Episode 55: The Great Weird North: On Algernon Blackwood's 'The Wendigo'

Phil Ford and J. F. Martel — Wed, 11 Sep 2019 11:30:00 -0400

No survey of weird literature would be complete without mentioning Algernon Blackwood (1869-1951). As with all masters of the genre, Blackwood's take on the weird is singular: here, it isn't the cold reaches of outer space that elicit in us a nihilistic frisson, but the vast expanses of our own planet's wild places -- especially the northern woods. In his story "The Wendigo," Blackwood combines the beliefs of the Indigenous peoples of the Eastern Woodlands with the folktales of his native Britain to weave an ensorcelling story that perfectly captures the mood of the Canadian wilderness. In this conversation, JF and Phil discuss their own experience of that wilderness growing up in Ontario. The deeper they go, the spookier things get. An episode best enjoyed in solitude, by a campfire.

Header Image: "Highway 60 Passing Through the Boreal Forest in Algonquin Park" by Dimana Koralova, Wikimedia Commons

SHOW NOTES

Glenn Gould, The Idea of North
Algernon Blackwood, "The Wendigo"
Game of Thrones (HBO series)
Weird Studies, Episode 29: On Lovecraft
H. P. Lovecraft, "Supernatural Horror in Literature"
Edgar Allan Poe, "The Philosophy of Composition"
Fritz Leiber, The Adventures of Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser
Richard Wagner, Parsifal
David Lynch, Twin Peaks: The Return
Peter Heller, The River: A Novel
The Killing of Tim McLean (July 30, 2008)
Weird Studies, Episode 3: Ecstasy, Sin, and "The White People"
Mysterious Universe: Strange and Terrifying Encounters with Skinwalkers
Jacques Vallée, Passport to Magonia: On UFOs, Folklore, and Parallel Worlds
Graham Harman, Weird Realism: Lovecraft and Philosophy
Arthur Machen, Hieroglyphics: A Note Upon Ecstasy

Episode 34: The Weird Realism of Robert Aickman

Phil Ford and J. F. Martel — Wed, 21 Nov 2018 10:00:00 -0500

Although he is one of the luminaries of the weird tale, Robert Aickman referred to his irreal, macabre short works as strange stories. Born in London in 1914, Aickman wrote less than fifty such stories before his death in 1981. JF and Phil focus on one of his most chilling, "The Hospice," from the collection Cold Hand in Mine, published in 1975. In it, Aickman uses a staple ingredient of the classic ghost story -- a man is stranded on a country road at night, lost and out of petrol -- to concoct an unforgettable blend of fantasy and nightmare, reality and dream. Indeed, Phil and JF argue that Aickman deserves a place alongside David Lynch and a few others as one of those rare fabulists who can adeptly disclose how reality is more dreamlike, and dreams more real, than most of us would care to admit.

Header Image: Detail from photo by Ivars Indāns (Wikimedia Commons)

REFERENCES

Robert Aickman, "The Hospice" from Cold Hand in Mine
Dante Aligheri, The Divine Comedy: The Inferno
David Lynch, Twin Peaks: The Return
David Hume, An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding
Weird Studies, Episode 22: Divining the World with Joshua Ramey
Norman Mailer, An American Dream

Weird Studies - Episodes Tagged with “Folklore”

Episode 55: The Great Weird North: On Algernon Blackwood's 'The Wendigo'

Episode 34: The Weird Realism of Robert Aickman