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Voodoo: A Chrestomathy of Necromancy
Collects eleven stories by Cornell Woolrich, Robert Bloch, Carl Jacobi, Henry S. Whitehead, and others.
- GenresAnthologies
295 pages, Hardcover
First published March 1, 1980
26 people want to read
About the author
Bill Pronzini
627 books235 followersMystery Writers of America Awards "Grand Master" 2008
Shamus Awards Best Novel winner (1999) for Boobytrap
Edgar Awards Best Novel nominee (1998) for A Wasteland of Strangers
Shamus Awards Best Novel nominee (1997) for Sentinels
Shamus Awards "The Eye" (Lifetime achievment award) 1987
Shamus Awards Best Novel winner (1982) for Hoodwink
Married to author Marcia Muller.
Pseudonyms:
Robert Hart Davis (collaboration with Jeffrey M. Wallmann)
Jack Foxx
William Jeffrey (collaboration with Jeffrey M. Wallmann)
Alex Saxon
Shamus Awards Best Novel winner (1999) for Boobytrap
Edgar Awards Best Novel nominee (1998) for A Wasteland of Strangers
Shamus Awards Best Novel nominee (1997) for Sentinels
Shamus Awards "The Eye" (Lifetime achievment award) 1987
Shamus Awards Best Novel winner (1982) for Hoodwink
Married to author Marcia Muller.
Pseudonyms:
Robert Hart Davis (collaboration with Jeffrey M. Wallmann)
Jack Foxx
William Jeffrey (collaboration with Jeffrey M. Wallmann)
Alex Saxon
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
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November 19, 2023PLACEHOLDER REVIEW:
“...Dead Men Working In The Cane Fields” by William Seabrook is a chapter of his book The Magic Island, which serves as his anthropological survey of the people, beliefs and practices of the island of Haiti (and thus are not "fictions" or "stories"). Specifically, it is the chapter on the belief in vodoun "zombies" and served to introduce the concept to the Western world. It's interesting because Seabrook is neither credulous nor overly critical and the chapter starts with his surprise at resistance from a learned man when the author lumps belief in the "walking dead" in with folklore and superstition of vampires, werewolves and demons. Which leads to a rather frank tale of why the man believes in the zombies, but perhaps not exactly in their backstory. Quite solid, it holds lots of interesting details which pique the imagination - the zombies as exploited workers (or a supernatural/religious reflection of slavery), the sense of sympathy which such beings evoke, how the central idea has transformed in our modern media, etc.
"Powers Of Darkness" by John Russell - Nickerson, representative of the Queen in Papua, New Guinea, has to contend with the disruptions caused by the crude, racist brute Dobel, operative for business interests, who is arrogant and dismissive to the natives and who demands to be shown some actual magic performed by the village's sorcerer... Because of colonialism, there are any number of "white men disbelieves native magic at his peril" stories - and most of them aren't very good (for my money, "Pollock and The Porroh Man" by H.G. Wells is one of the best), following a straightline narrative and often casually racist (while intending the opposite effect). This is not one of those. Russell (who also wrote the quite brilliant "The Fourth Man"), here attempts to unpack a loaded scenario of privilege and power dynamics (who is beholden to whom?) while illustrating one of the uglier sides of colonialism, and while asking "what is the real 'power of darkness?' I liked it.
“...Dead Men Working In The Cane Fields” by William Seabrook is a chapter of his book The Magic Island, which serves as his anthropological survey of the people, beliefs and practices of the island of Haiti (and thus are not "fictions" or "stories"). Specifically, it is the chapter on the belief in vodoun "zombies" and served to introduce the concept to the Western world. It's interesting because Seabrook is neither credulous nor overly critical and the chapter starts with his surprise at resistance from a learned man when the author lumps belief in the "walking dead" in with folklore and superstition of vampires, werewolves and demons. Which leads to a rather frank tale of why the man believes in the zombies, but perhaps not exactly in their backstory. Quite solid, it holds lots of interesting details which pique the imagination - the zombies as exploited workers (or a supernatural/religious reflection of slavery), the sense of sympathy which such beings evoke, how the central idea has transformed in our modern media, etc.
"Powers Of Darkness" by John Russell - Nickerson, representative of the Queen in Papua, New Guinea, has to contend with the disruptions caused by the crude, racist brute Dobel, operative for business interests, who is arrogant and dismissive to the natives and who demands to be shown some actual magic performed by the village's sorcerer... Because of colonialism, there are any number of "white men disbelieves native magic at his peril" stories - and most of them aren't very good (for my money, "Pollock and The Porroh Man" by H.G. Wells is one of the best), following a straightline narrative and often casually racist (while intending the opposite effect). This is not one of those. Russell (who also wrote the quite brilliant "The Fourth Man"), here attempts to unpack a loaded scenario of privilege and power dynamics (who is beholden to whom?) while illustrating one of the uglier sides of colonialism, and while asking "what is the real 'power of darkness?' I liked it.
July 26, 2011
I didn't think the stories were that bad; the thing that I didn't care for is they had a 'dated' quality about them (some of the stories having been written around 1910-30s), and the 'lingo' was difficult to read. Not bad, but not fantastic either. Just "eh".
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews