Legacy of Frankenstein #2: Frankenstein, or The Modern Prometheus (1818)

Mary (Godwin) Shelley first published her novel Frankenstein, or The Modern Prometheus in 1818, though her name wasn't attached until a later edition (upon which, predictably, reviewers criticized the writing as feminine, as if that's such a bad thing).

The first edition was longer, less melodramatic, and much more pro-science than later editions, and is more philosophical than we might expect. The book spends a lot of time telling us how Victor Frankenstein learned science, and some little time on his rigorous experimentation. The middle section of the book is nearly completely taken up by the Creature's viewpoint, as he fluently articulates his own learning process, his hopes and dreams and humanity. The Creature in this book isn't Karloff's simple, childlike hulk, though he may wish he could have those simple pleasures. This Creature is literate, cunning, human, and deeply sad.

Shelley's introduction sketches out her creative process (as you probably know, the novel began life as a friendly challenge to tell a scary story) and her modest goals: to entertain (she decries the boring contemporary novel), and to remind people it's good to have friends ("the exhibition of the amiableness of domestic affection" is how she puts it). And that might sound like a silly premise for a horror novel, even if you're writing the first horror novel ever. But it's true: the elaborate framing device is powered by a man's loneliness, and the Creature's evil is caused, he tells us, since he can never know true companionship.

Victor's scientific breakthroughs come at the expense of his relationships: he stops talking to his family and friends for weeks, months, years. Shelley's friends gave up on their stories as soon as the sun came out and they felt like going outside to hang, but she stuck it out and wrote this novel. And, to make a mountain of a molehill, even I, your devoted blogger, am sitting next to my sleeping wife, tapping this out rather than throwing my arm over her and dreaming together, since I'm driven to write this.

People want to create, to leave lasting impressions. But, as Victor finds out, careless half-assery leads to bad children (the Creature also blames his evil ways on Victor's shocked abandonment of him) and unintended consequences. (At least my half-assed blogging probably won't cause the death of everyone I've ever loved, so I'm one-up on the good doctor there). At the risk of sounding like a ridiculous cliche new-age crystal-waver, the secret is in balance. My schedule's tight, but I can read books and write about them and talk with my friends and sleep next to my wife too.

I listened to a free audio version of the original text, read by Cori Samuel. If you have eight hours, I'd highly recommend that you do the same. Her sensitive, no-frills delivery of the story was the perfect voice. Of course, you can always buy a paper edition instead:

A Spoopy Month #19: Apt Pupil (audiobook version)

The next novella in Stephen King's Different Seasons collection is Apt Pupil. This was only my second time reading this story (and, until last week, I'd never seen the movie, but more about that later). I remembered the basic bones of the plot, but none of the details.

This is deeply disturbing for me, and I'm used to being disturbed by fiction. I can easily imagine some people, who view King as a populist genre hack, looking down on his retelling of some of our worst atrocities as a species. I personally love Stephen King as a storyteller -- even when his plots are formulaic, his people almost always shine (no pun intended originally, but I kinda like that double meaning upon reflection). He is at his best writing people, and it's hard to take when the people I'm feeling for get eaten by monsters or tortured or evilly enabled by Nazis.

Apt Pupil isn't King's best work, but it includes some great characters (I love the characterizations of Monica and Rubber Ed) and some of his most grisly portrayals of cruelty. The narrator of my audiobook edition, Frank Muller, again does honor to the story and characters. In Muller's tones, Denker steers clear of stereotyped speech patterns. It would be tempting for a reader to soften the hard edges of this story, to add warmth and humanity, but Muller also avoids that temptation.

Tomorrow, I'll talk about the regrettable film of this book.

Once again, the CD version of this audiobook is much cheaper, so the link goes there.

A Spoopy Month #17: Rita Hayworth And The Shawshank Redemption

Uh-oh, missed a day there. I'll try to get an extra post in here sometime soon.

Starting this summer, I've been enjoying the audiobook versions of all of Stephen King's short fiction. I made it through all the short stories in about six weeks, and I've finally started the novella collections. The first one in his first collection is probably the best-known, and quite possibly just the flat-out best.

Of course I've seen, and of course I truly love, the film version of this story, and of all the King adaptations I've seen, it's not only the best but also the most faithful to the source material. If you've seen the film, 90% of what you saw on screen is from this novella (apart from the great PA classical music scene), and 90% of the important parts of the novella made it into the movie.

If you've watched the movie more than once, and will gladly watch it again, why not try the novella? You can get a paper copy for cheap, and this audio version, read by Frank Muller, is great. Muller doesn't spend too much time giving particularly unique voices to the characters (does it mean I'm 3 years old if I prefer that in my audiobooks?), but he acts each part to the fullest.

I've linked you to the CD version, as it's cheaper, but if you prefer the digital download on Audible, it's just a click away:

A Spoopy Month #2: Pseudopod Podcasts

So I'm writing this immediately after listening to one of the most recent episodes of a great horror fiction podcast, Pseudopod. I've been enjoying (and occasionally, freaking out to) Pseudopod for over two years now, which means I've heard well over 100 horror stories read to me for absolutely free. I first subscribed after hearing a reading of a Joe Lansdale story, "The Pit," which is gut-wrenching, horrible, very disturbing and, like a lot of Lansdale's work, genre-bending.

Through the eerie hand of pure coincidence, this podcast is co-edited by a friend of a friend, which I didn't know until he hosted an episode. "Fishhead," by Irvin S. Cobb, was published in 1913 and is open and honest about the racial politics of the time. The story is, of course, problematic in its treatment of race (though in a different way from the Lansdale story above), but I feel like Alex helps us put the story, and Cobb, into context.

The episode of Pseudopod which has haunted me the most is their 400th, "The Screwfly Solution" by James Tiptree, Jr. I'm mostly self-educated when it comes to horror and all other forms of speculative fiction, so I hadn't heard of Tiptree before. This story laid so many eggs in my head - sexual politics, biological imperatives -- I had to share a link on Facebook with my closest friends, and I immediately reserved a Tiptree collection at the library on the strength of that story. (There's a TV adaptation of this story, which I never bothered to seek out.)

Which brings us to this week (well, a few weeks ago -- due to a vacation, I'm still behind on my podcast listening). Frequently, they publish collections of several shorter stories, and the theme of this episode is great: using proper language to distance oneself from horror. Frequently, the editorial tone of the show as a whole can be very Nightvalian (to coin a term), and the second story especially uses the humor of incongruous language to both mask and deepen the horrors so obliquely described. I'm a comedy guy, and feel like humor can deepen most forms of storytelling. For me, that goes double with horror (which is why I'm such a big Lansdale fan).

This is by no means a complete or even representative overview of the show, just a collection of the episodes I remember liking the most over the last few years. If you have any interest in horror fiction, it's well worth your time to trawl through the archives (their Artemis Rising shows are also astounding) and find something that catches your eye.