How do the texts Frankenstein and A Werewolf Remembers: The Testament of Lawrence Stewart Talbot represent the literary archetype of monsters?

The following (see title above) is an essay from Joseph Gibson, 17, a student at Ogden High School, in Ogden, Utah. It is the completion of a yearlong project, part of his International Baccalaureate high school program. Joseph is the son of Plan9Crunch blogger Doug Gibson

Category 1 - Language and Literature

Word Count [3999]

Contents

1.  Introduction…
2. Investigation

a.                   Is a Monster Born or Made?...

b.                  Sympathetic Monsters...

c.                   Capacity of Monsters For Moral Growth/Accountability…

d.                  Monsters and Predestiny…

      3.  Conclusion…

      ----

 Introduction

 

Fiction has the power to provoke readers into questions they might not otherwise ask in a scenario where it is acceptable to agree or disagree with anything and experience anything within a surreal sphere.  Even so, audiences can tend to stay most comfortable watching their heroes prevail over monsters and villains. Though such stories are important, their battles pose an interesting question: are these conflicts against monsters and villains equal?  When a human is evil enough, he or she is called a monster.  Does that mean that any monster must face the designation of irredeemable villainy?  What even is a monster?  What do certain texts indicate about the morality of monsters?  A Student's Dictionary defines “monster” as “an animal or person with a strange or unusual shape,” and that is a rather standard explanation.  However, this does not fully explain the archetype of a monster in those traditional stories.  It is better to say a monster is any sole individual that is incompatible with the culture and society viewing it and one where interactions between that culture and the monster will lead to a dangerous conflict.  Any number of animal species are this to each other; it almost stands to reason monsters should have no culpability for their actions if those would follow a separate natural order.  Yet, the most enduring monsters have an intimate relationship with humans, and, as most authors are human, the texts will take a distinct stance on the culpability, responsibility and morality of such monsters. It is best to examine two narratives -- what some consider the original modern monster story: Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, specifically the 1831 version, and a novel that biographizes the Universal Monsters series under the lifespan of the Wolf-Man: A Werewolf Remembers: The Testament Of Lawrence Stewart Talbot by Frank Dello Stritto.  

The former provides a historical insight to the relatively recent publication of the latter.  The benefit of examining these two texts is how the texts specifically show two similar character arcs for their monsters that deserve more specific analysis, which can encompass the following: origin, sympathy, comparison to other monsters, development, and significant themes to explore each monster.  Another benefit to examining these two texts specifically is that Mary Shelley’s work, in some ways, defined the genre and archetype, whereas Dello Stritto, in crafting his work, sought to stick as close to the movies’ story as possible while repurposing werewolf tropes from other media to construct his monster story (Dello Stritto, 494).  Dello Stritto’s work has merit over other examples, because his novel charts the entire lifespan and character evolution of a famous monster.  Therefore, every rhetorical choice these texts make is deliberate; consequently, these are two of the best texts to examine here.

 Are Monsters Born Or Made?

 

            The question of someone being born a monster or nurtured accordingly pervades The Monster’s journey in Frankenstein, while tinging the edges of Talbot’s in his novel.  By that earlier definition for monster, the large frame and watery eyes indicate that he is a monster, but he shows no deliberate malice or instinct for wanton destruction.  Based on the preconceived notions of monsters in the first definition, The Monster has a greater potential to be one simply because of his stature (even though Victor especially designed its extraneous features due to his interpretation of attractiveness).  Similarly, while Talbot’s curse is something he acquires, one of his mentors, who studies his affliction on page 214, says, “The moonlight interplays differently with everyone….But it only ignites what is inside you.”  His mentor is not even incorrect in this; Talbot pursues an engaged woman named Gwen Conliffe at the beginning of his story in a somewhat predatory manner.  The lycanthropic curse only brings to the surface what is inside of him, just as the later ostracization of The Monster will awaken its cunning and darker urges.  Once again, though, these behaviors do not spring forth from a vacuum, and there is a very provocative implication in their origins that warrants further examination.  The Monster’s relationship with his father, Victor Frankenstein, fuels the novel, and Talbot spends a significant portion of his novel bouncing between alternate father figures because of a complicated relationship with his own father.  These alternative father figures almost invariably end very poorly, a fact frighteningly intimate with The Monster’s own experience with the blind man.  Strangely, it does not even end there, as the creation of these characters excludes women in a significant way. 

The Monster’s creation comes solely from man, withholding any female influence, and Dello Stritto meets this by recycling the other film roles of Talbot’s actor and Talbot’s father’s actor into more Talbots.  He thereby weaves a family tree that emphasizes the men in the lineage and strips women of any power by supposing the Talbot lineage bears no women and by killing off Talbot’s mother early into his life.  Thus, the texts insinuate that monsters are monsters due to complicated family dynamics.  Talbot’s negative qualities are possibly the result of his exploits with other Talbots he meets in America after his father sends him away there, where his main Talbot mentor teaches him to read people and treat most conversations as if they were a complicated game.  It is a mindset that informs some of his thoughts he describes when he was around Gwen.  The main maternal insert for Talbot ends up a gypsy woman Maleva, whose son infected him with lycanthropy.  Their partnership in trying to cure Talbot comes across as the least ambiguously positive as they travel together between the first few attempts at cures.  She seemingly devotes the rest of her life to helping him and confirms at one point that he has become a surrogate son.  Her early influence on him could be wholly responsible for the positive traits that manifest despite his curse.  She, also, is his primary tether to humanity for much of the novel.  The Monster lacks this kind of reprieve, any companion to stay with him through his journey.  This lack of any consistent mother figure or friend in particular outside of the blind man and Frankenstein himself add to the tragedy and inform The Monster’s fixation on his loneliness that drives his every action.  These interpersonal relationships or lack thereof generate much sympathy for The Monsters as well as creating them and forcing their trajectory in a specific way.  According to these texts, monsters lack familial stability and support systems.

 Sympathetic Monsters

 

            An audience’s sympathy for a character is triggered for any number of reasons, but this is a more delicate balance when the character kills human beings.  Indeed, The Monster and Talbot are sympathetic characters; it can be difficult to understand why without comparing other monsters.  Luckily, Dello Stritto’s text, summarizing the latter half of the Universal Monsters film series, yields such other monsters: the film versions of Dracula and The Frankenstein Monster.  Meanwhile, the novel Monster best compares to the literary Dracula, who is essentially the same character as the movie character with more textual similarities to The Monster.  Talbot meets his versions of The Monster and Dracula in an afterlife scenario, describing them in this passage.  “The Dark One radiated evil...I could feel his thirst for revenge.  He was plotting...The Big One waited.  I watched and remembered” (Dello Stritto, 230-231).  Here the intent is the key difference between the appropriate sympathy levels for these three monsters amidst the result of their similar crimes.  This version of The Monster mostly lacks agency, and Dracula has always derived pleasure from preying on humans.  Talbot’s monster is the monster within himself, but what makes his character compelling is his eternal battle with the self.  Most of his surrogate father figures are ones he enlists to cure him of his lycanthropy.  He regrets his murders and feels depression over them and takes responsibility in trying to cure himself.  Evidently, a monster archetype can feel remorse.

Talbot´s testaments absorb other vampires of the times into Dracula to further color the latter’s resume as a monster and villain, but the most intelligent scheme the character has enacted is the novel original.  Dracula puts evident thought into his movements in his novel, and here arises the comparison to The Monster.  He abducts and murders a child and tortures their female caretaker.  He meticulously preys on his target’s mental states through many targeted attacks.  He even frames his enemy for actions necessary for his plan, forcing them to act in ways that benefit him before that person defies him.  In response, he attempts to take away their new bride.  The significance here is that The Monster does all these same heinous actions in Frankenstein, showing the same level of intelligent thought and foresight.  There is no tangible reason why one should appear more sympathetic -- and therefore excusable -- than the other except the audience's understanding of the tragedy of The Monster and the comparative lack thereof of any nuance to the character of Dracula in either story.  The Monster justifies its motives thusly.  “I am content to reason with you.  I am malicious because I am miserable.  Am I not shunned and hated by all mankind?...tell me why I should pity man more than he pities me?” (Shelley, 104).  This demonstrates the importance of the backstory The Monster has just divulged to Frankenstein and the reader, and Frankenstein understands it.  The Monster asks for Frankenstein to build him a mate so he is no longer lonely.  There is the honest interpretation that had Frankenstein honored this request, The Monster’s terror would have ceased.  Shelley seems to be implying, then, that monsters can have emotional motivations like humans.  Frankenstein’s abortion of his Bride project incurs some of The Monster’s more malicious actions and evaluates The Monster as the monster that man makes as opposed to the monster whose nature is to prey on man.  In these ways as related to these other monsters, the texts clarify the instances where monster archetypes are sympathetic.

 Capacity of Monsters for Moral Growth and Accountability

 

            Sympathy is important for audience engagement, but growth and change -- if at all possible redemption -- has a more lasting impact and justifies the sympathy.  Talbot´s novel repeats a motif that directly links to his curse.  "Even a man who's pure in heart And says his prayers by night, May become a wolf when the wolf bane blooms And the autumn moon is bright." At first, it seems like a condemnation and a resignation to his curse, but it transforms into much more with the realization that Talbot was not pure in heart at the beginning of his journey and later grows into a man who is pure in heart because of his affliction.  Talbot´s actions and attitudes in similar situations shift over the course of the novel.  In the beginning, he struggles and gives into his impulses to hunt Gwen and, later, Elsa Frankenstein with comparative ease.  By the time the narrative reaches this relationship with the gypsy woman Illonka, though, there is a difference.  Dello Stritto had set up a scenario to foreshadow this turn in Talbot’s early years with a woman named Consuela.  At first, he goes along with the woman’s advances immediately, but he is a lot more wary of Illonka and how he could hurt her or how her attraction to him may be a result of her unsettled internal issues (Dello Stritto, 298).  It is not as if he is suddenly immune to his beast self’s fantasies about her or his own overwhelming attraction to her, but he recognizes the underlying circumstances in the situation and handles the situation with more maturity and care.  This level of self awareness from a monster is a specific choice to underline his growth in the narrative.  Still, he wants nothing more than to be cured, and she becomes a part of that fantasy.  Another important byproduct of this relationship is Talbot’s scheme to rescue her from his “beast-self” by drugging her and locking her in a room when his murderous impulses battle him over her.  Notwithstanding that he still ends up killing her the next day, this marks immense growth for the man.  Where he was previously powerless to his impulses and role as a monster, he is able to fight effectively against himself.  However, for the narrative to still focus on monsters, the redemption cannot be to a state of total humanity, and it can be to any degree of subtlety.  Talbot is a tragic character fundamentally that is cursed to lose control and kill, but he changes along the way to combat this.   He powerlessly follows his impulses to later seek death and after, a better life, deliberately battling his darker half.  Talbot further evolves with his later hunt of Dracula, learning to use the full scope of his abilities toward a good end.  

        At the end of Frankenstein, The Monster outlives his creator in a worldwide hunt that provides a catalyst for a change.  The Monster has likely already understood that without his creator, he is nothing ,and that has likely been an underlying motive.  In that regard, The Monster’s resolution to end his miserable life is not a surprise. The more important realization for The Monster is that what he did was wrong with his apology to Walton.  This is significant.  The monsters of the animal kingdom -- what the cat is to the mouse -- have no responsibility to do anything less than what they do to each other.  They do what they do to survive with no real morality.  On the surface, a monster like Dracula is the same, and it becomes hard to disprove the sentiment that monsters are wholly incompatible with humans and human society, doomed to villainy.  But the texts surrounding Frankenstein’s Monster and Larry Talbot offer a more nuanced perspective through the respective growth in accountability and limiting the impact of their actions.  It can never be a perfect redemption for them as society will not allow The Monster a place nor his creator allow him a mate.  Similarly, the final successful curing of Talbot´s condition only lasts for under a year, but this is a redemption of their characters that demonstrates the standards and responsibilities of even monsters.  Their remembrance is as monsters, but that only drags them down so far, as monsters can have the agency and intellect required to grow and change as a human.  Or, perhaps given their close proximity to humankind and aforementioned evolution and character development, the core of these texts’ representation of monsters is to imply that they are indeed human in terms of functionality.

 Monsters and Predestiny

 

            As aforementioned, there is a cure for Talbot at one point in the novel, though temporary.  This is because the film series had the penultimate installment approach that angle and the final one completely ignore that ending. Yet, Dello Stritto illustrates another undercurrent of his interpretation of Talbot’s journey through this.  This is the idea of destiny.  The framing device of the novel initially is Talbot writing his memoirs, cured and about to marry his fiancee.  The story progresses to that point from his beginning into his curse and search for viable long-term cures.   Amidst all of that, there are implications of a rigid fate. On the hands of his victims, there is always a pentagram to mark his hunt for them.  Maleva insinuates predestiny in her eulogies and lamentations she recites at certain intervals throughout the novel.  She turns out to be vindicated.  After each of his deaths, he finds himself in a place he calls “The Deep Darkness” with Frankenstein's Monster and Dracula.  The souls of the dead pass through that place into the afterlife, and Talbot, Dracula and this interpretation of The Monster are unique in that they are stuck to that place.  While Mannering’s machine could functionally drain the life energy of both him and The Monster, there is no indication that their afterlife connection is due to anything other than the supernatural.  A gypsy named Bela infects Talbot with lycanthropy, and Talbot, in turn, infects a couple of people, who infect more.  The story never mentions any of these werewolves being trapped in The Deep Darkness beyond Talbot’s questions about it.  They did not have the same destiny.  Furthermore, Talbot’s travails in this novel join him with several mad scientists who would, in their respective films, create beings similar to The Wolf-Man and The Monster that never gain any mention in The Deep Darkness either.  Therefore, these three do have a specific fate to necessitate their presence up to a certain point.  It is provable, because the story does end with circumstances that satisfy whatever is keeping them there as they never reappear again despite incurring deaths that were tame compared to their previous ones.  Destiny leads him to Edelmann, (Dello Stritto, 317), the man ultimately responsible for finding a cure for Talbot´s condition.  Talbot is cured and The Monster and Dracula die once more, but that is still not enough to keep them retired.  Destiny and his own character arc demand Talbot find Edelmann, receive his cure, fall in love again, and kill a Dracula-corrupted Edelmann.  Around page three hundred comes a major turning point as the appearance of Dracula coincides with the reappearance of his “beast-self”, serving to obliterate the ideal life he had finally achieved.  Dracula seduces Talbot´s fiancee into one of his own Brides, and The Wolf-Man has to destroy her.  After that point, Talbot’s drive is not to live a human life but to end the unnatural life and legacy of Dracula.  This is Talbot’s ultimate fate, and it is his arc but also destiny that leads to this (Dello Stritto, 483).  Talbot’s experiences made him into a monster able to exact a deadly force, and his struggle against his impulses after revival made him a better man.  His evolution in romantic circumstances makes him able to court Miliza Morelle.  Losing her and the remains of his normal human life as a Talbot is essential for completing his destiny.  A werewolf with nothing left to lose and no more illusions about regaining humanity is Dracula’s most permanent nemesis.  Talbot understands and cooperates with the Wolf-Man inside himself in detecting Dracula’s victims through scents.  The text is demonstrating that Talbot has the required abilities for an ultimate destiny of ridding the world of evil.  Evidently, monsters can be used for good in the grand scheme of things.  Talbot had soliloquized about being “permitted to die” (Dello Stritto, 179), which reaches its natural conclusion when the Wolf-Man’s murder of Dracula appeared to end both permanently, as well as The Monster, who he rescues from Dracula’s influence.  Talbot could not find permanent peace from the monster inside of man through anything except joining with that monster to end the reign of the monster that exclusively preyed on mankind and rescuing The Monster that man made.  The text portrays a divine, predestination streak.  

The Monster in Frankenstein exists in an opposite sphere.  The novel more prevalently concerns itself with the debate of nature and nurture.  Whereas destiny had a role that nobody can define in the fall and redemption of Lawrence Talbot, in his travels, The Monster encounters situations where the nurture of people around him warps his nature.  This harkens back to the earlier proposed working definition for a monster that is fundamentally contingent upon the society viewing it.  Frankenstein´s Monster appears too large and grotesque to his European beholders.  They instinctively view him as a loathsome and lesser creature and pass fierce judgements.  This is similar to the novel Dracula, wherein the viewpoint characters, mostly contemporary Western Europeans or highly respected and scientifically minded people, pass a series of judgements and assumptions on the motivations of Dracula and his brides, their morality and on the natives to the community Harker travels through on his way to Dracula’s castle.   It is human nature but also highlights another nuance that the definition of strange is subject to all sorts of preexisting bias.  In that respect, the nature and nurture of The Monster take more meaning as a self-fulfilling prophecy.  The Monster learns beautiful and eloquent language skills from the blind man and also of the kindness of man among each other through the blind man’s family.  He introduces a nature to help people in need when he helps them, but they will not repay him with kindness and generosity when they can see him.  As aforementioned, people such as Felix and William view The Monster as vile and hideous and do not allow him to prove otherwise, first meeting him with violence and fear.  It is easy to understand why he then sinks into vile schemes.  Once again, The Monster’s primary motivation is still loneliness, and his hunt with his creator is mired in desire for that creator to accept him or create him someone who can.  Terrorizing Frankenstein´s life is all The Monster has and all anyone has allowed him to have in their society.  The predestination of The Monster is through human biases and actions, rather than some divine aim, but his final action allows him to somewhat escape the prewritten.

 Conclusion

 

            To conclude, Frankenstein and A Werewolf Remembers: The Testament Of Lawrence Stewart Talbot, challenge perceptions of the monster archetype through telling two similar stories comprising the birth, life and death of two famous monsters.  These texts examine a monster’s morality.  Though Talbot and The Monster are ultimately monsters and will not be able to function within the confines of human society without heavy casualties, they are still beings that have the capacity for growth and change and self-awareness and self-discovery and can accomplish good, or end bad, if they choose it.  Other monsters can show the other lane to that choice, a senseless, unprovoked and well thought out crime.  It is the same choice every human has; thus, it lends understanding to the notion of terrible people being monsters.  This is remarkably a rectangular relationship, for these novels also prove not every monster is a terrible man and that becoming a monster and redemption are not mutually exclusive terms.  Still, this analysis has left several persisting questions however.  In the event where monsters do not have to be the villains, in what place does that put man in their stories, especially in being responsible for The Monster and ambition?  Until the turning point near the end of the novel, Talbot considers the closest thing to a villain in his story to be Dr. Frank Mannering.  Mannering is the first of a few to propose a solution to cure Talbot of The Wolf-Man.  He is also the first of a few that Talbot recognizes the obsession start to form with reviving The Monster.  Doctors Niemann and Edelmann follow in this pursuit.  The latter ultimately debates with an assistant if humans have any responsibility to The Monster or to their fellow selves.  The obsession and fixation that seems to infect those doctors has some roots possibly in Frankenstein, where the title character has the same feeling toward his construction of The Monster.  What is interesting is that Walton too bears that toward his own exploits and that Frankenstein must tell him not to indulge his ambition.  Mannering also masters the secrets of eternal youth through Frankenstein’s notes rather than the destiny that Talbot has to die and return at intervals.  It would be warranted to compare Elizabeth Lavenza and Miliza Morelle, the respective main love interests for each book that suffer unpleasant ends and to compare also what they accomplish, as characters, beyond furthering the protagonists’ and antagonists’ characters and rivalry in their stories.  Another questionable consideration is how much Victor Frankenstein himself qualifies as a monster through sheer comparison to Talbot and his own monster, given several similarities in personality and lifestyle with Lawrence Talbot.  The open sexuality of Talbot´s book deserves analysis, as many monster books, especially the older ones, aim more for a celibate outlook or otherwise comment on restrictive sexuality.  Dracula, in particular, has an interesting exploration on its culture’s sexuality through Lucy and Mina that seem to contrast with Talbot´s experiences.

Works cited:

Dello Stritto, Frank J., A Werewolf Remembers: The Testament of Lawrence Stewart Talbot. Cult Movies Press, 644 East 7 1/2 Street, Houston, Texas 77007, 2017

Shelley, Mary, Frankenstein, 1831, London, Dover, 1994.

Stoker, Abraham, Dracula, 1897, London, Barnes & Noble Inc. 122 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10011, 2011.

Dictionary Project, Inc. A Student's Dictionary & Gazetteer, 21st edition ed., USA, 2013, p. 209.

--

Noonan's Sci-Fi Fun Club a great place for cult genre fans; a chat with its founder

 

Today, Plan9Crunch blogs is thrilled with the opportunity to interview Clark West, who runs the Noonan’s Sci-Fi Club Facebook page. Recently nominated for a Rondo Award, Noonan’s is just a fascinating, cerebral journey into all things fantasy and horror … and more. I’m addicted to it and love to share observations, clips, art, blog posts and more. Ed Wood, vintage horror, grindhouse, TV sci-fi, Godzilla and pals including Hedorah, I’m a frequent poster to Noonan’s. It’s just a great, valuable genre site, and we now talk with its founder, who lives in Osaka, Japan.

----

Plan9Crunch: Welcome Clark! You have this very interesting Facebook page that tackles some cult genres, and has a steady stream of followers and conversation. Tell us about your past, and how you developed an interest in these genres?

West: I got an early start. Really early! My older sisters and dad were Trekkies, so I cannot even remember the first time I saw STAR TREK, but I am fairly certain my first glimpse of the Gorn required a diaper change. My earliest memory of ANY movie was James Whale’s 1931 FRANKENSTEIN. I learned how to tell time because my sister Joy came home from school one day exclaiming how there was going to be a really awesome movie called KING KONG on at 8pm that night. I sat and watched the clock on the kitchen wall for what seemed hours, and very well could have been, waiting for the fat hand to reach eight and the long hand twelve! Shortly after that, my sister introduced me to Godzilla via the infamous NBC 60 minute broadcast of GODZILLA VS MEGALON, hosted by John Belushi in a Godzilla suit! That hooked me on not just Kaiju but ALL things Japanese. Anime, Kurosawa, Hello Kitty… you name it. Almost a half century later, here I am in Osaka, lamenting that I cannot, for at least now, watch THE TWILIGHT ZONE or DOCTOR WHO, the latter of which I was hooked on since I was a 5 year old, and I’ve been a TZ fanatic since I was seven, so why not devote my spare time to creating a Facebook Group celebrating all this stuff! I was born in Oklahoma but ran away as fast as I could.”

