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Speaker 1: Cool Zone.

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Speaker 2: Media book Club, book Club Boo Club, Hello, and welcome

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Speaker 2: to close on Media book Club, the only book club

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Speaker 2: or you don't have to do the reading because I

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Speaker 2: do it for you.

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Speaker 3: The only book club where you don't have to go

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Speaker 3: to your English class to hear an insufferable gay person

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Speaker 3: who won't shut up, because I am the insufferable gay

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Speaker 3: person in your phone on demand. I'm your host, Margaret Kiljoy.

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Speaker 3: And this week it is still spooky month, and let's

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Speaker 3: be honest, it's always spooky month. I have this really

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Speaker 3: love hate relationship with horror.

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Speaker 4: I really like spooky and supernatural and the things that

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Speaker 4: make you feel.

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Speaker 3: Closer to the veil. And I think about death all

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Speaker 3: the time and I read about it a lot. But

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Speaker 3: I also like, can't stand a lot of types of horror,

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Speaker 3: just like the slasher stuff or I don't know a

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Speaker 3: lot of it doesn't work for me. So when I

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Speaker 3: say it might always be spooky month, that doesn't mean

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Speaker 3: that i'll read you everything, because whatever. Okay, we are

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Speaker 3: still doing horror because it is October and I wanted

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Speaker 3: to do some old timey stories, So we're going to

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Speaker 3: do some old timey stories because I really like contrasting

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Speaker 3: new stories and old stories, and like thinking about the

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Speaker 3: ways that story itself has changed, and how we think

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Speaker 3: about the supernatural has changed, and all this kind of stuff.

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Speaker 3: We are going to do two stories for you this

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Speaker 3: week because they are slightly shorter, and I'm excited about

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Speaker 3: these stories because they're both really fun and spooky. They're

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Speaker 3: also both written by authors I'm really fascinated by and

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Speaker 3: I want to learn more about, possibly enough that I

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Speaker 3: want to do cool people episodes about them. And they

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Speaker 3: sit at this really interesting place in the lineage of

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Speaker 3: the horror genre. I never actually heard these stories before,

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Speaker 3: which you can call me a poser about if you

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Speaker 3: would like. All engagement is good engagement. Don't call me

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Speaker 3: a poser or hurt my feelings. Okay. The first story

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Speaker 3: is called The Open Window, and it's by Hector hu Monro,

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Speaker 3: better known and usually attributed by his pen name Saki.

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Speaker 3: He was inspired by people like Oscar Wilde, who I

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Speaker 3: did do a bunch of episodes about on Coole people,

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Speaker 3: and like Oscar wild Saki was gay. And actually it's

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Speaker 3: gonna come up in a really interesting way in this story,

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Speaker 3: in this like total offhand way that is like not

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Speaker 3: what you would expect from the nineteenth century. His pen

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Speaker 3: name Saki is a reference to a symbolic and erotic

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Speaker 3: figure in Arabic and Persian poetry, and Saki's writing is

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Speaker 3: remembered for how it satirizes English social conventions around the

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Speaker 3: turn of the century and seems to often feature stuffy

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Speaker 3: aristocrats being eaten by wild animals. And we are pro

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Speaker 3: old aristocrats being eaten by wild animals on this podcast,

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Speaker 3: although that's not what the story. This story is one

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Speaker 3: of his supernatural ghost stories, and it's full of little

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Speaker 3: jabs at weird Victorian mannerisms, and it's got a twist

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Speaker 3: because it's a horror story. How can a horror story

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Speaker 3: or not have a twist. Actually, if you go back

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Speaker 3: old enough, they probably don't have twists. But this story

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Speaker 3: The Open Window by Saki. My aunt will be down presently,

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Speaker 3: mister Nuttle said, a very self possessed young lady of fifteen.

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Speaker 3: In the meantime, you must try and put up with me.

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Speaker 3: Frampton Nuttle endeavored to say the correct something which should

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Speaker 3: duly flatter the niece of the moment, without unduly discounting

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Speaker 3: the aunt that was to come. Privately, he doubted more

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Speaker 3: than ever whether these formal visits on a secession of

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Speaker 3: total strangers would do much towards helping the nerve cure

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Speaker 3: which he was supposed to be undergoing. I know how

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Speaker 3: it'll be, his sister had said, when he was preparing

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Speaker 3: to migrate to this rural retreat. You will bury yourself

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Speaker 3: down there and not speak to a living soul, and

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Speaker 3: your nerves will be worse than ever from moping. I

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Speaker 3: shall just give you letters of introduction to all the

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Speaker 3: people I know there. Some of them, as far as

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Speaker 3: I can remember, were quite nice. Frampton wondered whether missus Sappleton,

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Speaker 3: the lady to whom he was presenting one of the

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Speaker 3: letters of introduction, came into the nice division. Do you

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Speaker 3: know many of the people round here, asked the niece,

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Speaker 3: when she judged that they had had sufficient silent communion

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Speaker 3: hardly a soul, said Frampton. My sister was staying here

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Speaker 3: at the rectory, you know, some four years ago, and

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Speaker 3: she gave me letters of introduction to some of the

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Speaker 3: people here. He made the last statement in a tone

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Speaker 3: of distant regret. Then you know practically nothing about my aunt,

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Speaker 3: pursued the self possessed young lady. Only her name and address,

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Speaker 3: admitted the caller. He was wondering whether missus Sappleton was

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Speaker 3: in the married or widowed state an undefinable. Something about

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Speaker 3: the room seemed to suggest masculine habitat. Her great tragedy

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Speaker 3: happened just three years ago, said the child. That would

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Speaker 3: be since your sister's time her tragedy, asked Frampton. Somehow

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Speaker 3: in this RESTful country spot tragedy seemed out of place.

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Speaker 3: You may wonder why we keep that window wide open

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Speaker 3: on an October afternoon, said the niece, indicating a large

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Speaker 3: French window that opened on to a lawn. Just as

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Speaker 3: a side note, the phrase French window here, I think

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Speaker 3: is referencing what we would think of as like glass

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Speaker 3: porch doors. It is quite warm for the time of

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Speaker 3: the year, said Frampton. But has that window got anything

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Speaker 3: to do with the tragedy? Out through that window? Three

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Speaker 3: years ago to a day, her husband and her two

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Speaker 3: young brothers went off for their days shooting. They never

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Speaker 3: came back. In crossing the moor to their favorite snipe

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Speaker 3: shooting ground, they were all three engulfed in a treacherous

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Speaker 3: piece of bog. It had been that dreadful wet summer,

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Speaker 3: you know, and places that were safe for other years

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Speaker 3: gave way suddenly without warning. Their bodies were never recovered.

