sense of despondency and deep melancholy. The first story, The Swords sets an odd tone for the set while the closest to what I suppose would be thought of as a "traditional" horror story might be, Pages From Young Girl's Journal. They all carry the same dark feel while looking at Aickman's strange and disturbing world from a different angle.
I think (as many do) that Aickman was a talented writer, though his work is not generally to my taste. So, these are well written if they happen to be what you're looking for.
I would hesitate to call these "horror" stories. I might call them macabre stories, despairing stories, even dark stories. They carry in them a sense of despondency and deep melancholy. The first story, The Swords sets an odd tone for the set while the closest to what I suppose would be thought of as a "traditional" horror story might be, Pages From Young Girl's Journal. They all carry the same dark feel while looking at Aickman's strange and disturbing world from a different angle.
I think (as many do) that Aickman was a talented writer, though his work is not generally to my taste. So, these are well written if they happen to be what you're looking for.
May 6, 2017
Za sada, ubedljivo najdraža knjiga iz edicije.
Ejkman slično kao i M.R. Džejms koristi kratku formu i nema tendenciju da racionalizuje ili daje objašenje za svoje misterije. No dok mi je to kod Džejmsa smetalo jer je sam utisak pripovetki oštećen i banalizovan, kod Ejkmana je ovaj narativ doveden do savršenstva.
Svaka ' čudna' priča je fantastično zaokužena i ispunjena celina koja otvara lavirint pitanja, lavirint simbola i interpretacija.
Ejkman je svoje priče svrstavao u kategoriju ' čudnih' pre nego horor priča. I zaista, redom sve su neobične i ljupko bizarne( macabre je prvi izraz koji pada na pamet).
Svaka priča je stilski različita, kreće se u individualnom univerzumu a opet su sve prepoznatljive i tako tipične za autora.
Ejkman slično kao i M.R. Džejms koristi kratku formu i nema tendenciju da racionalizuje ili daje objašenje za svoje misterije. No dok mi je to kod Džejmsa smetalo jer je sam utisak pripovetki oštećen i banalizovan, kod Ejkmana je ovaj narativ doveden do savršenstva.
Svaka ' čudna' priča je fantastično zaokužena i ispunjena celina koja otvara lavirint pitanja, lavirint simbola i interpretacija.
Ejkman je svoje priče svrstavao u kategoriju ' čudnih' pre nego horor priča. I zaista, redom sve su neobične i ljupko bizarne( macabre je prvi izraz koji pada na pamet).
Svaka priča je stilski različita, kreće se u individualnom univerzumu a opet su sve prepoznatljive i tako tipične za autora.
January 12, 2015
I enjoyed Aickman's collection "The Unsettled Dust" a bit more than this collection, but this one still deserves 5 stars. Aickman's work surpasses that of many other writers in his ability to create an unreal, dreamlike (and sometimes nightmarish) atmosphere. In my opinion there's only one true masterpiece here, "The Swords," some of the others are very good like "The Real Road to the Church," "Pages From a Young Girl's Journal," "The Hospice" and "The Same Dog." But there's really no complete duds here, each one is individual and distinct in what it tries to do.
As in some other Aickman stories like "The Houses of the Russians" much of the weirdness comes when a person is put in, or exposed to an alien culture. We find this in "The Real Road to the Church," "Pages From the Diary of a Young Girl" and "The Clock Watcher."
"The Swords" is a deliciously weird story; very, very strange, queasy, unnerving. I think this story expresses very well a deep fear of sex and how nerve-racking and ultimately disappointing/gross it can be. It's about a man who explores a small fair and finds a tent advertising a show called "THE SWORDS." Inside he sees men stabbing a sword into a woman, who seems unharmed, even aroused by it. Later the man pays for a "private show" with the woman.
"The Real Road to the Church" is a sad, strange story that we perhaps never fully understand, but Aickman loves to leave his reader with something to puzzle over or it wouldn't be as memorable! In the end this story finishes rather upbeat. A woman who moves into an old house on an island hears vague whispers by the locals of how a procession will come by the house "on the real road to the church" and will "change the porters."
"Niemandwasser" felt a bit minor compared with the others, but I liked it. It does have some creepy parts, and a visceral ending compared with most of Aickman's stories. I'm not entirely sure how to interpret the story, honestly it feels to me like the main character is a homosexual dealing with his sexuality, a girl breaks his heart too and he loses the will to live.
