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Horror & Halloween
A glimpse at some writers that have been known to scare the life out of readers.
I Am Providence: The City that Made H.P. Lovecraft
Author: H.P. Lovecraft
Standing at the top of Jenckes Street in Providence, Rhode Island, I am looking down way down between lines of historic houses. The road is so steep there's a stone wall at the bottom to keep the next car with faulty brakes out of someone's living room. Further away, I can see downtown and Federal Hill across the city.
Posted on Sat, Sep 30, 2006
Times of Toil, Tales of Terror: Poe's Philadelphia
Author: Edgar Allan Poe
Trekking Spring Garden Street jungle-puddle traffic north of Philadelphia's Historical District in map-wandered May afternoon light, one arrives at 530-532 Seventh Street, the only standing structure remaining of Edgar Allan Poe's five Philadelphia residences, this one complete with brass knocker and, of all things, United States park rangers patches, caps, and all, designated as a national park site in 1978. Although Boston, Baltimore and New York City housed he and his, throughout his thirty-eight years, this Philadelphia address was Poe's most prolific hearth and home.
Posted on Sun, May 21, 2006
Bram Stoker's Dracula in Whitby
Author: Bram Stoker
"But, strangest of all, the very instant the shore was touched, an immense dog sprang up on deck from below ... and running forward, jumped from the bow on to the sand. Making straight for the steep cliff, where the churchyard hangs over the laneway to the East Pier ... it disappeared in the darkness."
Posted on Sat, Sep 20, 2003
Scholar, Athlete, and Artist,
Edgar Allan Poe At University of Virginia
In 1826, Edgar Allan Poe attended the University of Virginia to receive the liberal education promised to him by his foster father, John Allan. Almost 200 years later, I visited Charlottesville in search of background ambiance for a novel I was writing about Poe's stint as a college student. Although Poe had only turned 17 just three weeks before his arrival, John Allan's influence with the school's administrators cleared the way for his charge's early admission.
Posted on Wed, Oct 02, 2002
Edgar Allan Poe's Richmond
In "To One in Paradise," Edgar Allan Poe describes his longing for:
A green isle in the sea, love, A fountain and a shrine, All wreathed with fairy fruits and flowers, And all the flowers were mine.
The garden of the Poe Museum in Richmond creates just such a spot where visitors (and perhaps the poet's spirit) can linger.
Posted on Tue, Oct 01, 2002
Poe's Philadelphia Experience
Author: Edgar Allan Poe
By the scene is a vacant old house in the center of a bustling city. A cold chill follows you in before you can even shut the heavy door. There are no furnishings, only a barren fireplace of cold brick. The ambiance gives off the feeling of ice. The paint is desperately trying to peel completely away from the wall, and the bare wooden floors creek beneath your feet.
Posted on Tue, Oct 01, 2002
Lord Byron's Castle Chillon
Author: Lord Byron
Surveying Castle Chillon, an exquisite jewel that seems to float on the placid surface of Lake Geneva, Lord Byron may well have exclaimed, "It's a marvelous place to visit, but I wouldn't want to live here."
Posted on Tue, Sep 03, 2002
On Franz Kafka's Trail
Author: Franz Kafka
It's no wonder people get confused about Franz Kafka's nationality. A Czech Jew who wrote in German, Kafka was a citizen of the Austro-Hungarian Empire at birth in 1883 and a citizen of the newly minted nation of Czechoslovakia at his death in 1924.
But no matter what flags were flying overhead, there was one constant: Prague. Kafka was born, raised and educated from grammar school through law school in Prague. He wrote his stories, wooed his girlfriends, suffered through his tuberculosis and spent his entire professional career as an insurance lawyer in the city...
Posted on Mon, Jul 01, 2002
Nathaniel Hawthorne:
Hawthorne's Struggle and Romance with Salem
Author: Nathaniel Hawthorne
Nathaniel Hawthorne called himself a writer of romances, allegorical tales of times long past with supernatural overtones. Yet many of the stories he wrote came right out of the pages of his own family history in Salem, Massachusetts. Hawthorne was still struggling to relieve himself of the heavy psychic burden of his family's past.
Posted on Fri, Nov 16, 2001
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