Weird Woods: Tales from the Haunted Forests of Britain
Another Tales of the Weird anthology from John Miller, who previously edited Tales of the Tattooed and will publish The Philosophy of Tattoos with the British Library in Autumn 2020. The tales in this title span all regions of the U.K. – from the obviously eerie rural areas of Devon and Yorkshire to more unexpected cosmopolitan locations like Stoke Newington, London. It resonates with a growing readership of nature and folk stories, and contains fascinating notes on the history of these stories and their writers.
Woods play an important and recurring role in horror, fantasy, the gothic and the weird. They are places in which strange things happen, where you often can’t see where you are or what is around you. Supernatural creatures thrive in the thickets. Trees reach into underworlds of earth, myth and magic. Forests are full of ghosts.
In this new collection, immerse yourself in the whispering voices between the branches in Wistman’s Wood on Dartmoor, witness an inexplicable death in Yorkshire’s Strid Wood and prepare yourself for an encounter with malignant pagan powers in the dark of the New Forest. This edition also includes notes on the real locations and folklore which inspired these deliciously sinister stories.
Contents
Introduction essay by John Miller
1. The Whisper in the Wood short story by W. W. Fenn
2. Man-Size in Marble (1966) short story by E. Nesbit
3. The Striding Place (1896) short story by Gertrude Atherton
4. The Man Who Went Too Far (1904) novelette by E. F. Benson
5. An Old Thorn (1911) short story by W. H. Hudson
6. The White Lady of Rownam Avenue, Near Stirling short story by Elliott O'Donnell
7. Ancient Lights (1912) short story by Algernon Blackwood
8. The Name-Tree (1921) short story by Mary Webb
9. The Tree (1922) short story by Walter de la Mare
10. "He Made a Woman—" (1923) short story by Marjorie Bowen
11. A Neighbour's Landmark (1924) short story by M. R. James
12. N (1936) novelette by Arthur Machen
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John Miller
John Miller is Senior Lecturer in Nineteenth-Century Literature at the University of Sheffield, and specializes in the tattoo in literature.
British Library Tales of the Weird
The British Library Tales of the Weird series revives and unearths classic strange fiction from the late-nineteenth and early twentieth centuries in the form of novels, single-author collections and thematic anthologies, complete with new introductions and fascinating notes by expert editors.
British Library Tales of the Weird consists of seventy-one books and series is set to expand with the upcoming release of one more book. The current recommended reading order for the series is provided below.
