La mano muerta

by Wilkie Collins

La historia de las desventuras que aguardan al viajero que pasa la noche en una hostería es el núcleo de La mano muerta, que merece ser considerado como uno de los antecesores del célebre Psycho. Una serie de relatos donde Collins demuestra un notable talento: su capacidad para jugar con los géneros narrativos populares. En sus manos, el cuento gótico de terror y los relatos de fantasmas se convierten en inteligentes ejercicios, teñidos de ironía y sutil humor.

Genres: Short Stories, Horror, British Literature

155 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1856

About the author

Wilkie Collins was an English novelist and playwright, best known for The Woman in White (1860), an early sensation novel, and The Moonstone (1868), a pioneering work of detective fiction. Born to landscape painter William Collins and Harriet Geddes, he spent part of his childhood in Italy and France, learning both languages. Initially working as a tea merchant, he later studied law, though he never practiced. His literary career began with Antonina (1850), and a meeting with Charles Dickens in 1851 proved pivotal. The two became close friends and collaborators, with Collins contributing to Dickens' journals and co-writing dramatic works.
Collins' success peaked in the 1860s with novels that combined suspense with social critique, including No Name (1862), Armadale (1864), and The Moonstone, which established key elements of the modern detective story. His personal life was unconventional—he openly opposed marriage and lived with Caroline Graves and her daughter for much of his life, while also maintaining a separate relationship with Martha Rudd, with whom he had three children.
Plagued by gout, Collins became addicted to laudanum, which affected both his health and later works. Despite declining quality in his writing, he remained a respected figure, mentoring younger authors and advocating for writers' rights. He died in 1889 and was buried in Kensal Green Cemetery. His legacy endures through his influential novels, which laid the groundwork for both sensation fiction and detective literature.

Reviews

[Fernando · Rating 4 out of 5]

“El cuento ofrece ventajas peculiares que la novela no admite. Es, por supuesto, un terreno mucho mejor que el ensayo. Incluso, tiene puntos en los que supera a un poema. Un artista con habilidad literaria construye un cuento. Si es sensato, no ha moldeado sus pensamientos para acomodar los incidentes, recién combina los acontecimientos que mas le convenga para lograr el efecto preconcebido. En toda la composición no debe haber una sola palabra escrita cuya tendencia, directa o indirecta, no sea la establecida por el plan inicial. Y de esa manera, con mucho cuidado y habilidad, finalmente se completa una pintura que deja en la mente de quien la contemple una sensación de plena satisfacción. La idea del cuento ha sido presentada sin macula porque no ha sido perturbada." - Edgar Allan Poe

Las palabras de Edgar Allan Poe, creador del cuento moderno tal cual lo conocemos son las más indicadas para definir los relatos contenidos en este libro de Wilkie Collins y ello se debe a que este gran autor es un fiel y digno sucesor del maestro estadunidense.
Wilkie Colllins es más reconocido por sus novelas, especialmente "La dama de blanco" y "La piedra lunar", verdaderas joyas literarias del suspenso y de excelente corte policial, género que casualmente fue instaurado por Poe.
De todas maneras, este autor publicó más de cincuenta cuentos y debo reconocer que algunos son realmente muy bien logrados, puesto que conservan la estructura propuestas por Poe para mantener el misterio de la trama hasta que hace eclosión en el final que en más de una oportunidad es sorprendente.
Naturalmente y como es normal en un selección de cuentos, no todos me han agradado de la misma manera. Más allá de las preferencias, debo recalcar que los cuentos "¿Quién mató a Zebedee?", "La Dama del sueño", "Una cama sumamente rara" y "¡Volar con el bergantín!" son lejos los mejores del libro.
Todos se componen de ese elemento que obligan al lector a llegar al final para develar el misterio. Otra característica soprendente de Wilkie Collins era la manera que tenía de manejar los elementos supuestamente sobrenaturales sin necesidad de convertir al relato en un cuento fantástico. Esto sucede propiamente en el cuento "La dama de sueño" en "La mano muerta".
La construcción de estas historias se asemejan más a Guy de Maupassant o a Sheridan Le Fanu, quienes eran también verdaderos maestros de género.
En lo que remite a Poe me quedo con el cuento "¡Volar con el bergantín!" porque me recordó directamente a uno de los mejores de sus cuentos, me refiero a "El pozo y el péndulo", dado que el suspense y desesperación que le imprime al personaje principal es el mismo y logra un efecto parecido al final del cuento, con la diferencia que el de Collins tiene un final un tanto más abrupto que el de Poe.
De todas maneras, Wilkie Collins es un escritor al que no había leído pero del que me pondré en campaña para seguir leyendo, puntualmente su novela "La piedra lunar". Me ha hecho disfrutar nuevamente cuentos de esta naturaleza a los que hace mucho no leía.
Por eso, debo decirle: ¡Gracias, Wilkie!

[Laura · Rating 3 out of 5]

From BBC Radio 4 Extra:
"When he looked at the bed now, he saw hanging over the side of it a long, white hand."

When Arthur visits Doncaster during race week, he's obliged to share a hotel room with a stranger.

A tale of mystery by Wilkie Collins - adapted by Michael Bakewell

Read by Peter Marinker

Producer: Rosemary Hart

First broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in 1989.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/radio/play/b007...

[Sasha · Rating 2 out of 5]

Libro compuesto de 4 relatos:
La mujer ensueño (2★)
La confesión del Pastor anglicano (2★)
La mano muerta (2 ★)
Monkton el loco (4★)

No soy propensa a que me gusten los libros de relatos, suelo olvidarme de ellos con facilidad, y probablemente sea el ultimo relato "Monkton el loco" el que más me ha gustado, porque ha sido el que tenia mas paginas y el que tengo más reciente.

A pesar de todo, tengo unas ganas ENORMES de leer las novelas de Wilkie Collins, los relatos no me llenan bastante pero me han dejado un buen sabor de boca, no dudo de su capacidad para escribir un buen libro porque sin duda tenia una facilidad inmensa en la narración.

[Daniy ♠ · Rating 4 out of 5]

Book 14 of 30 days Challenge (2)

Such a good short story, Collins is becoming a fave author so fast

[Laura Virginia · Rating 4 out of 5]

Cuatro relatos cortos con una buena dosis de intriga y suspenso para pasar el rato.

[Classic reverie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wilkie Collin's "The Dead Hand" would have been a good story for old time radio and might be and I will keep my ears out. This is another favorite of mine from "The Queen of Hearts", it is truly sad on many levels but it also is a story of strength and perseverance. Brother Morgan who tells the story is a doctor and personal knowledge of the events.

Story in short- A young man rents a room for the night with a dead man as a roommate.


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“Before my brother begins,” I said, “it may be as well to mention that he is himself the doctor who is supposed to relate this narrative. The events happened at a time of his life when he had left London, and had established himself in medical practice in one of our large northern towns.”
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BROTHER MORGAN’S STORY of THE DEAD HAND
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WHEN this present nineteenth century was younger by a good many years than it is now, a certain friend of mine, named Arthur Holliday, happened to arrive in the town of Doncaster exactly in the middle of the race- week, or, in other words, in the middle of the month of September. He was one of those reckless, rattle-pated, open-hearted, and open-mouthed
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mouthed young gentlemen who possess the gift of familiarity in its highest perfection, and who scramble carelessly along the journey of life, making friends, as the phrase is, wherever they go. His father was a rich manufacturer, and had bought landed property enough in one of the midland counties to make all the born squires in his neighborhood thoroughly envious of him. Arthur was his only son, possessor in prospect of the great estate and the great business after his father’s death; well supplied
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with money, and not too rigidly looked after during his father’s lifetime. Report, or scandal, whichever you please, said that the old gentleman had been rather wild in his youthful days, and that, unlike most parents, he was not disposed to be violently indignant when he found that his son took after him. This may be true or not. I myself only knew the elder Mr. Holliday when he was getting on in years, and then he was as quiet and as respectable a gentleman as ever I met with.

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Arthur Holliday is rich and has taken into wild youthful ways as his father had been in the past. He decides to go to Doncaster for the races but he is unable to find rooms though he is very wealthy, until he comes to "The Two Robins" and hears a man refusing to take a room offered. Arthur found out the reason for the other man not wanting it was because the bed was to be shared and being told the man was extremely quiet, he gives the owner his money but when he is shown the room, it is evident the man on the bed is dead. The owner warned him without telling about his death, and refused to give the money back. Arthur being young and proud says he will stay but really too ashamed to leave. The dead man died the evening before and is waiting the inquest. Arthur cannot sleep and sees the dead man's hand move so he calls the owner who calls in the doctor, who happens to be Morgan, who revives the man but the mystery around his illness unsolved. The man is thankful but seems to be taken back when Arthur mentions that his father will help the man who is a young doctor find a place but the mention of the name Holliday, Morgan saw the sick man's pulse change. Arthur shows a painting that is noticed by the man which was painted by a young lady he loves but who is engaged to a poor man. The young doctor is taken back and told Arthur he might be able to marry her if things fell through. Arthur and Morgan leave for the night at a friend's house with a servant looking after the man. Morgan feels these two young men should not meet again because he thinks that this young doctor who told them he had no father and the conversation lead for Morgan to believe they are brothers. The father had his wild days and this must have been one of the results from his carelessness. Morgan returns to the inn and finds the young doctor gone. A year later Arthur marries the young lady who decided to marry him after all. She dies years later from an illness and having been friendly with Morgan tells him of the man she first love who was a doctor and studied abroad. It seems clear that it was the same man from long ago. Arthur remarried years later and they lost touch but Morgan thinks the same young doctor from years ago applies to be his assistant but questions asked him are never answered but the feeling is too strong. I see how things might turn out badly if Arthur found out this was his brother and the lady he loves was his half brother's fiance but I think it would have been better if it came out in the open. I think that the young doctor could finally have his name and that the father might have embraced the young doctor now. The young lady would have married her first love but Arthur could have found another love. It seems that on her death bed she thought of her lost love who she broke of the engagement, never hearing from him again. The young doctor was someone to be proud of and his making his own way without troubling his so called father and giving up his love to another was indeed noble, though I would have liked it differently.


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Well, one September, as I told you, young Arthur comes to Doncaster, having decided all of a sudden, in his hare-brained way, that he would go to the races. He did not reach the town till toward the close of evening, and he went at once to see about his dinner and bed at the principal hotel. Dinner they were ready enough to give him, but as for a bed, they laughed when he mentioned it. In the race-week at Doncaster it is no uncommon thing for visitors who have not bespoken apartments to pass the
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night in their carriages at the inn doors. As for the lower sort of strangers, I myself have often seen them, at that full time, sleeping out on the doorsteps for want of a covered place to creep under. Rich as he was, Arthur’s chance of getting a night’s lodging (seeing that he had not written beforehand to secure one) was more than doubtful. He tried the second hotel, and the third hotel, and two of the inferior inns after that, and was met everywhere with the same form of answer. No accommodation for the night of any
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sort was left. All the bright golden sovereigns in his pocket would not buy him a bed at Doncaster in the race- week. To a young fellow of Arthur’s temperament, the novelty of being turned away into the street like a penniless vagabond, at every house where he asked for a lodging, presented itself in the light of a new and highly amusing piece of experience. He went on with his carpet-bag in his hand, applying for a bed at every place of entertainment for travelers that he could find in Doncaster, until he wandered into the outskirts of the town. By this time the last glimmer of twilight had faded out, the moon was rising dimly in a mist, the wind was getting cold, the clouds were gathering heavily, and there was every prospect that it was soon going to rain! The look of the night had rather a lowering effect on young Holliday’s spirits. He began to contemplate the houseless situation in which he was placed from the serious rather than the humorous point of view, and he
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looked about him for another public house to inquire at with something very like downright anxiety in his mind on the subject of a lodging for the night. The suburban part of the town toward which he had now strayed was hardly lighted at all, and he could see nothing of the houses as he passed them, except that they got progressively smaller and dirtier the further he went. Down the winding road before him shone the dull gleam of an oil lamp, the one faint lonely light that struggled ineffectually with the foggy
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darkness all round him. He resolved to go on as far as this lamp, and then, if it showed him nothing in the shape of an inn, to return to the central part of the town, and to try if he could not at least secure a chair to sit down on through the night at one of the principal hotels. As he got near the lamp he heard voices, and, walking close under it, found that it lighted the entrance to a narrow court, on the wall of which was painted a long hand in faded flesh-color, pointing, with a lean forefinger, to this inscription:
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THE TWO ROBINS. Arthur turned into the court without hesitation to see what The Two Robins could do for him. Four or five men were standing together round the door of the house, which was at the bottom of the court, facing the entrance from the street. The men were all listening to one other man, better dressed than the rest, who was telling his audience something, in a low voice, in which they were apparently very much interested.
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On entering the passage, Arthur was passed by a stranger with a knapsack in his hand, who was evidently leaving the house. “No,” said the traveler with the knapsack, turning round and addressing himself cheerfully to a fat, sly-looking, bald-headed man, with a dirty white apron on, who had followed him down the passage, “no, Mr. Landlord, I am not easily scared by trifles; but I don’t mind confessing that I can’t quite stand that.” It occurred to young Holliday, the moment he heard these words, that

[Bill Jenkins · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Dead Hand is a retread of one of the stories found in Wilkie Collins' novel The Queen of Hearts. This is one of the ten stories one of the brothers tells Jessie Yelverton (probably the doctor). It's a good story but I can't remember how the story ends in The Queen of Hearts but I believe it's different. The description of the hand and everything leading up to the ending however is exactly the same.

[Beckiezra · Rating 3 out of 5]

Things that were probably pretty salacious 150 years ago aren’t really that exciting today. I expected something supernatural with the “dead” man, instead we got a lot unanswered questions about a medical student who was mistakenly thought dead and his wealthy happy go lucky temporary roommate. If this sort of thing happened often no wonder people wanted to be buried with a string to ring a bell…

[Carolina Búho · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5/5

[Bill Graf · Rating 4 out of 5]

Love Wilkie, but this one strikes me as - Not Quite Sensational -

[Lil · Rating 4 out of 5]

audio

[Tom · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.25⭐

[ray (Warner's version) · Rating 4 out of 5]

Creepy and kinda funny

[Forked Radish · Rating 3 out of 5]

Dead men tell no tales, which is what makes them such pleasant roommates.

[Arimi Reads · Rating 3 out of 5]

If you're dead, you can't tell the story; which means- the ghostly goings on just remain that- a permanent mystery.

[Phil Syphe · Rating 3 out of 5]

"The Dead Hand" is a decent short story, though not a true horror tale as the title implies.

It features some creepy moments when a young man, who's away from home and is caught out in the rain, excepts the only vacant room around, only to discover that it's not exactly vacant. Wilkie Collins does a good job here of showing the man's discomfiture of trying bed down for the night with a corpse lying nearby.

Things aren't what they seem, however, and at length the creepiness vanishes and is replaced with a sense of mystery. The story lost much of its hold on me from this point.

[Vel Veeter]

This is a collection of shorter pieces by Wilkie Collins, author of The Woman in White and The Moonstone. I recently read his early novella A Rogue’s Life. These stories are for the most part from the same era as that novella.

The lead story here is “The Dead Hand” and at first I thought it was going to be a kind of cheap thrill of a story. A man goes to a hotel off the main road and is offered a solid, if suspicious, deal on a bed for the night. As he inspects the room, there’s another man asleep in the bed in the room already, and I quickly was like “ok, the dude is going to be dead” and he was. But that was merely the setup of the longer story. This man then gets brought back to life by a doctor friend and the focus of the story is not the horror of the original conceit but the followthrough life and times of the original man, the resurrected man, and doctor who performs it.

In the other primary story, “Who Killed Zebede?”, we are presented with the titular question, as you might have guessed, and are treated to an early example of a detective story. Poe of course is credited in his own way for the fullest early realization of the detective story, but as is the case in The Moonstone, Wilkie Collins is also an early adopter of that story. This one sets the tone for many to come, including the invocation of the audience to way in on the guilty party through the narrator’s storytelling.

The other stories are also fine, but less leaving of an impression.

[LimesRickie · Rating 5 out of 5]

At one point it was getting so scary .. that I just couldn't stand it .. so I skipped ahead. lol.

[Benjamin Stahl · Rating 2 out of 5]

Could have been better. Very similar to A Watcher by the Dead by Bierce.

[Becci · Rating 2 out of 5]

started out suspenseful and then turned vague

[Vani]

Listened to the audiobook via BBC Radio. Started out well with descriptions of the dead man faintly reminiscent of The Tell-Tale Heart by Edgar Allen Poe. Halfway through, I felt like the author lost the plot. Spoiler.......

The "dead man" woke up, turns out he's possibly an illegitimate child of the main protagonist's father. Grateful for being saved, he (possibly) forsakes the woman he's promised to marry because his brother is in love with her too. Years later, someone who looks a lot like him (according to the narrator) joins the medical practice of the narrator as an assistant. The conclusions the narrators make depend on his interpretation of the expressions and words of the "dead man". He may or may not be correct but nothing is ever confirmed.