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Fantasy Commentator, v. 1, issue 1, December 1943
Page 5
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FANTASY COMMENTATOR 5 as "a supremely accomplished artist", and the former story, whose theme is vampirism, substantiates this opinion to the fullest extent. "The Room in the Tower" is undoubtedly one of the most skillfully constructed novelettes on its theme yet to appear. Unfortunately, it has never been anthologized elsewhere, and so it is doubtful is it will eer attain to a popularity equalling that of stories more widely know. "Caterpillars", however, was chosen for inclusion in Colin de la Kare's excellent collection They Walk Again (1931), and is clearly representative of the master at his best. A visitor at the Italian villa of friends is troubled, on his first night in the building, with strange dreams, unlike any hitherto experienced. The second night finds him restless and unable to sleep; he arises in search of a book left in another room, the better to while away the night hours. Returning to his chamber, he passes a disused bedroom, and glancing within, notices an eerie gray light coming from the bed. The latter was covered with great caterpillars, a foot or more in length, which crawled over it...they were faintly luminous, and...instead of the sucker-like feet of ordinary caterpillars they had rows of pincers like crabs...in colour these dreadful insects were yellowish-grey, and they were covered with irregular lumps and swellings. There must have been hundreds of them for they formed a sort of writhing, crawling pyramid on the bed. Occasionally one fell off on to the floor, with a soft, fleshy thud... Paralyzed with horror, the visitor at first can do nothing except stare, but finally flees in terror. With morning come doubts as to his adventure---perhaps it was merely a dream. But he encounters an artist, also staying at the villa, who shows him a caterpillar, a miniature of those seen the previous night; he is overcome by the same feeling of horror, whereupon the artist crushes it beneath his heel. Once more unable to sleep, that night he leaves his room, and once more sees the caterpillars, this time swarming from the disused chamber toward the artist's room in a hideous gray tide of flesh. They crawl through the keyhole and hinge-cracks of the door unimpeded...With the next day he leaves the house, never to return, and never learns until months later that the disused bedroom had been occupied the year before by a fatal case of cancer, nor that, shortly after his own visit, the artist had likewise succumbed to that disease. The lurking horror throughout the story is depicted with nothing less than a genius worthy of Lovecraft at his best; had he written no other story, Mr. Benson's reputation would rest as securely on the basis of this one as does that of Charlotte Perkins upon her isolated effort in the field. The author's second volume devoted to the weird did not appear until eleven years had elapsed. In 1923 there was published in this country Visible and Invisible, to date the only Benson collection to be printed in America. Not a few of the twelve stories included first saw print in the now-defunct Munsey magazines, though precise information on the dates of publication is lacking at present. Visible and Invisible, while not a common book, is nevertheless not a difficult one to obtain; bookdealers' prices range from a dollar to two-fifty, and many collectors have been fortunate enough to obtain it for less. In quality, it rates as excellent, being at least equal to its predecessor in this respect. "And the Dead Spake--" begins the volume with a ghastly description of a scientist's experiment---tapping a recently-dead woman's brain with a "needle" to reveal its "recorded" information about her husband's murder; while "Mrs. Amworth" reveals the discovery of a vampire in a quiet Sussex village. The latter story was anthologized by Dorothy Sayers in her first Omnibus of Crime (1929).
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FANTASY COMMENTATOR 5 as "a supremely accomplished artist", and the former story, whose theme is vampirism, substantiates this opinion to the fullest extent. "The Room in the Tower" is undoubtedly one of the most skillfully constructed novelettes on its theme yet to appear. Unfortunately, it has never been anthologized elsewhere, and so it is doubtful is it will eer attain to a popularity equalling that of stories more widely know. "Caterpillars", however, was chosen for inclusion in Colin de la Kare's excellent collection They Walk Again (1931), and is clearly representative of the master at his best. A visitor at the Italian villa of friends is troubled, on his first night in the building, with strange dreams, unlike any hitherto experienced. The second night finds him restless and unable to sleep; he arises in search of a book left in another room, the better to while away the night hours. Returning to his chamber, he passes a disused bedroom, and glancing within, notices an eerie gray light coming from the bed. The latter was covered with great caterpillars, a foot or more in length, which crawled over it...they were faintly luminous, and...instead of the sucker-like feet of ordinary caterpillars they had rows of pincers like crabs...in colour these dreadful insects were yellowish-grey, and they were covered with irregular lumps and swellings. There must have been hundreds of them for they formed a sort of writhing, crawling pyramid on the bed. Occasionally one fell off on to the floor, with a soft, fleshy thud... Paralyzed with horror, the visitor at first can do nothing except stare, but finally flees in terror. With morning come doubts as to his adventure---perhaps it was merely a dream. But he encounters an artist, also staying at the villa, who shows him a caterpillar, a miniature of those seen the previous night; he is overcome by the same feeling of horror, whereupon the artist crushes it beneath his heel. Once more unable to sleep, that night he leaves his room, and once more sees the caterpillars, this time swarming from the disused chamber toward the artist's room in a hideous gray tide of flesh. They crawl through the keyhole and hinge-cracks of the door unimpeded...With the next day he leaves the house, never to return, and never learns until months later that the disused bedroom had been occupied the year before by a fatal case of cancer, nor that, shortly after his own visit, the artist had likewise succumbed to that disease. The lurking horror throughout the story is depicted with nothing less than a genius worthy of Lovecraft at his best; had he written no other story, Mr. Benson's reputation would rest as securely on the basis of this one as does that of Charlotte Perkins upon her isolated effort in the field. The author's second volume devoted to the weird did not appear until eleven years had elapsed. In 1923 there was published in this country Visible and Invisible, to date the only Benson collection to be printed in America. Not a few of the twelve stories included first saw print in the now-defunct Munsey magazines, though precise information on the dates of publication is lacking at present. Visible and Invisible, while not a common book, is nevertheless not a difficult one to obtain; bookdealers' prices range from a dollar to two-fifty, and many collectors have been fortunate enough to obtain it for less. In quality, it rates as excellent, being at least equal to its predecessor in this respect. "And the Dead Spake--" begins the volume with a ghastly description of a scientist's experiment---tapping a recently-dead woman's brain with a "needle" to reveal its "recorded" information about her husband's murder; while "Mrs. Amworth" reveals the discovery of a vampire in a quiet Sussex village. The latter story was anthologized by Dorothy Sayers in her first Omnibus of Crime (1929).
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