Faber Aickmans Log Out | Topics | Search
Moderators | Edit Profile

RAMSEY CAMPBELL » Discussion » Faber Aickmans « Previous Next »

Author Message
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Simon Strantzas (Nomis)
Username: Nomis

Registered: 05-2008
Posted From: 99.225.111.224
Posted on Sunday, May 04, 2008 - 11:58 pm:   

For those who couldn't afford the Tartarus collections, Faber has the rights to Aickman's UNSETTLED DUST, WINE-DARK SEA, and COLD HAND IN MINE coming soon. Check Amazon for details. Who knows? If they sell well, there might be more!
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

John_l_probert (John_l_probert)
Username: John_l_probert

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 90.203.130.139
Posted on Monday, May 05, 2008 - 03:12 pm:   

When books like that come out I almost want to buy them to encourage the publisher even though I already have all the stories
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Huw (Huw)
Username: Huw

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 218.168.191.232
Posted on Monday, May 05, 2008 - 05:22 pm:   

Same here. A writer as good as Aickman should be more readily available.
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Simon Strantzas (Nomis)
Username: Nomis

Registered: 05-2008
Posted From: 38.113.181.169
Posted on Monday, May 05, 2008 - 06:41 pm:   

Sometime I do buy them to support the cause. I may even buy these. Maybe.
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Des (Des)
Username: Des

Registered: 06-2008
Posted From: 86.161.241.208
Posted on Wednesday, June 04, 2008 - 03:24 pm:   

I think Aickman's work is wonderful. Anyone else read his autobiography called 'The Attempted Rescue'? Very odd father he describes he had!
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Allybird (Allybird)
Username: Allybird

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 79.78.87.187
Posted on Wednesday, June 04, 2008 - 03:33 pm:   

I allow myself to read one of the stories in THE WINE DARK SEA every few weeks because I don't want it to end.
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Des (Des)
Username: Des

Registered: 06-2008
Posted From: 86.161.241.208
Posted on Wednesday, June 04, 2008 - 04:00 pm:   

I've recently completed a systematic re-reading of all Aickman's stories.

Particularly struck by 'My Poor Friend' (which amazingly I can't recall reading before) -- a very strange tale (even for Aickman!) that takes place in the British Parliament and even features Harold Wilson with his fish and chips!
It a disturbing tale. Highly recommended.

'Larger Than Life' is superficially a satire on spiritualists and religionists ....with some sexy underclothes! Extemely weird. It even has a Lewisite! The vision at the end is most unsettling.

Another very strange story: A CHOICE OF WEAPONS.
Includes stale confetti and the smell of bloaters.

WE ARE FOR THE DARK containing six stories by Robert Aickman and Elizabeth Jane Howard (1965) - (my copy Mayflower Dell) - is the only forerunner of 'Nemonymous' that I can think of, as the stories are not allocated in print to a particular author. We do now know which is which, but not if we only depend on this book itself. 'The Insufficient Answer' mentions an art show in a gallery entitled: Women Who've Made As Good As Men. I think I would have guessed the story was by Aickman not Howard (had I not already known)!


'Growing Boys', when I read it the first time a generation ago, had more of an effect than it did now. It now seems like Dr Who burlesque.

'The Swords', however, has redoubled its power. The seediest story I've ever read. Patrick Hamilton squared.

Just read the story entitled MARRIAGE. This is probably the most scandalously salacious story I've ever read!

'The Real Road To The Church' is a finely satisfying, deeply textured, Elizabeth-Bowenesque ghost story.

Attacked by woman from the water (Niemandswasser) and from the air (Compulsory Games)!!

RAISING THE WIND depicts the church-door through-the-keyhole-kiss that is prevalent in the area where I live in Essex, UK. Unknown elsewhere. The story even mentions Marks Tey which is quite close by.

Who agrees with me that 'Residents Only' is possibly Aickman's least known masterpiece? It is one of his longest stories. Which is sort of relevant. When I started reading it, the glanced-at length seemed about average for Aickman - but as I continued reading it, and looking, from time to time, at the pages still to read, it seemed bodily to grow, as if the act of reading made it longer. A bit like the very British committee system embodied in its plot, the cemetery committee itself that is the centrepiece, reminding me of Jarndyce & Jarndyce or of a meal at Aickman's own Hospice. I mean this quite seriously ... and this seemed to be confirmed by the story's coda with these words: "Everyone perceived that the past should be allowed to merge into the future, with no official recognition given to an interregnum."

'No Stronger Than A Flower' (I can't remember reading it before but I must have done!) -
Nesta reminds me of Pete Burns in Celebrity Big Brother... A visit to an imputed 'back-street abortionist' to be 'reborn' as a nothing or a ghost gradually - coupled with an SF morality tale about the coming Plastic Surgery generation that was presumably in Aickman's real future when he wrote the story. I think it interesting that Pete Burns' famous group in the eighties was 'Dead or Alive'.

Quote: "I have often noticed in life that we never really learn anything - learn for the first time, I mean. We know everything already, everything that we, as individuals, are capable of knowing, or fit to know; all that other people do for us, at the best, is to remind us, to give our brains a little twist from one set of preoccupations to a slightly different set."
Robert Aickman (from 'The Clock Watcher')

That certainly gave my brain a little twist! I don't yet know why, but I feel that helps to 'explain' RA's stories, if explanation is seen to be needed.



