A music hall violinist is haunted by a Vivaldi sonata only he can play, which has the power to start fires and summon the devil. A man wanders into a painting of a Dutch trading port, where a trawler captain on his deathbed relives, even as his wife poisons him, the day he netted a rotting mermaid. Music from a glass organ […]
Michael Moorcock is one of the most famed writers and editors in science fiction and fantasy history, a key figure in the British New Wave movement in the 60s and 70s, which itself held a strong influence on modern weird fiction. Moorcock is famed for his stories detailing the adventures of Jerry Cornelius and Elric of Melnibone, […]
This post is part of an ongoing series on 101 weird writers featured in The Weird compendium, the anthology that serves as the inspiration for this site. There is no ranking system; the order is determined by the schedule of posts. Mercè Rodoreda (1908 — 1983) was an important postwar Catalan writer whose novel La plaça del diamant (translated […]
We have before us a book with a peculiar name. It is called The Palm-Wine Drinkard and his dead Palm-Wine Tapster in the Dead’s Town, by Amos Tutuola. Let us gather around this object and poke it with a stick — but gingerly, because at any moment it may transform itself into a bird, or a lizard, or a canoe, or the air […]
Eric Schaller is a writer and illustrator living in New Hampshire. Possessing a unique, precise, and decidedly weird aesthetic, he has contributed art to publications such as Lady Churchill’s Rosebud Wristlet and Last Drink Bird Head, in the case of the latter creating the illustration that provided the inspiration for that anthology. He has also contributed art to […]
Eric Schaller is a writer and illustrator possessing a unique, precise, and decidedly weird aesthetic. He has contributed art to publications such as Lady Churchill’s Rosebud Wristlet, Last Drink Bird Head, and Jeff VanderMeer’s Ambergris story cycle, most notably in the chapbook of “The Exchange,” later included in the Ambergris collection City of Saints and Madmen. Earlier this […]
“Remember: Ignore the warnings your parents gave you as children. Be nosy and talk to strangers. Wander. If you sit in one place all night you will miss everything. If you have any questions or need assistance come and find me. I will whisper secrets in your ear. Cheers, Cynthia von Buhler Send from the future.” I […]
This post is part of an ongoing series on 101 weird writers featured in The Weird compendium, the anthology that serves as the inspiration for this site. There is no ranking system; the order is determined by the schedule of posts. Georg Heym (1887- 1912) was a German poet and playwright who also wrote one novel. Heym believed […]
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 […]
(Image by Jeremy Zerfoss) Buy The Weird compendium here… A “weird tale,” as defined by H.P. Lovecraft in his nonfiction writings and given early sanctuary within the pages of magazines like Weird Tales (est. 1923) is a story that has a supernatural element but does not fall into the category of traditional ghost story or Gothic tale, […]