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Jonathan (Jonathan)
Username: Jonathan

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 91.143.178.131
Posted on Friday, December 11, 2009 - 02:08 pm:   

Just seen that there is a resurrection of The Pan Book of Horror in the offing. I know that Shaun Hutson (shudder) is doing the intro but does anybody know what other writers are involved in this project?
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Carolinec (Carolinec)
Username: Carolinec

Registered: 06-2009
Posted From: 82.38.75.85
Posted on Friday, December 11, 2009 - 02:50 pm:   

Yep, just going to find a link and post it for you in a minute. The person who's done so much to resurrect this is Johnny Mains. Back in a bit with a link ...
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Carolinec (Carolinec)
Username: Carolinec

Registered: 06-2009
Posted From: 82.38.75.85
Posted on Friday, December 11, 2009 - 02:57 pm:   

Here we are - full contents included in the listing:
http://www.nooseandgibbetpublishing.com/

It looks good! Due for release at WHC in March. Looking forward to it.
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Zed (Gary_mc)
Username: Gary_mc

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 81.96.240.106
Posted on Friday, December 11, 2009 - 03:10 pm:   

Johnny Mains has actually convinced Pan to re-issue the original first Pan Book of Horror, too. The man's a dynamo; more power to him.
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Jonathan (Jonathan)
Username: Jonathan

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 91.143.178.131
Posted on Friday, December 11, 2009 - 03:15 pm:   

That does actually look pretty cool. I was just a little unsure why Hutson got involved.
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Allybird (Allybird)
Username: Allybird

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 80.47.27.75
Posted on Friday, December 11, 2009 - 03:19 pm:   

And as Charles Black of Mortbury Press has just said on FB 'December 11th 1959 - The Pan Book of Horror published.' An anniversary today then.
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Stephen Walsh (Stephenw)
Username: Stephenw

Registered: 03-2009
Posted From: 194.32.31.1
Posted on Friday, December 11, 2009 - 03:30 pm:   

Hutson fits in exactly with the worst of the later Pan books so his involvement is a pretty true reflection of the series' legacy (warts and all).
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Carolinec (Carolinec)
Username: Carolinec

Registered: 06-2009
Posted From: 82.38.75.85
Posted on Friday, December 11, 2009 - 07:43 pm:   

.. although the early Pans were brilliant, Stephen. I grew up reading them. Used to love hanging round my local WH Smiths and Woolies (we didn't have a proper bookshop in my small town) waiting for the next one to come out - along with Fontana Horrors and so on too.
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John Llewellyn Probert (John_l_probert)
Username: John_l_probert

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 88.202.210.68
Posted on Saturday, December 12, 2009 - 09:27 am:   

Everyone knows I love the Pans. The complete set make up the only books I still have from my childhood, that have been carted from house to house as I've moved, and that have always been on the shelf rather than packed away somewhere.

I'm not saying all the stories were great, in fact some of them were pretty awful, but I still love them all. I've said this before and I don't expect anyone to agree with me, but when I was young they made me love horror. If a 12 year old version of me today read a recent copy of Best New Horror or an Ellen Datlow anthology I would have given up on horror literature and stuck to the movies - seriously. We need their equivalent today if the genre is to survive and be populist rather than just a minority interest.
And if it takes Shaun Hutson doing an introduction to help that along I really don't have a problem with it.
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Alexicon (Alexicon)
Username: Alexicon

Registered: 10-2009
Posted From: 88.106.74.119
Posted on Saturday, December 12, 2009 - 11:52 am:   

John,are you not being a little contentious?

The implication here is that contributors to BNH,Ellen Datlow,etc. need to dumb down in some way if they are to become part of any populist genre revival.

Like the rest of us,there IS still a 12 year old version of you within that surgically enhanced body.Thus, you seem to be saying that you would rather read a revivalist Pan antho in preference to anything similar on offer today.

Uhmm...nostalgia is seductive indeed.It'll be interesting to see what effect this forthcoming Pan pilot has upon us.

Needless to say,I don't agree with you.
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Hubert (Hubert)
Username: Hubert

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 78.21.22.249
Posted on Saturday, December 12, 2009 - 12:14 pm:   

Used to love hanging round my local WH Smiths and Woolies (we didn't have a proper bookshop in my small town) waiting for the next one to come out - along with Fontana Horrors and so on too.