Plan9Crunch: What made you decide to take the social media plunge and create a Facebook page. How did your ideas for it develop?

West: All the peeps I refer to as the “Founding Noonans”, and I, belonged to a really fun Facebook Group more than half a decade ago called “The Science Fiction Multiverse.” (It was) really fun, except for the person who ran the group. One day the group’s “Overlord,” as he liked to call himself, had a meltdown and closed shop on our dear old “SFM.” So a few days later, Noonan’s Sci-Fi Fun Club was born. I didn’t do it all alone though. A super fan named Perry Williams, our senior admin, as it were, was a huge help, even rewriting the Group Intro into something more presentable. And Andrew Gaska, now an award-winning professional writer of roleplay games and various things, talked me out of calling the place “Richard’s Sci-Fi Fun Club”, telling me “You can’t have a more Sci-Fi name than Noonan!” I am forever in their debt! And I owe a debt to my late friend Richard Noonan, in whose memory the page was named.

Plan9Crunch: What drives you to think about new ideas, and how do you keep the enthusiasm to maintain an atmosphere where new ideas can be discussed?

West: Perry Williams clearly states in our Group Intro, “And Everything Else Geeks and Nerds Love.” So I take that as cart-blanche. Just about anything goes! From Silent Movies to Baby Sloths!  I often post about interesting things in Japan, and our Welsh Administrator often shares facts about his country. I really want Noonan’s Sci-Fi Fun Club to appeal to the Renaissance Nerd, the Anorak who is all over the place, the Otaku who does not where to curb their enthusiasm. Basically, people like me!

Plan9Crunch: You place an emphasis on hashtags. I try to make hashtags. I think it's an intriguing idea within the page. How do the hashtags increase the impact of the page?

West: The Hashtag idea was introduced to me by a former admin, David Cho, and I am forever in his debt! I was slow to pick up on the idea myself, but then I realized, it was genius! Especially if you come from a Message Board Background, the hashtags enable you to actually organize your Facebook Group’s content, making it easier to browse, and in my thinking, more conducive to the sort of fan scholarship I try to encourage in the group. The average Facebook Groups I am sad to say are ephemeral wastelands. Hashtags lend your post some immortality. It is a hard sell though. None of the Admins and Mods in Group understand the benefit. Except for our hashtag hero, Alex Pass! A new member Marcie Carpenter has also been a big help of late. I think the hashtags are FINALLY starting to catch on!

Plan9Crunch: Your Facebook page was nominated for a Rondo. That must have been gratifying. Who do you credit besides yourself for the nomination?

West: Just being nominated for a Rondo, that will always be worn by the group as a badge of honor! David Colton’s Classic Horror Film Board is what I am striving for with Noonan’s Sci-Fi Fun Club! That level of fun, yet serious, scholarly analysis, and discussion of the things we love. Who do I credit for the nomination? All the fantastic members of course! They are the ones who helped us come close to that goal this year!

Plan9Crunch: What new ideas are in the planning stage?

West: My wife is very insistent I make something called “money”, so now that I appear to have a recognizable brand name, even if to a limited crowd … expect Noonan’s Sci-Fi Fun Club, the Pod Cast, to come soon. I have also have been trying off and on to encourage members to create local, physical chapters of the Club. All of that was before Covid-19 hit. As the world recovers, or at least gets used to the new conditions, I plan to continue that push. We have an Osaka Chapter, with a Meet Up page and everything, but with only three members!.

Plan9Crunch: I think it's a great idea to have page followers vote occasionally. Although Noonan's Sci-Fi Fun Club encompasses many genres, what is your favorite cult genre?

West: I try to make everyone feel they have a voice! They too are playing a major part in the Group. So I usually put the bigger decisions up to a poll. I want everyone to feel included! I am not sure I can reveal my favorite cult genre though! Noonan’s Sci-FI Fun Club covers so many things precisely because I love so many things with a deep passion! I love the movies of Studio Ghibli founders Hayao Miyazaki and Issao Takahata. I consider Miyazaki the greatest living director of our times. I also have a huge soft spot for pre-code Hollywood, especially the Horror Movies and Comedies. I deeply love DOCTOR WHO, at least from the Hartnell era up to the end of David Tennant. I can’t wait to see what the returning Russell T Davis has in store for us next year. It really depends on my mood. I deeply love so many different things!

Plan9Crunch: Expound on the reason for the name of the page Noonan's Sci-Fi Fun Club?

West: Richard Noonan was a sweet, elderly man in the previously mentioned Science Fiction Multiverse. He got banned for posting too many “Off Topic” posts, and I led the charge to convince “The Overlord” to re-instate him as a member. He would send me video Christmas Cards of him singing “Amazing Grace” every year. With no near family, he spent his final few days after the heart attack in a hospice. I was text messaging with the kindly lady who sat vigil over him at the moment he died. I want Noonan’s Sci-Fi Fun club to be a tribute to him. (It’s) a place full of compassion, love, and understanding.

Plan9Crunch: It might be interesting to know the advantages and challenges, of following these cult genres living in Japan.

West: Since I am a pre-code Hollywood kind of guy, it hasn’t been too much of a problem. I trust the members to bring me news from the outside world! Here in Japan, we get the Marvel Movies the same date as their American releases, and Netflix and Amazon Prime have me fixed for TREK. I do miss DOCTOR WHO though. The show had a huge following amongst Japanese women for a while, the idea of a handsome foreigner taking you away on a life of travel appeals greatly to them. Sad to say the current Doctor, Jodie Whittaker, destroyed that fantasy. But Japan and the US are the same Blu-Ray region, so I just need to make money and buy American Blu-Rays of DOCTOR WHO and the Classic Horrors and Comedies I miss so! I have many pots on the fire. I’m doing various English lessons, working on starting my own English school, and of course, I want to launch Noonan’s Sci-Fi Fun Club: The Pod Cast! Perhaps then, I can interview you? Thank you so much for this opportunity!

