Spirits of the Seasons: Christmas Hauntings by ed. Tanya Kirk

Author:ed. Tanya Kirk [Kirk, ed. Tanya]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: Horror
Publisher: British Library
Published: 2018-10-17T18:30:00+00:00

‌ THE KIT-BAG

‌ Algernon Blackwood

First published in Pall Mall Magazine , December 1908

Algernon Henry Blackwood (1869–1951) established a new kind of weird fiction, describing supernatural encounters in which the natural world possesses sinister powers. He was born into a wealthy family, the son of a man who had been a playboy known as ‘Beauty Blackwood’ but who had been converted into a deeply conservative and evangelical Christian during the Crimean War. Blackwood rebelled against his upbringing, becoming interested in mysticism and involved in The Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, an occult group that also included Bram Stoker, Arthur Machen and Aleister Crowley as members. His most famous story is ‘The Willows’, in which two men on a canoeing trip up the Danube stop on an island covered with willows. Blackwood sets up a sense of impending doom by making each natural element on the island seem increasingly malevolent, until it seems that a mystical force is actually attacking the friends.

In addition to fiction exploring the darker side of nature, Blackwood was famed for ghost stories, and in fact featured on the BBC’s first ever television programme, Picture Page , relating a ghost story at the broadcast from Alexandra Palace on 2 November 1936. He later made regular appearances on both television and radio, and became known as ‘The Ghost Man’.

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