Thank You

A quick "thank you" to old and new friends who follow this blog. I don't pay much attention to the social aspects of blogging, so I was quite surprised to have a look this morning and notice that I have a few "followers". I look forward to mining your very intelligent blogs for good books, films, images, and other pleasant diversions. I'm quite impressed with the amount of work you all put into your blogs! I hope to return the favor in the near future by linking to these blogs so that others may find and enjoy them.

On the negative side, knowing that someone is reading will goad me to put my sloth aside and work harder to come up with more thoughtful reviews and opinions!

Cheers, and happy reading!

-Maki

P.S. In case you don't know, I also have a sister site on blogger called "Tijuana Bible", dedicated to random images, unusual short films and strange old cartoons. Unfortunately, I had forgotten that this site exists until a few minutes ago. I suppose I had better think about updating it.

Ancient Sorceries and Other Weird Stories by Algernon Blackwood

The weird stories of Algernon Blackwood (1869-1951) are supernatural in the truest sense. They testify to an awareness that the natural world is greater and more powerful than the puny destiny of man. Blackwood the nature-mystic holds the certitude that there are deeper forces at work in the universe, of which man is ignorant and before which he is helpless. These forces are not malignant per se, but are rather of such immensity of power and so mysterious in their purpose that before them man is but an insignificant microbe. The horror in Blackwood is the realization that modern man is insignificant to the degree that nature hardly deigns to perceive him, or perceives him only as a slight impediment in the fabric of the cosmos. Blackwood writes of a terrifying nature spirit or elemental (“The Wendigo”) that haunts the great northern forests of North America, of the Danube willows which threaten to engulf two stranded campers on a island crumbling in flood (“The Willows“), and of the innate animalistic instincts of the atavistic soul (“Ancient Sorceries”, which loosely inspired the film “Cat People”). Anyone with an interest in tales of the strange and uncanny ought to be acquainted with the stories of Algernon Blackwood.

The Penguin Classics edition of Blackwood contains four fewer stories than the Dover publication misleadingly named The Best Ghost Stories of Algernon Blackwood, but does contain a useful introduction by S.T. Joshi, who has also compiled editions of the works of Lovecraft, Machen, and Lord Dunsany.