Those were the days . . . You could find them just anywhere. It was difficult to get around them, wherever you were in England. Try to find books with covers like that in your local Woolworth's nowadays.
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Simon Bestwick (Simon_b)
Username: Simon_b

Registered: 10-2008
Posted From: 212.121.214.114
Posted on Saturday, December 12, 2009 - 12:23 pm:   

Try finding a Woolworth's first.
:D
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John Llewellyn Probert (John_l_probert)
Username: John_l_probert

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 88.202.210.68
Posted on Saturday, December 12, 2009 - 01:08 pm:   

The implication here is that contributors to BNH,Ellen Datlow,etc. need to dumb down in some way if they are to become part of any populist genre revival.

Of course I'm being contentious my dear Mr Alexicon (whoever you are), but that isn't quite what I meant. I meant that those books may indeed showcase 'the best' in terms of what can be achieved in the genre and I don't dispute that, but if more people are to be turned onto the horror genre then perhaps other kinds of books are needed to do that.
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Alexicon (Alexicon)
Username: Alexicon

Registered: 10-2009
Posted From: 88.106.74.119
Posted on Saturday, December 12, 2009 - 01:49 pm:   

A kind of 'Janet & John' intro to the genre then,before moving on to more worthy things.

We'll see...
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Stephen Walsh (Stephenw)
Username: Stephenw

Registered: 03-2009
Posted From: 82.17.252.126
Posted on Saturday, December 12, 2009 - 03:50 pm:   

Like JLP I too have carted my complete Pan and Fontana anthologies everywhere with me since the glory days of the 70s/80s and would most likely rush to save them first in the event of a house fire.

The Fontanas stayed strong throughout their runs due to spreading the stories across different eras while the Pans went through three distinct phases: the early classic period that the Fontanas went on to emulate, the middle "experimental" period from which all the best contemporary stories came and the later populist slide into a sad decline when I hung in there out of pure loyalty and the standout stories that still appeared right up to the 30th.

I agree we do need their like today for the genre to survive and make horror "cool" again as it was when I were a lad!
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John Llewellyn Probert (John_l_probert)
Username: John_l_probert

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 88.202.210.68
Posted on Saturday, December 12, 2009 - 04:26 pm:   

the Pans went through three distinct phases: the early classic period that the Fontanas went on to emulate, the middle "experimental" period from which all the best contemporary stories came and the later populist slide into a sad decline when I hung in there out of pure loyalty and the standout stories that still appeared right up to the 30th.

That's exactly how I feel about the series, Stephen! And yes - after Lady P they'd be the first thing I'd save in a house fire.
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Kate (Kathleen)
Username: Kathleen

Registered: 09-2009
Posted From: 93.96.181.75
Posted on Saturday, December 12, 2009 - 05:27 pm:   

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Alexicon (Alexicon)
Username: Alexicon

Registered: 10-2009
Posted From: 88.106.6.146
Posted on Saturday, December 12, 2009 - 06:29 pm:   

Nonsense! I'm depressed.I'm going out to get Walshed later.
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Stephen Walsh (Stephenw)
Username: Stephenw

Registered: 03-2009
Posted From: 82.17.252.126
Posted on Saturday, December 12, 2009 - 06:32 pm:   

Me too...
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Alexicon (Alexicon)
Username: Alexicon

Registered: 10-2009
Posted From: 88.106.6.146
Posted on Saturday, December 12, 2009 - 06:51 pm:   

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Carolinec (Carolinec)
Username: Carolinec

Registered: 06-2009
Posted From: 82.38.75.85
Posted on Saturday, December 12, 2009 - 09:48 pm:   

Ah, now my intiation into the Pans was during the early "classic" phase - I'm clearly a little older than you guys. Those were the ones which really got me into horror. I tried some later ones a few years after and remember thinking "either my taste has changed or these aren't as good as they used to be".

And, yes, Hubert - Woolworths doesn't exist any longer either. A bit of my childhood vanished when they went into liquidation around this time last year.
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Hubert (Hubert)
Username: Hubert

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 78.22.226.100
Posted on Sunday, December 13, 2009 - 11:05 am:   

And, yes, Hubert - Woolworths doesn't exist any longer either.