'Ravissante' came up fresh. It's probably - with the vantage point of years of experience with RA - his best story. It is very powerful - and that black poodle...??!
Particularly inspired by this (edited) passage:
"My pictures are visionary and symbolical, and, from first to last, have seemed to be painted by someone other than myself. [...] I am thus entirely self-taught, or taught by that other within me. I am aware that my pictures lack serious technique(if there is a technique that can be distinguished from inspiration and invention). I should have given up painting them some time ago, were it not that a certain number of people seemed to find something remarkable in them, and have thus identified me with them, and made me feel mildly important."

'The Breakthrough', 'Into The Wood' (to be differentiated from 'Wood') and 'The Fetch':
these three stories are very powerful and represent humanity sleep-walking into death as surrounded by motley shapes in various states of this journey.

And I could go on... :-)
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Huw (Huw)
Username: Huw

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 61.216.38.249
Posted on Wednesday, June 04, 2008 - 04:06 pm:   

Des, I have read The Attempted Rescue. An interesting father, indeed (to say the least!). His grandfather was Richard Marsh, author of the popular novel The Beetle, and numerous short stories (which have been published in a collection by Ash-Tree Press). It's an interesting read, although it's a pity he doesn't really talk about his stories. I picked up the first edition for only a fiver some years ago - I think the Tartarus edition is nicer, though.

Have you read his second autobiographical book, The River Runs Uphill? It focuses mostly on his work with the Inland Waterways, but is certainly worth reading. It also contains some interesting (and rare) pictures of him along with acquaintances such as Elizabeth Jane Howard, mostly on boats or near canals. He mentions Blackwood's 'The Willows' at one point, while describing being on the river at night.

Ally, I really envy you having all those Aickman stories to read for the first time. Have you read any of the others yet, or are you going to finish The Wine-Dark Sea first? They're all good - he was a very consistent writer, in terms of quality, with only a few lesser stories missing the mark, in my opinion.
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Des (Des)
Username: Des

Registered: 06-2008
Posted From: 86.161.241.208
Posted on Wednesday, June 04, 2008 - 04:10 pm:   

Huw, I think your last post crossed with my previous one which also mentions Elizabeth Jane Howard.
No, I've not read that one, but I would like to do so. I shall now go off and seek it out!
des
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Huw (Huw)
Username: Huw

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 61.216.38.249
Posted on Wednesday, June 04, 2008 - 04:15 pm:   

Des, I thought that 'Residents Only' was one of his less effective stories, but it's ages since I read it, so I'll have to give it another go. I love all of the other stories you mentioned (not quite so much 'Growing Boys'), and would add 'The Stains', 'The School Friend', 'Bind Your Hair', 'The Visiting Star', 'No Time is Passing', 'The Inner Room' and 'The Trains' as some of my other favourites. His stories are full of strange touches and symbolism, and successive readings tend to reveal things that were hidden before.

'Larger Than Oneself' is another one I need to read again. It's been literally twenty years since I read some of these.
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Des (Des)
Username: Des

Registered: 06-2008
Posted From: 86.161.241.208
Posted on Wednesday, June 04, 2008 - 04:18 pm:   

'The Same Dog' is wonderful and strangely Proustian. (I've not put all my favourites in my previous post - 'The Stains', I agree! - ah shucks, they are all my favourites!) :-)
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Huw (Huw)
Username: Huw

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 61.216.38.249
Posted on Wednesday, June 04, 2008 - 04:28 pm:   

I know! It's very difficult to choose favourites with Aickman - there are so many great stories, and even the ones that don't work as well (for me) are still so well-written that they're a pleasure to read.
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Allybird (Allybird)
Username: Allybird

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 79.78.125.11
Posted on Wednesday, June 04, 2008 - 06:00 pm:   

I'm loving him so much, Des, I can hardly bear for it to end. I've just read INTO THE WOOD and of course next is BIND YOUR HAIR and then finally THE STAINS which I'm putting off until the last possible moment - when the house is all quiet.

I'm very short of funds so it is going to be a very slow process in collecting the books, still you are right, I have a wonderful reading experience to look forward to.
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Joel (Joel)
Username: Joel

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 86.149.134.59
Posted on Wednesday, June 04, 2008 - 06:56 pm:   

Ally, a lot of ex-library Aickmans are available quite cheaply in the UK if you are patient! Don't sell out for first editions unless you really want them. And the paperbacks of at least three collections crop up second-hand quite a bit. My favourites of his books are Dark Entries, Sub Rosa, Cold Hand in Mine and Intrusions.

Favourite stories: No Time Is Passing, The Stains, Bind Your Hair, Into the Wood, The Inner Room, Wood, The Next Glade.
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Joel (Joel)
Username: Joel

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 86.149.134.59
Posted on Wednesday, June 04, 2008 - 06:56 pm:   

And The Swords. How did I forget that one?
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Allybird (Allybird)
Username: Allybird

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 79.78.125.11
Posted on Wednesday, June 04, 2008 - 07:31 pm:   

INTO THE WOOD left me feeling very strange. With Aickman I feel that I am entering an eerie world. I get lost in his fiction and come out of it almost believing that this world could hold mystery too.
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Allybird (Allybird)
Username: Allybird

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 79.78.125.11
Posted on Wednesday, June 04, 2008 - 07:33 pm:   

Thanks Joel! I won't give up hope of getting more and if anyone knows of something coming up for sale at a reasonable price please let me know. He is having an amazing effect upon me.
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Chris_morris (Chris_morris)
Username: Chris_morris

Registered: 04-2008
Posted From: 98.220.71.248
Posted on Thursday, June 05, 2008 - 02:38 am:   

"WE ARE FOR THE DARK ... is the only forerunner of 'Nemonymous' that I can think of, as the stories are not allocated in print to a particular author."

That's funny, Des. I always thought you'd cribbed the idea from A Stable for Nightmares, an "anonymous anthology" from 1896.

Re: Aickman -- I find it difficult to believe that such rewarding stories are out of print, as they are in America, and so little known outside the weird-fiction community. I honestly feel Aickman was among the most profound authors of the twentieth century -- and I do not mean just the genre authors. I believe his work is at least as worthy of study in universities as Beckett's and Pinter's.
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Des (Des)
Username: Des

Registered: 06-2008
Posted From: 86.161.241.208
Posted on Thursday, June 05, 2008 - 09:25 am:   

Hi, Chris, I'm always interested in (and hoping for) fore-runners of Nemonymous (so far, to my knowledge, Nemonymous in 2001 being the world's first multi-authored anthology of stories collected as such).
Wasn't the book you mention in 1896 by Sheridan Le Fanu?
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Des (Des)
Username: Des

Registered: 06-2008
Posted From: 86.161.241.208
Posted on Thursday, June 05, 2008 - 09:45 am:   

Sorry, I should have said above: "so far, to my knowledge, Nemonymous in 2001 being the world's first anonymous multi-authored anthology of stories collected as such".
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Joel (Joel)
Username: Joel

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 86.149.134.59
Posted on Thursday, June 05, 2008 - 11:26 am:   

Thought you were having a Year Zero moment there, Des!
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Chris_morris (Chris_morris)
Username: Chris_morris

Registered: 04-2008
Posted From: 98.220.71.248
Posted on Thursday, June 05, 2008 - 02:53 pm:   

A Stable for Nightmares includes LeFanu, and his name is on the title page, but it's a multi-authored anonymous anthology. The title page says:

"A STABLE
FOR NIGHTMARES

OR

WEIRD TALES

BY

J. SHERIDAN LE FANU

AUTHOR OF "UNCLE SILAS," "HOUSE BY THE CHURCHYARD,"

SIR CHARLES YOUNG, BART.

AND OTHERS"

I'm not sure of the identities of all the contributors, but Fitz-James O'Brien's "What Was It?" is an obvious inclusion. (Others here would no doubt be able to identify other authors.)

You can see for yourself -- the e-text is here:

http://www.archive.org/details/stablefornightma00lefauoft
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Des (Des)
Username: Des

Registered: 06-2008
Posted From: 86.161.241.208
Posted on Thursday, June 05, 2008 - 03:04 pm:   

Great! Thanks to you and this forum. I'm glad you showed me that. That goes back before the Aickman book (which isn't really multi-authored!

I suppose the first Nemonymous was different inasmuch it has no publisher's name, no editor's name, nobody's name at all! It is wholly anonymous and multi-authored!

I could now re-word my "so far, to my knowledge, Nemonymous in 2001 being the world's first anonymous multi-authored anthology of stories collected as such".

to
(a) The world's first completely uncredited anthology of stories

or

(b) "so far, to my knowledge, Nemonymous in 2001 was the first anonymous multi-authored anthology of stories from the beginning of the 20th century".
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Chris_morris (Chris_morris)
Username: Chris_morris

Registered: 04-2008
Posted From: 12.165.240.116
Posted on Thursday, June 05, 2008 - 03:38 pm:   

Glad I could help, Des. :-)
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Des (Des)
Username: Des

Registered: 06-2008
Posted From: 86.156.32.207
Posted on Sunday, October 19, 2008 - 03:45 pm:   

I'm reading Robert Aickman's "The River Runs Uphill' at the moment where he says: "I am very honoured to be a member of the Fund's Advisory Panel, and was honoured too to be put on the map when a Canadian archipelago was named the Aickman Islands."

I wonder why the Internet has no other record of these islands?
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Huw (Huw)
Username: Huw

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 218.168.193.34
Posted on Sunday, October 19, 2008 - 04:08 pm:   

I can't find it on Google Earth either, Des. I wish I had my enormous Reader's Digest world atlas handy. Even in Aickman's non-fiction we are confronted by mysteries...
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Des (Des)
Username: Des

Registered: 06-2008
Posted From: 86.156.32.207
Posted on Sunday, October 19, 2008 - 04:15 pm:   

Indeed. I'm enjoying this book even as much as his stories. It's pure Aickman.
Also because I had a few Narrow Boat canal holidays about 20 years ago.
des
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Huw (Huw)
Username: Huw

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 218.168.193.34
Posted on Sunday, October 19, 2008 - 04:24 pm:   

I liked the reference to Blackwood's 'The Willows' when he describes being on the boat at night. There's a photograph in there that strongly reminds me of the cover of Ramsey's collection Waking Nightmares.

Glad you are enjoying these autobiographical works - I really need to read them again, myself.
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Des (Des)
Username: Des

Registered: 06-2008
Posted From: 86.156.32.207
Posted on Sunday, October 19, 2008 - 05:25 pm:   

Found this, though:
"The Akimiski Island Group includes Akimiski, Gasket, and Gullery Islands; Albert Shoal, and the Akimiski Strait Isles."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Akimiski_Island
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Des (Des)
Username: Des

Registered: 06-2008
Posted From: 86.156.32.207
Posted on Sunday, October 19, 2008 - 06:20 pm:   

having made enquiries elsewhere, received at least this trace of the name Aickman as a group of islands;
http://tiny.cc/ZXRP0
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Des (Des)
Username: Des

Registered: 06-2008
Posted From: 86.156.32.207
Posted on Tuesday, October 21, 2008 - 06:29 pm:   

I've now blogged about the Aickman Islands and also a quote from THE RIVER RUNS UPHILL with some new info here:
http://weirdmonger.blog-city.com/the_aickman_islands.htm

Our Huw was the one who pointed out Aickman's wife's name was Ray in this context.
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Huw (Huw)
Username: Huw

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 218.168.193.194
Posted on Wednesday, October 22, 2008 - 10:51 am:   

Glad to be of service, Des! I love finding (and trying to solve) mysteries such as this.
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Tony (Tony)
Username: Tony

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 81.157.114.136
Posted on Saturday, October 25, 2008 - 09:15 pm:   

Sigh. Just started reading Painted Devils. How good is this bloke? To read him is to attend some kind of seance, for the reading seems to conjure a world around you, a presence. Literally no other writer, however great they might be, has the power to do what he does. It's like he's tarried with gods, been privvy to things most of us aren't. And it's like he's alive in his stories, passing something on to us. I'm reading The View just now and my Lord, it's good.
I've read Aickman before, and have everything, but you forget till you read him again just what he can do, where he can take you.
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Tony (Tony)
Username: Tony

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 81.157.114.136
Posted on Saturday, October 25, 2008 - 09:17 pm:   

http://www.faber.co.uk/work/unsettled-dust/9780571244263/
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Simon Strantzas (Nomis)
Username: Nomis

Registered: 09-2008
Posted From: 99.225.111.224
Posted on Saturday, October 25, 2008 - 10:00 pm:   

I know it's minor in the grand scheme, but it really bothers me Faber didn't make these Aickman reprints consistent in size.

What sense does it make to alter the books' dimensions?
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Huw (Huw)
Username: Huw

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 218.168.180.66
Posted on Saturday, October 25, 2008 - 10:01 pm:   

Absolutely, Tony. Every time I pick up an Aickman book to reread one of his stories, I'm struck by just how original and skillful a writer he was.

It's good to have those three titles back in print, but for heaven's sake, they are the three easiest collections to find and have been for the past two or three decades. Why aren't Faber reissuing the original collections if they truly want to bring his hard-to-find fiction back into print?
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Tony (Tony)
Username: Tony

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 81.157.114.136
Posted on Saturday, October 25, 2008 - 11:00 pm:   

Hope they just doing it because they the most 'popular'. That wouldn't be surprising. But isn't Wine a sort of best of anyway?
But what it comes down to is Aickman being out there again, and for that we must be very grateful (didn't see that about the size, Simon. That is dumb.)
There's no voice I've ever read quite like him. And he is far from cold, as some have suggested.
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Simon Strantzas (Nomis)
Username: Nomis

Registered: 09-2008
Posted From: 99.225.111.224
Posted on Sunday, October 26, 2008 - 02:20 am:   

writers that remind me of Aickman: Edith Wharton; LP Hartley; Shirley Jackson; Elizabeth Jane Howard; Terry Lamsley.
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Tony (Tony)
Username: Tony

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 81.157.114.136
Posted on Sunday, October 26, 2008 - 09:41 am:   

Those people are very good, yes, but it's like he's seen something. Have you read Elizabeth Bowen? The bits I've seen on Des's recommendation seem to suggest she has, too.
I feel like I'm coming round when I stop reading Aickman's words, and that something has attached itself to me. The world feels different.
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Tony (Tony)
Username: Tony

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 81.157.114.136
Posted on Sunday, October 26, 2008 - 09:42 am:   

And Simon - have you read The Go Between? That has it's moments.
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Zed (Gary_mc)
Username: Gary_mc

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 81.96.242.126
Posted on Sunday, October 26, 2008 - 10:16 am:   

"it's like he's seen something."

That's exactly it, Tony - as if he has witnessed sights no one else could fathom. De la Mare is also like that for me.
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Hubert (Hubert)
Username: Hubert

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 78.21.23.52
Posted on Sunday, October 26, 2008 - 11:32 am:   

I was about to mention De la Mare. He has the same degree of introspection, although he can be very whimsical, a quality I have yet to find in Aickman.
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Des (Des)
Username: Des

Registered: 06-2008
Posted From: 86.156.32.207
Posted on Sunday, October 26, 2008 - 11:37 am:   

Aickman can be very whimsical I find.

Aickman is a unique voice. I can't think of anyone who truly resembles him. Perhaps Nugent Barker?

My first blog on Aickman a while ago;
http://cwgpress.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=107
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Hubert (Hubert)
Username: Hubert

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 78.21.23.52
Posted on Sunday, October 26, 2008 - 12:14 pm:   

I confess I haven't read all that much Aickman; the story that comes most readily to mind, is "Meeting Mr Millar". The passage where the narrator hears someone "clumping up the many flights of stairs, straight to the attic" gave me goosebumps, something which - alas! - doesn't happen too frequently anymore. I was almost afraid to read on.
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Huw (Huw)
Username: Huw

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 218.168.196.172
Posted on Sunday, October 26, 2008 - 02:37 pm:   

Aickman is unique, although there are a few writers whose work sometimes displays a similar feel (de la Mare, Hartley, etc., all mentioned here already). Though I've never seen them compared, Aickman's smooth, evocative writing style reminds me of another of my favourite authors, Isak Dinesen.