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Speaker 3: That was the dreadful part of it. Here the child's

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Speaker 3: voice lost its self, possessed note and became falteringly human.

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Speaker 3: Poor aunt always things that they will come back someday,

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Speaker 3: they and the little brown spaniel that was lost with them,

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Speaker 3: and walk in at that window, just like they used

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Speaker 3: to do. That is why the window is kept open

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Speaker 3: every evening till it is quite dusk. Poor dear aunt.

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Speaker 3: She has often told me how they went out, her

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Speaker 3: husband with his white waterproof coat over his arm, and Ronnie,

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Speaker 3: her youngest brother, singing, Bertie, why do you bound? As

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Speaker 3: he always did to tease her, because she said it

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Speaker 3: got on her nerves. Do you know sometimes on still

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Speaker 3: quiet evenings like this, I almost get a creepy feeling

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Speaker 3: they will all walk in through that window. She broke

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Speaker 3: off with a little shudder. It was a relief to

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Speaker 3: Frampton when the aunt bustled into the room with a

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Speaker 3: whirl of apologies for being late and making her appearance.

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Speaker 3: I hope Vera has been amusing you, she said. She

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Speaker 3: has been quite interesting, said Frampton, I hope you don't

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Speaker 3: mind the open window, said missus Sappleton briskly. My husband

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Speaker 3: and brothers will be back home directly from shooting, and

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Speaker 3: they always come in this way. They've been out for

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Speaker 3: snipe in the marshes today, so they'll make a fine

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Speaker 3: mess over my poor carpets. So like you menfolk, isn't it.

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Speaker 3: She rattled on cheerfully about the shooting and the scarcity

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Speaker 3: of birds and the prospects for duck in the winter.

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Speaker 3: To Frampton, it was all purely horrible. He made a

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Speaker 3: desperate but only partially successful effort to turn the talk

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Speaker 3: on to a less ghastly topic. He was conscious that

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Speaker 3: his hostess was giving him only a fragment of her attention,

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Speaker 3: and her eyes were constantly straying past him to the

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Speaker 3: open window and the lawn beyond. It was certainly an

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Speaker 3: unfortunate coincidence that he should have paid his visit on

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Speaker 3: this tragic anniversary. And do you know what else is

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Speaker 3: here to pay a visit? It's the horrible visage of

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Speaker 3: goods and services that support this shure. I can't do this.

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Speaker 4: I'm I'm trying to do it.

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Speaker 3: This straight support this show.

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Speaker 1: Isn't that fun? Don't we all love ads?

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Speaker 3: And we're back, and I'm gonna start doing the thing

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Speaker 3: where I come back from ads, where I, like, say,

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Speaker 3: the last sentence or so before the break. It was

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Speaker 3: certainly an unfortunate coincidence that he Frampton should have paid

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Speaker 3: his visit on this tragic anniversary. The doctors agree in

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Speaker 3: ordering me complete rest, an absence of mental excitement, and

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Speaker 3: avoidance of anything in the nature of violent physical exercise,

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Speaker 3: announced Frampton, who labored under the tolerably widespread delusion that

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Speaker 3: total strangers and chance acquaintances are hungry for the least

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Speaker 3: detail of one's ailments and infirmities, their cause and cure.

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Speaker 3: On the matter of diet, they are not so much

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Speaker 3: in agreement, he continued. Oh no, said missus Sappleton, in

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Speaker 3: a voice that only replaced a yawn at the last moment.

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Speaker 3: Then she suddenly brightened into alert attention, but not to

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Speaker 3: what Frampton was saying. Here they are at last, she cried,

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Speaker 3: just in time for tea. And don't they look as

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Speaker 3: if they were muddy up to the eyes? Frampton shivered

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Speaker 3: slightly and turned towards the nise with a look intended

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Speaker 3: to convey sympathetic comprehension. The child was staring out through

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Speaker 3: the open window with dazed horror in her eyes. In

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Speaker 3: a chill shock of nameless fear, Frampton swung round in

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Speaker 3: his seat and looked in the same direction. In the

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Speaker 3: deepening twilight, three figures were walking across the lawn towards

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Speaker 3: the window. They all carried guns under their arms, and

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Speaker 3: one of them was additionally burdened with a white coat

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Speaker 3: hung over his shoulders. A tired brown spaniel kept close

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Speaker 3: at their heels noiselessly.

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Speaker 1: They neared the house.

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Speaker 3: Then a hoarse, young voice chanted out in the dusk,

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Speaker 3: I said, Birdie, why do you bow? Frampton grabbed wildly

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Speaker 3: at his stick and hat. The hall door, the gravel drive,

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Speaker 3: and the front gate were dimly noted stages in his

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Speaker 3: headlong retreat. A cyclist coming along the road had to

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Speaker 3: run into a hedge to avoid an imminent collision. Here

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Speaker 3: we are, my dear, said the bear of the white Macintosh,

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Speaker 3: coming in through the window. Fairly muddy, but most of

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Speaker 3: us dry. Who was that who bolted out as we

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Speaker 3: came up? A most extraordinary man, a mister Nuttle, said

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Speaker 3: missus Sappleton, who could only talk about his illnesses, and

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Speaker 3: then dashed off without a word of goodbye or apology.

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Speaker 3: When you arrived, one would think he had seen a ghost.

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Speaker 3: I expect it was the spaniel, said the niece calmly.

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Speaker 3: He told me he had a horror of dogs. He

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Speaker 3: was once hunted into a cemetery somewhere on the banks

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Speaker 3: of the Ganges by a pack of pariah dogs and

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Speaker 3: had to spend the night in a newly dug grave

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Speaker 3: with the creatures snarling and grinning and foaming just above him,

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Speaker 3: enough to make anyone lose their nerve. Romance at short

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Speaker 3: notice was her specialty. Okay, I always say I like

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Speaker 3: that story so much because I like that story so

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Speaker 3: much because I like how mischievous it is. Also, we

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Speaker 3: don't use the word of romance to mean fantasy enough,

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Speaker 3: Like why are they two separate genres fantasy romanticy but

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Speaker 3: they're synonyms already synonyms Anyway. The reveal at the end

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Speaker 3: of the story that the teenager just loves fucking with

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Speaker 3: all the adults around her by making them ghost stories

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Speaker 3: I love. I also love that the protagonist's name is

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Speaker 3: a Frampton nuttle, which is absolutely the perfect name for

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Speaker 3: like a boring, neurotic Victorian Englishman. It also is a

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Speaker 3: name that I would make up if I was trying

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Speaker 3: to make fun of the English. I also thought that

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Speaker 3: there was a line in there about like you like

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Speaker 3: the menfolk, don't you, And I actually was mistaken on

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Speaker 3: first read. I thought it was like you're a gay,

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Speaker 3: but actually it was just something like just like you menfolk,

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Speaker 3: like you know, oh, you're always getting mud on the carpets.