"The Hospice" is considered Aickman's best story, I've read it twice and although I think it's really good, I also believe Aickman wrote several which are more memorable, creepy and evocative. His novella "The Stains" is far better. I would even put "Bind Your Hair" and "The Cicerones" above it too. "The Hospice" is about a man who becomes stranded and takes refuge in a very weird place called The Hospice where he's unable to leave.
"Pages From the Diary of a Young Girl" I found the beginning of this one just a bit overlong. Recalled to my mind Machen's "The White People" also concerning a young girls journal with weird allusions, although Machen's is a masterpiece of horror fiction and is better. This one is one of the more subtle and intelligent vampire stories I've read. A young girl traveling in Italy with her family writes about how she meets a strange man at a party who fascinates her utterly -- over passing days she starts to feel herself change into a vampire.
"The Same Dog" is a sad, touching story, more straight-forward than many other Aickman tales, although the end is still wide open to interpretation. What struck me about it was it's pervasive sadness, beginning to end. A boy learns that his sweetheart met a horrible fate after they discovered a strange old house together, guarded by a vicious dog which seems to entrance her. Years later he returns to the spot to try and understand what happened.
"Meeting Mr. Millar" didn't do a lot for me, it's certainly a strange story, but it's hard to know what to make of it and doesn't have a lot of punch. What makes that all the worse is it's probably the longest story here. A man living in the upper story of a building is unnerved by the very strange behavior of a business that moves in below. The owner acts stranger and stranger as time passes.
"The Clock Watcher" was the saddest Aickman story I've read. The storyline of the man marrying a strange, exotic girl who has a weird secret reminded me very much of "The Stains." Where many of his stories have a thick atmosphere of unease, creepiness, this one just feels utterly sad and the end was devastating, all the more because it is so unexplained. A British man meets a pretty German girl during his time serving in World War II, and brings her back home to marry her. She insists on collecting cuckoo clocks, which unnerve him, but even more so when he finds out that these clocks are maintained by a mysterious, unseen figure.
Compared with the "Unsettled Dust" collection I found many of these stories were more melancholy, "The Clock Watcher" is very sad and "The Same Dog" isn't far behind in this capacity. On the other hand "The Real Road to the Church," eerie as it is, has a hopeful conclusion. Can't wait to dive into his collection "The Wine-Dark Sea."
As in some other Aickman stories like "The Houses of the Russians" much of the weirdness comes when a person is put in, or exposed to an alien culture. We find this in "The Real Road to the Church," "Pages From the Diary of a Young Girl" and "The Clock Watcher."
"The Swords" is a deliciously weird story; very, very strange, queasy, unnerving. I think this story expresses very well a deep fear of sex and how nerve-racking and ultimately disappointing/gross it can be. It's about a man who explores a small fair and finds a tent advertising a show called "THE SWORDS." Inside he sees men stabbing a sword into a woman, who seems unharmed, even aroused by it. Later the man pays for a "private show" with the woman.
"The Real Road to the Church" is a sad, strange story that we perhaps never fully understand, but Aickman loves to leave his reader with something to puzzle over or it wouldn't be as memorable! In the end this story finishes rather upbeat. A woman who moves into an old house on an island hears vague whispers by the locals of how a procession will come by the house "on the real road to the church" and will "change the porters."
"Niemandwasser" felt a bit minor compared with the others, but I liked it. It does have some creepy parts, and a visceral ending compared with most of Aickman's stories. I'm not entirely sure how to interpret the story, honestly it feels to me like the main character is a homosexual dealing with his sexuality, a girl breaks his heart too and he loses the will to live.
"The Hospice" is considered Aickman's best story, I've read it twice and although I think it's really good, I also believe Aickman wrote several which are more memorable, creepy and evocative. His novella "The Stains" is far better. I would even put "Bind Your Hair" and "The Cicerones" above it too. "The Hospice" is about a man who becomes stranded and takes refuge in a very weird place called The Hospice where he's unable to leave.