The Wine-Dark Sea and The Unsettled Dust are both posthumous 'best-of' collections. Of the Fabers, only Cold Hand in Mine is an original Aickman collection. It's a shame they don't just reissue the other original seven collections, either singly or as a couple of omnibus volumes. As is stands, some of Aickman's best stories - 'Wood', 'The School Friend' and 'No Time is Passing', to name just a few - remain out of print.
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Huw (Huw)
Username: Huw

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 218.168.196.172
Posted on Sunday, October 26, 2008 - 02:42 pm:   

Sorry, make that "the other six" original collections. There's also Night Voices, but that was published posthumously.
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Des (Des)
Username: Des

Registered: 06-2008
Posted From: 86.169.217.61
Posted on Sunday, October 26, 2008 - 04:58 pm:   

Another passage from Robert Aickman's non-fiction book 'The River Runs Uphill' in the COMMENT to this post:
http://weirdmonger.blog-city.com/the_aickman_islands.htm
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Albie (Albie)
Username: Albie

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 195.195.236.131
Posted on Monday, October 27, 2008 - 12:23 pm:   

Have you ever slowed down the sound of babies talking? It's quite refreshing.
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Allybird (Allybird)
Username: Allybird

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 79.70.97.102
Posted on Monday, October 27, 2008 - 12:46 pm:   

I mentioned De La Mare and Robert Aickman in my introduction to the ghost story evening. Both - two of the best writers.

As it is my daughter's tenth birthday this morning I've just read this poem by De La Mare to he:

'The Birthnight'

Dearest, it was night
That in its darkness rocked Orion's stars;
Along the willows, and the cedar boughs
Laid their white hands in stealthy peace across
The starry silence of their antique moss:
No sound save rushing air
Cold, yet all sweet with Spring,
And in thy mother's arms, couched weeping there,
Thou lovely thing.
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Huw (Huw)
Username: Huw

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 61.216.32.153
Posted on Monday, October 27, 2008 - 01:02 pm:   

Good for you, Ally. I love good poetry. I'd rather read Keats, Coleridge, Wang Wei, Basho or de la Mare than any number of modern poets.

Oh, and happy birthday to your daughter!
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Allybird (Allybird)
Username: Allybird

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 79.70.97.102
Posted on Monday, October 27, 2008 - 01:11 pm:   

My writer has been heavily influenced by poetry, especially Keats, Yeats and William Blake lately. Thank God for poets!

Thanks for the good wishes to my daughter Huw. She keeps waiting for the post man to come. I really hope that she gets at least one card in the post.
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Albie (Albie)
Username: Albie

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 195.195.244.67
Posted on Monday, October 27, 2008 - 01:18 pm:   

Slow down her voice.
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Albie (Albie)
Username: Albie

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 195.195.244.67
Posted on Monday, October 27, 2008 - 01:21 pm:   

She'll sound like a weird man saying childish things.

Aw, go on.
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Craig (Craig)
Username: Craig

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 75.4.248.204
Posted on Monday, October 27, 2008 - 02:01 pm:   

Aickman reminds me of both Henry James and Avram Davidson. He's the kind of writer I can't see the average, contemporary, attention-span-less reader ever really appreciating... sadly....
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Albie (Albie)
Username: Albie

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 195.195.236.131
Posted on Tuesday, October 28, 2008 - 12:12 pm:   

Aickman isn't that special. Not after you've read his stories enough. You see the hints he drops quite plainly then. Of course,the ability to fashion clear writing still evades most people. And he does have that 19th century pompous style that combines with the modernistic excess of suggestion to...
Sorry, I'm bored now.
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Craig (Craig)
Username: Craig

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 75.5.4.122
Posted on Tuesday, October 28, 2008 - 04:20 pm:   

Albie has a point. Aickman's work can often be maddeningly - clumsily? - overwrought. When you do compare him to, say, Henry James... or, dare I say, Avram Davidson... those two come out on top (Davidson, because he deliberately takes that "19th century pompous style" and transforms it {stylistically} into something utterly unique - witness the Dr. Eszterhazy stories, etc.)....
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Huw (Huw)
Username: Huw

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 218.168.177.83
Posted on Tuesday, October 28, 2008 - 04:26 pm:   

I think Aickman is very special indeed.
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Huw (Huw)
Username: Huw

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 218.168.177.83
Posted on Tuesday, October 28, 2008 - 04:28 pm:   

Craig, I've come across people who don't 'get' Aickman, but never have I seen his work described as clumsy or overwrought. In my opinion, you couldn't be further from the mark.
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Albie (Albie)
Username: Albie

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 195.195.236.131
Posted on Wednesday, October 29, 2008 - 12:03 pm:   

>>Albie has a point. Aickman's work can often be maddeningly - clumsily? - overwrought.

Oops. I think I misrepresented my opinion. I DO think he writes clearly. I wasn't suggesting that clear writing evades Aickman. The opposite. Don't know how I managed that.

He's not special, ONCE you've read his stories enough. As no one is. But he is special for creating so many suggestive tricks, amongst other reasons for him to be classed as 'special.'

I'm just going to have a sit down.
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Craig (Craig)
Username: Craig

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 75.4.231.85
Posted on Wednesday, October 29, 2008 - 03:18 pm:   

Huw, I just think he has that tendency to overwrite, which can be a clumsy tendency; and that he's... opaque to a deliberate degree. I would venture to guess very few people "get" Aickman's stories: what they get, are their own surmises about an Aickman story. He makes you work for every insight, and it can be tiring. I've not yet read an Aickman story I didn't enjoy... but at the same time, I find him work, to read.
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Des (Des)
Username: Des

Registered: 06-2008
Posted From: 86.169.217.61
Posted on Wednesday, October 29, 2008 - 03:46 pm:   

He makes you work for every insight, and it can be tiring. I've not yet read an Aickman story I didn't enjoy...
==================

Exactly.
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Hubert (Hubert)
Username: Hubert

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 78.21.22.160
Posted on Wednesday, October 29, 2008 - 04:23 pm:   

Did Aickman have a 'philosophy of composition' (for want of a better word)?
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Huw (Huw)
Username: Huw

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 218.168.186.19
Posted on Wednesday, October 29, 2008 - 05:33 pm:   

It's been a long time since I read Aickman, especially his non-fiction, but I remember him saying that a good ghost story (or 'strange' story, as he preferred) should be akin to poetry. He also described writing some of his tales as if in a trance, but I'll need to reread him to check on this.

I expect Des, who's just been reading Aickman (and Ramsey, of course, who knew RA) can tell you more. Possibly the best place to look for insights into Aickman's thoughts on writing and the ghost story are his series of introductions to the Fontana ghost story series, and the essay he wrote for publication in the 1975 World Fantasy Awards anthology (this is also included in the Tartarus set, if I remember correctly).
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Ramsey Campbell (Ramsey)
Username: Ramsey

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 195.93.21.74
Posted on Wednesday, October 29, 2008 - 08:22 pm:   

Yes, I think that WFA acceptance essay is about as close as Robert came to stating his method.

By the way, there's still a lot of unpublished or uncollected Aickman out there - I assume it's in the Bowling Green archives. Here's to whoever goes in there and publishes it. I'd still like to read Robert's film reviews. (I do know that he utterly despised Roeg's Don't Look Now.
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Des (Des)
Username: Des

Registered: 06-2008
Posted From: 86.169.217.61
Posted on Wednesday, October 29, 2008 - 08:35 pm:   

By the way, there's still a lot of unpublished or uncollected Aickman out there -
=============

Wow!
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Allybird (Allybird)
Username: Allybird

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 79.70.29.243
Posted on Wednesday, October 29, 2008 - 08:41 pm:   

I really wish that someone would publish it.
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Huw (Huw)
Username: Huw

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 218.168.176.143
Posted on Wednesday, October 29, 2008 - 09:24 pm:   

Ramsey, I would like to read his film reviews too. I remember reading in your piece in All Hallows (and later in the Tartarus Aickman set) that he liked The Blue Light, Ugetsu Monogatari, Picnic at Hanging Rock, and Night of the Living Dead.
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Craig (Craig)
Username: Craig

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 75.5.3.13
Posted on Thursday, October 30, 2008 - 05:19 am:   

... he liked... Picnic at Hanging Rock...

Hell, Aickman could have written it!
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Hubert (Hubert)
Username: Hubert

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 78.21.22.160
Posted on Thursday, October 30, 2008 - 09:29 am:   

Sounds like a job for ST Joshi. I gather he knows about that unpublished material?
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Ramsey Campbell (Ramsey)
Username: Ramsey

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 195.93.21.74
Posted on Thursday, October 30, 2008 - 11:19 am:   

I assume he does, Hubert - I'll check!

I remember recommending on the basis that it resembled his tales that he should see Picnic at Hanging Rock. He thought the lady who loses her underwear was closest to his work.
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Ramsey Campbell (Ramsey)
Username: Ramsey

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 195.93.21.74
Posted on Thursday, October 30, 2008 - 11:19 am:   

...recommending to Robert, I mean...
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Richard_gavin (Richard_gavin)
Username: Richard_gavin

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 65.110.174.71
Posted on Thursday, October 30, 2008 - 12:42 pm:   

I'm still hoping to make the trek to Ohio to visit the Aickman archives at Bowling Green one of these days.

I also wasn't at all surprised to read that Aickman liked Picnic at Hanging Rock. I was, however, a bit taken aback by his vitriolic reaction to Don't Look Now; a film that, up to that reading, I'd always thought of as having touches of Aickman.

I remember from Ramsey's essay in the Tartarus volume that one of Aickman's objections to the film (besides the sex scene) was that Donald Sutherland's accent was "calculatedly international"; a criticism that confused me then and confuses me still.
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Albie (Albie)
Username: Albie

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 195.195.236.131
Posted on Thursday, October 30, 2008 - 12:48 pm:   

For some time I was convinced I had been haunted by Aickman. But who hasn't felt that changes in their persona stemmed from outside?

I like to think that he's so unknown that paying a visit on a fan wouldn't take up too much of his time...that would otherwise be spent swimming and dreaming in the waterways of the island.

Some might say "You're a sponge, Bob. A sponge. You simply sucked his liquids up inside of you."
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Albie (Albie)
Username: Albie

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 195.195.236.131
Posted on Thursday, October 30, 2008 - 12:51 pm:   

>>"calculatedly international"
Like a lot of us, perhaps he was slightly disappointed that Sutherland wasn't English.
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Ramsey Campbell (Ramsey)
Username: Ramsey

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 195.93.21.74
Posted on Monday, November 03, 2008 - 10:38 pm:   

Hubert (and everyone), S. T. gave me permission to copy his reply to my question.

"I managed to obtain (for research purposes only) the manuscript (actually a typescript with a lot of handwritten revisions) of Aickman's unpublished novel GO BACK AT ONCE. It probably runs to about 70,000 words. It is not a weird novel by any means, but a mainstream work dealing with two women who travel to Italy and have some curious experiences. I fear that, in my judgment, it is a poor piece of work. I sent the text to Ray Russell of Tartarus Press, who ultimately agreed that the work does not represent Aickman to best advantage and decided against publishing it. Of course, anyone seeking to publish it would have to secure the permission of Aickman's agents. I stand willing to prepare this novel for publication if any small press would be interested and can secure proper permission."
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Tony (Tony)
Username: Tony

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 81.157.114.136
Posted on Tuesday, November 04, 2008 - 12:55 am:   