And I didn't know . . . Well, I haven't been in England since 1992 or so. Shame on me.
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Ian Alexander Martin (Iam)
Username: Iam

Registered: 10-2009
Posted From: 64.180.64.74
Posted on Sunday, December 13, 2009 - 09:58 pm:   

Woolworth's hung on long enough in the UK for my visit last October, when I met with the Knight in Shining Armour that is JLP to his own — as the Bard put it — 'very bouncy Kate'. Quite decent of them, you'll agree.

Am I the only one who looks at the title of this thread and starts singing in a ridiculous voice, by the way?
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John Llewellyn Probert (John_l_probert)
Username: John_l_probert

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 88.202.210.68
Posted on Sunday, December 13, 2009 - 10:14 pm:   

Yes
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Stephen Walsh (Stephenw)
Username: Stephenw

Registered: 03-2009
Posted From: 194.32.31.1
Posted on Monday, December 14, 2009 - 10:43 am:   

Been thinking about this and what made the Pans important is that - good or bad - they consistently hit the zeitgeist of the times for a good 30 years (from Hammer to the video nasty boom) and when they disappeared it was the final proof that the HORROR bubble had well and truly burst.

The scene may have become more refined and cultish since then (some may say better) but I would contend it is also less vital and says very little about the real times we live in... for that to happen the genre needs to become popular (not populist) again and that would take something of the same panache and impudence of the old Pan Horror series.
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Zed (Gary_mc)
Username: Gary_mc

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 213.219.8.243
Posted on Monday, December 14, 2009 - 11:07 am:   

I'd actually disagree with all that. Even as a kid, I was aware of how rubbish most of the stories in the Pan books were. They were "guilty pleasures"... but, yes, there were also some genuinely good tales in the books, too.

The scene may have become more refined and cultish since then (some may say better) but I would contend it is also less vital and says very little about the real times we live in...

I couldn't disagree more. You may be reading the wrong kind of horror fiction. The Pan stories were always slightly old-fashioned and OTT, which was part of their appeal. These days the very best of horror fiction is more vital and relevant to the world we live in than any other type of fiction. IMHO.
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John Llewellyn Probert (John_l_probert)
Username: John_l_probert

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 213.253.174.81
Posted on Monday, December 14, 2009 - 11:15 am:   

I agree with you absolutely Stephen. As I'm sure you can guess both panache and impudence are things I'd love to see much more of in genre fiction. And yes - populist wasn't the right word.
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Stephen Walsh (Stephenw)
Username: Stephenw

Registered: 03-2009
Posted From: 194.32.31.1
Posted on Monday, December 14, 2009 - 12:56 pm:   

Personally I blame that old bugbear "political correctness" for the death of horror as a popular genre and the disappearance of gruesome in-your-face covers from our bookstores.

Zed states: Even as a kid, I was aware of how rubbish most of the stories in the Pan books were. They were "guilty pleasures"... but, yes, there were also some genuinely good tales in the books, too.

And JLP states: Everyone knows I love the Pans. The complete set make up the only books I still have from my childhood, that have been carted from house to house as I've moved, and that have always been on the shelf rather than packed away somewhere.

We may disagree as to the series literary merits (higher than the popular imagination would have us believe imho) it is interesting that we all agree on the immense formative effect these books had on our childhoods. That's what horror today lacks... getting 'em while they're young with the allure of the forbidden and genuinely adult no-holds-barred macabre material (the more gruesome and OTT the better).
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Ramsey Campbell (Ramsey)
Username: Ramsey

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 195.93.21.74
Posted on Monday, December 14, 2009 - 01:19 pm:   

Well, the first Pan volume was my Christmas present in 1959 - I was thirteen then - and I certainly valued it as just about the only anthology of new or unfamiliar horror then available in Britain. But let's be clear: the literary standard was overall pretty high in those early volumes. The first one includes Joan Aiken, Jack Finney, L. P. Hartley, Nigel Kneale, Muriel Spark and Angus Wilson (and, though pseudonymously and nowhere near his best, Lovecraft). This said, I'd already read and indeed owned collections by Poe and M. R. James, among others, and anthologies by Basil Davenport and John Kier Cross and the Conklins - so the van Thal book by no means brought me into the field; I'd been there for years.

