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cimoreneI think I mentioned that I have been listening to Tony Walker's Classic Ghost Stories Podcast. I was inclined to pick shorter stories first because I dislike having to break off my attention in mid-story, but I finally listened to:
1. The Haunting of Hill House. I have been meaning to give this a try since I saw some analytical videos about Shirley Jackson by Books 'n' Cats on Youtube and then listened to a couple of her short stories. I am an anti-horror-genre person in general, but this is mostly down to a dislike of jump scares, slashers, thrillers where someone is pursued, etc. I had heard, and I think correctly, that this novel is not very horrific in that sense, although it definitely qualifies as psychological horror. I was not as distressed by the horrible ghost manifestations and the tragedies as by the characters of the professor's wife and her henchman who arrive with 0% psychic sensitivity and a conviction that all ghosts need is loving kindness, along with overbearing rudeness. Given the genre and the events up to their arrival I had good reason to hope that something horrible would happen to them even though they were unable to sense the ghosts. But it didn't. Not that the book wasn't good! It was unsatisfying in this respect on purpose. I see what you did there. But man, listening to their dialogue was really raising my blood pressure.
BIG BONUS: Tony Walker, as mentioned in a previous post I think, is Northern, but he does a variety of accents and is quite good at them. His Scots, Irish, Cockney, etc all seem great. His American accent is... mostly good? I mean it's better than Ewan McGregor's, but it's EXTREMELY midwest with slightly too much chewy mouthing around everything and a bit of sort of New Yorky nasal tone. For some reason, he only read the professor and his wife with this accent, leaving the other residents British, and then the wife's dumb henchman is like... rustic Scots. It's very distracting.
2. Don't Look Now, a short story by Daphne DuMaurier. I have read Rebecca a few times but that was my only acquaintance with her works. This is a short story that's... um... well, the surprise twist ending is that the narrator is murdered by an active serial killer who has been recently plaguing Venice and it turns out that the serial killer is a child-sized small person who disguises herself as a child and runs away in pretend terror from an accomplice, leading would-be rescuers away and then killing them. So she's been on a killing spree that was in the news several times, so this must be working for her! And when the narrator follows her into an abandoned house turns around, shows him her horrible face, and... throws a dagger across the room through his throat that kills him almost instantly. The last line is something like, 'What a stupid way to die'. Well, you've got that right! Although 'stupid' is the least of it!
3. Dracula. I had read Dracula 23 years ago, and started to do Dracula Daily a few years ago but I didn't make it very far. So a lot of my memory of the story was worn away by time. I remembered thinking that Jonathan Harker was a moron whose thoughts were a trial to read, and this was true again even though I am older and more patient (but maybe it's harder when you're listening to an audiobook since it's so much slower than reading). I remembered thinking that Mina was the only character with two braincells to rub together. I had actually forgotten how large Van Helsing's role was and didn't remember thinking anything about him. I was surprised to see such a distinct character, who is both likeable and maddening (long-winded with weird metaphors). He is not as slow as the other three men of the party, who are required to be confused so that he can explain things, but he also makes more errors and these more repeatedly because all through Lucy's slow demise he is the only one who suspects, then knows what is going on, and continually fails to act decisively in a way that reminded me irresistably of the bungled western powers' responses to the pandemic.
His and Seward's attempts to minimize the dangers in order to avoid upsetting the fragile womenfolk lead directly to Lucy and her mother's deaths, and after seeing Mina learn all that they know and offer valuable analytical help in collating their narrative (which does not stagger her fragile woman nerves!) - he congratulates her explicitly for her help and insights, acknowledges that their knowledge and strategic preparation is the direct result of having shared and compiled all the information, and then immediately turns around and proposes that from now on Mina should be told nothing about their plans to hunt Dracula because she's a fragile woman who would be upset, and all the other men passionately agree (although Jonathan feels emotionally that this is wrong at least). This folly leads to Dracula getting into their own house and nearly turning Mina into a vampire under their noses before they realize that keeping everybody informed is better. Aswaxjism says, this towering height of infuriating stupidity seems entirely credible and completely in character with Victorian gender norms.