"Pages From the Diary of a Young Girl" I found the beginning of this one just a bit overlong. Recalled to my mind Machen's "The White People" also concerning a young girls journal with weird allusions, although Machen's is a masterpiece of horror fiction and is better. This one is one of the more subtle and intelligent vampire stories I've read. A young girl traveling in Italy with her family writes about how she meets a strange man at a party who fascinates her utterly -- over passing days she starts to feel herself change into a vampire.
"The Same Dog" is a sad, touching story, more straight-forward than many other Aickman tales, although the end is still wide open to interpretation. What struck me about it was it's pervasive sadness, beginning to end. A boy learns that his sweetheart met a horrible fate after they discovered a strange old house together, guarded by a vicious dog which seems to entrance her. Years later he returns to the spot to try and understand what happened.
"Meeting Mr. Millar" didn't do a lot for me, it's certainly a strange story, but it's hard to know what to make of it and doesn't have a lot of punch. What makes that all the worse is it's probably the longest story here. A man living in the upper story of a building is unnerved by the very strange behavior of a business that moves in below. The owner acts stranger and stranger as time passes.
"The Clock Watcher" was the saddest Aickman story I've read. The storyline of the man marrying a strange, exotic girl who has a weird secret reminded me very much of "The Stains." Where many of his stories have a thick atmosphere of unease, creepiness, this one just feels utterly sad and the end was devastating, all the more because it is so unexplained. A British man meets a pretty German girl during his time serving in World War II, and brings her back home to marry her. She insists on collecting cuckoo clocks, which unnerve him, but even more so when he finds out that these clocks are maintained by a mysterious, unseen figure.
Compared with the "Unsettled Dust" collection I found many of these stories were more melancholy, "The Clock Watcher" is very sad and "The Same Dog" isn't far behind in this capacity. On the other hand "The Real Road to the Church," eerie as it is, has a hopeful conclusion. Can't wait to dive into his collection "The Wine-Dark Sea."
June 21, 2015
This sounds arch, but the first full memories I have of reading this collection is back in December, the day after Christmas, on the beach, watching gray clouds blow over the cold water. It was almost too perfect of a setting. Stories like "The Real Road to the Church" ceased to be a vessels for narrative, and became a sense of mood, one projected on everyone walking by. It was, if anything, a little too perfect a synchronization, the reader equivalent of a photographer photographing a teddy bear left behind after a tornado's destruction: the point was too sharp. Partially for this, I put the book aside for some time, and came back to it later, in a whole other setting: sunny days, sitting in the student union after my library shifts were over, listening to generic pop music and people chatted endlessly nearby. The stories, it must be said, were just as effective.
In many ways, I still hold Wine-Dark Sea as the best collection (it is a re-collection of stories from others) to start with Aickman, but Cold Hand in Mine [not a re-collection, this one is an original] is not a bad place to go next to get a full flavored taste of what it might mean to call something, Aickman-esque, . Stories like "The Same Dog"—in which a house with a strange dog is the harbinger of unspecified doom and melancholy, mired perhaps by a few lines too many at the end—and "Mr. Millar"—where an editor of pornographer's semi-idyllic state is disrupted by a business office that is engaged in some unknown, but presumably unsavory, business—delight in their easy hints mired next to unsolvable enigmas. Even to the point that you can comment definites upon "The Hospice", it is the indefinites which drive you. Interestingly, this collection has award- and Aickman-favorite, "Pages from a Young Girl's Journal", which seems to be the most obvious Aickman story in existence, so it is not all ghosts of ideas bubbling forth.
These stories are well-written, even in their parts impenetrable, and the collection is a fine one. You will feel sad, frustrated, enlightened, and even a little terrified. Not in the sense of your usual horror fright, but in the sense of things being out of place, of what the clocks might actually mean in "The Clock Watcher", or what is underneath the skin in "The Swords". It is recommended, but perhaps not for someone fresh out of the gate. Though who knows, stories like "The Swords" and "The Hospice" would probably not frighten off an Aickman-novice, so maybe this collection is just fine to dive head first into.
