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Classic horror novels

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kickycan
 
Reply Tue 4 May, 2004 06:17 pm
I'm thinking of catching up on the old classics, starting with Frankenstein. Anyone read it? Anyone have any other suggestions? Is there any classic novel about werewolves, or is that a movie thing?

By the way, could we please make this a "No Stephen King" zone? I've read them all, and loved a bunch of them, but that's not what I'm looking for here.
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jespah
 
  1  
Reply Tue 4 May, 2004 06:28 pm
Yes, I've read it; I've also read Dracula. Gotta run now, but they're both good 19th century novels.
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edgarblythe
 
  1  
Reply Tue 4 May, 2004 06:54 pm
I never liked the style of writing used in Frankenstein, but it is a remarkable tale. I would recommend it to anyone.
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Greyfan
 
  1  
Reply Tue 4 May, 2004 07:07 pm
The scariest story I ever read was Daphne Du Maurier's The Birds. It appeared originally in a collection of her short stories called The Apple Tree and was much scarier than the Hitchcock movie.

From the Du Maurier website:

Quote:
The Apple Tree
by Daphne du Maurier

First published by Gollancz in 1952, this collection of short stories enabled her devoted readership to see her, for the first time, in a very different guise as an exponent of the sinister and macabre.

The Birds
The idea for this famous story came to her one day when she was walking across to Menabilly Barton farm from the house. She saw a farmer busily ploughing a field whilst above him the seagulls were diving and wheeling. She developed the idea about the birds becoming hostile and attacking him.

In her story, the birds become hostile after a harsh winter with little food, first the seagulls, then birds of prey and finally even small birds, all turn against mankind.

The nightmarish idea appealed to Hitchcock who turned it into the celebrated film. Daphne disliked the film and particularly disliked the translation of the setting from Cornwall, with its small fields and stone hedges, to small-town America.


Might not be a classic yet, but possibly worth looking up.
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edgarblythe
 
  1  
Reply Tue 4 May, 2004 07:52 pm
I read "The Birds" many years ago. Perhaps my memory is playing tricks, but I thought the story was about three or four pages long and only suggested what the birds were about to do before it abruptly ended.
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Greyfan
 
  1  
Reply Tue 4 May, 2004 08:06 pm
edgarblythe wrote:
I read "The Birds" many years ago. Perhaps my memory is playing tricks, but I thought the story was about three or four pages long and only suggested what the birds were about to do before it abruptly ended.


I hope its your memory, because otherwise it could be mine.... as I recall, not only did the birds attack (usually going for the eyes), but there was no getting in your car and driving away to safety as Rod Taylor and Tippi Hedron did in the film. There was no place to get away to because the attacks were world wide.

I read the story when I was about 12, so perhaps I wouldn't find it as striking now, but it gave me many sleepless nights, and no other story has.
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doglover
 
  1  
Reply Tue 4 May, 2004 08:23 pm
Aside from the Stephen King horror novels I've read and loved, I would have to say William Peter Blatty's 'The Exorcist' and Robert Louis Stevenson's 'Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde' are far and away the scariest books I've ever read.
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edgarblythe
 
  1  
Reply Tue 4 May, 2004 09:07 pm
greyfan
It may be there were two versions of the Birds in circulation.
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farmerman
 
  1  
Reply Tue 4 May, 2004 09:17 pm
Might I add some attention be paid to the works of HP Lovecraft, his tales will leave you sufficiently creeped out.
Hes like Stephen King with an Ivy League(Brown) education
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kickycan
 
  1  
Reply Tue 4 May, 2004 10:40 pm
H.P. Lovecraft. Now there's an interesting idea. Doglover, I tried to read The exorcist when I was about fifeen and my sweet god-fearing mother ripped it up. Laughing I read it later, and I also read Dr. Jekyll, which I loved. You have good taste in books. Smile

Edgar: I heard something about how it was written. Isn't it like a series of letters or something?
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Linkat
 
  1  
Reply Wed 5 May, 2004 07:12 am
Although not technically a horror novels, 1984 by George Orwell and A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess are scary. A good horror novel I have read is The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson.
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cavfancier
 
  1  
Reply Wed 5 May, 2004 07:22 am
Shirley Jackson's short stories are also really creepy. If it's still out there, I would suggest getting a copy of 'The Lottery', an anthology of her short fiction.

I'm not quite sure what the distinction is between horror and gothic literature, but I'll just throw out a few suggestions: Perfume by Patrick Suskind, The Wasp Factory by Iain Banks, and The Torture Garden by Octave Mirbeau.
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kickycan
 
  1  
Reply Wed 5 May, 2004 01:44 pm
Linkat, I read 1984. . . very depressing. I loved it. A clockwork orange might be good, but I saw the movie way too many times. I don't know if I could get into it.

Shirley Jackson is one I've been meaning to get to.

Hey, great suggestions, all of you. Thanks!

Feel free to post more. It might be a cool thread for some other person searching for a classic tale of terror.
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cavfancier
 
  1  
Reply Wed 5 May, 2004 01:57 pm
Here is some info on one of my favorite Gothic novels, Vathek, by William Beckford, an eccentric millionaire with too much time on his hands. The link contains a passage from the book:

http://www.wwnorton.com/nael/romantic/topic_2/vathek.htm
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Linkat
 
  1  
Reply Wed 5 May, 2004 02:03 pm
Top Ten Classic Horror Novels

1) Dracula - Bram Stoker
2) Frankenstein - Mary Shelley
3) The Haunting of Hill House - Shirley Jackson
4) The Exorcist - Peter Blatty
5) I Am Legend - Richard Matheson
6) The Shining - Stephen King
7) Rosemary's Baby - Ira Levin
8) The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde - Robert Louis Stevenson
9) Ghost Story - Peter Straub
10) Psycho - Robert Bloch

http://horror.about.com/cs/bookreviews/tp/aatp051203.htm

Here is a link to top 100 Classic Horror Novels - http://www.strangewords.com/weirdbooks/horror100.html

The funny thing on this link is they have Northanger Abbey by Jane Austen as the seventh top Horror Novel. I have read this and there is some what of a horror tale associated with it, but I personally would not classify it as a horror novel.
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kickycan
 
  1  
Reply Wed 5 May, 2004 02:05 pm
Awesome! So much good stuff to pick from . . .
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kickycan
 
  1  
Reply Wed 5 May, 2004 02:08 pm
Cav, that book looks really creepy. I'll definitely check that one out after Frankenstein.
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cavfancier
 
  1  
Reply Wed 5 May, 2004 02:49 pm
Ewww, I was forced to read Northanger Abbey in my Gothic Lit class, and I completely concur, KC. Now I did love The Picture of Dorian Grey, by Oscar Wilde of course.
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cavfancier
 
  1  
Reply Wed 5 May, 2004 02:50 pm
I also think that some of the darker Grimm fairy tales could be classified as horror.
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doglover
 
  1  
Reply Wed 5 May, 2004 04:13 pm
cavfancier wrote:
I also think that some of the darker Grimm fairy tales could be classified as horror.


Like Hansel and Gretel?

Those are some sadistic, violent tales for a childs consumption. Mr. Green
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