1. The Haunting of Hill House. I have been meaning to give this a try since I saw some analytical videos about Shirley Jackson by Books 'n' Cats on Youtube and then listened to a couple of her short stories. I am an anti-horror-genre person in general, but this is mostly down to a dislike of jump scares, slashers, thrillers where someone is pursued, etc. I had heard, and I think correctly, that this novel is not very horrific in that sense, although it definitely qualifies as psychological horror. I was not as distressed by the horrible ghost manifestations and the tragedies as by the characters of the professor's wife and her henchman who arrive with 0% psychic sensitivity and a conviction that all ghosts need is loving kindness, along with overbearing rudeness. Given the genre and the events up to their arrival I had good reason to hope that something horrible would happen to them even though they were unable to sense the ghosts. But it didn't. Not that the book wasn't good! It was unsatisfying in this respect on purpose. I see what you did there. But man, listening to their dialogue was really raising my blood pressure.
BIG BONUS: Tony Walker, as mentioned in a previous post I think, is Northern, but he does a variety of accents and is quite good at them. His Scots, Irish, Cockney, etc all seem great. His American accent is... mostly good? I mean it's better than Ewan McGregor's, but it's EXTREMELY midwest with slightly too much chewy mouthing around everything and a bit of sort of New Yorky nasal tone. For some reason, he only read the professor and his wife with this accent, leaving the other residents British, and then the wife's dumb henchman is like... rustic Scots. It's very distracting.
2. Don't Look Now, a short story by Daphne DuMaurier. I have read Rebecca a few times but that was my only acquaintance with her works. This is a short story that's... um... well, the surprise twist ending is that the narrator is murdered by an active serial killer who has been recently plaguing Venice and it turns out that the serial killer is a child-sized small person who disguises herself as a child and runs away in pretend terror from an accomplice, leading would-be rescuers away and then killing them. So she's been on a killing spree that was in the news several times, so this must be working for her! And when the narrator follows her into an abandoned house turns around, shows him her horrible face, and... throws a dagger across the room through his throat that kills him almost instantly. The last line is something like, 'What a stupid way to die'. Well, you've got that right! Although 'stupid' is the least of it!
3. Dracula. I had read Dracula 23 years ago, and started to do Dracula Daily a few years ago but I didn't make it very far. So a lot of my memory of the story was worn away by time. I remembered thinking that Jonathan Harker was a moron whose thoughts were a trial to read, and this was true again even though I am older and more patient (but maybe it's harder when you're listening to an audiobook since it's so much slower than reading). I remembered thinking that Mina was the only character with two braincells to rub together. I had actually forgotten how large Van Helsing's role was and didn't remember thinking anything about him. I was surprised to see such a distinct character, who is both likeable and maddening (long-winded with weird metaphors). He is not as slow as the other three men of the party, who are required to be confused so that he can explain things, but he also makes more errors and these more repeatedly because all through Lucy's slow demise he is the only one who suspects, then knows what is going on, and continually fails to act decisively in a way that reminded me irresistably of the bungled western powers' responses to the pandemic.
His and Seward's attempts to minimize the dangers in order to avoid upsetting the fragile womenfolk lead directly to Lucy and her mother's deaths, and after seeing Mina learn all that they know and offer valuable analytical help in collating their narrative (which does not stagger her fragile woman nerves!) - he congratulates her explicitly for her help and insights, acknowledges that their knowledge and strategic preparation is the direct result of having shared and compiled all the information, and then immediately turns around and proposes that from now on Mina should be told nothing about their plans to hunt Dracula because she's a fragile woman who would be upset, and all the other men passionately agree (although Jonathan feels emotionally that this is wrong at least). This folly leads to Dracula getting into their own house and nearly turning Mina into a vampire under their noses before they realize that keeping everybody informed is better. As
waxjism says, this towering height of infuriating stupidity seems entirely credible and completely in character with Victorian gender norms.
(no subject)
Date: 13 Mar 2025 09:50 pm (UTC)Don't Look Now is a much better movie than it is a story.
(no subject)
Date: 14 Mar 2025 01:42 pm (UTC)