In many ways, I still hold Wine-Dark Sea as the best collection (it is a re-collection of stories from others) to start with Aickman, but Cold Hand in Mine [not a re-collection, this one is an original] is not a bad place to go next to get a full flavored taste of what it might mean to call something, Aickman-esque, . Stories like "The Same Dog"—in which a house with a strange dog is the harbinger of unspecified doom and melancholy, mired perhaps by a few lines too many at the end—and "Mr. Millar"—where an editor of pornographer's semi-idyllic state is disrupted by a business office that is engaged in some unknown, but presumably unsavory, business—delight in their easy hints mired next to unsolvable enigmas. Even to the point that you can comment definites upon "The Hospice", it is the indefinites which drive you. Interestingly, this collection has award- and Aickman-favorite, "Pages from a Young Girl's Journal", which seems to be the most obvious Aickman story in existence, so it is not all ghosts of ideas bubbling forth.
These stories are well-written, even in their parts impenetrable, and the collection is a fine one. You will feel sad, frustrated, enlightened, and even a little terrified. Not in the sense of your usual horror fright, but in the sense of things being out of place, of what the clocks might actually mean in "The Clock Watcher", or what is underneath the skin in "The Swords". It is recommended, but perhaps not for someone fresh out of the gate. Though who knows, stories like "The Swords" and "The Hospice" would probably not frighten off an Aickman-novice, so maybe this collection is just fine to dive head first into.
November 19, 2019
Horor se nalazi u spoznaji, “otkrivanju čudovišta�, ali takođe i u nepoznatom. Robert Ejkman voli da se poigrava ovim činjenicama i da ih kombinuje u svojim pričama. Ponekad voli da oduži priču, koja nam se čini kao priča običnog čoveka i običnog života kako bi u poslednjih nekoliko stranica otkrio nelagodnu, ponekad stravičnu pojavu koja je više element magičnog realizma, a ne horora. Ponekad je užas prožet kroz čitavu priču, ali ništa konkretno nam ne objašnjava pojave sa kojima smo se susreli, već je ostavljeno na čitaocima kako bismo sami, ili zajedno sa naratorom, mogli da spekulišemo, što je takođe, ako ne i više, užasavajuća stvar koja naravno zavisi od čitaoca i njegove mašte.
Ono što je sigurno jeste da Ejkman voli svoje likove da provede kroz jedan izlet strave iz koje oni, na prvi pogled, izlaze često netaknuti, ali ih je u stvari to iskustvo promenilo na nepovratan način. Međutim, njih nije promenilo nikakvo novo saznanje, šta više, samo ih je podsetilo na ono što su oduvek znali, nešto za šta se nisu usudili da izvuku iz dubina svog nesvesnog.
“Često sam u životu zapažao kako mi nikad ne naučimo ništa � tačnije, ništa ne naučimo po prvi put. Mi već sve znamo, sve što smo, kao pojedinci, sposobni da ikada znamo, ili što nam je najbolje dato da znamo; i sve što drugi ljudi rade za nas je, u najboljem slučaju, da nas podsete, da nam malo podbodu mozak i skrenu ga s jednog skupa interesovanja na neki drugi, pomalo drugačiji.�
Ejkman spoznaju, ili bolje rečeno, podsećanje uvodi u unutrašnji svet, dok nepoznato ostaje u spoljašnjem svetu, govoreći nam da ljudi mogu normalno da vode svoje živote, ali se nikad neće u potpunosti osetiti kao istinski deo sveta u kojem žive, osećaće se kao neprirodna pojava. I zbog te neusaglašenosti sa prirodom, nikada neće u potpunosti shvatati u kakvom svetu žive, koji je potpuno indiferentan prema njihovim mukama.
Najmoćnije oružje kojim se Ejkman koristi jesu, neko bi rekao podrazumevano, reči. One su zaista u svakoj priči uklopljene tako da je frustracija, tuga, iskrivljenost, nelagodnost, strava i užas opipljivi. O vizuelnim i auditivnim pojavama ne mora ni da se priča. Za takav utisak je naravno zaslužan i prevodilac ove knjige koji ju je izvanredno preveo na naš jezik.
Ono što je sigurno jeste da Ejkman voli svoje likove da provede kroz jedan izlet strave iz koje oni, na prvi pogled, izlaze često netaknuti, ali ih je u stvari to iskustvo promenilo na nepovratan način. Međutim, njih nije promenilo nikakvo novo saznanje, šta više, samo ih je podsetilo na ono što su oduvek znali, nešto za šta se nisu usudili da izvuku iz dubina svog nesvesnog.