I'd suggest, however, that most of the authors I've listed above as contributors would not be thought of as typical Pan Horror, and that the typical stuff became increasingly offensive and pornographic as either the contributors or van Thal, or both, decided to go for the most basic appeal.
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Carolinec (Carolinec)
Username: Carolinec

Registered: 06-2009
Posted From: 82.38.75.85
Posted on Monday, December 14, 2009 - 01:29 pm:   

Agreed on that last paragraph, Ramsey. I haven't read many of the later Pans, but I noticed a tendency in many stories in those I have read to "shock for shock's sake" - not any kind of "literary" shocks, but just seeming to be as tacky as possible for the sake of it. (sorry, that's a bad sentence - hope you know what I mean - trying to think/type quickly as I'm dashing off somewhere)

I do think that if I'd started with the later Pans rather than the earlier ones, I probably wouldn't have got into them at all - and I might not have got into horror at all either.
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Alexicon (Alexicon)
Username: Alexicon

Registered: 10-2009
Posted From: 88.106.44.216
Posted on Monday, December 14, 2009 - 01:35 pm:   

Two questions to ponder:

'...take something of the same panache and impudence of the old Pan Horror series.'

Are you guys not writing like that? If not - why?

'...That's what horror today lacks...getting 'em while they're young with the allure of the forbidden and...'. Someone said the latest edition of the Black Book of Horror series was the most Pan-like. So theoretically things should be taking off - in terms of popularity - anytime soon.
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John Llewellyn Probert (John_l_probert)
Username: John_l_probert

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 213.253.174.81
Posted on Monday, December 14, 2009 - 01:42 pm:   

I'd suggest, however, that most of the authors I've listed above as contributors would not be thought of as typical Pan Horror, and that the typical stuff became increasingly offensive and pornographic as either the contributors or van Thal, or both, decided to go for the most basic appeal.

I wouldn't argue with any of that. I well remember that it was the more offensive stuff that got passed around at school with the kind of OMG you won't believe what's in this story kind of guilty furtiveness that made these books the kind of forbidden thrill you wanted when you were 12.

I've mentioned before that my first book in the series was Pan 9 - in which all the stories were new. They ranged from tales I still think are excellent (Eddy Bertin's The Whispering Horror is a classic, as is Thou Shalt Not Suffer a Witch by Dorothy K Haynes) to the really nastily awful (The Best Teacher). But what that book did more than anything else was make me want to buy more of them, including those first few classic volumes, and try other collections and anthologies as well. I honestly don't think I would have picked up collections by MR James, Robert Bloch and the rest at the 'right age' if it hadn't been for dear old Pan.

One final point. Living in a little Welsh market town meant the Pan books were often the only thing labelled 'Horror' in the newsagents (there wasn't a bookshop). There were no second hand shops selling battered copies of Machen, Lovecraft or anyone else. In fact there was nothing else, so for a long time they were the only thing I could get to read anyway, and if it hadn't been for their popularity, quite possibly due to their eventual 'lowest common denominator catering' my childhood would have been considerably poorer.
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Stephen Walsh (Stephenw)
Username: Stephenw

Registered: 03-2009
Posted From: 194.32.31.1
Posted on Monday, December 14, 2009 - 01:46 pm:   

Well said, Sir!
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Zed (Gary_mc)
Username: Gary_mc

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 213.219.8.243
Posted on Monday, December 14, 2009 - 01:46 pm:   

"But let's be clear: the literary standard was overall pretty high in those early volumes"

Oh, I agree completely, Ramsey. I should have said in my post above that I was aware that the latter volumes were bad - these were the ones I encountered first. I went back and bought second-hand copies of the early volumes, and they're much better: like books from a different series entirely. Like you, though, I wasn't brought into the genre by the Pan books. I was already there.
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Zed (Gary_mc)
Username: Gary_mc

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 213.219.8.243
Posted on Monday, December 14, 2009 - 01:50 pm:   

How about this: the early Pan showed us how good the genre can be; the late Pans showed us how low it can sink.

