The Mere Touch: Weird Reviews

The mere touch of cold philosophy.”   –   Keats Reviewed in this column: The Man who Walked Through Walls by Marcel Aymé, trans. Sophie Lewis (Pushkin Press, London, 2012) Requiems and Nightmares by Guido Gozzano, trans. Brendan and  Anna Connell (Hieroglyphic Press, 2012) The Pottawatomie Giant and Other Stories by Andrew Duncan (PS Publishing Ltd, 2012) Crackpot Palace by Jeffrey Ford (William […]

The Mere Touch: Weird Reviews

The mere touch of cold philosophy.”   –   Keats Reviewed in this column: Traveller of the Century by Andrés Neuman, trans. Nick Caistor and Lorenza García (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, USA; Pushkin Press, UK, 2012) Communion Town by Sam Thompson (Fourth Estate, 2012) Hawthorn and Child by Keith Ridgway (Granta Books, 2012) After more of a hiatus than I intended (let’s just […]

The Mere Touch: Weird Reviews: Maureen Kincaid Speller

The mere touch of cold philosophy.”   –   Keats Reviewed in this column: The Troupe by Robert Jackson Bennett (Orbit, NY, 2012) Ivyland by Miles Klee (OR Books, NY, 2012) Shiny Thing by Patricia Russo (Papaveria Press, 2011) Hemlock Grove by Brian McGreevy (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, NY, 2012 Recently, the New Yorker has, a little unexpectedly, produced a science-fiction issue. […]

The Weird: Approaches and Foci

All editors have key concepts or ideas about the approach to creating an anthology. Here are a few of the ideas and foci that occurred to us during the preliminary steps of creating The Weird anthology and during the process of research and selection.  –  Ann & Jeff Edited in the context of: Avoid the Great Certainty (certainty and making […]

Frédérik Peeters’ Pachyderm: A Lynchian Switzerland

I seem to be working recently on a number of comics that won awards in France (which often, despite purportedly heightened visibility, signifies squat abroad). What can it mean? A syncing up of American and continental tastes when it comes to comics? A realization of the European riches out there and still to be brought over? Expect more […]

Razors to the Heart: William Shakespeare and Horror Fiction

(A shot from Julie Taymor’s Titus Adronicus) Over the course of his career, William Shakespeare made many a foray into the darker regions of drama. Beginning with Titus Andronicus, the playwright experimented with different ways in which he could show humanity at its worst. These visions depended on depictions of cruelty, agony and alterity. As his […]