“Često sam u životu zapažao kako mi nikad ne naučimo ništa � tačnije, ništa ne naučimo po prvi put. Mi već sve znamo, sve što smo, kao pojedinci, sposobni da ikada znamo, ili što nam je najbolje dato da znamo; i sve što drugi ljudi rade za nas je, u najboljem slučaju, da nas podsete, da nam malo podbodu mozak i skrenu ga s jednog skupa interesovanja na neki drugi, pomalo drugačiji.�
Ejkman spoznaju, ili bolje rečeno, podsećanje uvodi u unutrašnji svet, dok nepoznato ostaje u spoljašnjem svetu, govoreći nam da ljudi mogu normalno da vode svoje živote, ali se nikad neće u potpunosti osetiti kao istinski deo sveta u kojem žive, osećaće se kao neprirodna pojava. I zbog te neusaglašenosti sa prirodom, nikada neće u potpunosti shvatati u kakvom svetu žive, koji je potpuno indiferentan prema njihovim mukama.
Najmoćnije oružje kojim se Ejkman koristi jesu, neko bi rekao podrazumevano, reči. One su zaista u svakoj priči uklopljene tako da je frustracija, tuga, iskrivljenost, nelagodnost, strava i užas opipljivi. O vizuelnim i auditivnim pojavama ne mora ni da se priča. Za takav utisak je naravno zaslužan i prevodilac ove knjige koji ju je izvanredno preveo na naš jezik.
October 6, 2018
“‘We are most of us two people, your Highness. There is something lacking in the man who is one man only, and so, as he believes, at peace with the world and with himself.’�
These words, addressed to a German nobleman by the aptly-named village teacher Spalt, seem to be utterly at variance with most of the protagonists we get in Robert Aickman’s collection of short stories Cold Hand in Mine, for these are mostly bigoted pedants, pandering to, and bowing before the conventions of middle-class life, with hardly anything more than average surfaceness about them, but on the one hand, the incongruity is dissolved when Spalt, a little later, goes on in this vein:
And then, on the other hand, �
� what Spalt says about man, that he is Janus-faced, not knowing about the depths slumbering beneath the surface, is easily true of life itself as it is depicted by the author of these “strange stories�. The best example of this world behind whose details we can see a more weird, unsettling reality, is the adventure described in The Hospice where a travelling salesman, thinking he is taking a short-cut, loses his bearings and has no choice but to spend the night in the mysterious eponymous place where they seem to know him and stuff the guests with thick soup and viscid turkey. The story is rather long but never boring because Aickman manages to add one eerie detail at a time, keeping us wondering what kind of place the Hospice actually is and if the rest and quiet it promises can easily be exchanged for a little bit of life again. The Real Road to the Church is another such tale about an ancient reality behind everyday life, but this one failed to impress me because of its mysticism.
Next to The Hospice, there are two very gripping stories in this collection: The Same Dog is quite short but doubtless memorable, and it starts with two children who, on one of their ramblings, come to a derelict house which is fenced in by a crumbling wall. The two children see a yellow dog on the premises, which growls at them but makes no attempts at fighting the gate separating him from the visitors. All the same, the dog seems to exert some hypnotic power of the girl, but finally the boy manages to break the spell and get the hell out of there with his friend. A little later, he falls ill and when he recovers, he learns that something very terrible has befallen his companion � but that is not all, because the story takes us into an episode of the boy’s adult life, afterwards.
An equally chilling story is The Swords, which makes us accompany an adolescent boy to a run-down funfair � the word “fun� is probably saying too much �, where he experiences a performance of men sticking swords into a young girl and kissing her. Later when the young girl’s partner, or pimp, offers him to have the girl visit him in his room and he takes them up on that offer, the young boy will experience something even more unsettling.