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Speaker 3: And the story was also released in the nineteen tens,

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Speaker 3: about twenty to thirty years after the big Gothic revival

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Speaker 3: of the eighteen eighties and eighteen nineties, which was the

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Speaker 3: time period that gave us things like Robert Lows Stevenson's

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Speaker 3: The Strange Case of Doctor Jekyl and Mister Highe of

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Speaker 3: eighteen eighty six, Oscar Wilde's The Picture of Dorian Gray

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Speaker 3: eighteen ninety one, and Bram Strow Stoker's Dracula eighteen ninety seven.

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Speaker 3: And then Hazel, who does a lot of the episode

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Speaker 3: prep and picks a lot of stories, said about this

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Speaker 3: that Gothic fiction or Gothic herd, depending on how you

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Speaker 3: like it, is obsessed with ghosts, and it's obsessed with

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Speaker 3: hysteric women, and they're obsessed with this ever creeping fear

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Speaker 3: of the past intruding upon the present, like in Jane Eyre.

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Speaker 3: So Hazel wrote this, by the way, in prep for

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Speaker 3: this episode, Hazel read a lot of ooh, emotionally tortured

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Speaker 3: lady saw a ghost, and it's a metaphor kind of stories,

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Speaker 3: and so this one was frankly a breath of fresh air.

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Speaker 3: So the story is really interesting one because we see

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Speaker 3: all of those things madness, ghosts, etc. Played for laughs,

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Speaker 3: but we also see a young girl acting with agency

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Speaker 3: and weaponizing the stereotypes for her own amusement. And it

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Speaker 3: feels like this story is really poking fun at this

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Speaker 3: preoccupation where every small thing must have a creepy tragedy

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Speaker 3: behind it, and it's driving the wife insane, especially given

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Speaker 3: how easily framped and Nuttle, whose name none of us

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Speaker 3: are going to get over. It's especially given how easily

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Speaker 3: framped and Nuddle is led to believe a supernatural tale

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Speaker 3: over what his own eyes are telling him that like,

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Speaker 3: you know, men live in the house, that the returned

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Speaker 3: hunters are alive, and well he's still just like, oh,

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Speaker 3: it's clearly a ghost and it ends up being a

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Speaker 3: story about how easily we believe that women are crazy

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Speaker 3: in a fun way, and that's something. It's a signpost

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Speaker 3: in the development for the genre. Horror has mostly been

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Speaker 3: supernatural and folkloric through the end of the eighteen hundreds,

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Speaker 3: like ghost stories, haunted mansions, vampires, all that shit, and

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Speaker 3: at the turn of the twentieth century it takes a

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Speaker 3: turn towards psychological and fantastical, cosmic horror, alien pulp fiction

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Speaker 3: and all that. So this story's emphasis on sanity and

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Speaker 3: whose narration we're willing to believe ends up foreshadowing a

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Speaker 3: lot of where horror is going to go, and we're

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Speaker 3: going to trace how Gotha Karr becomes psychological horror becomes

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Speaker 3: cosmic car with this next story. Our next story is

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Speaker 3: called a hal of Carcosa by Ambrose Bierce. Bierce is

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Speaker 3: really fucking interesting from what I can tell. He's mostly

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Speaker 3: known as this satirist and journalist, like a lot of

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Speaker 3: writers back then who are like kind of like just

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Speaker 3: doing their thing or whatever, but he's also well respected

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Speaker 3: for short stories. He was born in Ohio. He fought

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Speaker 3: for the Union in the Civil War, and he writes

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Speaker 3: a lot about his experiences of war in a way

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Speaker 3: that I think i'd really respect. But I haven't read

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Speaker 3: all of his stuff yet, but it seems like he

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Speaker 3: both hated the horrors of war and he fucking hated Confederates,

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Speaker 3: which is the right mix if you ask me. Like,

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Speaker 3: he has this whole story that the name.

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Speaker 4: Of it escapes me because I forgot to put it

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Speaker 4: in the script. But it's like a story about like

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Speaker 4: a hanging, and it's about a Confederate being hanged, and

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Speaker 4: it's just this, like I don't know, really, it's a

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Speaker 4: shockingly visceral description of the experience of being hanged. He

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Speaker 4: also wrote The Devil's Dictionary, which is the whole dictionary

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Speaker 4: of satirical definitions. There's actually a modern one called the

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Speaker 4: contrad Dictionary by Crime think that's really cool, and I

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Speaker 4: think it must be a reference to this one. But

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Speaker 4: within the Devil's Dictionary there's a couple good ones, like

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Speaker 4: conservative noun a statesman who is enamored of existing evils,

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Speaker 4: as distinguished from the liberal who wishes to replace them

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Speaker 4: with others. And egotist noun a person of low taste

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Speaker 4: more interested in himself than me. And maybe the one

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Speaker 4: of the season is autocrat noun a dictatorial gentleman with

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Speaker 4: no other restraint upon him than the hand of the assassin.

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Speaker 4: The founder and patron of that great political institution, the

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Speaker 4: Dynamite Bombshell System. He also wrote a satirical poem about

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Speaker 4: I think President McKinley getting assassinated the year before President

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Speaker 4: McKinley was assassinated, and so he kind of got some

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Speaker 4: hot water about that. And in nineteen thirteen he went

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Speaker 4: down to Mexico to embed with Pantovilla to cover the

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Speaker 4: Mexican Revolution as a conflict journalist, and he disappeared and

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Speaker 4: his body was never recovered. Oral tradition in that area

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Speaker 4: of Mexico holds that he was shot by Spaniards. But

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Speaker 4: if Game of Thrones has taught me anything it's that

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Speaker 4: if a character dies off screen, they're coming back. So

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Speaker 4: I like to believe that Beers is still out there

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Speaker 4: killing imperialists and writing witty little diatribes. But eventually I

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Speaker 4: might do a whole thing about him. And actually, the

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Speaker 4: beginning of this story talks about how sometimes a person

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Speaker 4: dies and their body disappears, and I don't know, it's

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Speaker 4: just interesting because then like his body was never recovered,

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Speaker 4: just saying, just saying, this is a ghost story written

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Speaker 4: by him. It's from eighteen eighty six, and so it's

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Speaker 4: from that Gothic revival, and it's about twenty.

