The supernatural horror of Montague Rhodes James

Far from being classified simply in the context of "hauntology", the stories of Montague Rhodes James, far more than just "ghost stories", anticipated the "cosmic-horror" mythopoeia of HP Lovecraft and Thomas Ligotti, presenting the Horror in โ€œtotally otherโ€ terms, completely unrelated to anthropomorphism and the typically human physical-corporeal dimension.


di Marco Maculotti
cover: Montague Rhodes James

Already in the past on our pages, in the category "HP Lovecraft and surroundings", we have paid tribute, in addition to the Providence Dreamer, also to the genius of some of his colleagues (as well as more or less his contemporaries) whose vision of the world and whose mythopoiesis they made them in his eyes not only deserving to be read, but also to be studied as supreme exponents of the literary vein of Supernatural Horror. In his essayย Supernatural Horror in Literature [and. it.ย Horror Theory, Bietti, Milan 2011], drawn up in 1927, it is Lovecraft himself who outlines the vademecum on how to write this type of literature effectively, citing, if necessary, the authoritative opinion of some giants who anticipated it in this sort of "relay" to keep alive the spark of this particular "golden cord" that spans the centuries: now an Edgar Poe, now a Coleridge, now a Stevenson.

Among the most valid exponents of the supernatural horror genre within the British ecumene of his time, Lovecraft recognized the importance above all of four authors; we have already talked about two of these on our pages, and these are Arthur Machen e Algernon Blackwood. The other two great contemporary masters were in his opinion to be traced in Irish Lord Dunsany, particularly important for ours as regards his cycle of more dreamlike stories, and in a writer "diametrically opposed to the genius" of the first, and also "endowed with an almost diabolical power in evoking horror with delicate touches starting from more prosaic everyday reality "[Horror Theory, p. 421]: the scholar Montagu Rhodes James, born in Kent in 1862 and destined to pass away in 1936, a few months before Lovecraft, which we will discuss here. According to Lovecraft [Horror Theory, p. 427]:

โ€œDr. James, despite his light touch, evokes terror and revulsion in the most shocking forms; and he will certainly remain as one of the few, true masters and creators of this dark literary genre. "

Historian and bibliographer, rector of Eton Collage for decades, famous antiquarian, well-known scholar of paleography and archeology, recognized authority in terms of medieval manuscripts and the history of cathedrals, which in his stories he was able to describe in the smallest details with the competence of the specialist (here, mainly, by whom the young HPL was influenced in this type of descriptions, so dear to him too: let's go with the mind, to eg, to the one contained inย The inhabitant of the dark): this and much more was Montague Rhodes James, a typical intellectual exponent of Victorian England. Yet today, despite all his occupations and skills, almost a century after his death he is remembered by most for having written ghost stories.

Paul Lowe, portrait of Montague Rhodes James


Which ghosts?

This, at least, is the usual wording: it seems in fact that in the literal circles of the time not too much distinction was made between 'classic' stories of ghostly presences and haunted houses, so inflated since the birth of the gothic novel in the second half of the eighteenth century, and another type of tales, of which Montague Rhodes James could rightly be seen as one of the greatest exponents in Europe (in addition, possibly, to another great genius of the nineteenth century in many ways comparable to James, or the Baltic ETA Hoffmann). As we will try to demonstrate here and in another article soon to be published, the literary creations of a James or a Hoffmann detach themselves significantly from the canonical "ghost story" of the Gothic school, starting from the characteristic of being deeply focused on the supernatural-esoteric-magical element rather than on that of a sentimental-psychological nature.

Thus, for James as for Hoffmann (but also later, for Machen, Lovecraft and Blackwood) the ghostly apparitions become a 'spy' to introduce and stage much larger and indefinable horrors, with distinctly anti-human characteristics. and anti-rational: the world of (black) magic is a kind of upside-down world in which absolute chaos reigns and where the values โ€‹โ€‹of the world of humans are neither recognized nor in force. As Lovecraft noted [Horror Theory, pp. 422-3]:

By inventing a new kind of ghost, he has departed considerably from the conventional Gothic tradition; because, where the old repertoire ghosts were pale and solemn and were perceived above all through sight, James's typical ghost is gaunt, short and shaggy: a hellish, indolent nocturnal abomination halfway between beast and man, and is usually touched before seen. Sometimes the look is even more abnormal: a flannel roll with spider eyes, or an invisible entity modeling itself with a sheet and showing a crumpled linen face. "

Paul Lowe 'The Tractate Middoth' 2019
Paul Lowe, illustration for โ€œThe Tractate Middothโ€ by MR James, 2019

Similarly to Lovecraft, another well-known continuer of the supernatural horror vein, the British Ramsey Campbellย pointed out how de facto in Montague Rhodes James one of the first, true initiators of the literary current from whose primeval sources he himself drank should be identified [introduction toย Sinister tales, and. Sylvestre Bonnard, Cremona 2006, p. 11]:

โ€œHis definition of a ghost was not limited to the dead returning to earth. His tales are crowded with spiders [โ€ฆ], immense insects, demons with tentacles or, even worse, evil beings nestled in wells or [โ€ฆ] under the pillow. "

Torn heartsย ("Lost Hearts", 1895), the short story that gives the title to the anthology edited by Dino Buzzati for Bompiani (Milan, 1967), is paradigmatic in order to realize how, in the final analysis, most of the time the ghostly apparitions are in James' stories more preparatory to other narrative elements rather than central to themselves. In this case, for example, it is more than anything else the portrait of cousin Abney, lord of Aswarby, that remains in the mind of the reader, as well as his extensive library, which makes him a typical Lovecraftian character. ante-literam: it contained in fact "All the books available at that time on the Mysteries, the Orphic poems, the cult of Mithras and the Neoplatonists", in addition to Corpus Hermeticum by Ermete Trismegisto and other treatises which (as the reader is left to understand) are undoubtedly classified under the heading of โ€œblack magicโ€, the practices of which are tested by cousin Abney in order to obtain eternal youth.

Magical practices, on the other hand, are a recurring element in James' stories, as we will try to show well in the continuation of our article. The consequence and / or end of these prohibited practices is, in most cases, the evocation of an entity from the Other World, which most of the time presents itself as a demon or a vampiric being who is preparing to gradually suck all the vital energy of the person to whom he has been linked with magic, either for a curse or for a rash move of the unfortunate, until the inevitable death.

Neย The register of canon Albericoย ("Canon Alberic's Scrap-Book", 1894) some illustrations depicting these demonic creatures are described: only partly anthropomorphic, similar to skeletons "with protruding muscles like metal wires" and protruding nails, completely covered with a "disgusting tangle of hair ". A description that brings to mind is the Wendigo of the North American folklore (and of the homonymous story by Algernon Blackwood, which we will return to later in this article) that the ghoul described by Lovecraftย Pickman's model. These entities, on the other hand (it is implied) were well known in antiquity, even to the ancient prophets: "Isaiah was a very sensitive man; - one of the characters of the story in question at the end of the narrative - does he not speak of nocturnal monsters living in the ruins of Babylon?ยป.

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Odilon Redon Beneath the shadowy wing the black creature inflicted a deep bite 1891
Odilon Redon, "Beneath the Shadowy Wing the Black Creature Inflicted a Deep Bite", 1891

The portal-object to the Elsewhere

No less disturbing it isย Whistle, and I'll run to you, my boyย (โ€œOh, Whistle, and I'll Come to You, My Ladโ€, 1904), of which a television transposition was made in 1968 for the BBC. In all probability influenced by the first publications of Arthur Machen (The great god Panย eย The three impostors), the story centers on the discovery by the protagonist of an ancient metal flask found in the ruins of a medieval church, characterized by the inauspicious property of recalling and making what is defined as a "terrifying demon" with "an absolutely horrible face, di crumpled canvasยป. As in other James Terror Tales (eg.ย The spell of the runesย eย A warning for the curious, analyzed later here) here too the presence of the unwelcome guest, who follows the protagonist in his movements without the latter almost noticing it, is instead noticed by the people around him.