Would anyone like to read such a piece?
God, I'd love to see scans of this. Handwriting shows as much as words for me.
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Huw (Huw)
Username: Huw

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 218.168.189.215
Posted on Tuesday, November 04, 2008 - 02:33 am:   

Thank you for posting this, Ramsey (and for asking Mr. Joshi about it). I, for one, would like to read this, and indeed anything else that Aickman wrote, even if the content is not supernatural. I remember reading that there is also an untitled philosophical non-fiction work titled Panacea. It's a shame there are no further short 'strange' stories (as far as I know).
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Simon Strantzas (Nomis)
Username: Nomis

Registered: 09-2008
Posted From: 99.225.111.224
Posted on Tuesday, November 04, 2008 - 04:00 am:   

Tony, thanks to our own Huw...

http://www.prairienet.org/~almahu/aletter1.jpg
http://www.prairienet.org/~almahu/aletter2.jpg
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Tony (Tony)
Username: Tony

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 81.157.114.136
Posted on Tuesday, November 04, 2008 - 10:19 am:   

Huw - how did you get this? Wow...
The writing feels confident, humble, buzzing with ideas and feelings - but controlled, that the writer is in charge of both. Nothing to base this on of course but my own writing, guessing what certain movements mean.
Sad that Aickman's is almost unintelligible, too!

I remember reading that aickman thought ghosts stories akin to poetry. It really lined up with my feelings about them.
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Albie (Albie)
Username: Albie

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 195.195.236.131
Posted on Tuesday, November 04, 2008 - 11:25 am:   

Notice the dots on the letter i? In the sky. A dreamer.
A combination of small, tight letters and big ones. The letter T always seems to be capital. (artistic, so I'm told)
The word "that" looks like "tit" to me.

See the second R is lost in his name. And the dot of the i looks like a French style apostrophe.

Robet A'ckman.

Robet is, as you know, an old Hebrew word for a demon.
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Ramsey Campbell (Ramsey)
Username: Ramsey

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 195.93.21.74
Posted on Tuesday, November 04, 2008 - 01:50 pm:   

"It's a shame there are no further short 'strange' stories (as far as I know)."

Well, there was that odd tale about the first drafts supposedly pinched by another author. I did ask Leslie Gardner, the agent for Robert's estate, about this, but she wasn't to be drawn.
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston)
Username: Weber_gregston

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 83.98.9.4
Posted on Tuesday, November 04, 2008 - 01:54 pm:   

Even when you offered a great illustrater to do it for her?
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Ramsey Campbell (Ramsey)
Username: Ramsey

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 195.93.21.74
Posted on Tuesday, November 04, 2008 - 02:07 pm:   

That's a bit of a sketchy joke.
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston)
Username: Weber_gregston

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 83.98.9.4
Posted on Tuesday, November 04, 2008 - 02:09 pm:   

my 'art sank as i wrote it
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Huw (Huw)
Username: Huw

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 218.168.186.183
Posted on Wednesday, November 05, 2008 - 09:18 am:   

Tony, I bought the Aickman letter around ten years ago - it was pretty cheap, considering how rarely these things turn up at secondhand bookshops. I bought it along with the first edition of Aickman's first volume of autobiography, The Attempted Rescue, which I got for a fiver! Quite a bargain... it's hard to find such things at a price I can even consider meeting these days.

I have another, longer handwritten Aickman piece - a questionnaire he filled out in the sixties, just before his novel The Late Breakfasters was published. It's a fascinating document. I love finding these items - in a sense, they are like talismans that contain something of their authors' essence (that probably sounds really pretentious, but I'm dead tired - more hospital tests this morning - and can't think of a better way to put it right now), and provide little glimpses into the mind of great writers.

Alas, I can no longer afford to buy things like this... but I have built up a nice little collection of signed/inscribed books and assorted goodies by some of the writers and artists I admire most and from whose work I've derived so much pleasure over the years. Arthur Machen's personal (I like to hope!) copy of The Bowmen, with his personal (and fittingly mystic) bookplate is one of my most treasured things, and then there's the signed Blackwood, M.R. James (another writer with near undecipherable handwriting!), de la Mare, and my favourite, the original manuscript of The Influence, which is fascinating to read alongside the published novel, both for the differences in content and as an insight into how the best horror writer of our age (insert 'sycophant' emoticon here) goes about writing a novel. I'm still missing the signatures of some of the giants: Lovecraft, William Hope Hodgson, Shirley Jackson, Isak Dinesen, Lafcadio Hearn and (the holy grail for me) E.T.A. Hoffmann, most of which I know I'll probably never find (and wouldn't be able to afford even if I did). I live in hope, though.... ;-)
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Tony (Tony)
Username: Tony

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 81.157.114.136
Posted on Wednesday, November 05, 2008 - 09:48 am:   

That's amazing, Huw. These things are like paper Stonehenges. I envy you.
Can you scan the Influence pages? I'd love to see how he corrects his work.
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Albie (Albie)
Username: Albie

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 195.195.236.131
Posted on Wednesday, November 05, 2008 - 12:18 pm:   

He has a rubber stamp that prints out the words "SORRY DADDY!" in red ink.
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Ramsey Campbell (Ramsey)
Username: Ramsey

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 195.93.21.74
Posted on Wednesday, November 05, 2008 - 12:36 pm:   

Tell us more about Robert's questionnaire, Huw! And watch out for the cry...
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Hubert (Hubert)
Username: Hubert

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 78.21.22.227
Posted on Wednesday, November 05, 2008 - 03:31 pm:   

I wonder: why would and ideal craftsman like Aickman choose to write a 'poor piece of work' like the novel under consideration? Maybe it's a first draft which needs pruning and polishing?
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Joel (Joel)
Username: Joel