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Speaker 3: Years earlier than the story we just read. And it's

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Speaker 3: got a good twist. And maybe you'll even see it coming.

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Speaker 4: I didn't.

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Speaker 3: Hazel claims that they did. The story is called an

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Speaker 3: Inhabitant of Carcosa by Ambrose Biers And you're gonna have

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Speaker 3: to bear with me. The first paragraph has a lot

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Speaker 3: of v's and thoos and haseth and I'm gonna do

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Speaker 3: my best. An Inhabitant of Carcosa by Ambrose Biers. For

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Speaker 3: there be diverse sources of death. Somewhere in the body remaineth,

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Speaker 3: and in some it vanisheth quite away with the spirit.

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Speaker 3: This commonly occurreth only in solitude, such as God's will,

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Speaker 3: and none seeing the end. We say the man is

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Speaker 3: lost or gone on some long journey, which indeed he hath,

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Speaker 3: But sometimes it hath happened in sight of many, as

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Speaker 3: abundant testimony showeth. In one kind of death, the spirit

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Speaker 3: also dieth, and this it hath been known to do

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Speaker 3: while yet the body was in vigor for many years. Sometimes,

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Speaker 3: as is veritably attested, it dieth with the body, but

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Speaker 3: after a season is raised up again, and in that

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Speaker 3: place where the body did decay. Pondering these words of Halley,

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Speaker 3: whom God rest, and questioning their full meeting, as one who,

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Speaker 3: having an intimation, yet doubts if there be not something

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Speaker 3: behind other than that which he has discerned, I noted

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Speaker 3: not whither I had strayed, until a sudden chill wind

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Speaker 3: striking my face revived me in a sense of my surroundings.

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Speaker 3: I observed with astonishment that everything seemed unfamiliar. On every

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Speaker 3: side of me stretched a bleak and desolate expanse of

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Speaker 3: plane covered with a tall overgrowth of sear grass, which

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Speaker 3: rustled and whistled in the autumn wind. With Heaven knows

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Speaker 3: what mysterious and disquieting suggestion protruded at long intervals. Above

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00:19:48,880 --> 00:19:53,520
Speaker 3: it stood strangely shaped in somber colored rocks, which seemed

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Speaker 3: to have an understanding with one another, and to exchange

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00:19:56,720 --> 00:20:00,320
Speaker 3: looks of uncomfortable significance, as if they had reared their

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00:20:00,359 --> 00:20:04,520
Speaker 3: heads to watch the issue of some foreseen event. A

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00:20:04,560 --> 00:20:07,960
Speaker 3: few blasted trees here and there appeared as leaders in

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Speaker 3: this malevolent conspiracy of silent expectation. The day I thought

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00:20:14,320 --> 00:20:17,399
Speaker 3: must be far advanced. Though the sun was invisible, and

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00:20:17,480 --> 00:20:20,720
Speaker 3: although sensible that the air was raw and chill, my

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00:20:20,840 --> 00:20:25,280
Speaker 3: consciousness of that fact was rather mental than physical. I

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Speaker 3: had no feeling of discomfort. Over All the dismal landscape,

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Speaker 3: a canopy of low lead colored clouds, hung like a

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Speaker 3: visible curse. In all this there were a menace and

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Speaker 3: a portent, a hint of evil, and intimation of doom, bird,

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Speaker 3: beast or insect there was none. The wind sighed in

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Speaker 3: the bare branches of the dead trees, and the gray

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00:20:49,280 --> 00:20:52,359
Speaker 3: grass bent to whisper its dread secret to the earth.

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Speaker 3: But no other sound nor motion broke the awful repose

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Speaker 3: of that dismal place. I observed in the herbage a

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Speaker 3: number of weather worn stones, evidently shaped with tools. They

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Speaker 3: were broken, covered with moss, and half sunken in the earth.

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Speaker 3: Some lay prostrate, some leaned at various angles. None was vertical.

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Speaker 3: They were obviously headstones of graves, though the graves themselves

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00:21:18,560 --> 00:21:22,600
Speaker 3: no longer existed as either mouths or depressions. The years

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Speaker 3: had leveled all scattered here and there more massive blocks

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00:21:26,560 --> 00:21:30,160
Speaker 3: showed where some pompous tomb or ambitious monument had once

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Speaker 3: flung its feeble defiance at oblivion. So old seemed these relics,

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Speaker 3: these vestiges of vanity and memorials of affection and piety,

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Speaker 3: so battered and worn and stained, so neglected, deserted, forgotten

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Speaker 3: the place that I could not help thinking myself, the

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Speaker 3: discoverer of the burial ground of a prehistoric race of

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Speaker 3: men whose very name was long extinct. Filled with these reflections,

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Speaker 3: I was for some time heedless of the sequence of

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Speaker 3: my own experiences. But soon I thought, how came I hither?

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00:22:05,880 --> 00:22:08,399
Speaker 3: A moment's reflection seemed to make this all clear and

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Speaker 3: explain at the same time, though in a disquieting way,

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Speaker 3: the singular character with which my fancy had invested all

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Speaker 3: that I saw or heard. I was ill. I remembered

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Speaker 3: now that I had been prostrated by a sudden fever

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Speaker 3: that my family had told me. In my periods of delirium,

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Speaker 3: I had constantly cried out for liberty and air, and

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Speaker 3: had been held in bed to prevent my escape out

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Speaker 3: of doors. Now I had eluded the vigilance of my

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Speaker 3: attendants and wandered hither to where I could not conjecture clearly.

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Speaker 3: I was at a considerable distance from the city where

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Speaker 3: I dwelt, the ancient and famous city of Carcosa. No

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Speaker 3: signs of human life were anywhere visible nor audible. No

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Speaker 3: rising smoke, no watchdog's bark, no lowing of cattle, no

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Speaker 3: shouts of children at play, nothing but that dismal burial place,

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Speaker 3: with its air of mystery and dread due to my

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00:23:05,680 --> 00:23:10,439
Speaker 3: own disordered brain. Was I not becoming again delirious there

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Speaker 3: beyond human aid? Was it not, indeed all an illusion

384
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Speaker 3: of my madness? I called aloud the names of my

385
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Speaker 3: wives and sons, reached out my hands in search of theirs.

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Speaker 3: Even as I walked among the crumbling stones and in

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Speaker 3: the withered grass, A noise behind me caused me to

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Speaker 3: turn about. A wild animal, a lynx, was approaching. The

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Speaker 3: thought came to me, if I break down here in

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Speaker 3: the desert, if the fever return and I fail, this

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Speaker 3: beast will be at my throat. I sprang toward it, shouting.

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Speaker 3: It trotted tranquility by within a hand's breath of me,

393
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Speaker 3: and disappeared behind a rock. A moment later, a man's

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00:23:55,320 --> 00:23:57,720
Speaker 3: head appeared to rise out of the ground. A short

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00:23:57,720 --> 00:24:01,240
Speaker 3: distance away. He was ascend, seeing the farther slope of

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Speaker 3: a low hill whose crest was hardly to be distinguished

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00:24:04,440 --> 00:24:07,960
Speaker 3: from the general level. His whole figure soon came into

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Speaker 3: view against the background of gray cloud. He was half naked,

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Speaker 3: half clad in skins. His hair was unkempt, his beard

400
00:24:16,960 --> 00:24:20,040
Speaker 3: long and ragged. In one hand he carried a bow

401
00:24:20,080 --> 00:24:23,040
Speaker 3: and arrow. The other held a blazing torch with a

402
00:24:23,119 --> 00:24:27,840
Speaker 3: long trail of black smoke. He walked slowly and with caution,

403
00:24:28,520 --> 00:24:31,719
Speaker 3: as if he feared falling into some open brave concealed

404
00:24:31,760 --> 00:24:36,240
Speaker 3: by the tall glass. This strange apparition surprised but did

405
00:24:36,280 --> 00:24:39,480
Speaker 3: not alarm, and taking such a course as to intercept him,

406
00:24:39,520 --> 00:24:42,119
Speaker 3: I met him almost face to face, accosting him with

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Speaker 3: the familiar salutation God keep you. He gave no heed,

408
00:24:46,840 --> 00:24:50,480
Speaker 3: nor did he arrest his pace. Good stranger, I continued,

409
00:24:50,560 --> 00:24:53,119
Speaker 3: I am ill and lost direct me. I beseech you

410
00:24:53,280 --> 00:24:57,520
Speaker 3: to carcosa. The man broke into a barbarous chant, and

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Speaker 3: an unknown tongue, passing on and away. An owl on

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Speaker 3: the branch of a decayed tree hooted dismally and was

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00:25:05,600 --> 00:25:09,160
Speaker 3: answered by another in the distance. Looking upward, I saw,

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00:25:09,240 --> 00:25:13,120
Speaker 3: through a sudden rift in the clouds Albadarin and the Hiates.

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Speaker 3: In all this there was a hint of night, the lynx,

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Speaker 3: the man with the torch, the owl. Yet I saw,

417
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Speaker 3: I saw even the stars and absence of the darkness.

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00:25:24,480 --> 00:25:28,600
Speaker 3: I saw, but was apparently not seen nor heard. Under

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Speaker 3: what awful spell? Did I exist? And dear listeners, I

420
00:25:34,000 --> 00:25:36,399
Speaker 3: exist under a spell? Or twice an episode. I have

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Speaker 3: to break the flow and promote the wonderful.

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Speaker 1: Ads that support this podcast.

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Speaker 3: And rebec I saw, but was apparently not seen nor heard.

424
00:26:02,200 --> 00:26:06,399
Speaker 3: Under what awful spell did I exist? I seated myself

425
00:26:06,440 --> 00:26:09,640
Speaker 3: at the root of a great tree seriously to consider

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Speaker 3: what it were best to do. That I was mad,

427
00:26:12,520 --> 00:26:15,720
Speaker 3: I could no longer doubt. Yet I recognized a ground

428
00:26:15,760 --> 00:26:19,320
Speaker 3: of doubt in the conviction a fever I had no trace.

429
00:26:19,920 --> 00:26:23,440
Speaker 3: I had withal a sense of exhilaration and vigor altogether

430
00:26:23,520 --> 00:26:27,000
Speaker 3: unknown to me, a feeling of mental and physical exultation.

431
00:26:27,920 --> 00:26:30,680
Speaker 3: My senses seemed all alert. I could feel the air

432
00:26:30,720 --> 00:26:35,919
Speaker 3: as a ponderous substance. I could hear the silence a

433
00:26:35,960 --> 00:26:38,600
Speaker 3: great root of the giant tree, against whose trunk.

434
00:26:38,680 --> 00:26:39,119
Speaker 1: I leaned.

435
00:26:39,160 --> 00:26:42,639
Speaker 3: As I sat held enclosed in its grasp a slab

436
00:26:42,680 --> 00:26:46,120
Speaker 3: of stone, a part of which protruded into a recess

437
00:26:46,160 --> 00:26:50,040
Speaker 3: formed by another root. The stone was thus partly protected

438
00:26:50,040 --> 00:26:54,840
Speaker 3: from the weather, though greatly decomposed. Its edges were worn round,

439
00:26:55,040 --> 00:26:59,240
Speaker 3: its corners eaten away, its surface deeply furrowed and scaled.

440
00:27:00,040 --> 00:27:03,840
Speaker 3: Glittering particles of mica were visible in the earth around it,

441
00:27:04,600 --> 00:27:09,080
Speaker 3: vestiges of its decomposition. This stone had apparently marked the

442
00:27:09,119 --> 00:27:11,880
Speaker 3: grave out of which the tree had sprung ages ago.

443
00:27:12,800 --> 00:27:15,800
Speaker 3: The trees exacting roots had robbed the grave.

444
00:27:15,560 --> 00:27:17,080
Speaker 1: And made the stone a prisoner.

445
00:27:18,600 --> 00:27:21,680
Speaker 3: A sudden wind pushed some dry leaves and twigs from

446
00:27:21,680 --> 00:27:25,600
Speaker 3: the uppermost face of the stone. I saw the low

447
00:27:25,680 --> 00:27:28,560
Speaker 3: relief letters of an inscription, and bent to read it.