I mentioned that Aickman’s protagonists are often rather unpleasant people � unpleasant in the everyday sense, not in terms of Wolf Larsen or Bill Sikes: They are frequently (lower) middle-class men, bigoted and pettifogging, and they love their lunch served at 12 on the nose. In the two final stories of this collection, we see how people like this react to the supernatural breaking into their routine lives: This works very well in The Clock Watcher, where we keep guessing with the prim and proper husband what is wrong with his German wife and her mania about clocks, but it turns out less successful in Meeting Mr. Millar, where Aickman indulges too much in detail and, once in all the stories I have read so far, loses his timing. Nevertheless, the protagonist gives us some good insight into a mind that is prone to experience fear when he says:
It is quite impressive to see how deftly Aickman manages to adapt his style to the personality of his protagonists because there are almost as many styles in this collection as there are stories. In Pages from a Young Girl’s Journal, he gives us a completely different narrative voice, the one of an English girl who visits Italy at the time of Lord Byron. Although this story even won prizes in its time, it somehow falls short of the other tales in this book because it lacks the ambiguity that is so typical of Aickman.
The last story to be mentioned here is Niemandswasser, the tale I took the introductory quotation from. If we say that Aickman is all about ambiguity, the unnamed horrors lying hidden beneath the routines of daily life, then this story of an undisputed patch of water (and what is lurking in its depths) of the Bodensee, is probably emblematic of this writer.
These words, addressed to a German nobleman by the aptly-named village teacher Spalt, seem to be utterly at variance with most of the protagonists we get in Robert Aickman’s collection of short stories Cold Hand in Mine, for these are mostly bigoted pedants, pandering to, and bowing before the conventions of middle-class life, with hardly anything more than average surfaceness about them, but on the one hand, the incongruity is dissolved when Spalt, a little later, goes on in this vein:
”’[…] Life, as we know it, could hardly continue if men did not soon slay the dreamer inside them. There are the children to think of; the mothers who breed them and thus enable our race to endure; the economy; the ordered life of society. […]’�
And then, on the other hand, �
� what Spalt says about man, that he is Janus-faced, not knowing about the depths slumbering beneath the surface, is easily true of life itself as it is depicted by the author of these “strange stories�. The best example of this world behind whose details we can see a more weird, unsettling reality, is the adventure described in The Hospice where a travelling salesman, thinking he is taking a short-cut, loses his bearings and has no choice but to spend the night in the mysterious eponymous place where they seem to know him and stuff the guests with thick soup and viscid turkey. The story is rather long but never boring because Aickman manages to add one eerie detail at a time, keeping us wondering what kind of place the Hospice actually is and if the rest and quiet it promises can easily be exchanged for a little bit of life again. The Real Road to the Church is another such tale about an ancient reality behind everyday life, but this one failed to impress me because of its mysticism.
Next to The Hospice, there are two very gripping stories in this collection: The Same Dog is quite short but doubtless memorable, and it starts with two children who, on one of their ramblings, come to a derelict house which is fenced in by a crumbling wall. The two children see a yellow dog on the premises, which growls at them but makes no attempts at fighting the gate separating him from the visitors. All the same, the dog seems to exert some hypnotic power of the girl, but finally the boy manages to break the spell and get the hell out of there with his friend. A little later, he falls ill and when he recovers, he learns that something very terrible has befallen his companion � but that is not all, because the story takes us into an episode of the boy’s adult life, afterwards.
An equally chilling story is The Swords, which makes us accompany an adolescent boy to a run-down funfair � the word “fun� is probably saying too much �, where he experiences a performance of men sticking swords into a young girl and kissing her. Later when the young girl’s partner, or pimp, offers him to have the girl visit him in his room and he takes them up on that offer, the young boy will experience something even more unsettling.
I mentioned that Aickman’s protagonists are often rather unpleasant people � unpleasant in the everyday sense, not in terms of Wolf Larsen or Bill Sikes: They are frequently (lower) middle-class men, bigoted and pettifogging, and they love their lunch served at 12 on the nose. In the two final stories of this collection, we see how people like this react to the supernatural breaking into their routine lives: This works very well in The Clock Watcher, where we keep guessing with the prim and proper husband what is wrong with his German wife and her mania about clocks, but it turns out less successful in Meeting Mr. Millar, where Aickman indulges too much in detail and, once in all the stories I have read so far, loses his timing. Nevertheless, the protagonist gives us some good insight into a mind that is prone to experience fear when he says:
”Conceivably it was my first clear apprehension of the truth that is the foundation of wisdom: the truth that change of its nature is for the worse, the little finger (or thick gripping thumb) of mortality’s cold paw.�
It is quite impressive to see how deftly Aickman manages to adapt his style to the personality of his protagonists because there are almost as many styles in this collection as there are stories. In Pages from a Young Girl’s Journal, he gives us a completely different narrative voice, the one of an English girl who visits Italy at the time of Lord Byron. Although this story even won prizes in its time, it somehow falls short of the other tales in this book because it lacks the ambiguity that is so typical of Aickman.
