Weird Fiction discussion

For April 2023 we as a group, all 294 of us, have committed to read The Beetle by Richard Marsh. I thusly create this topic for discussion of said masterpiece.

Let us start reading this book on April 1, or within days afterwards. Until then, welcome would be any sharings of knowledge regarding this author, of whom I have never before previously heard. Without getting into story particulars yet, I also wonder if any of us know about this book in general, its printing, its reception, if it spawned any good films I can catch on Netflix, etc. Good thing there is a Wikipedia page for that, right?

I read this a few years ago so I'll be rereading it since it's short-and weird.

Gutenberg lists no fewer than 23 different fiction works by Richard Marsh available for free reading: https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/auth... That's certainly more prolific than Bram Stoker, the author Marsh is invariably compared to, who has but 10: https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/auth....

I had never heard of Richard Marsh or his work, until a favorite booktuber introduced me to The Beetle in one of his videos. Shortly thereafter I went online to search for a copy to purchase, and discovered a nice little editon published by The Horror Writers Association as part of their Haunted Library & Horror Classics line. According to the author write-up in the back, Richard Marsh was a pen name, under which he wrote, ". . . at least seventy-six volumes and over two hundred and fifty short stories, all in the span of twenty-seven years." To give a better understanding of just how prolific a writer he was, it took Leonaur Ltd six volumes to publish The Collected Supernatural and Weird Fiction of Richard Marsh. While no modern film adaptation was ever made (that I can find), there was, however, a silent film made in 1919.

As a side-note, his grandson is the author Robert Aickman. Much like his grandfather, he is not as well known as other authors of strange tales, but he was known to August Derleth who wanted to publish a collection of his work for Arkham House. That alone makes him an author of interest for me.

Thanks for the background, Kevin. You raise some interesting points.

Honestly, I have read many claims for many authors of some impossibly prodigious volume of production. Authors never make these claims. Someone else does on their behalf. The count of Marsh's 27 years are accurate, him starting in 1888 and going through the year of his death 1915. But 76 volumes and over 250 short stories? Really? That would mean an average of three volumes (meaning novels I assume) and 9 short stories per year, one published work per month then. Yeah. I am really skeptical. I only begin to give grand claims like this credence when the claimer accompanies it with a bibliography, which happens just about never. Until that time I tend to think these numbers are pulled out of ... pure air let's say.

ISFDB does list fifteen novels by Marsh, all of which are verified. I find that number alone impressive. They also list 37 short stories by title with publication sources, one of which, "A Set of Chessmen" (1890), sounds particularly intriguing to this chess player.

That's interesting about Robert Aickman being Marsh's grandson. We read an Aickman collection in this group a few years back. It's listed on our bookshelf. We discussed it quite a bit here. I thoroughly enjoyed most of those short stories. If GoodReads ratings are an objective standard we can employ, Aickman's 23,000 ratings for his works surpass Marsh's 5,000 for his, suggesting Aickman can be considered the better known author.

Thanks for mentioning that horror.org page. I found it here: http://horror.org/haunted-library.htm. In need of a bit of updating, but fascinating nonetheless.

I can understand your scepticism. However, I include the url below for the pdf of the Victorian Fiction Research Guide 35 - Richard Marsh, by Minna Vuohelainen (Edge Hill University).

https://victorianfictionresearchguide...

Thank you, Kevin. That bibliography is exactly what I look for to verify claims like that. What an amazing amount of work (referring to the author AND the bibliographer)!

I verified the bibliography to some extent, too. I took one particularly busy year at random, 1900, and verified that all eight books published at six different houses are indeed real. I could get my hands on any of the eight over the internet and begin reading any I cared to within the hour. In addition, I see he published five short stories, not counting the periodical version of The Goddess: A Demon in the Manchester Times, which was probably just an excerpt. At an average of say 80,000 words a novel, the man wrote something like 700,000 publishable words that year alone on his manual typewriter.

Thanks again for sharing this. I'm happy to be proven wrong.

I am almost a quarter of the way into this long novel and I am finding it very engrossing. It is written in a way that makes the situation easy to track, not too many characters, no highfalutin English.

Once when I was in my early 20s homelessness threatened me. So the situation of the protagonist hits rather close to home, if you will forgive the pun. I am so glad there are radical shifts in perspective between the parts. If we were stuck this entire long book with the situation presented in Part 1, that would have been rather miserable. Fortunately, Part 2 is different characters, mostly, and a different situation. What a relief!

For anyone doubting that The Beetle is weird fiction, I point you to the Lovecraft selection this very month. It's pure coincidence, but they both deal with identical themes and tropes: possession (or mental takeovers of bodies), what it costs the possessor, the one taken over, etc. And no one is going to say Lovecraft is not weird fiction. The Beetle definitely fits the genre in my opinion.

For those grossed out by bugs and not too thrilled to be reading about beetles, I have good news. I so far do not see what bugs have to do with this story at all. They're not featured except as symbols or names. I would not avoid reading this novel on that account.

I can't wait to see how these characters in Part 2 fit into the situation introduced in Part 1.

I've finished part 1 and have started part 2.
The narrator in part 1 got a really bad break climbing into the window of the wrong house. Poor guy!

Part 2 is really different so far, but it looks like it's going to tie in to Part 1. I think the guy climbing into the window was already pretty down on his luck. Are things really worse for him now?

We don't know what has happened to him yet.
I've just finished the chapter where Paul Lessingham makes a speech in Parliament. There is certainly a different atmosphere than the first part.

Part 2: I'm not impressed with Atherton's invention or the fact that he used a cat for his experiment!

Part 3 towards the end-back to that creepy house-and Marjorie's there alone!

I've just finished the book. Part 4 was suspenseful and fast paced.

Glad you enjoyed it Rosemarie. Still, just 3 stars worth?

I got bogged down in the uninteresting (for me) politics in Part 2--speeches in Parliament in 1890s Britain, like I care--put the book down for a while to read some other stuff, and have just now picked it back up.

The Marjorie Lindon love triangle, well maybe it's a pentagon since it seems like four guys are after her, has created interesting suspense. Marsh is good at writing her in such a way that one can understand her appeal. She always seems to be up and chipper.

It sounds like from your comments that it picks back up after Part 2. I'm hoping we get back to Robert Holt's situation soon, find out if he breaks that possession thing.

Got to admit, the attempted ties into Egypt's ancient pantheon, Isis, Osiris, are confusing. I'm wondering if all that is really necessary or adding anything.

I rate a book three stars if I enjoyed the book, so I tend to rate lots of books at three stars.
Four stars means that I really enjoyed and five stars means that it was an outstanding book or that I really loved it for many different reasons.

I enjoyed the fact that there were four different narrative voices, so we could see the characters from different perspectives.

I finished the novel today, right on time! My review: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...