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E Nesbit was one of the great British Edwardian storytellers, whom
we now remember most for her children’s novels. But she
wrote ghost stories prolifically for adults, her imagination
focused on the detail of the domestic to draw out horror, chills
and delight. Revel in the dark side of Victorian and Edwardian
England, where visiting a house of strangers becomes a trial of
nerve, and rediscovering the past leads you into strange and
terrifying places. Melissa Edmundson, a noted authority on
supernatural writing from this period and the curator
of Women’s Weird and Women’s Weird
2, has selected the best of E Nesbit’s short
scary fiction for this new Handheld Classic.
This book begins with the assumption that the presence of non-human
creatures causes an always-already uncanny rift in human
assumptions about reality. Exploring the dark side of animal nature
and the 'otherness' of animals as viewed by humans, and employing
cutting-edge theory on non-human animals, eco-criticism, literary
and cultural theory, this book takes the Gothic genre into new
territory. After the dissemination of Darwin's theories of
evolution, nineteenth-century fiction quickly picked up on the idea
of the 'animal within'. Here, the fear explored was of an unruly,
defiant, degenerate and entirely amoral animality lying (mostly)
dormant within all of us. However, non-humans and humans have other
sorts of encounters, too, and even before Darwin, humans have often
had an uneasy relationship with animals, which, as Donna Haraway
puts it, have a way of 'looking back' at us. In this book, the
focus is not on the 'animal within' but rather on the animal
'with-out': other and entirely incomprehensible.
Following the success of Handheld Press's 2019 best-selling
anthology Women's Weird, we will be publishing a second anthology
of classic Weird short fiction by women authors. To be published
alongside James Machin's anthology of classic British Weird
fiction, British Weird, Women's Weird 2 will contain thirteen
remarkably chilling stories originally published from 1891 to 1937,
by women authors from the USA, Canada, the UK, India and Australia.
Featured stories will include: Lettice Galbraith's 'The Blue Room'
(1897) Barbara Baynton's 'A Dreamer' (1902) Katherine Mansfield's
'The House' (1912) Bithia Mary Croker's 'The Red Bungalow' (1919)
Marjorie Bowen's 'Florence Flannery' (1924) L M Montgomery's 'The
House Party at Smoky Island' (1934) Stella Gibbons' 'Roaring Tower'
(1937) Melissa Edmundson's introduction will explore how the
evolving Weird tradition was interpreted using colonial settings,
and focus on how Weird fitted naturally into the careers of writers
like Montgomery (Anne of Green Gables) and Gibbons (Cold Comfort
Farm) who were not normally considered exponents of supernatural
fiction.
The CW's long-running series Supernatural follows the adventures of
brothers Sam and Dean Winchester as they pursue the "family
business" of hunting supernatural beings. Blending
monster-of-the-week storylines with the unfolding saga of the
brothers' often troubled relationship, the show represents Gothic
concerns of anxiety, the monstrous, family trauma and, of course,
the supernatural. The lines between human and monster, good and
evil, are blurred and individual identities and motivations resist
easy categorization. This collection of new essays examines how the
series both incorporates and complicates Gothic elements related to
traditional tropes, storytelling, women and gender issues and
monstrosity.
Early Weird fiction embraces the supernatural, horror, science
fiction, fantasy and the Gothic, and was explored with enthusiasm
by many women writers in the United Kingdom and in the USA. Melissa
Edmundson has brought together a compelling collection of the best
Weird short stories by women from the late nineteenth and early
twentieth centuries, to thrill new readers and delight these
authors' fans. The thirteen authors include: Charlotte Perkins
Gilman, author of `The Yellow Wallpaper', with her story of a
haunted New England house, `The Giant Wistaria' (1891). Margaret
Oliphant's delicate story of ghostly possession, `The Library
Window' (1897). Edith Nesbit's `The Shadow' (1910) about the peril
of telling a ghost story after a ball. Edith Wharton's alarming
story of Breton dogs and a jealous husband, `Kerfol' (1916). May
Sinclair's `Where Their Fire Is Not Quenched' (1927), a story of a
love that will never die. Mary Butts' `With and Without Buttons'
(1938), a story of very haunted gloves. D K Broster's unholy story
of a mistress's feathery revenge, `Crouching At The Door' (1942).
D K Broster was one of the great British historical novelists of
the twentieth century, but her Weird fiction has long been
forgotten. She wrote some of the most impressive supernatural short
stories to be published between the wars. Melissa Edmundson, editor
of Women's Weird, Women's Weird 2, Elinor Mordaunt's The Villa and
The Vortex and Helen Simpson's The Outcast and The Rite, all
published by Handheld, has curated a selection of Broster's best
and most terrifying work. From the Abyss contains eleven stories,
including: 'The Window', in which a deserted chateau takes revenge
on anyone who opens one particular window. 'The Pavement', in which
the protectress of a Roman mosaic cannot bear to let it go.
'Clairvoyance', in which the spirit of a vengeful Japanese
swordmaster enters an adolescent girl. 'From the Abyss', in which
the survivor of a car crash is followed out of the gorge by her
doppelganger.
This book begins with the assumption that the presence of non-human
creatures causes an always-already uncanny rift in human
assumptions about reality. Exploring the dark side of animal nature
and the 'otherness' of animals as viewed by humans, and employing
cutting-edge theory on non-human animals, eco-criticism, literary
and cultural theory, this book takes the Gothic genre into new
territory. After the dissemination of Darwin's theories of
evolution, nineteenth-century fiction quickly picked up on the idea
of the 'animal within'. Here, the fear explored was of an unruly,
defiant, degenerate and entirely amoral animality lying (mostly)
dormant within all of us. However, non-humans and humans have other
sorts of encounters, too, and even before Darwin, humans have often
had an uneasy relationship with animals, which, as Donna Haraway
puts it, have a way of 'looking back' at us. In this book, the
focus is not on the 'animal within' but rather on the animal
'with-out': other and entirely incomprehensible.
This book explores women writers' involvement with the Gothic. The
author sheds new light on women's experience, a viewpoint that
remains largely absent from male-authored Colonial Gothic works.
The book investigates how women writers appropriated the Gothic
genre-and its emphasis on fear, isolation, troubled identity,
racial otherness, and sexual deviancy-in order to take these
anxieties into the farthest realms of the British Empire. The
chapters show how Gothic themes told from a woman's perspective
emerge in unique ways when set in the different colonial regions
that comprise the scope of this book: Canada, the Caribbean,
Africa, India, Australia, and New Zealand. Edmundson argues that
women's Colonial Gothic writing tends to be more critical of
imperialism, and thereby more subversive, than that of their male
counterparts. This book will be of interest to students and
academics interested in women's writing, the Gothic, and colonial
studies.
This book explores women writers' involvement with the Gothic. The
author sheds new light on women's experience, a viewpoint that
remains largely absent from male-authored Colonial Gothic works.
The book investigates how women writers appropriated the Gothic
genre-and its emphasis on fear, isolation, troubled identity,
racial otherness, and sexual deviancy-in order to take these
anxieties into the farthest realms of the British Empire. The
chapters show how Gothic themes told from a woman's perspective
emerge in unique ways when set in the different colonial regions
that comprise the scope of this book: Canada, the Caribbean,
Africa, India, Australia, and New Zealand. Edmundson argues that
women's Colonial Gothic writing tends to be more critical of
imperialism, and thereby more subversive, than that of their male
counterparts. This book will be of interest to students and
academics interested in women's writing, the Gothic, and colonial
studies.
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The Half-Caste (Paperback)
Dinah Mulock Craik; Edited by Melissa Edmundson
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R827
Discovery Miles 8 270
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Ships in 12 - 17 working days
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Dinah Mulock Craik's The Half-Caste concerns the coming-of-age of
its title character, the mixed-race Zillah Le Poer, daughter of an
English merchant and an Indian princess. Sent back to England as a
young girl, Zillah has no knowledge that she is an heiress. She
lives with her uncle Le Poer, his wife, and two daughters, and is
treated as little more than a servant in the household. Zillah's
situation is gradually improved when Cassandra Pryor is employed as
a governess to the Le Poer daughters and takes an interest in the
mysterious ""cousin."" Craik explores issues of gender, race, and
empire in the Victorian period in this compact and gripping
novella. Along with a newly-annotated text, this Broadview edition
includes a critical introduction that discusses Craik's involvement
with contemporary racial and imperialist attitudes, her place
within the broader genre of Anglo-Indian fiction, and the
importance of Zillah Le Poer as a positive symbol of empire. The
edition is also enriched with relevant contemporary contextual
material, including Dinah Mulock Craik's writing on gender and
female employment, British views on the biracial Eurasian community
in India, and writings on the Victorian governess.
Originally published in 1901, 'East of Suez' was Alice Perrin's
first collection of short stories. Her fascinating and
thought-provoking tales of Anglo-Indian life rival the best work of
Kipling, and were hugely successful in their day. Perrin tells
stories of illicit love against a beautifully-drawn backdrop of the
mystical east, interweaving the supernatural with exquisite details
of her characters' lives. This scholarly edition includes: a
critical introduction; author biography; suggestions for further
reading; explanatory notes; contextual material on representations
of the British Raj; illustrations from 'The Illustrated London
News' and 'The Windsor Magazine'.
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