Thank you very much. This was a fascinating interview. You have a unique, creative mind.

Dracula Never Dies a passionate, eloquent read, provides unique assessments of Bela Lugosi, Hollywood

Review by Doug Gibson

Picture this passage from author Christopher R. Gauthier's new novel, Dracula Never Dies: The Revenge of Bela Vorlock," (Arcane Shadows Press, 2021): 

Our protagonist, Vorlock, one-time horror film star, reduced to poverty row through two decades of abuse and betrayal by fellow actors, family members and media hacks -- who rival Ayn Rand's "Ellsworth M. Toohey" in evil -- believes he is to receive a peer appreciation award for his decades as "Dracula" and other roles.

It turns out to be an elaborate, cruel joke. At that last minute the award is snatched away and instead given to a well-fed, successful acting rival, one who has abused Vorlock, and his immediate family, personally. With much laughing and sniggering, the Toohey-like MC thrusts a jester's cap on Vorlock's head.

It is an indignity gone too far. But I don't want to give away too much of Gauthier's excellent novel, part one of a planned trilogy). 

---

I have a blurb on this edition's back cover, and I have read earlier versions of Chris' draft that total several hundred pages. Dracula Never Dies is nearly 300 pages. An appropriate one-sentence summary of the novel is an elegant primal scream of abuse, survival, more abuse, justice, and revenge. 

There are no chapter breaks once Dracula Never Dies gets going. The narrator describes a life -- with prose -- that moves from passion to emotion to anguish to anger to regret to survival to despair to grief to irony to love to hate to gothic horror to revenge to resignation, and to perhaps 20 other emotions.

In an Amazon review, Robert Cremer, biographer of Bela Lugosi (Lugosi: The Man Behind the Cape), notes how Hollywood, its dreams and schemes that can destroy dreams, contributes to the gothic horror of the novel. (Cremer also has a blurb on the back cover.)

Cremer also notes a plus to the novel, that genre fans will recognize many references to characters, and events from the times of Bela Lugosi. 

And, of course Dracula Never Dies' protagonist Bela Vorlock is Bela Lugosi. This is an alternate biography of Bela Lugosi existing in another multiverse, with much of the plot including Lugosi's times and life in our universe.

The plot -- and I wish to reveal very little of particulars, more for the reader to enjoy -- involves Vorlock's youthful escape from patriarchal tyranny, an interlude of happiness and love, a period of success in the entertainment world, and his efforts to endure and survive while suffering personal and professional setbacks/betrayals.

Gauthier's prose is magnificent. Expression is a key strength of his writing. Although their styles are different, Gauthier's word craftmanship reminds me of the satisfaction of reading a good novel from E. Annie Proulx, author of "The Shipping News" and "Brokeback Mountain." 

Dracula Never Dies' text demands to be read carefully. If it is glossed over the reader will get lost. Careful reading will provide a rewarding long, satisfying read. 

After finishing the final two score of pages (in which a character who Ed Wood and Lugosi fans will recognize is included) I am already eager to read the next installment of Gauthier's trilogy. Alas, it may be a while. I'll be patient. Dracula Never dies is priced relatively inexpensively. I hope I can add a Kindle version to the dead tree edition I own.

Ghostly Tales of Japan provide supernatural bedtime stories

Review and interview by Doug Gibson

Andi Brooks, who lives in Japan with his wife and son, is the co-author of "Vampire of London: Bela Lugosi in Britain," a book we’vereviewed in this blog. He also oversees the superb, The Bela Lugosi Blog. Andi has also been writing fiction for more than a generation and recently published “Ghostly Tales of  Japan,” (Kikui Press, 2020) an anthology of supernatural stories. (Purchase it here) He dedicates the book to his son, Yuine, which is appropriate because Andi created these stories as bedtime stories for Yuine.

The stories are anchored in Japanese culture and tradition. Most range between a couple to four minutes of reading time, perhaps a tad long in audio. The longest is about a 10-minute read. I am captivated by these tales, which from revenge horror to ghostly reunions that tug at your heart to moral tales, with abrupt, pithy endings in which an unforgiving or unpleasant protagonist gets his or her due.

The first story, “The Hunter’s Wife,” tells of a hunter lucky enough to kill a stag with his arrow. The doe with the stag escapes, but not before providing a piercing stare at her adversary. The hunter marries and has children before the doe reappears in his life in an ending so shocking it kept me awake the night I read it.

An interesting tale, almost fable- or parable-length, very short, “The Kindly Old Woman Who Wasn’t,” provides a very succinct commentary on how society offers prefer to remain away from truth so long as they are satisfied.

“The Ginkgo Tree and the Drunken House” is a captivating story of love surviving a mortal tragedy and the loved one’s unconventional resurrection.

My favorite story, the longest, is “The Homecoming,” a tale of an adult somehow finding his way back home to his long-dead parents to receive assurances and renewals of love he has long sought. One knows at the end that this visit will impact his remaining years

.

“The Story of Matsudo Hideyuki” had a Twilight Zone-type eeriness. It involves a man, out of place in the modern world, finally solidifying an existence in the past he craves to  be in.

