~~ an introduction & statement of purpose ~~
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"These walls," said he, "were once the seat of luxury and vice. They exhibited a singular instance of the retribution of Heaven, and were from that period forsaken, and abandoned to decay." His words excited my curiosity, and I enquired further concerning their meaning. A Sicilian Romance Ann Radcliffe NOTE: The image to the left is part of The House on Haunted Hill film poster. ~~ my reasoning ~~
A Sicilian Romance Ann Radcliffe
NOTE: The image to the left is part of The House on Haunted Hill film poster.
~~ my reasoning ~~
......I have long been a fan of H P Lovecraft, his own "Mythos" material (& Dreamlands, of course), & the "Mythos" material of others. Initially, I built this "Othere Worldlie" page as a subpage of my "Arkham Shadows" page, a page meant as a tribute to H P Lovecraft & the "Cthulhu Mythos". Lovecraft had been inspired, in some way, by a variety of earlier writers, many having written in the "Gothic genre" or at the very least, having skirted the "Gothic genre". Thus, as noted, I began to build this "Gothic" page as a subpage to my original H P Lovecraft tribute page. In time this page expanded beyond what I had intended, both in size & scope. Therefore, I decided to restructure THIS page, making it a "site" in it's own right, & not just a subpage of another site. Thus, this page includes links to various pages & authors of "Other Worldlie" fiction, ie., Weird Fiction. I have also included a list of authors (without links) that tend to be personal favorites of mine. ......Many of the authors mentioned on this page (or soon to be added to this page), ie., Ann Radcliffe, John Polidori, Wilkie Collins, Oliver Onions, Mary Shelley, et al, come from a genre known as "Gothic Literature". I definitely enjoy this form of literature, however, concerning the term "Gothic" & it's relation to literature,...forgive me if I have said this before somewhere on this site (just wanting to make it perfectly clear),...by "Gothic" I mean mood & atmosphere - haunted mansions &/or large estates, creeping shadows, soft oblique moonlight, foggy moors, strange noises, creeking doors, & such. Things to stimulate your imagination! ......By "Gothic" I certainly do not, & I repeat - "DO NOT", mean those black leather clad, white face painted, bar-hopping, teenie-bopper, sub-cultural, seemingly mindless night crawlers who "think" they know what "Gothic" really is! Preposterous! That lifestyle I DO NOT enjoy, & certainly have NO use for. Anyway, on with this introduction... ......There are many more authors I could have included who have written somewhat in what we consider to be the weird fiction genre, but I have left these authors off the list. The reason for this is simply that whereas they may have written a story or two of weird fiction, their principle fame does not lie exclusively within weird fiction. A case in point - Washington Irving and his "Legend of Sleepy Hollow". Others include John Keats, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Daniel DeFoe, Francis Marion Crawford, Lord Byron, Nathaniel Hawthorne, & more. Note that these tend to be "Classic Writers". ......Suffice it to say - these writers have all had an impact on me at one time or another during my writing & reading career!
......By "Gothic" I certainly do not, & I repeat - "DO NOT", mean those black leather clad, white face painted, bar-hopping, teenie-bopper, sub-cultural, seemingly mindless night crawlers who "think" they know what "Gothic" really is! Preposterous! That lifestyle I DO NOT enjoy, & certainly have NO use for. Anyway, on with this introduction...
......There are many more authors I could have included who have written somewhat in what we consider to be the weird fiction genre, but I have left these authors off the list. The reason for this is simply that whereas they may have written a story or two of weird fiction, their principle fame does not lie exclusively within weird fiction. A case in point - Washington Irving and his "Legend of Sleepy Hollow". Others include John Keats, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Daniel DeFoe, Francis Marion Crawford, Lord Byron, Nathaniel Hawthorne, & more. Note that these tend to be "Classic Writers".
......Suffice it to say - these writers have all had an impact on me at one time or another during my writing & reading career!