About this title: Two works -- one of imaginative and decadent horror, the other lyrical and introspective -- comprise these books by one of the pioneers of supernatural fiction. "The Great God Pan "scandalized Victorian London with its suggestive visions of sexuality and paganism. "The Hill of Dreams" is a semi-autobiographical work about Machen's battles with his inner demons.
Note: This is a general synopsis. Each listing is described below.
Binding: Paperback
Publisher: Dover Pubns
Date Published: 2006
ISBN-13:9780486443454ISBN:0486443450
Description: New. Two works--one of imaginative and decadent horror, the other lyrical and introspective--comprise these books by one of the pioneers of supernatural fiction. "The Great God Pan "scandalized Victorian London with its suggestive visions of sexuality... read more
"I seem to remember first coming across the name of Arthur Machen from Henry Miller's big list of books he loved. The Machen book on the list was The Hill of Dreams, and (maybe 20?) years ago I read it and felt a great kinship with the book, the author, and the main character. It's a book about a young man struggling to be an author (much in the mode of Hamsun's Hunger, Fante's Ask the Dust, and others) but at the same time he's struggling with a sort of personal haunting after having a mysteriously powerful experience in an old Roman fort. After this experience he has some difficulty distinguishing the world of his phantasy from the "real" world, but he prefers his phantasy world more anyway. Scenes alternate between his countryside home where the fort is and his down and out life in London trying to be a writer, both of which are very evocatively portrayed.
But this time around... it's just boring me with too much unnecessary verbiage. This is the book where Machen "found his unique voice", and like a newly discovered watering hole on a hot August day he spends way too much time splashing around and swimming in this new voice for no purpose but his own enjoyment. I don't typically have a problem with this sort of indulgence, but given the magic I felt on my first reading, and lack of it this time, I simply have no patience for it. So I'll leave the last 20 pages unread and hope that next time it strikes a more resonant chord with me, because I actually still think it's a worthy book.
One somewhat interesting note for me regarding this book: I was thoroughly unfamiliar with the term psychogeography until Tosh recently brought it up, and then a few days later I finally pulled this book off the shelf for a reread and read on the back of this edition that Machen's name often crops up in the writings of psychogeography.
* * * * *
The Great God Pan is a succinct gem of horror and mystery, a variation on classic tales of wolfmen. A scientist (a self-proclaimed practicioner of transcendental medicine) cuts into a young woman's brain to heighten her awareness but instead Pan, the wild nature spirit, enters her and impregnates her. The spawn of this diabolical union wreaks havoc in late 19th century London (very atmospherically portrayed in all its twisty mystery) as a series of well-heeled men mysteriously commit suicide.
At the time of publication this book caused quite a scandal because of its suggestion that men were killing themselves because of some dark sex magic... or something. It's hard now to see what the fuss was.
As an author of some of the best Weird Tales, Arthur Machen has the added advantage of actually believing a lot of what he writes, at least the parts about powerful realities hidden from our intellects by the thinnest of veils, with the parting of this veil possible through various means - drugs, meditation, magic, a blow to the head, etc. In the late 19th early 20th centuries in London there was real Magic in the air, with quite a few prominent authors seriously participating the The Order of the Golden Dawn, and Machen was one of those."
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