448
00:27:29,600 --> 00:27:34,199
Speaker 3: God in Heaven, my name in full, the date of

449
00:27:34,359 --> 00:27:40,280
Speaker 3: my birth, the date of my death. A level shaft

450
00:27:40,320 --> 00:27:42,760
Speaker 3: of light illuminated the whole side of the tree. As

451
00:27:42,800 --> 00:27:45,879
Speaker 3: I sprang to my feet in terror, the sun was

452
00:27:46,000 --> 00:27:49,520
Speaker 3: rising in the rosy east. I stood between the tree

453
00:27:49,560 --> 00:27:53,679
Speaker 3: and his broad red disk. No shadow darkened the trunk.

454
00:27:55,680 --> 00:27:59,560
Speaker 3: A chorus of howling wolves saluted the dawn. I saw

455
00:27:59,600 --> 00:28:04,080
Speaker 3: them sitting on their haunches, singly and in groups, on

456
00:28:04,119 --> 00:28:07,800
Speaker 3: the summits of irregular mounds, and to my oli, filling

457
00:28:07,840 --> 00:28:11,119
Speaker 3: a half of my desert prospect and extending to the horizon.

458
00:28:12,119 --> 00:28:14,879
Speaker 3: And then I knew that these were the ruins of

459
00:28:14,920 --> 00:28:20,240
Speaker 3: the ancient and famous city of Carcosa. Such are the

460
00:28:20,320 --> 00:28:23,760
Speaker 3: facts imparted to the medium by Rolis, by the spirit

461
00:28:24,240 --> 00:28:31,040
Speaker 3: usseb Alar Robardin. That's the end of the story. Okay,

462
00:28:31,040 --> 00:28:33,200
Speaker 3: So the prose in the story is so biblical without

463
00:28:33,200 --> 00:28:36,440
Speaker 3: feeling too purple or overwritten, at least for the standards

464
00:28:36,480 --> 00:28:38,680
Speaker 3: of the time. Like it's not like you can see

465
00:28:38,680 --> 00:28:40,480
Speaker 3: the difference in only like twenty years later how they

466
00:28:40,520 --> 00:28:43,200
Speaker 3: were writing, But nineteenth century had this whole thing. And

467
00:28:43,760 --> 00:28:47,920
Speaker 3: it uses the like the was dead all along trope,

468
00:28:47,920 --> 00:28:50,320
Speaker 3: which is a sort of staple of Gothic horror, but

469
00:28:50,360 --> 00:28:53,800
Speaker 3: it also gets using contemporary stuff like the show Lost

470
00:28:54,480 --> 00:28:56,760
Speaker 3: spoilers for the TV show Lost, I guess, even though

471
00:28:58,480 --> 00:29:01,000
Speaker 3: whatever you fuck lost us the long Shaggy Dog story,

472
00:29:01,000 --> 00:29:03,560
Speaker 3: the most expensive shaggy dog story ever put to film,

473
00:29:04,600 --> 00:29:06,680
Speaker 3: And I think that he was dead all along trope

474
00:29:06,720 --> 00:29:10,040
Speaker 3: isn't exactly my favorite trope. These days, but where they

475
00:29:10,080 --> 00:29:13,080
Speaker 3: come from before it's really as much of a trope,

476
00:29:13,440 --> 00:29:15,719
Speaker 3: is actually much more interesting to me, And I think

477
00:29:15,760 --> 00:29:18,680
Speaker 3: that Beers uses it to heighten the horror really well

478
00:29:18,800 --> 00:29:21,680
Speaker 3: rather than just to kill all the steaks, right, because

479
00:29:21,680 --> 00:29:24,840
Speaker 3: it's like, oh, fuck, I'm dead instead of like, ah,

480
00:29:24,880 --> 00:29:29,240
Speaker 3: that explains it. I'm dead five seasons in fuck you Lost,

481
00:29:30,360 --> 00:29:31,920
Speaker 3: which I don't think they even knew what was going

482
00:29:31,960 --> 00:29:35,320
Speaker 3: to happen ahead of time. I'm so mad about Lost, Okay,

483
00:29:35,320 --> 00:29:38,560
Speaker 3: and then Hazel wrote a lot of really interesting stuff

484
00:29:38,600 --> 00:29:42,400
Speaker 3: about this, so I'm gonna read it to you. I'm

485
00:29:42,440 --> 00:29:44,800
Speaker 3: really drawn to this impulse to establish the point of

486
00:29:44,840 --> 00:29:48,480
Speaker 3: view character as sane and fully capacitated. Gothic KR and

487
00:29:48,560 --> 00:29:51,560
Speaker 3: later Cosmic are so fixated on madness, but the choice

488
00:29:51,560 --> 00:29:54,240
Speaker 3: to zoom in on sanity is a really interesting contrast.

489
00:29:54,680 --> 00:29:57,200
Speaker 3: It's an important part of this story's horror that our

490
00:29:57,280 --> 00:29:59,880
Speaker 3: narrator fully understands what's going on and can be tr

491
00:30:00,040 --> 00:30:03,120
Speaker 3: us when he reveals that he's dead. Right, And even

492
00:30:03,160 --> 00:30:05,600
Speaker 3: the spirit name checks at the end Beerston just invent

493
00:30:05,680 --> 00:30:08,000
Speaker 3: this story. No, he wants you to know the name

494
00:30:08,040 --> 00:30:11,000
Speaker 3: of the medium they channeled it through. He's actively trying

495
00:30:11,040 --> 00:30:13,920
Speaker 3: to cultivate as much credibility in the framing of the

496
00:30:13,960 --> 00:30:17,120
Speaker 3: story as he can. So this story is like weirdly

497
00:30:17,160 --> 00:30:20,160
Speaker 3: and quietly important in the horror lineage in that it

498
00:30:20,240 --> 00:30:22,680
Speaker 3: introduces a ton of names. They get picked up and

499
00:30:22,680 --> 00:30:27,120
Speaker 3: recycled by later authors. Most notably, the City of Carcosa

500
00:30:27,400 --> 00:30:30,120
Speaker 3: gets picked up by Robert W. Chambers for his eighteen

501
00:30:30,200 --> 00:30:33,240
Speaker 3: ninety five short story collection called The King in Yellow,

502
00:30:33,680 --> 00:30:36,680
Speaker 3: which is a series of interrelated stories where the characters