As mentioned, the stories, there are 30, are steeped in Japanese history, traditions, religion and culture. Below this review is an interview with the author. The stories are very well-crafted and possess lyrical prose blessed with the author’s gentle intellect and knowledge. In spirit, if not necessarily style or subject matter, they remind me of “The Harafish,” by Naguib Mahfouz. Enjoy the interview with Brooks, who lives in Tokyo with his family, below.

---

Interview with Andi Brooks, author of Ghostly Tales of Japan

1) How long have you been writing short fiction? Was your interest sparked by Japanese life, history and culture, or was there an earlier genesis?

Brooks: I first attempted to write short fiction in 1992. I was laid off work with a very handsome payoff, which included six months paid leave and a contractual clause prohibiting me from taking another job during that period. With all of that time on my hands, I decided that I would try my hand at writing. The first story I wrote was an ecological sci-fi tale called The Visitor, which was miraculously published in an anthology. Although I remember the thrill of seeing the book on the shelves of a local bookstore at the time, I haven’t got the courage to reread the story now!

After this unexpected initial “success,” I threw myself into writing. The short stories I wrote at that time were all heavily derivative of 1950s sci-fi and were, probably quite rightly, all met with scathing rejections. My other rejections from this period included a radio play featuring a life-size cardboard cutout of Vincent Price as one of the main characters and a grade Z trashy sci-fi horror film script called The Butcher Girls, which got as far as scouting locations and actors before ending up on the scrapheap.

After that I restricted my writing to non-fiction. I contributed articles of varying merit on vintage films to various magazines in the UK and the U.S., which culminated in the Bela Lugosi biography “Vampire Over London: Bela Lugosi in Britain,” with Frank Dello Stritto.

I didn’t do any further writing until moving to Japan in 2006. At a creative loose end, I tried to fill the void by writing an unpublished volume of humorous poetry and some darkly humorous short stories heavily influenced by Vivian Stanshall’s “Rawlinson End” for my short-lived first blog.

I finally threw all of my energy into putting together The Bela Lugosi Blog for a few years until returning to my main passion of music. I reactivated my 1980s record label, promoted a monthly live event in Tokyo and produced my own music.

As recounted in the introduction to "Ghostly Tales of Japan," I started writing Japanese ghost stories completely by accident. My son and I had been really captivated by the world of the Japanese supernatural since catching an episode of the long-running supernatural animation series Ge! Ge! Ge! No Kitaro on TV shortly after arriving in Japan when he was three-years-old. Bedtime reading sessions alternated between Dr. Suess and the world of yūrei (Japanese ghosts) and yōkai (Japanese supernatural creatures). One night when he was around six, we read a story from Lafcadio Hearn’s “Kwaidan.” When he learned that it was the last one in the book, he asked me to tell him another story, so I made up what was to become the first story in “Ghostly Tales of Japan,” "The Hunter’s Wife." I made up more for him until he stopped requesting them.

I completely forgot about the stories until about three years ago when I visited a small historic pond in Tokyo called Muchi no Ike (commonly translated as the Pond of the Whip), which, legend has it, is inhabited by kappa, an amphibious supernatural creature of Japanese folklore. I didn’t see any of them, but the atmosphere inspired me to write a story, which in turn reignited my interest in the old stories I’d written for my son. When I reread them, I liked them sufficiently to decide to try to write enough stories for a collection. There were lots of stops and starts until last year when I threw all of my energy into the project.

2) You have a tremendous knowledge of the land you live in? How was this interest sparked? What resources did you utilize to learn this much?

Brooks: Most things in my life just seem to come out of the blue. Whenever someone hollers “Hey, let’s put on a show!” I always seem to be at the front of the queue. If I remember rightly, that’s how the Bela Lugosi biography came about. Frank phoned me up from America and said, ”Hey, lets write a book!” The thought had never occurred to me, but of course, I just said okay.

That same attitude led me to Japan. Until 1998, my knowledge of the country was pretty much restricted to Godzilla and documentaries about World War II. It was a place which didn’t really register in my consciousness.

That changed when I reluctantly went to a party in 1998. I started to chat with a stranger who was living in Japan at the time. The alcohol had clearly been flowing rather generously as she said, “Hey, why don’t you come over for a visit?” One month later I arrived in Japan for a month-long stay. Even though I thought it would be a one-off trip, when I returned home I began to study Japanese and to read classical Japanese literature, which often has a healthy dose of the supernatural, and histories of the country.

To be truthful, I would describe my knowledge of Japan, its culture and its history as selective, but I have always been fascinated by history and enjoyed research. Whenever I come across an interesting snippet or someone tells me something interesting, I jot it down in a notebook for possible use in a story. I often visit local museums and places of historical interest. Japan has lost an awful lot of its historical structures due to wars, natural disasters and the relentless march of progress, but everywhere there are signs and markers on the streets relating the history of the place. The ghosts of the past are on almost every street corner. My own garden has a statue of Jizō (the Japanese incarnation of the Buddhist deity Ksitigarbha Bodhisattva) which has supposedly been standing there for at least 400 years.

To be truthful, I often feel like the character in my story “The Story of Matsuda Hideyuki,” a man who lives in the present, but has one foot firmly planted in the past.

One thing which was very important to me when writing the stories was that they were all historically and culturally accurate. They may be works of fiction, but I tried to make the background settings and details as real as possible. I want to eventually have the book translated into Japanese, so I don’t want a Japanese reader to feel that they are not natural or to think that some aspect is impossible. I basically write two kinds of stories. They are either directly inspired by a place I have actually visited, such as Muchi no Ike in Tokyo or Nijo Castle in Kyoto, or inspired by historical or cultural knowledge I already have.

