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The Great God Pan, The White People, and Other Stories
“The Great God Pan, The White People, and Other Stories” is a collection of nineteen short stories and novellas by Arthur Machen. The Welsh author, journalist, actor, and mystic, was well-known for his early influential horror and supernatural fantasy tales published in the late 19th and early 20th century. Included in this collection are some of his most enduring and famous works, such as the novella “The Great God Pan”, first published in 1890. Considered one of the best horror stories in English literature, the tale of Helen Vaughn and the mystery and violence that surrounded her life was met with much controversy and acclaim when it first appeared for its taboo subject matter and suggestive imagery. Also included are such classics as “The Bowmen”, his 1914 tale of ghosts helping British soldiers at the Battle of Mons that was widely believed by many at the time to be a true story of otherworldly intervention. Machen’s imaginative and spell-binding tales continue to entertain and inspire generations of readers and writers who enjoy well-crafted tales of suspense and supernatural fantasy. This edition is printed on premium acid-free paper.
446 pages, Paperback
Published June 3, 2020
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About the author
Arthur Machen
1,112 books1,004 followersArthur Machen was a leading Welsh author of the 1890s. He is best known for his influential supernatural, fantasy, and horror fiction. His long story The Great God Pan made him famous and controversial in his lifetime, but The Hill of Dreams is generally considered his masterpiece. He also is well known for his leading role in creating the legend of the Angels of Mons.
At the age of eleven, Machen boarded at Hereford Cathedral School, where he received an excellent classical education. Family poverty ruled out attendance at university, and Machen was sent to London, where he sat exams to attend medical school but failed to get in. Machen, however, showed literary promise, publishing in 1881 a long poem "Eleusinia" on the subject of the Eleusinian Mysteries. Returning to London, he lived in relative poverty, attempting to work as a journalist, as a publisher's clerk, and as a children's tutor while writing in the evening and going on long rambling walks across London.
In 1884 he published his second work, the pastiche The Anatomy of Tobacco, and secured work with the publisher and bookseller George Redway as a cataloguer and magazine editor. This led to further work as a translator from French, translating the Heptameron of Marguerite de Navarre, Le Moyen de Parvenir (Fantastic Tales) of Béroalde de Verville, and the Memoirs of Casanova. Machen's translations in a spirited English style became standard ones for many years.
Around 1890 Machen began to publish in literary magazines, writing stories influenced by the works of Robert Louis Stevenson, some of which used gothic or fantastic themes. This led to his first major success, The Great God Pan. It was published in 1894 by John Lane in the noted Keynotes Series, which was part of the growing aesthetic movement of the time. Machen's story was widely denounced for its sexual and horrific content and subsequently sold well, going into a second edition.
Machen next produced The Three Impostors, a novel composed of a number of interwoven tales, in 1895. The novel and the stories within it were eventually to be regarded as among Machen's best works. However, following the scandal surrounding Oscar Wilde later that year, Machen's association with works of decadent horror made it difficult for him to find a publisher for new works. Thus, though he would write some of his greatest works over the next few years, some were published much later. These included The Hill of Dreams, Hieroglyphics, A Fragment of Life, the story The White People, and the stories which make up Ornaments in Jade.
At the age of eleven, Machen boarded at Hereford Cathedral School, where he received an excellent classical education. Family poverty ruled out attendance at university, and Machen was sent to London, where he sat exams to attend medical school but failed to get in. Machen, however, showed literary promise, publishing in 1881 a long poem "Eleusinia" on the subject of the Eleusinian Mysteries. Returning to London, he lived in relative poverty, attempting to work as a journalist, as a publisher's clerk, and as a children's tutor while writing in the evening and going on long rambling walks across London.
In 1884 he published his second work, the pastiche The Anatomy of Tobacco, and secured work with the publisher and bookseller George Redway as a cataloguer and magazine editor. This led to further work as a translator from French, translating the Heptameron of Marguerite de Navarre, Le Moyen de Parvenir (Fantastic Tales) of Béroalde de Verville, and the Memoirs of Casanova. Machen's translations in a spirited English style became standard ones for many years.
