| Author | Message | ||
     Matt_cowan (Matt_cowan) Username: Matt_cowan Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 68.249.99.182 |
For something I've been working on lately I was trying to put together a list of some of the most unique and interesting horror literature antagonists. An was looking for possible suggestions. So far I have: Minheer Valderkaust of Rotterdam from Schaulken the Painter by LeFanu, Smilemimme from The Grin of The Dark by Ramsey Campbell, Dickon the Devil also by LeFanu, The Severed Hand from The Beast with Five Fingers by W.F. Harvey, and the monsterous Alice from Happy Hour by Ian Watson. There are a ton more I know but I've had some trouble bringing them to mind. Anybody have some suggestions? | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.5.15.126 |
What about... Count Dracula?... | ||
| Seanmcd (Seanmcd) Username: Seanmcd Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 86.155.106.11 |
Those creeping bushes from 'The Willows' by Algernon Blackwood. The spectre composed of bed sheets in 'Oh! Whistle and I'll come to you, my Lad' by M.R.James. | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.110.251.6 |
The narrator in Poe's 'The Imp of the Perverse'. Fortunato in Poe's 'The Cask of Amontillado'. The cat in Poe's 'The Black Cat'. Poe had more issues than a collector of WEIRD TALES. | ||
| Huw (Huw) Username: Huw Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 218.168.182.236 |
Interesting question, Matt. How about the house itself in Shirley Jackson's The Haunting of Hill House? Also: - Coppelius in Hoffmann's 'The Sandman' - Miss Seaton in de la Mare's 'Seaton's Aunt' - Asenath Waite in Lovecraft's 'The Thing on the Doorstep' - Pennywise the clown in King's It - Mr. Dark in Bradbury's Something Wicked This Way Comes Of course, there's always Moriarty, in the Sherlock Holmes stories. | ||
| Matt_cowan (Matt_cowan) Username: Matt_cowan Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 68.249.99.182 |
There are a lot of great suggestions here, many I have read but there are some I'll have to look up. By the way Huw, I always enjoyed "The Thing on the Doorstep" as well but it seems not a lot of people do. I'm glad I'm not alone there. | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.110.130.38 |
I like it. Underrated, because it's about a marriage gone wrong rather than 'the cosmos'. That scene in the car is incredible. | ||
| Simon Bestwick (Simon_b) Username: Simon_b Registered: 10-2008 Posted From: 86.24.165.182 |
Helen Vaughn in Machen's 'The Great God Pan' Mr Abney in James' 'Lost Hearts' Mr Karswell in James' 'Casting The Runes' A certain female figure in Leiber's 'Our Lady Of Darkness'... Horridge in 'The Face That Must Die' Queenie in 'The Influence' Dudley Smith in 'Secret Story' Oswald in 'The House On Nazareth Hill' And many more... | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 82.20.31.211 |
Norman Daniels in Rose Madder. | ||
| Tom_alaerts (Tom_alaerts) Username: Tom_alaerts Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.78.35.170 |
As the recent discussion of Mo Hayder brought back chilling memories of The Nurse (in Tokyo), this is my candidate. | ||
| Stephenw (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 194.32.3.2 |
Off the top of my head some of the most memorable horror villains I've read... Melmoth in 'Melmoth The Wanderer' by Maturin Gil Martin in 'The Private Memoirs And Confessions Of A Justified Sinner' by Hogg The doppelganger of Golyadkin in 'The Double' by Dostoevsky Svengali in 'Trilby' by Du Maurier Stoker's Dracula (for me justifiably the greatest of all horror villains) Joseph Curwen in 'The Case Of Charles Dexter Ward' by Lovecraft Mocata in 'The Devil Rides Out' by Wheatley Old Mother Bates in Bloch's 'Psycho' - the novel, where she is every bit as much a character as poor downtrodden Norman The entity that is Sage/Eve/that hideous old woman in Ramsey's 'Incarnate' Absalom Troet/nice old Mr Rosebottom in 'The Ceremonies' by Klein Mamoulian in 'The Damnation Game' by Barker The demonic dwarf in 'Sleeping In Flame' by Carroll etc, etc, etc... | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.47 |
Timmy Valentine in Somtow's great trilogy Hector woolley in silent Chlidren the title character from Birdman by Hayder. | ||
| Stephenw (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 194.32.3.2 |
Hi "Weber", glad to meet a fellow Jonathan Carroll fan!! I was beginning to think I was the only person who had ever heard of him. The guy is right up there with Ramsey imho. | ||
| Huw (Huw) Username: Huw Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 218.168.179.191 |
The Land of Laughs is a particular favourite of mine, and I think The Panic Hand is a good collection (I wish he'd write more short stories). I still have a handful of his novels that I've dutifully bought, but not got around to reading... must rectify that. | ||
| Frank (Frank) Username: Frank Registered: 09-2008 Posted From: 79.187.206.46 |
Stephenw - Mr Carroll has many admirers on this board. The Land of Laughs is one of my favourite debuts. | ||
| Karim Ghahwagi (Karim) Username: Karim Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 80.167.124.163 |
I really want to get round to reading Jonathan Carroll's work- have not read his stuff. Where is a good place to start other than with The land of laughs? | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.47 |
Sleeping in flames, Bones of the moon, A child Across the Sky, Outside the dog museum. There you go, one of the most original horror protagonists, Midnight from Child Across the Sky | ||
| Karim Ghahwagi (Karim) Username: Karim Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 80.167.124.163 |
Thanks Weber! | ||
| Stephenw (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 194.32.3.2 |
It was 'Voice Of Our Shadow' got me into JC back in the early 80s (like 'The Nameless' with RC). These two books - along with 'The Religion' by Nicholas Conde - struck me at the time as somehow important. I knew they were somehow better than the Stephen King/James Herbert material I had been reading at the same time but couldn't quite articulate why back then. Now I realise that - as great a storyteller as Mr King undoubtedly is - their works lack that subtle ambiguity and haunting quality that is the mark of geat writing. My favourite authors are now William Golding & Fyodor Dostoevsky which will give some idea of the journey I've taken since then (without ever losing my hot-wired-to-the-synapses love of Horror). 'Lord Of The Flies' & 'Crime And Punishment' (I suspect a big influence on Mr Campbell too?) are the pinnacle of "disturbing literature" for me! | ||
| Matt_cowan (Matt_cowan) Username: Matt_cowan Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 68.249.99.182 |
The Land of Laughs is a particular favourite of mine I heard of this book recently because it was referrenced in the TV show Fringe.  | ||
| Stephenw (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 82.4.20.22 |
'The Land Of Laughs' is probably the most original example of my favourite horror theme: the individual/couple/family unwittingly straying into an isolated outwardly normal small community that hides a dark secret and from which leaving proves just a tad difficult. While 'Voice Of Our Shadow' is a mind-bogglingly original complete reinvention of the old "revenge from beyond the grave" ghost story. After that Carroll's books just get harder to second guess and all the more addictive - for me anyway. |