Halloween Reading List: Part One

I'm not one for horror films, or Zombies, or creepy Halloween decorations. In fact, I hate them. Why, then, am I writing a Halloween post?

Simply put, there are many amazing stories that are perfect for a Halloween mood, and I love stories. After all, that is why I started this blog.

I have selected thirty one stories – one for each day of October – from a variety of times, places, and style. Some are poems, one is a folk ballad, another a folk tale, and two other are stage plays. There are ghost stories, horror stories, fantasy, science fiction, and tales of murder and madness. A few are lighthearted, most are dark. Some have a moral to tell. All of them involve a sense that things are not always quite as they seem to be, and that is the perfect recipe for enjoying Halloween. These stories are arranged in a rough chronological order, from Euripides to Daphne du Maurier. My selection criteria are entirely subjective, and what it boils down to is stories that I enjoy. Isn’t that what recommendations are about? In some cases I have tried to choose lesser known stories and authors, but not always. A few of these stories are very well known, and might even be called obvious choices. I also intend to explore some of these authors at greater length because it is a pity to limit ourselves just to one story.

Because this is a long list, it is split into three.


1. The Bacchae - Euripides

A king persecutes the followers of Bacchus, bringing about his own death by a crazed mob. One of the earliest examples of what we would now term horror stories.

2. The Bridegroom and the Angel of Death – Howard Schwartz
 
A wedding is disturbed by the appearance of the angel of death himself, sent to take the groom’s life. A Jewish tale from medieval Yemen retold by Howard Schwartz.

3. Tam Lin - Anonymous
 
The great Scottish ballad of Halloween and true love conquering all. A woman must save her lover from the vindictive fairie queen before he is given as a tithe to Hell.

4. Bluebeard – Charles Perrault

A classic of fairytale horror. Why you should open even the doors that are forbidden. Forget the plot holes.

5. Lenore – Gottfried August Burger

Not Poe’s poem. This one is about death and the lady, a challenge to God’s sovereignty, and a nighttime ride. Burger, in one way or another, has influenced all subsequent horror tales.

6. The Erlking – Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

A father and son are pursued by the malevolent elf king during a(nother) nighttime ride, but the father refuses to believe until it is too late.

7. The Night Before Christmas – Nikolai Gogol

Gogol has many creepy, Gothic stories, but this one has a light, humorous touch. The Devil tries to get his revenge on a village blacksmith, but fails spectacularly.

8. The Queen of Spades – Aleksandr Pushkin

An officer is obsessed with discovering the secret to winning at cards, but is driven to madness once the secret is revealed.

9. The Masque of the Red Death – Edgar Allen Poe

  You cannot have one of these lists without Poe. In this story a prince and his retinue attempt to escape a devastating plague by hiding within a castle, until they throw a party and a mysterious guest arrives uninvited.

10. An Account of Some Strange Disturbances in Aungier Street – Joseph Sheridan le Fanu

One of the finest ghost stories ever written. This one terrified me when I first read it on a winter night while staying in an old house near Hereford as a teenager.

11. The Signal-Man – Charles Dickens

Not a Christmas Carol! Dickens had surprisingly good horror chops as seen in this story about a railroad signalman who has premonitions of death and disaster. Not only is it a good story, Dickens, as usual, had a social agenda in writing it.