Of all the writers in the Pan books, David Case is the only one who really sticks in my mind as producing real quality work in some of those later volumes. In act, it's his name I associate with the series, because it was the only place I could read his work.
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Ramsey Campbell (Ramsey)
Username: Ramsey

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 195.93.21.74
Posted on Monday, December 14, 2009 - 02:00 pm:   

I certainly agree about the excellence of David Case, and I think it's worth remembering that all those stories were reprinted from his collections, not written for van Thal. I assume folk realise that van Thal ("Bertie") was Robert Aickman's agent, but significantly used only "Ringing the Changes" for the Pan series.
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Stephen Walsh (Stephenw)
Username: Stephenw

Registered: 03-2009
Posted From: 194.32.31.1
Posted on Monday, December 14, 2009 - 02:01 pm:   

It just so happens I'm about to reread 'The 18th Pan Book Of Horror Stories' for the first time in I don't know how many years.

This is just the place for a story-by-story reassessment.
A glance at the contents page shows stories by several authors I'm looking forward to:
Patricia Highsmith, Myc Harrison, Monica Lee, Alan Temperley, Rosemary Timperley & Harry E. Turner.

We shall see...
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Zed (Gary_mc)
Username: Gary_mc

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 213.219.8.243
Posted on Monday, December 14, 2009 - 02:04 pm:   

I've been meaning to re-read the Pan books for years, but really can't seem to summon the energy. What I thought was great (and naughty and bloody and fun) when I was 14 will probably seem a bit garish now.

Perhaps I'll just re-read the first few volumes. I do dip into them occasionally.

David Case is great. Isn't Steve Jones editing a new collection of some of his vintage tales?
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Zed (Gary_mc)
Username: Gary_mc

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 213.219.8.243
Posted on Monday, December 14, 2009 - 02:17 pm:   

I assume folk realise that van Thal ("Bertie") was Robert Aickman's agent

Wow, I didn't know that. Fascinating...he commissioned those grotesque stories in the Pan books yet represented one of the most subtle writers the field has ever produced.
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Hubert (Hubert)
Username: Hubert

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 78.21.232.205
Posted on Monday, December 14, 2009 - 02:45 pm:   

the typical stuff became increasingly offensive and pornographic as either the contributors or van Thal, or both, decided to go for the most basic appeal.

Is it an established fact that this was done consciously? It was always my impression that van Thal simply ran out of good material and so ended up including just about anything, as long as it filled up the book. After all, the series was very succesful, commercially speaking.
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Gary Fry (Gary_fry)
Username: Gary_fry

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 129.11.76.230
Posted on Monday, December 14, 2009 - 03:01 pm:   

>>>It was always my impression that van Thal simply ran out of good material and so ended up including just about anything, as long as it filled up the book.

Unimaginable nowadays!
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John Llewellyn Probert (John_l_probert)
Username: John_l_probert

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 213.253.174.81
Posted on Monday, December 14, 2009 - 03:07 pm:   

Unimaginable nowadays!

True, but we're talking about a time where screenwriters like Christopher Wicking (Demons of the Mind) would get the cold shoulder at pretty much any showbusiness party if he admitted he wrote horror. I suspect van Thal's list of reliable authors got less and less, which might explain why there are more and more pseudonyms used in the later volumes.
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Carolinec (Carolinec)
Username: Carolinec

Registered: 06-2009
Posted From: 82.38.75.85
Posted on Monday, December 14, 2009 - 03:33 pm:   

>>Living in a little Welsh market town meant the Pan books were often the only thing labelled 'Horror' in the newsagents (there wasn't a bookshop). There were no second hand shops selling battered copies of Machen, Lovecraft or anyone else. In fact there was nothing else, so for a long time they were the only thing I could get to read anyway<<

If you substitute "little English market town" instead of "little Welsh market town" that sounds like the place I grew up in too! That's why PBoH introduced me to horror - those and the Fontanas were the only things I could get my hands on.
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Zed (Gary_mc)
Username: Gary_mc

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 213.219.8.243
Posted on Monday, December 14, 2009 - 03:37 pm:   

I guess I was lucky to grow up in the thrusting megalopolis that is Sunderland...
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Hubert (Hubert)
Username: Hubert

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 78.21.232.205
Posted on Monday, December 14, 2009 - 06:22 pm:   

And I was lucky to have a dad who sailed to the thriving ports of Dover and Folkestone on a regular basis
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Stephen Walsh (Stephenw)
Username: Stephenw

Registered: 03-2009
Posted From: 82.17.252.126
Posted on Monday, December 14, 2009 - 10:05 pm:   

I'll say something for Herbert Van Thal as an editor... he certainly wasn't sexist.