503
00:30:36,720 --> 00:30:39,560
Speaker 3: discover and read a play called The King in Yellow

504
00:30:40,000 --> 00:30:43,840
Speaker 3: that contains profound incomprehensible truths about the universe that drive

505
00:30:43,880 --> 00:30:48,120
Speaker 3: you mad. And as a sidebar, Chambers is also using

506
00:30:48,360 --> 00:30:51,560
Speaker 3: yellow as the color of madness, much like Book Club

507
00:30:51,600 --> 00:30:54,880
Speaker 3: alum Charlotte Perkins Gilman does later in The Yellow Wallpaper,

508
00:30:55,120 --> 00:30:56,760
Speaker 3: which you can go back and re listen to if

509
00:30:56,760 --> 00:31:00,160
Speaker 3: you want so The King in Yellow, which goes on

510
00:31:00,200 --> 00:31:02,800
Speaker 3: to inspire none other than and please note that I'm

511
00:31:02,800 --> 00:31:05,320
Speaker 3: crossing myself in penance when I name check this fucking guy,

512
00:31:05,600 --> 00:31:09,520
Speaker 3: HP Lovecraft. The ancient city of Carcosa, as well as

513
00:31:09,520 --> 00:31:13,880
Speaker 3: the names Holly, Hyaatees, and Aldebaran, appear in Lovecraft's Caffulu

514
00:31:13,960 --> 00:31:18,280
Speaker 3: mythos obviously influential in the genre, less because readers at

515
00:31:18,320 --> 00:31:20,960
Speaker 3: the time were reading him he died early and lonely

516
00:31:21,000 --> 00:31:24,720
Speaker 3: and broke as he deserved Lovecraft again, but because other

517
00:31:24,800 --> 00:31:28,440
Speaker 3: authors were reading him and being inspired. And also Carcosa

518
00:31:28,480 --> 00:31:30,640
Speaker 3: shows up in a ton of other stuff, like True

519
00:31:30,720 --> 00:31:35,280
Speaker 3: Detective Chilling Adventures of Sabrina, and also book Club alum

520
00:31:35,440 --> 00:31:38,560
Speaker 3: Haley Piper's new book A Game in Yellow, which sounds

521
00:31:38,640 --> 00:31:41,160
Speaker 3: really fucking red. It's about a lesbian couple that starts

522
00:31:41,240 --> 00:31:43,360
Speaker 3: microdosing that play that drives you mad, the King in

523
00:31:43,480 --> 00:31:46,200
Speaker 3: Yellow for sex reasons, and it's a happy coincidence that

524
00:31:46,240 --> 00:31:50,000
Speaker 3: these two are back to back anyway. This shit even

525
00:31:50,040 --> 00:31:52,760
Speaker 3: pops up in A Song of Ice and Fire by

526
00:31:52,760 --> 00:31:53,160
Speaker 3: George R.

527
00:31:53,280 --> 00:31:53,600
Speaker 1: Martin.

528
00:31:53,720 --> 00:31:56,120
Speaker 3: There's multiple Wikipedia pages about the stuff if you want

529
00:31:56,120 --> 00:31:58,719
Speaker 3: a good rabbit hole, but Beers doesn't give us too

530
00:31:58,800 --> 00:32:01,719
Speaker 3: much information about the famed in ancient city of Carcosa.

531
00:32:02,120 --> 00:32:04,880
Speaker 3: It's maybe in space, or maybe it's like Atlantis but

532
00:32:04,920 --> 00:32:08,120
Speaker 3: in the desert, depending on who's writing it. Hazel's take

533
00:32:08,200 --> 00:32:10,840
Speaker 3: is that for Carcosa is meant to sound like carcass

534
00:32:11,360 --> 00:32:14,200
Speaker 3: or whatever just does regardless of what the author intended,

535
00:32:14,480 --> 00:32:16,600
Speaker 3: so the city ends up serving as a parallel to

536
00:32:16,640 --> 00:32:20,800
Speaker 3: the narrator's body, the city as body. Initially, the narrator

537
00:32:20,840 --> 00:32:23,080
Speaker 3: is looking for the city he inhabited in the splendor

538
00:32:23,120 --> 00:32:25,880
Speaker 3: of its heyday after he realizes that he's dead. He

539
00:32:25,960 --> 00:32:29,200
Speaker 3: sees the city and ruins ancient and distant. But that's

540
00:32:29,360 --> 00:32:32,240
Speaker 3: all the city really has to quote unquote do in

541
00:32:32,320 --> 00:32:35,400
Speaker 3: the story. But importantly, none of the world building is

542
00:32:35,440 --> 00:32:38,880
Speaker 3: what's brought forward in horror legacy. But that's okay because

543
00:32:38,920 --> 00:32:41,880
Speaker 3: this story isn't about world building. It's about mood, and

544
00:32:42,040 --> 00:32:45,440
Speaker 3: fuck does Beers know how to construct a mood for me? Hazel?

545
00:32:46,080 --> 00:32:48,920
Speaker 3: This story is at a really interesting junction and juncture.

546
00:32:48,960 --> 00:32:51,400
Speaker 3: Please get that the story is at a really interesting

547
00:32:51,480 --> 00:32:55,120
Speaker 3: juncture and horror legacy. We've talked before about Gothakar being

548
00:32:55,160 --> 00:32:57,440
Speaker 3: about ghosts and madness and the fear of the past

549
00:32:57,480 --> 00:33:00,400
Speaker 3: intruding upon the present, which is absolutely the world that

550
00:33:00,440 --> 00:33:02,720
Speaker 3: this story is swimming in with the death and spirits

551
00:33:02,720 --> 00:33:05,920
Speaker 3: and ancient ruins. But Biers is sometimes credited as an

552
00:33:05,960 --> 00:33:08,680
Speaker 3: early writer of psychological horror, and we know that this

553
00:33:08,720 --> 00:33:11,880
Speaker 3: story goes on to influence early cosmic car and that's

554
00:33:11,920 --> 00:33:14,400
Speaker 3: a genre that's also interested in madness, but more so

555
00:33:14,640 --> 00:33:18,840
Speaker 3: about the ununderstandable, the vastness of the universe, the inevitability

556
00:33:18,880 --> 00:33:21,720
Speaker 3: that the future will come to erase the present. To

557
00:33:21,800 --> 00:33:25,040
Speaker 3: draw an overly simplified binary, we often see Gothic carr

558
00:33:25,120 --> 00:33:27,760
Speaker 3: stories is about fear of one's self and one's family members,

559
00:33:27,800 --> 00:33:30,520
Speaker 3: a fear of the known, and cosmic car is often

560
00:33:30,520 --> 00:33:33,480
Speaker 3: about the fear of things beyond us and beyond our comprehension,

561
00:33:33,920 --> 00:33:37,160
Speaker 3: fear of time and space and oblivion, a fear of

562
00:33:37,160 --> 00:33:41,040
Speaker 3: the unknown. And to me, Hazel, an inhabitant of Carcosa,

563
00:33:41,120 --> 00:33:43,800
Speaker 3: sits at such an interesting place between the two. This

564
00:33:43,960 --> 00:33:46,800
Speaker 3: isn't a story where the ghost is a manifestation of trauma.