An analogous role to the whistle in "Oh, Whistle" he covers it in another of his best works,ย A view from the hillย ("A View from a Hill", 1925; from this splendid story in 2005 it was taken a medium-length film) an ancient binoculars. If it is The Sandmanย by ETA Hoffmann the telescope that Nataniele buys from the barometer seller Giuseppe Coppola - alter ego of the Mephistophelesย Sandy Wizardย - will contribute in a decisive way to precipitate him towards the abyss of madness, not unlike the fate of Mr. Fanshawe since he begins to look at the world through the medium of binoculars built by the now deceased Mr. Baxter, a bizarre character who during his natural life was interested from ancient cults and forbidden practices. Where in the Sandmannย the esoteric suggestions, however relevant, remained hidden behind the narrative structure of a psychological mold, here we are instead in the field of witchcraft practices and black magic in the clearest sense of the term (themes that Hoffmann himself did not fail to deal with in other stories), as can be seen from the chilling finale.ย In both stories the ophthalmological instrument opens new glimpses to the organ of view, in a literal and at the same time esoteric sense (the vision): Fanshawe with his help will begin to see a mysterious abbey that shouldn't exist, as well as a gallows on the top of a hill, not visible to the naked eye.

Neย The mezzotint ("The Mezzotint", 1904) is a figurative work of art, an etching or mezzotint precisely, to act as a portal for the 'Absolute elsewhere. The sketch arouses the perplexity of observers as the scene depicted by the artist seems to change progressively, as if it were a kind of short film made up of several slides, which reveals to the horrified eyes of the viewer what appears to be the abduction of a terrified child by a ghostly skeleton-like entity, with "frighteningly thin" legs. Here, as in other stories by James (and in the decades that followed by Lovecraft), the most sinister secrets are often in connection with the events of certain aristocratic families who had previously lived in the places where the protagonist happens to be staying.

Odilon Redon Death- It Is I Who Makes You Serious Let Us Embrace 1896
Odilon Redon โ€œDeath - It Is I Who Makes You Serious, Let Us Embraceโ€, 1896

Lovecraftian suggestions

It is equally an artistic and figurative element, notably an abbey window, that opens up 'other' scenarios in another of James' most significant tales of terror,ย The treasure of Abbot Thomas ("The treasure of abbot Thomas", 1904), centered on an enigmatic code to be solved according to the example ofย The golden beetleย by Poe. To reach the "treasure" mentioned in the title, the protagonists will have to make a real one descent into hell accessing a well of precious Italian marble, embellished with reliefs representing some of the most famous Old Testament figures (Elijah, Jacob, etc.), demonstrating the fact that in the more esoteric tales of James often Judeo-Christianity and "paganism" (and / or "black magic") are closely linked. The "guardian" demon (ie, guarded by Abbot Thomas) that adventurers eventually stumble upon may have influenced the anatomy of the Ancient Lovecraftians to some degree, to the point that one of them describes with disgust " the impression that several arms or legs o tentaclesย [italics ns.] or who knows what else, [the] had clung to the body "(the exact same description will also be repeated in" The residence at Whitminster ", see below), and that another describes the head carved on the well, portrait of the Guardian, as "something very like a toad", thus anticipating the human-batrachian hybrids of Dagon e The Innsmouth mask.

Both โ€œThe treasure of abbot Thomasโ€ and the next An episode in the history of a cathedral ("An episode of cathedral history", 1914) also inspired one of the most valid horror films on the Italian scene of the late XNUMXs: The church by Michele Soavi. In the story set in a cathedral previously built on a swamp, it is the removal of the pulpit that causes an avalanche of horrible nightmares and unexpected deaths to fall upon the community; to accompany this increasingly oppressive atmosphere of restlessness is added a chilling scream that resounds in the depths of the night - replacing here the more classic, sinister laughter from outer space, who so often, in James' stories, makes fun of intended victims.

Odilon Redon Death- My iron surpasses all others 1889
Odilon Redon, "Death - My Iron Surpasses All Others", 1889

As the reader will have guessed by now, it is not only witches and "pagans" who hide abominable secrets in James' stories: often, as in the already analyzedย The register of canon Albericoย eย The treasure of Abbot Thomas, I'm very the prelates to appear like sinister characters possessing unspeakable knowledge destined to bring horror into the life of those who dare to exhume them from their tombs or from the legacies they have handed over to the aftermath. This is also the case for de The stalls of Barchester Cathedral (โ€œThe stalls of Barchester Cathedralโ€, 1910), where archdeacon Haynes has a "very strange fate". Of all James's stories, this is probably what inspired Lovecraft the most, starting with the enumeration of events as a diary, especially in stories such as The Dunwich Horrorย e Alonzo Typer's diary. To act as a gateway to the terrifying 'other' world that lies behind the ordinary one are three small statues sculpted in a grotesque way, one of which depicts a seated figure on a throne, evidently in possession of the trappings of royalty, but who at the same time presents "demonic" characteristics: the feet are "carefully hidden by a long cloak" and "neither the crown nor the hood he wears is enough to conceal the pointed ears and curved horns that betray its Tartar origin" (i.e. infera); his hand, moreover, is "armed with frighteningly long and sharp claws."

Also in this case we notice a mixture of elements coming from the Judeo-Christian cultural ecumene with other more typically "pagan" ones: the aforementioned statuettes were engraved in the wood of the Sacred Oak forest adjacent to the village: one in particular of these trees, which rises in the center of the grove, it is known as the โ€œQuercia della Forcaโ€ due to the large quantity of human bones found among its roots. It is also mentioned the custom, typical of British folklore, of hanging from its branches "small images or crude puppets of straw [or] wicker" to ensure success in affairs of the heart or of another kind: even today this habit persists in much of Ireland and the trees in question so decorated (usually hawthorn, two of the most famous located near the sacred hill of Tara and near the Neolithic megalithic site of Creevykeel) are usually called "Fairy trees" (fairy tree).

69275415_10218746900357139_1905884650903961600_o
The Author at the Fairy-tree adjacent to the Neolithic site of Creevykeel, County Sligo in Ireland

Another famous tale by Lovecraft,ย The mice in the wall, may have whetted James's imagination by writing the near-namesakeย Topiย ("The Rats", 1929), which in turn anticipated certain suggestions staged by the Providence writer in the followingย The Innsmouth mask: think of the โ€œmarine curseโ€, of the hotel where the protagonist finds himself blocked in spite of himself, of the mysteriously sealed room that nevertheless seems to be inhabited by a sinister tenant.

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As inย Rats in the wall, on the other hand, mice are not at all responsible for the actual horror: if in the Lovecraftian tale they figured as spies of an immensely more terrifying horror, in James's tale they even play no role, being inserted only in the title to hint at the nature of the sinister noises heard by the protagonist; but that it is not the mice who are responsible is put in black and white right away, so much so that at the opening of the story we read: ยซBut was it really for the mice? I ask why else [that is to say in the story that the narrator is preparing to tell, ed]ย it wasn't for thatยป. The description of the real source of the noise, at the end of the story, constitutes one of the high points of the black Jamesian fiction:

โ€œAnd so, as quietly as possible, he crept up to the door and opened it. The collapse of illusions! He hardly burst out laughing. Leaning, one could almost say sitting, on the edge of the bed, there was nothing else in the world than ... a scarecrow! A field scarecrow, of course, hunted in a deserted roomโ€ฆ yes, but at this point the fun was over. Do scarecrows have bare, bony feet? Do their heads swing on their shoulders? Do they have iron collars and rings of chains around their necks? Can they get up and move, and not that rigidly, waving their heads and arms? And shudder?

The Mephistophelian Mr. Karswell de is also purely Lovecraftianย The spell of the runesย (โ€œCasting the Runesโ€, 1911), narrative segment from which one of the most horror films was made cult from the XNUMXs:ย Night of the Demonย by Jacques Tourneur (1957). Halfway between the Sand Wizard of the famous story by ETA Hoffmann and il Nyarlathotep born from the pen (and even before from the dream experiences) of Lovecraft, Karswell is told of how he scared to death a group of children from the local parish with the help of a sort of "magic lantern", with which he projected images as realistic as terrifying of hapless little boys chased and torn apart by demonic creatures, as well as of "snakes, centipedes and disgusting winged creatures" swarming in a way so truthful that they seem to literally step off the screen and invade the room. Similarly to theย villainย most iconic born from Lovecraft's imagination, Karswell was also said to have founded his own religion, whose "dreadful rites" were performed by the abject individual with the help of servants., also referred to as "horrible people".

The public library is one of James's favorite places to bring the unfortunate protagonists of his stories into the most unexpected horror: in this regard, in addition to the story just analyzed, it is also paradigmaticย The Middoth Treatiseย ("The Tractate Middoth", 1911), kaleidoscopic episode halfway between Borges and Meyrink. Even these last two tales mentioned can be defined as "ghost stories" only in a very broad sense: as the reader will have understood we are still in the full field of black magic and occultism rather than in thehauntology stricto sensu.

Odilon-Redon-The-Crying-Spider-1881-e1429566923102
Odilon Redon, "The Crying Spider", 1881

Folklore and Horror

Neย Il ash treeย ("The Ash Tree", 1904), a story inspired in part by Irish folk superstitions, it is the unresolved spirit of a witch - this Mrs. Mothersole, eliminated following the death sentence - to bring terror and death among the current inhabitants of the mansion, who despite themselves undergo a progressive devitalization reminiscent of that of the unfortunate victims in Lovecraftian stories written in the following decades such asย The escaped houseย eย Color from outer space.ย The ash treeย is one of several James horror stories in which the demonic entities, familiar in this case of the revived witch, are described with characteristics similar to those of the arachnids ("He saw the remains of a huge spider, lumpy and charred").

Equally inspired by the witchcraft practices and beliefs of Irish folklore (notably the "Second view", that is to say the foresight and the ability to remotely see seers and sorcerers, which the Reverend Robert Kirk also treated in his epochal treatise The Secret Commonwealth, written at the end of the XNUMXth century) is the taleย The residence of Whitminster ("The residence at Whitminster", 1931), some passages of which cannot fail to bring to the reader's mind the atmospheres typically found in the most paradigmatic stories of Arthur Machen ("The White People"). Take this excerpt as an example:

โ€œI assure you, Emily, in the name of what is dearest to both of us, that the experiences I have had this afternoon transcend the limits of what I have so far deemed credible. [...] a vision, strange to my eyes, of a hill of wild grass with gray stone ruins in the center and a rough stone wall all around. And there was a woman in there, old and very ugly, in a red cloak and a tattered robe, talking to a boy dressed in the fashion of about a hundred years ago. He put something shiny in her hand and he gave her something to her [...] Then the scene vanished [...] "

Odilon Redon. The Chimera Regarded All Things with Terror 1886
Odilon Redon, โ€œThe Chimera Regarded All Things with Terror,โ€ 1886

Typically Machenian is alsoย The rose garden (โ€œThe rose gardenโ€, 1911), in which the oneiric visions and those with open eyes of two mirror pairs of characters merge, identical visions to each other despite the chronological and spatial distances. The restlessness that oppresses the characters here - a consequence, as often happens in James' stories, of terrible events that happened in the past in the place where they find themselves - seems here to go hand in hand with the devastating effects of the so-called hypnagogic paralysis: uncontrolled anxiety, an indefinite sense of oppression, time suspended and dilated indefinitely, the feeling that something horrible is about to happen and that nothing can be done to avoid it.

The reference to owls as a fictitious memory to cover the real one, much more chilling, surprisingly anticipates the medical case histories of the so-called abduction alien. In this regard it can be mentionedย Communionย by Whitley Strieber, an account of close encounters of type III and IV that the author claims to have really happened to him, written at the end of the XNUMXs: here it is curious to note how the narrator, before returning to possession of his memories thanks to the regressive hypnosis, he used to "hide" the memory of abductionย suffered after alleged nocturnal encounters with owls or owls. In addition to this, it is not out of place to report a very famous quote from the television series Twin Peaks: ยซOwls are not what they seemยป!

Odilon Redon. The Sinister Command of the Specter is Fulfilled. The Dream Is Realized by Death 1887
Odilon Redon, โ€œThe Sinister Command of the Specter Is Fulfilled. The Dream Is Realized by Death โ€, 1887

But probably the story by Montague Rhodes James that most winks at the folk-horror atmospheres dear to Machen is to be identified inย Mr. Humphreys and his legacyย ("Mr. Humphreys and his inheritance", 1911), story set inside a villa that the protagonist suddenly receives as an inheritance from an uncle he never met, and above all in the maze of badgers, circular in shape, built in the park adjacent to it. Inside the aforementioned labyrinth, when darkness falls, Mr. Humphreys experiences situations of anguish that closely recall the stories of his Welsh colleague ("A fragment of life"), as well as the popular traditions of the entire British archipelago:

โ€œWhen the darkness deepened, it seemed to him that there were more than one spying on him, and it might even have been a whole gang; so he judged by the rustle they made in the bushes. And then, from time to time, whispers could be heard, as if they were holding conciliaboli among themselves. But who they were or what shape they were, he didn't want to say. "

Even more effective is the description of the mysterious object which stands at the end of a perfectly smooth and solitary column in holy of holies of the labyrinth, i.e. at its center: a finely inlaid copper globe, in all probability the most sensational 'magical' artifact of the entire literary production of our, whose ornamental motifs are thus described by the narrator (note, among other things, the description of the South Pole as a "supernatural" and "infernal" valley that opens up within a mountain range; description that surprisingly anticipates Lovecraft's Antarctica in the novelย To the mountains of madness, in which it is implied that it is equivalent to a sort of "double terrestrial" of the notorious Lang Plateau):

"A figure seemed familiar to him, Draco, a winged serpent that surrounded the sphere at the point that, on the terrestrial globe, corresponds to the Equator: on the other hand, however, much of the northern hemisphere was covered by the outstretched wings of a large figure whose head was hidden by a ring that dominated the whole. The words could be read around his head Princeps Tenebrarum. In the southern hemisphere, on the other hand, there was a zone shaded by vertical lines, marked as umbra mortis. Near this was a mountain range, and between the mountains a valley opened from which flames rose. The valley was defined as [...] Vallis filiorum Hinnom. Around Draco there were various figures not dissimilar from the celestial constellations, but not the same. For example, a naked man with a raised club was not described as Hercules, but as Cain. Another, stuck in the center of the earth up to his torso and with his arms outstretched in despair, was not Ophiuchus, but Kore, and a third, hanging by the hair from a twisted tree, was Absalom. Next to the latter was a man who wore a long tunic and a high hat, and stood erect in the center of a circle, from which he called two demons that circled around him, and who was calledย Hostanes Magusย [โ€ฆ]. The scene as a whole was to represent the gathering of the Patriarchs of Evil, and was perhaps inspired by Dante. "

Odilon Redon. Pilgrim of the Sublunary World 1891
Odilon Redon, โ€œPilgrim of the Sublunary Worldโ€ 1891

British folklore reigns supreme in A warning for the curious ("A warning to the curious", 1925), in which the protagonist's misfortunes begin with the reckless exhumation at the coastal town of Seaburgh, by the protagonist, of a real sacred relic: a crown which, according to tradition, would have the power to defend the coasts of Albion from invasions from the outside. Legend has it that initially there were three crowns scattered on the English coast for this purpose (hence the three crowns visible in the East Anglia coat of arms): but over the centuries the first two were irretrievably lost and only that of Seaburgh remained. Like "The residence at Whitminster", "A warning to the curious" is also embellished with exquisitely Machenian suggestions: from the moment of the insane gesture, Mr. Paxton - this is the name of the protagonist - is inevitably followed by dark presences, whose work is reminiscent of that of Fair Ones in the Welsh tales: he can sense the hateful presence only out of the corner of his eye while, as often happens in James's horror stories, others see it clearly, like some kind of astral parasite that follows its intended victim everywhere.