Fourteen stories in this 18th volume with seven by male and seven by female authors. Which kind of gives the lie to the allegation that these books were full of nothing but lowest common denominator, immature male fantasy "torture porn"!
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Stephen Walsh (Stephenw)
Username: Stephenw

Registered: 03-2009
Posted From: 82.17.252.126
Posted on Monday, December 14, 2009 - 10:09 pm:   

Actually, I'm wrong... it's eight female and six male authors.
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John Llewellyn Probert (John_l_probert)
Username: John_l_probert

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 88.202.210.68
Posted on Monday, December 14, 2009 - 10:39 pm:   

"Jane Gregory" was actually Harry E Turner, Stephen
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Stephen Walsh (Stephenw)
Username: Stephenw

Registered: 03-2009
Posted From: 82.17.252.126
Posted on Monday, December 14, 2009 - 11:10 pm:   

Interesting... this adds a whole new dimension to my enjoyment of the Pans. Like reading one of those Nemonymous books!

Don't tell me anymore pseudonyms as I want to judge each story on its own merits.

First up: 'Meat' by Carolyn L. Bird - unless that's an anagram of Cyril L. Brando
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Ian Alexander Martin (Iam)
Username: Iam

Registered: 10-2009
Posted From: 64.180.64.74
Posted on Tuesday, December 15, 2009 - 12:42 am:   

AHA! Carolyn L. Bird is the only time that Carolyn and Allyson have admitted publicly to the fact they are the same person! I am VINDICATED!!!!
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Mick Curtis (Mick)
Username: Mick

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 86.176.178.93
Posted on Tuesday, December 15, 2009 - 01:54 am:   

{I've mentioned before that my first book in the series was Pan 9 - in which all the stories were new. }

Lord P., was "Mrs Anstey's Scarecrow" in that issue?
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Mick Curtis (Mick)
Username: Mick

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 86.176.178.93
Posted on Tuesday, December 15, 2009 - 01:55 am:   

Ooh yes, it was:-

http://www.trashfiction.co.uk/horror_pan09_cover.html
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Stephen Walsh (Stephenw)
Username: Stephenw

Registered: 03-2009
Posted From: 194.32.31.1
Posted on Tuesday, December 15, 2009 - 10:29 am:   

W.H. Carr (male, female, pseudonym, who knows???) - one of my favourites as well and particularly scary! The scarecrows in 'Ancient Images' reminded me a lot of that tale.

'Meat' was okay, well enough written and quite witty in a cod-Sakiesque kind of way, not particularly gory despite the allure of the title. A one-armed beggar tells the story of how he lost his arm to a wide-eyed young boy. A mildly diverting bit of filler material.

'The Bravest Rat In Venice' by Patricia Highsmith was a brilliantly written and memorably gothic anthropomorphic horror/fantasy all told from the point of view of a rat. Captured by a group of children this pathetic creature survives all the physical abuses they throw at it, escapes, nurses itself back to health and emerges from the shadows with one thought in mind... reads like an evil fairy-tale or a spaghetti western for rodents. Quite wonderful!!
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Carolinec (Carolinec)
Username: Carolinec

Registered: 06-2009
Posted From: 82.38.75.85
Posted on Tuesday, December 15, 2009 - 01:28 pm:   

Ian says:
"AHA! Carolyn L. Bird is the only time that Carolyn and Allyson have admitted publicly to the fact they are the same person! I am VINDICATED!!!!"


Sadly, no, I really can't lay claim to that. I don't know about Ally though - she might have some hidden Pan past she doesn't want people to know about. Believe me, if I had ever written a story which had got into a PBoH I'd be telling EVERYBODY about it!
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Stephen Walsh (Stephenw)
Username: Stephenw

Registered: 03-2009
Posted From: 194.32.31.1
Posted on Tuesday, December 15, 2009 - 04:29 pm:   

Just read 'Quod Erat Demonstrandum' by "Judith Eleanor Green" over lunch (almost losing it in the process) and it was your typical Pan splatter piece.

Though, interestingly, the story plays the part of a typical "battle of the sexes" drama right up until the bloke loses the argument and resorts to...

There is no way a woman wrote this... and if so - where has she been all my life!!
[i.e. this is either a really clever or a really dumb yarn]
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Alexicon (Alexicon)
Username: Alexicon

Registered: 10-2009
Posted From: 88.106.115.75
Posted on Tuesday, December 15, 2009 - 04:40 pm:   

Stephen - you're a really great fella. But,by Christ,are you fanatical,or what?

Will you feel the same way once you've read the new stuff coming from the original writers? Blimey,I shudder to think...
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Stephen Walsh (Stephenw)
Username: Stephenw

Registered: 03-2009
Posted From: 194.32.31.1
Posted on Tuesday, December 15, 2009 - 04:44 pm:   

Maybe I just like defending the underdog, Alex?

I don't suppose you could introduce me to Judith by any chance?
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Alexicon (Alexicon)
Username: Alexicon

Registered: 10-2009
Posted From: 88.106.115.75
Posted on Tuesday, December 15, 2009 - 04:50 pm:   

IMHO,you're a good guy. I'll raise a glass of Walsh or two over the next few weeks.
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Alexicon (Alexicon)
Username: Alexicon

Registered: 10-2009
Posted From: 88.106.115.75
Posted on Tuesday, December 15, 2009 - 05:04 pm:   

P.S. Stephen. The Golding book will be here by Christmas.
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Stephen Walsh (Stephenw)
Username: Stephenw

Registered: 03-2009
Posted From: 194.32.31.1
Posted on Tuesday, December 15, 2009 - 05:06 pm:   

You're a pretty decent bloke yourself, Alex.

Wish me luck... got the big work's do on Thursday and been in training for this one since the summer. Friday booked off in readiness.

Have elbow, will quaff!
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Alexicon (Alexicon)
Username: Alexicon

Registered: 10-2009
Posted From: 88.106.115.75
Posted on Tuesday, December 15, 2009 - 05:42 pm:   

Ha! The dreaded work's "do". Insulting your bosses,knees-ups with the underdogs - everything politically-incorrect. Love it.Please get thoroughly Walshed.
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Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston)
Username: Weber_gregston

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 194.176.105.56
Posted on Tuesday, December 15, 2009 - 05:55 pm:   

My "works do" is a meal (the we have to pay for) at a shit overpriced local restaurant tomorrow lunchtime and everyone is expected to come back to work after. There's not even an evening do. I got such strange looks when I asked why it was a lunch thing and not an evening thing, they couldn't see the point.

What a fun f***ing office I work in.

I'm getting called all kinds because I said I wasn't going. Everyone I know that's ever gone to that restaurant has hated it. Gives me a couple of hours peace tomorrow when I'll be pretty much the only person here.
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Stephen Walsh (Stephenw)
Username: Stephenw

Registered: 03-2009
Posted From: 194.32.31.1
Posted on Tuesday, December 15, 2009 - 06:03 pm:   

My heart goes out to you, Weber.

Over he we start imbibing on Christmas punch from 10.00 - hit the restaurant at 12.00 - disco afterwards that goes on until closing time.

Wake up the next day wondering is it 2010 yet... different culture I suppose.
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Carolinec (Carolinec)
Username: Carolinec

Registered: 06-2009
Posted From: 82.38.75.85
Posted on Tuesday, December 15, 2009 - 06:29 pm:   

I don't even have a "works do". Mind you, that might be something to do with being self employed and working on my own. I used to get invited to various different do's in different departments and universities (I do bits of work for different places), but they stopped inviting me as I always said "No"! I'm unsociable and I hate Christmas.
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Tony (Tony)
Username: Tony

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 86.153.151.209
Posted on Tuesday, December 15, 2009 - 06:56 pm:   

I read the Pans but sometimes felt uncomfy doing so, like I was a bit ashamed. I do, however, agree that horror now feels a bit 'serious'. The thing is, back in those days people were a bit tougher than us and had a lot of reasons to be unhappy, but here they were writing the sort of stuff that was often a joy (er, I might have drifted away from the Pans here...).
I've got the address of the asda person to approach about a yearly Halloween book, maybe two (one adult, one kid friendly). Anyone think of tales that might fit in them? For the kid one I want ones parents can read to their kids, maybe be about six or sevne pages in length, but not ones that are too 'soft'. Anyone thinking they might fancy contributing such stuff feel free to contact me.
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Tony (Tony)
Username: Tony

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 86.153.151.209
Posted on Tuesday, December 15, 2009 - 06:57 pm:   

I like Christmas a lot, but have never fancied the idea of any kind of 'do'.
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John Llewellyn Probert (John_l_probert)
Username: John_l_probert

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 88.202.210.68
Posted on Tuesday, December 15, 2009 - 09:23 pm:   

OMG Hospital Xmas parties!