565
00:33:47,160 --> 00:33:50,600
Speaker 3: Death and decay are very literal here. The ancient ruins

566
00:33:50,600 --> 00:33:52,400
Speaker 3: of the city are not invoked to mark that the

567
00:33:52,400 --> 00:33:54,720
Speaker 3: past is here now, but to show that the future

568
00:33:54,760 --> 00:33:56,640
Speaker 3: has arrived and has pushed you out of the way.

569
00:33:57,320 --> 00:34:00,160
Speaker 3: Literally no one can see or interact with the narrator.

570
00:34:00,480 --> 00:34:03,240
Speaker 3: We get some good like Isn't Nature spooky scenes that

571
00:34:03,280 --> 00:34:06,160
Speaker 3: are a touchstone of Gothic fiction, and we also get

572
00:34:06,160 --> 00:34:09,799
Speaker 3: a cosmic car classic unknowable tongue spoken by the man

573
00:34:09,880 --> 00:34:11,880
Speaker 3: on the road at the end of the day. This

574
00:34:11,960 --> 00:34:13,719
Speaker 3: is a story about waking up to realize the world

575
00:34:13,840 --> 00:34:17,240
Speaker 3: is continued without you. The slanger used to isn't hip anymore.

576
00:34:17,360 --> 00:34:19,480
Speaker 3: The young people are suddenly so much younger than you.

577
00:34:20,200 --> 00:34:23,239
Speaker 3: Time comes for us all in the end. Or is

578
00:34:23,280 --> 00:34:26,240
Speaker 3: something like that. And Tazel wrote me a lot about

579
00:34:26,239 --> 00:34:29,800
Speaker 3: this because both of us have been having a stressful week.

580
00:34:30,040 --> 00:34:32,680
Speaker 3: I also really like this is Margaret's voice.

581
00:34:32,680 --> 00:34:34,560
Speaker 4: Now, well it's always my voice, but this is me

582
00:34:34,640 --> 00:34:36,840
Speaker 4: saying what I think about it. HP Lovecraft is like

583
00:34:36,880 --> 00:34:40,480
Speaker 4: famously a racist and cosmic Car for him is about

584
00:34:40,480 --> 00:34:45,400
Speaker 4: this fear of like the unknown, spooky foreigners and nature.

585
00:34:45,680 --> 00:34:48,600
Speaker 4: He writes about trees, like he's just terrified of trees,

586
00:34:49,080 --> 00:34:51,680
Speaker 4: you know. So he's clearly afraid of like the chaos

587
00:34:51,719 --> 00:34:56,959
Speaker 4: and like change and diversity and organic stuff. Because he's

588
00:34:57,120 --> 00:34:58,400
Speaker 4: sounds like a skill issue.

589
00:34:58,680 --> 00:35:02,839
Speaker 3: But I think it gets really interesting that so people

590
00:35:02,880 --> 00:35:05,600
Speaker 3: will be like, oh, well, cosmic car comes from this shit. Well, actually,

591
00:35:05,960 --> 00:35:07,839
Speaker 3: cosmic car if you trace it back far enough as

592
00:35:07,840 --> 00:35:11,919
Speaker 3: someone who like fought for the Union and went off

593
00:35:11,960 --> 00:35:15,280
Speaker 3: to go support Pancho Villa, you know, who is famously

594
00:35:15,440 --> 00:35:19,080
Speaker 3: a right wing character in history, So whatever, take that

595
00:35:19,360 --> 00:35:22,920
Speaker 3: HP Lovecraft's a dead person and yeah, I don't know.

596
00:35:23,239 --> 00:35:26,520
Speaker 3: That's it for today, too early psychological horror adjacent stories

597
00:35:26,520 --> 00:35:30,239
Speaker 3: about madness, credibility, point of view, and ghosts. We got

598
00:35:30,239 --> 00:35:32,799
Speaker 3: both of these stories from classic tales of horror from

599
00:35:32,840 --> 00:35:36,040
Speaker 3: Canterbury Classics. I'm Margaret Kiljoy. You can find me on

600
00:35:36,080 --> 00:35:38,880
Speaker 3: this feed and on the internet. I have a substack

601
00:35:38,960 --> 00:35:41,879
Speaker 3: that's called Birds before the Storm and that's as good

602
00:35:41,880 --> 00:35:43,239
Speaker 3: of a place as I need to keep up with me.

603
00:35:43,360 --> 00:35:44,720
Speaker 1: I'm on the various things.

604
00:35:45,760 --> 00:35:50,080
Speaker 3: Take care of yourself, stay safe, stay dangerous, and never

605
00:35:50,160 --> 00:35:54,920
Speaker 3: forget that the HP of HP Lovecraft stands or Harry

606
00:35:54,920 --> 00:35:56,279
Speaker 3: Potter good night.

607
00:35:57,800 --> 00:36:00,239
Speaker 2: It could happen here as a production of cool Zone Media.

608
00:36:00,400 --> 00:36:01,880
Speaker 3: For more podcasts from cool.

609
00:36:01,680 --> 00:36:04,759
Speaker 2: Zone Media, visit our website coolzonemedia dot com or check

610
00:36:04,840 --> 00:36:07,640
Speaker 2: us out on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever

611
00:36:07,680 --> 00:36:10,400
Speaker 2: you listen to podcasts. You can find sources where it

612
00:36:10,400 --> 00:36:14,640
Speaker 2: could Happen here, updated monthly at coolzonemedia dot com slash sources.

613
00:36:14,760 --> 00:36:15,600
Speaker 1: Thanks for listening,