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 217.37.199.45
Posted on Wednesday, November 05, 2008 - 04:24 pm:   

Even great writers don't always get it right, especially when working in a medium (the mainstream novel in this instance) they're not known for. For all we know, Ramsey has the libretto of his one and only romantic opera hidden away somewhere...
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston)
Username: Weber_gregston

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 83.98.9.4
Posted on Wednesday, November 05, 2008 - 05:40 pm:   

I don't know about that, but under the name of heidi betts he has had several Mills and boon novels published...
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Tony (Tony)
Username: Tony

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 81.157.114.136
Posted on Wednesday, November 05, 2008 - 06:18 pm:   

I've always fancied writing a romance novel, or porn. I can feel it in me.
(described a bungled kiss tonight in my book and felt such a rush of emotion I almost had to lie down)
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Albie (Albie)
Username: Albie

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 195.195.236.131
Posted on Thursday, November 06, 2008 - 12:17 pm:   

I want someone to write a horror novel about the TV show RAINBOW. I'm sick of waiting.
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Joel (Joel)
Username: Joel

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 217.37.199.45
Posted on Thursday, November 06, 2008 - 01:28 pm:   

That would describe how all the programme's makers slaved their butts off for years with no pay, because they were told... (fill in the rest for yourself).
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Albie (Albie)
Username: Albie

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 195.195.244.67
Posted on Thursday, November 06, 2008 - 01:38 pm:   

...wearing bright dungarees and frightening babies was payment enough?
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Huw (Huw)
Username: Huw

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 218.168.191.236
Posted on Friday, November 07, 2008 - 05:41 am:   

Sorry to be late in replying, Ramsey and Tony. I haven't been able to post anything for a couple of days - I've been too stiff and sore to do anything after being prodded and pierced with yet more needles and electrodes at the hospital on Wednesday. I'm beginning to feel like a voodoo doll.

I don't have a scanner myself, but I'll see if I can find someone who does so I can put up some images of the Aickman questionnaire. It's only a couple of pages, but it's an interesting read, I think, and quite revealing.

Ramsey: coincidentally, I just received my copies of Thieving Fear the other day - they somehow managed to find their way to Thailand and Mainland China, before finally arriving here in Taiwan following a long, treacherous six-month journey (it's at least the third or fourth time I've had parcels go astray like this - they must keep getting the place-names mixed up). Needless to say, I am extremely chuffed about the mysterious acknowledgment - thank you! I am going to start it as soon as I finish the John Gordon novel I've been re-reading: Ride the Wind, a sequel to The Giant Under the Snow, the first supernatural novel I read, at the grand old age of seven, if I'm not mistaken.
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Ramsey Campbell (Ramsey)
Username: Ramsey

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 195.93.21.74
Posted on Friday, November 07, 2008 - 03:34 pm:   

Ouch, Huw! Hope you're better soon - but have you read Ted Sturgeon's "A Way of Thinking"?

The acknowledgment refers to a comment you made on here years ago.
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Huw (Huw)
Username: Huw

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 218.168.176.229
Posted on Saturday, November 08, 2008 - 04:55 pm:   

Thanks, Ramsey! I had a feeling the acknowledgment was related to something I'd posted here, but my memory is terrible these days. I'm not sure about 'A Way of Thinking' - I think it may be one of the few stories in E Pluribus Unicorn that I haven't read (I'll have to rectify that now).

I'm hoping to be able to get some images of that Aickman document up as soon as possible. If I can just find someone who has a scanner...
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Allybird (Allybird)
Username: Allybird

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 79.70.38.59
Posted on Saturday, November 08, 2008 - 05:07 pm:   

I really, really hope that you feel better soon Huw!
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Huw (Huw)
Username: Huw

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 218.168.176.213
Posted on Saturday, November 08, 2008 - 09:24 pm:   

Thanks, Ally!
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Craig (Craig)
Username: Craig

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 67.116.103.241
Posted on Sunday, November 09, 2008 - 03:04 am:   

Yes, do feel better, Huw... so I can continue drubbing you here....

Tangent: I kinda think Aickman would have also enjoyed (the film) A PASSAGE TO INDIA....
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Huw (Huw)
Username: Huw

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 218.168.184.172
Posted on Monday, November 10, 2008 - 04:35 pm:   

Thanks, Craig... I think. ;-)

Ramsey, I finally dug up my copy of E Pluribus Unicorn, and am about to begin reading 'A Way of Thinking'. It's been a long time since I read Sturgeon, and I'm looking forward to it. Each time I revisit his work I'm reminded just how good a writer he was.

Still working on getting that Aickman questionnaire scanned...
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Des (Des)
Username: Des

Registered: 09-2010
Posted From: 86.158.237.247
Posted on Friday, November 12, 2010 - 08:33 pm:   

Robert Aickman & Cannibalism?
http://nullimmortalis.wordpress.com/2010/11/12/john-magwitchs-thesis-on-robert-a ickman-cannibalism/
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Tony (Tony)
Username: Tony

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 86.139.216.19
Posted on Saturday, November 13, 2010 - 09:17 am:   

Sigh. What an old thread. It's like Albie was here just a moment ago.

Add Your Message Here
Post:
Bold text Italics Underline Create a hyperlink Insert a clipart image

Username: Posting Information:
This is a private posting area. Only registered users and moderators may post messages here.
Password:
Options: Enable HTML code in message
Automatically activate URLs in message
Action:

Topics | Last Day | Last Week | Tree View | Search | Help/Instructions | Program Credits Administration