By S.T. Joshi

Back Cover Text

S.T. Joshi has established himself as a leading critic and scholar of the weird tale. Having begun by studying the work of H. P. Lovecraft, Joshi has expanded his interests to include the entire range of horror fiction from such classics as Lord Dunsany and Algernon Blackwood to such contemporaries as Ramsey Campbell, Stephen King, and Clive Barker. In this generous sampling of the reviews that Joshi has written in nearly thirty years as a critic, we find trenchant analyses of writers ranging from Arthur Machen, E. F. Benson, and Shirley Jackson to Peter Straub, Thomas Ligotti, Norman Partridge, and David J. Schow. Joshi also addresses such significant themes in horror fiction as the subgenre of dark suspense, the haunted house, Arkham House and its legacy, and the work of the small press. Of particular note is a lengthy section devoted to H. P. Lovecraft, including studies of an array of Cthulhu Mythos writings and detailed examinations of recent Lovecraft scholarship. Joshi’s essays and reviews are enlivened with a pungent wit and literary flair that bring to mind the work of John Clute and Brian Aldiss.

S.T. Joshi is the author of such works as The Weird Tale (1990), H. P. Lovecraft: A Life (1996), and The Modern Weird Tale (2001). He has edited or coedited such important reference works as Supernatural Horror Literature of the World: An Encyclopedia (2005) and Icons of Horror and the Supernatural (2006). His numerous publications have received the World Fantasy Award, the British Fantasy Award, the Horror Writers Association Award, and the International Horror Guild Award.

Contents

Preface

I. Some Overviews

• Arkham House and Its Legacy
• The Haunted House
• Professional and Amateurs
• Some Thoughts on Weird Poetry
• Bram and Bela and Mary and Boris
• What the Hell Is Dark Suspense?
• The Small Press

II. Classics

• Algernon Blackwood: The Starlight Man
• Arthur Machen: A Minor Classic
• William Hope Hodgson: Writer on the Borderland
• E. F. Benson: Spooks and More Spooks
• A. M. Burrage: The Ghost Man
• Herbert S. Gorman: Where Is the Place Called Dagon?
• Andrew Caldecott: The Well-Crafted Ghost
• Rescuing Shirley Jackson

III. Contemporaries

• Les Daniels: The Sardonic Vampire
• Dennis Etchison and His Masters
• Thomas Tryon: The Return of the Posthumous Collaboration
• Stephen King and God
• Peter Straub and the Blue Pencil
• Ramsey Campbell: Alone with a Master
• Clive Barker: Weird Fiction as Subversion
• David J. Schow: Zombies, Tapeworms, and Kamikaze Butterflies
• Donald R. Burleson: Enmeshed in the Bizarre
• Norman Partridge: Here to Stay
• Thomas Harris: Lecter as Albatross
• Thomas Ligotti: The Long and the Short of It
• Michael Cisco: Ligotti Redivivus?
• Sherry Austin: The Southern Ghost Story
• Shades of Edgar and Ambrose

IV. Scholarship

• The Charting of Horror Literature
• Classics and Contemporaries

V. H. P. Lovecraft

• Some Lovecraft Editions
• The Cthulhu Mythos
• Lovecraft as a Character in Fiction
• Some Lovecraft Scholarship
• Barton L. St. Armand
• Donald R. Burleson
• Peter Cannon
• Robert M. Price
• Kenneth W. Faig, Jr.
• Edward W. O’Brien, Jr.
• Robert H. Waugh

Index

Acknowledgments

Bibliographic Information

Classics & Contemporaries: Some Notes on Horror Fiction. By S.T. Joshi. New York, NY: Hippocampus Press; 2009; ISBN 978-0-9814888-3-7; softcover; 296 pages.

Purchasing This Book

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