The last story to be mentioned here is Niemandswasser, the tale I took the introductory quotation from. If we say that Aickman is all about ambiguity, the unnamed horrors lying hidden beneath the routines of daily life, then this story of an undisputed patch of water (and what is lurking in its depths) of the Bodensee, is probably emblematic of this writer.
June 1, 2011
If you'd never heard of Aickman, or had built no notion of what to expect from him, then all you'd need to do was read the epigraph for this collection. "In the end it is the mystery that lasts and not the explanation." That pretty much sums him up. For some people, this just isn't good enough. Some people don't view reading as anything other than another form of TV - to sit idle, to do nothing, and to receive entertainment as good as the creator can come up with. Aickman doesn't just not do this, but compels you to ponder long afterwards what you have just experienced. The man oozes subtlety in almost every single thing that he writes about. There are no answers, only obscure occurrences. (Why people actually get angry at not being given the answers always confuses me. I would prefer it this way at all costs.) Nevertheless, he's very good at laying bare the emotions of singular people or couples who have slowly drifted apart. He knows humans, at the least. But also has a very good eye for making what seem simple events seem so peculiarly sinister. In 'The Same Dog', for example, a man looking over a wall became probably the most unnerving image I've ever pictured in a short story. Ever. Obviously what preceded this helped, but the more stories you read by Aickman the more you realise how much skill actually goes into writing them. Some people - like Stephen King, for instance - say they get the germ of a story, and then see what happens. I can see a similar thing happening in all writing - you can't just have it fully formed, at least not in terms of how it is published - but with Aickman I'm convinced that the choice of words and their positions, as well as their timing, are just as crucial as what's going on in the story themselves. He likes to fog up the atmosphere, to make it difficult to be sure that what you've just read(or seen) is really what's happening. In 'The Hospice', probably my new all-time favourite short story of any kind, a man, Maybury, becomes lost driving on a road and has to spend the night in a sort of hotel, which is slightly odd and full of eccentrics(or so it seems). At one stage he's in a lounge speaking with a woman, watched over by a youth who works in the hotel, who for some reason is idling around for no good reason, hovering but not evidently watchful. The hotel's manager(or owner, or whatever, we don't really know) is also there, but soon they all leave. It's written as: "All of them filtered away, Maybury's lady among them. She had spoken no further word, made no further gesture." I thought 'filtered' was a prudent choice of word in this respect, as on the next page we read about a dull, large mechanic trying to help fix Maybury's car, which won't start. "Cromie duly extricated himself and shambled off into the darkness." There's a lot of this shambling and filtering away on the part of the secondary characters. It's very effective at making you unsure of yourself, unsure of what exactly is going on.
All the stories share this element of uncertainty, but for reasons I don't really know not all of them affected me in the same way as did The Same Dog and The Hospice. At any rate, the final four stories did much more for me than did the initial four. Pages from a Young Girl's Journal I thought slightly disappointing, as it had a reputation coming before it, having won the world fantasy award. But this is why I like lesser known authors. You stumble into them almost always accidentally, and can have no real idea of what to expect. Aickman is this type of writer, and though I didn't really enjoy some of the stories as much as I expected, I'll be reading more of him. Neil Gaiman called him a magician. Magicians make the magic seem real. Aickman's closer to a wizard. What he does isn't merely sleight of hand.
All the stories share this element of uncertainty, but for reasons I don't really know not all of them affected me in the same way as did The Same Dog and The Hospice. At any rate, the final four stories did much more for me than did the initial four. Pages from a Young Girl's Journal I thought slightly disappointing, as it had a reputation coming before it, having won the world fantasy award. But this is why I like lesser known authors. You stumble into them almost always accidentally, and can have no real idea of what to expect. Aickman is this type of writer, and though I didn't really enjoy some of the stories as much as I expected, I'll be reading more of him. Neil Gaiman called him a magician. Magicians make the magic seem real. Aickman's closer to a wizard. What he does isn't merely sleight of hand.
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