I went to one that was 15 women and me and I must say I had the most splendid time, although I was a bit tired the next day.

I went to another where I ended up being chased by someone's very angry husband and I had to hide in a wheelie bin (NOT recommended when wearing velvet)

Following the Hammersmith Renal Unit Xmas party in 1999 I ended up being woken up by a kindly policeman from my resting place on a park bench on Ealing Common at 5am on a Friday morning because of the frost that had formed on my overcoat & he was worried I might be dead.

I love work Christmas parties, but I think I've probably gone to enough of them now.
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Allybird (Allybird)
Username: Allybird

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 80.47.27.75
Posted on Tuesday, December 15, 2009 - 09:31 pm:   

I'd like to read all of the above in stories :>)
Can we have a surgeon in the horror - house sort of thing?

We talked about your escapades at a Fantasycon - set then down :>)
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Carolinec (Carolinec)
Username: Carolinec

Registered: 06-2009
Posted From: 82.38.75.85
Posted on Tuesday, December 15, 2009 - 09:37 pm:   

Are you asking Lord P to write his autobiography, Ally? Actually, that's not a bad idea - I think I'd buy it!

Tony said:
"The thing is, back in those days people were a bit tougher than us and had a lot of reasons to be unhappy"

Tony - I'm wondering here which era you're referring to. If it's the time of the early to mid Pans, I was around in those days. I don't think I'm tough but unhappy!
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Allybird (Allybird)
Username: Allybird

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 80.47.27.75
Posted on Tuesday, December 15, 2009 - 09:55 pm:   

I'd buy it - Caroline :>0
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Tony (Tony)
Username: Tony

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 86.153.151.209
Posted on Wednesday, December 16, 2009 - 10:06 am:   

Caroline - I was talking about the authors, not us! :-)
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Hubert (Hubert)
Username: Hubert

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 78.21.232.232
Posted on Wednesday, December 16, 2009 - 10:16 am:   

Over he we start imbibing on Christmas punch from 10.00 - hit the restaurant at 12.00 - disco afterwards that goes on until closing time.

Sounds like The Office. I always tried to avoid Xmas work parties, because it meant you had to mingle with and be friendly to people who were awful to you the rest of the year.
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Carolinec (Carolinec)
Username: Carolinec

Registered: 06-2009
Posted From: 82.38.75.85
Posted on Wednesday, December 16, 2009 - 08:59 pm:   

>>Caroline - I was talking about the authors, not us! :-)<<

Ah, right! I think I'm with you now.

BTW folks, how can a thread go from talking about Pan Horrors to Christmas office parties? Only on the RCMB, eh?
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Alexicon (Alexicon)
Username: Alexicon

Registered: 10-2009
Posted From: 88.106.71.16
Posted on Thursday, December 17, 2009 - 03:26 am:   

Ahem...isn't the WHC Brighton nothing more than a giant work's knees-up? Pan Horror madmen will be there too - which should spice things up a bit.

So,not much thread-deviation so far.
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Stephen Walsh (Stephenw)
Username: Stephenw

Registered: 03-2009
Posted From: 194.32.31.1
Posted on Thursday, December 17, 2009 - 11:58 am:   

I always tried to avoid Xmas work parties, because it meant you had to mingle with and be friendly to people who were awful to you the rest of the year.

Hubert, but you can be horrible to them in return... in spades lol.

Work's Christmas parties are the modern day equivalent of the old mediaeval carnivale tradition.
Someone really should write a horror story about that!
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Stephen Walsh (Stephenw)
Username: Stephenw

Registered: 03-2009
Posted From: 194.32.31.1
Posted on Thursday, December 17, 2009 - 12:29 pm:   

'Belvedere's Bride' by Jane Gregory/Harry E. Turner was another bit of adequately written short filler material.

I remember the twist plot being done much more effectively by Nigel Kneale in the story 'Oh, Mirror, Mirror'.

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