For the latter, I write the story first and then check that that it fits the historical and geographical context I have given it. For that, I consult either my own library or the Internet. Quite often the information I need exists only in Japanese, so my Japanese wife is very helpful in helping me to research sources which are beyond my ability to read or understand. One of the most difficult stories to square with reality was “A Pilgrim’s Tale.” I already knew about the ancient pilgrimage route upon which I set the story, but the lake by which the main events take place was of my own creation. I suppose it would have been okay to have a fictitious lake as the average reader would have no idea of the geography of the pilgrimage route, but it went against my desire to have each story 100 percent believable. It took quite a bit of searching before I could find a real lake which fit my own.

3) What is your son's favorite story/ies?

Brooks: Funnily, although the book is dedicated to him and without him it wouldn’t exist, he hasn’t read it yet! Some stories he remembers from when I read them to him when he was younger and others he knows because I discussed them with him. So, he feels as if he has already read it.

His feedback was very helpful during the writing process, especially for “The Story of Matsuda Hideyuki.” I was very unsure about the ending and actually had two versions. When I asked for his opinion, he choose the one which is in the book. I discussed the possibility of using the alternative, perhaps more subtle, ending in the forthcoming paperback version, but he was adamant that I shouldn’t change it.

4) Anything else you want to add? I am impressed with your pacing, the abrupt endings, either terror or moral story ending. The first story really grabbed me. It stays with me, the ending.

Brooks: I have very little faith in my ability as a writer. I know the story ideas are good, but writing does not come naturally to me. It’s an often painful process. All of the stories have undergone countless revisions. Whenever I thought they were finished, I would reread them and find so many flaws. I was never happy, but in the end I had to tell myself that enough was enough. I could have gone on revising them forever. Despite that, even when the proofreading was completed I found myself doing some tweaking. I suspect that I would still want to revise them if I sat down and reread them now.

The Japanese have a particular knack for reinvention. When Buddhism was introduced to Japan, the deities were given Japanese incarnations. Many Japanese legends and myths have a Chinese origin. You can find the same folktales retold throughout Japan with regional flavours added. There is a tradition of writers of each age rewriting and adapting stories for their own times. Popular kabuki plays were rewritten by subsequent generations of writers to keep them relevant for current audiences. Even a startlingly original story such as “Ring,” by Koji Suzuki follows the tradition of incorporating and updating already very well-known elements of folklore.

Anyone familiar with Japanese ghost stories will recognise the well, the long black hair and the white funeral garb as centuries-old staples of Japanese horror. To some extent, I have tried to do the same with my stories, to connect them both directly or indirectly to a recognised tradition to make them acceptable to a Japanese audience. To do this, I totally absorbed myself in written, pictorial and filmed adaptations of Japanese ghostly stories.

The abrupt moral story endings you mentioned were influenced by medieval Buddhist setsuwa, a teaching tool used by itinerant monks to illustrate the laws of karmic causality. The abrupt horrific endings are more akin to the sensational horror stories of the Edo era (1603-1868) a period when the telling of ghost stories as a popular entertainment came into its own. It is an effective format still popular in modern short storytelling. We will have to wait for the Japanese translation is completed to discover how successful, or not, I have been. 

The new Halloween movie – is it any good?

Review by Steve D. Stones

Is the new Halloween movie as good as the 1978 original? Will it become a great classic in time as the original? Perhaps only time can answer these questions. I feel that the new Halloween is not as good as its original, but it has plenty of knuckle-biting sequences to keep the viewer on the edge of their seat, particularly the last twenty minutes of the film. As I watched the film, I enjoyed picking out references from the first film and finding similarities in how scenes are shown.

References to the first two films can be found throughout this film. A mother carving a ham is hammered in the head by killer Michael Meyers as she is watching something on TV in the kitchen, in a scene very similar to one shown in the second film. A babysitter is also murdered and draped with a white ghost sheet – which gives reference to Meyers draping a ghost sheet over himself when he confronts actress P.J. Soles in an upstairs bedroom in the first film.

When Lori Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis) is thrown through an upstairs window by Meyers, her body is no longer laying on the ground when the camera cuts away from Meyers standing above her, which is similar to the first film when Dr. Loomis (Donald Pleasence) is looking out the upstairs window of the Meyers home after Meyers falls to the ground from multiple gunshots at the end.

The director is careful not to reveal the face of Meyers when he is questioned by an interviewer in an opening sequence. He is chained to a block, standing inside a painted square in the yard of a mental institution. Here we see a much older, graying Meyers, but his height and size still make him very imposing.

In the first film, the viewer is not shown how Meyers obtains his iconic mask. Sheriff Brackett simply tells his daughter at the scene of a hardware store burglary that someone stole some Halloween masks and tools from the store, so the viewer assumes that Meyers took the mask from the hardware store. In this new film, the viewer gets to see where Meyers obtains the iconic mask by taking it from the trunk of a car of two reporters who attempt to interview him at the mental institution.

What makes the first film so effective to me is that the violence is much more subtle, and often only implied. This new film uses techniques more appealing to the millennial generation by showing extreme, graphic violence in which the violence is drawn out for a much longer period of time in the scene, such as a gas station bathroom killing sequence near the beginning of the film.

The opening credits also show a similar type face design to the credits shown in the first film, which is a nice touch to the opening of the film. Instead of the camera slowly zooming in on a lit pumpkin as we see in the first Halloween, here we see the pumpkin slowly reshaping itself from being squished.

The new Halloween movie is well worth the price of admission, but only time will tell if it becomes the great classic of the original 1978 film. Happy Halloween!!

An interesting silent curio: The Haunted House from 1908

We came across this early silent short via YouTube. It's really quite impressive for a film made 105 years ago, directed by Segundo de Chomon. The stop-motion work, and other FXs, are particularly well done. It's only six minutes so enjoy. I wish there was music but it's still a treat. (Hat tip to The Monster Club on Facebook)

-- Doug Gibson