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The parallelism that exists between the concluding episodes of this story and certain passages in the aforementioned is also amazingย Wendigoย by Blackwood, written 15 years earlier. In the latter the narrator describes the footprints of the unfortunate Dรฉfago, kidnapped by the Wendigo (demonic entity of the Algonquin folklore), accompanied by other mysterious footprints, "sinister marks ... left in the snow by the unknown creature who had lured a human being to bring him to ruinยป; โ€œAnd the sight of these weird tracks running side by side, silent evidence of a journey in which terror or madness had led to impossible results, was deeply unsettling. He was troubled by it even in the secret abysses of the soul ยป. And here, as a demonstration of our hypothesis, an almost mirror-like passage of A warning for the curiousย from James:

โ€œAnd there were traces in the sand: of someone wearing shoes and walking in a hurry; and others in front of these, because every now and then the shoes tread the footprints that preceded them, the prints of bare feet. [โ€ฆ] The only thing we could do was notice those footprints as we continued running. But they repeated themselves with increasing frequency and by now we no longer had any doubt that what we were seeing, there before our eyes, were the prints of bare feet, feet that showed more bones than flesh. The idea of โ€‹โ€‹Paxton chasingโ€ฆ chasing something like that, convinced they were the friends he was expecting, was simply chilling. ยป

Odilon-Redon-A-strange-Juggler
Odilon Redon, "A strange Juggler", 1885

Which "Ghost stories"?

As a "ghost story" stricto sensuย could perhaps be framed, at least in the first place,ย Room number 13ย (โ€œRoom 13โ€, 1899), a story set in a hotel in which a mysterious episode that happened in the past seems to be staged at night. Yet even in this case, in addition to the animal screams, the ghostly songs and the sinister laughter, James does not give up a vague description of the supernatural entity that brings it closer to the demons present in other tales rather than to the revived soul of a deceased ("Bare skin ... covered with long gray hair"). Finally, the reader learns that even here there is black magic involved, and in particular a pact that the deceased in room number 13 had made with the Evil One. As in the tales of ghosts and fairies, the crowing of the cock and the rising of the sun puts an end to the sinister apparitions.

"Of ghosts" can perhaps be defined without hesitationย Martin's enclosureย ("Martin's close", 1911), trial story centered on the murder of the young Ann Clark, who closely remembers the โ€œhauntedโ€ stories of the American contemporary Ambrose Bierce, of which, however, he cannot reach the pathos. It is evident that James's definition of "ghost story writer" is really narrow, and as a further demonstration one cannot help but underline how his narrative efforts that do not involve "other" horrors and more difficult to define and classify ( like most of those mentioned here) are placed on a significantly lower level.

But then, in the end,ย which โ€œGhost storiesโ€ born from the brilliant pen of Montague Rhodes James, who we have ultimately seen to be one of the great initiators of supernatural horror literature at the turn of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, can they actually be defined in this way? Very few, in hindsight, since the ghostly apparitions on which other more typically Gothic writers (think, for example, the homonymous Henry James) center their plots turn out to be for Montague a 'spy' of a much worse horror, which it nestles behind the scenes not only of the rational and the human, but even of the real.

Anticipating the dictates of the cosmic horrorย made famous first by Lovecraft and then, in recent decades, by Thomas Ligotti, Montague Rhodes James sketched the Horror (il true horror, with a capital O) in "totally other" terms, completely unrelated to anthropomorphism and the typically human physical-corporeal dimension, in a way that mirrors the creation by the Providence Dreamer of a very nourished and variedย pantheon, as well as in line with the Machenian idea of "Protoplasmic regression" typical of Fair Ones and of those who have had the misfortune to see the face of the Great God Pan.

Montague Rhodes James.png
Montague Rhodes James (1862 - 1936)

Editions consulted:

  • Montague Rhodes James,ย Torn hearts, curated by Dino Buzzati, Bompiani, Milan 1967
  • Montague Rhodes James,ย Ghosts and other horrors, edited by Gianni Pilo and Sebastiano Fusco, Newton, Rome 1995
  • AAVV,ย Sinister tales in the tradition of MR James, edited by Ramsey Campbell, Sylvestre Bonnard, Milan 2006

10 comments on โ€œThe supernatural horror of Montague Rhodes James"

  1. You mentioned the BBC medium-length films of the A Ghost Story for Christmas series, well I highly recommend finding them all because they are very beautiful and different they are taken from the stories of MR James

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