Around 1890 Machen began to publish in literary magazines, writing stories influenced by the works of Robert Louis Stevenson, some of which used gothic or fantastic themes. This led to his first major success, The Great God Pan. It was published in 1894 by John Lane in the noted Keynotes Series, which was part of the growing aesthetic movement of the time. Machen's story was widely denounced for its sexual and horrific content and subsequently sold well, going into a second edition.
Machen next produced The Three Impostors, a novel composed of a number of interwoven tales, in 1895. The novel and the stories within it were eventually to be regarded as among Machen's best works. However, following the scandal surrounding Oscar Wilde later that year, Machen's association with works of decadent horror made it difficult for him to find a publisher for new works. Thus, though he would write some of his greatest works over the next few years, some were published much later. These included The Hill of Dreams, Hieroglyphics, A Fragment of Life, the story The White People, and the stories which make up Ornaments in Jade.
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
January 15, 2025
Having gone from not knowing who Arthur Machen was to reading this hefty collection of short stories and novellas, I can confidently say I understand why he is not more widely known. There are elements that work in his stories. The subtlety of supernatural elements makes his narratives more horrific and believable than the melodrama of Poe, but...
Machen's earlier work, especially the Dyson stories, are too wordy, rely too heavily on dialogue, provide little context, and the framing of a story within a story tends to be confusing and frustrating to deal with after reading two or three. It's difficult to distinguish characters from one another since they are all written essentially as clones of each other; well-bred Englishmen with little to do but make exclamations about the strange events they observe. Women are not characters in Machen's works so much as they are objects, and when they do act as characters, they are indistinguishable from their white knights.
Still, I enjoyed a few of these stories. The Lost Club, The Great God Pan, and A Fragment of Life were stand outs for me. Still early works, but by the time I got to the later stories in this collection, it took everything in me just to skim over them and decide that I should perhaps try them on audio one day.
Machen's earlier work, especially the Dyson stories, are too wordy, rely too heavily on dialogue, provide little context, and the framing of a story within a story tends to be confusing and frustrating to deal with after reading two or three. It's difficult to distinguish characters from one another since they are all written essentially as clones of each other; well-bred Englishmen with little to do but make exclamations about the strange events they observe. Women are not characters in Machen's works so much as they are objects, and when they do act as characters, they are indistinguishable from their white knights.
Still, I enjoyed a few of these stories. The Lost Club, The Great God Pan, and A Fragment of Life were stand outs for me. Still early works, but by the time I got to the later stories in this collection, it took everything in me just to skim over them and decide that I should perhaps try them on audio one day.
October 24, 2025
"Clarke, in the deep folds of dream, was conscious that the path from his father's house had led him into an undiscovered country, and he was wondering at the strangeness of it all, when suddenly, in place of the hum and murmur of the summer, an infinite silence seemed to fall on all things, and the wood was hushed, and for a moment in time he stood face to face there with a presence, that was neither man nor beast, neither the living nor the dead, but all things mingled, the form of all things but devoid of all form. And in that moment, the sacrament of body and soul was dissolved, and a voice seemed to cry 'Let us go hence,' and then the darkness of darkness beyond the stars, the darkness of everlasting."
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October 12, 2021Alchemy and fae folk seep back into the consciousness of 19th century London. The result is madness and the reclamation of nature over modern society. Loved this entire collection and was pleasantly surprised at Machen's work being more subtle magical realism than 19th century horror a la Poe.
One biographical note that I think help set the mood for this collection -- when Machen was a child he would visit Wales and meditate on an old Roman set of ruins that was built atop an existing set of Druid/Celtic ruins. The imagery infected his mind in a way that created his oeuvre of short stories.
One biographical note that I think help set the mood for this collection -- when Machen was a child he would visit Wales and meditate on an old Roman set of ruins that was built atop an existing set of Druid/Celtic ruins. The imagery infected his mind in a way that created his oeuvre of short stories.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews