Orchard of the Dead and Other Macabre Tales

by Stefan Grabiński, Anthony Sciscione (Translator), Brian Evenson (Introduction)

A new collection of original translations by a legendary writer of weird fiction often compared to Poe and Lovecraft. In 'At Sarah's House', a man watches his friend wasting away before his eyes under the spell of a beautiful but deadly woman. In 'Burning Ground', a man defies local superstition with terrible consequences when he decides to build a home on a site where every previous dwelling has burned to the ground. The title story, 'Orchard of the Dead', tells of the otherworldly happenings at a children's graveyard full of trees laden with luscious fruit. And in the highlight of the collection, 'Szatera's Engrams', a stationmaster becomes obsessed with lingering echoes of a deadly train wreck and grows convinced that he knows a terrible means of bringing his beloved back from the other side. With thirteen tales that feature Stefan Grabinski's favorite themes of passion and death - some appearing in English for the first time - this volume will be welcomed by the author's long-time admirers as well as those seeking the perfect introduction to his work. This edition includes a new introduction by a modern-day master of the weird, Brian Evenson.

Genres: Horror, Short Stories

189 pages, Paperback

Published November 3, 2023

About the author

Stefan Grabiński (February 26, 1887 - November 12, 1936) was a Polish writer of horror fiction, sometimes called "the Polish Poe".

Grabiński worked as teacher in Lwów and Przemyśl and is famous for his train stories collected in Demon ruchu (The Motion Demon). A number of stories were translated by Miroslaw Lipinski into English and published as The Dark Domain. In addition, some of his work has been adapted to film, such as Szamota's Mistress.

Grabiński died of tuberculosis in 1936.

Reviews

[beach horrorreader · Rating 5 out of 5]

Gorgeous writing (and it’s translated to English!). Clever little stories sprinkled with cultural references that I enjoyed. Some of the tales are wrapped up too quickly- the twist or ending begins and ends in one or two sentences. Still, fantastic prose from a virtually unknown to the Western world writer.

[Andy Weston · Rating 4 out of 5]

Polish writer, Stefan Grabiński (1887-1936), born in Ukraine, began writing in 1906, with his first collection published three years later that included the title story here. This collection spans his writing career, until 1922. In his later years he was ill with tuberculosis, and died in poverty, with his writing largely forgotten.

He was first brought back to attention in Valancourt’s world horror collection, and now much more so, with this. This must go down as one of Valancourt’s greatest resdiscoveries.

There’s just a hint of the supernatural about his writing and more of a focus on the darkness of humankind, sickness and insanity, quite Poe-esque as several reviewers comment. It really is my sort of horror, with the horror content taking a firm second place to the mysteries of the human condition.
I’d single out two to comment more on, though the fourteen that make up the collection are consistently good.

The title story concerns gravedigger, Gregor, who has performed the service ever since a plague resulted in the death of almost all the children of his village, except his granddaughter, Magda. He maintains the graveyard with great care, planting fruit trees, which after some years produce an abundant harvest, though they are not to be eaten, as they belong to the dead, he tells Magda.

And The Parable of the Tunnel Mole which tells of Florek, who is the last in his family and forebears whose job it is to manage workers of the tunnel under the Gorce Mountains. He rarely spends anytime above ground and eschews the sun. One day he becomes aware of some who are even more dedicated to the darkness than him.

[Jesse · Rating 3 out of 5]

I thought when I bought this collection that it was contemporary, mostly because I didn't read Valancourt's description very carefully, but in fact these stories were written in the 1910s and 20s, and they feel very much of that period, but more in the line of, say, Kafka and Bruno Schulz than Lovecraft and his cohorts, even though Grabinski and HPL are almost exact contemporaries--there's a lot of metaphysical wrestling with modernity, with trains and cities, as well as what feel like feudal leftovers, with a good number of nobles of various stripes, a few manor houses, and some huts in fields, and at least one gypsy's curse. So, a mirror, given what I imagine of Poland at the time, poised on the brink of cosmopolitanism in the cities but still rife with rural backwaters and peasant intellectual worlds unchanged for several hundred years. A lot of the stories feel incipiently Freudian, concerned in some way with the ranges and impacts of desire and often featuring a budding teenage girl in whose wake destruction follows. (And also, to be fair, several middle-aged bourgeois coping not very well with the same afflictions.) The Marshall Berman "all that is solid melts into air" point about the subjective experience of modernity holds as well, with multiple characters on the edge of dissolution, sometimes psychologically and sometimes literally and sometimes both. These read less like "horror" as a genre and more like the classic Blackwood/Dunsany weird tale--but with a modern psychological edge that dances on the line between natural and un-.

[Vultural · Rating 4 out of 5]

Grabinski, Stefan - Orchard Of The Dead

First encounter with this author. Spectral tales, ghost sightings, haunted locations, and sexual bouts that go awry. So, a of loose morals.

“At Sarah’s House” combines two of these themes, the unearthly and the erotic. After Wladek fails to aid a friend, wasting away toward death, he is soon drawn to the widow. A gorgeous, exotic creature, fragrant with an overpowering scent of desire.

The piece of land had a long, troubled history. Buildings erected there, burned down. Nevertheless, the location was fantastic! And outsiders, newcomers, never believed in old wives nonsense about the “Burning Ground”.

“Orchard Of The Dead” proves a gentle change. Set in the cemetery – children’s cemetery – where fruit trees flourish. Villagers dare not eat the fruit, though, for fear of where the tree roots tap.

As if from old habit, station master Szaten still walks from Ziklicz to Kniejow every night after his shift concludes. The latter station was long dismantled, yet Szaten has fond memories that he cherishes more than the day to day. “Szaten’s Engrams” is a haunting finish about the power of memory, the sadness of fading memories, and the lengths some will go to preserve memories.

[Alex Budris · Rating 3 out of 5]

"... where the weather becomes cloudy, contours blur, and the world is taken over by the kingdom of darkness."

I'm glad to see that this guy's tales are steadily becoming more available to English speaking readers. The Stefan Grabinski "Masters of the Weird Tale" from Centipede Press is a great starting point for this author, but if you know anything about MotWT books, you'll know they are hardly accessible. (I own two, they are absolute beauties, but I don't know if I'll ever have a third.) The present collection from Valancourt remedies that with fourteen tales - not overlapping with the Centipede book - in an affordable TPB.

Grabinski likes fire. Grabinski likes trains. His characters are often wounded - and ultimately destroyed by - yearning and nostalgia. Terribly, beautifully haunted; violently, sometimes. They are no strangers to sex, and can be obsessive, neurotic.

I would say that every weird fiction library should house at least one Grabinski book. This one is worth your time.

[Rafal Gluchowski · Rating 4 out of 5]

I adore Stefan Grabinski, and put him fast aside Poe and Lovecraft, but - pls, believe me - this selection of short stories doesnt' do him justice. There is a lot of mediocre, immature half-baked tales, and only few of them are his best. If you read's - start with At Sarah's House (sexy, dark and discreetly vampiric, with slight hint of "The Hunger" movie), than go to "Red Magda" (firestarter-ish), "Burning Ground" (pyromaniac obsession with "The Shining" finale, than go to very weird "Before a Long Journey" and finish with brilliant "On the Trail" (remember "Angel Heart"?).
Rest is of minor importance &quality though.

[Remi VL · Rating 2 out of 5]

Some of the stories were ok, but I was mostly bored and almost DNF. Seems like a lot of half thought out ideas for stories with no real endgame or message of any kind.

[Tammie Koning · Rating 1 out of 5]

Officially done reading macabre
This was beyond boring

[elderfoil...the whatever champion · Rating 4 out of 5]

Favorite stories:

Parable of the Tunnel Mole
A Night's Lodging