Yesterday some cited fun Halloween reading. Every October I re-read what I believe is the best haunted house story in the English language, Shirley Jackson’s The Haunting of Hill House. It’s exquisitely creepy: Jackson sets the mood with the first paragraph….
“No live organism can continue for long to exist sanely under conditions of absolute reality; even larks and katydids are supposed, by some, to dream. Hill House, not sane, stood by itself against its hills, holding darkness within; it had stood so for eighty years and might stand for eighty more. Within, walls continued upright, bricks met neatly, floors were firm, and doors were sensibly shut; silence lay steadily against the wood and stone of Hill House, and whatever walked there, walked alone.”
And that third sentence is later echoed in a way that shows that it is the house that persists in power while generations of mortals enter and exit. There was an excellent movie of this in 1963. and a wretched remake in 1999, both just called “The Haunting.” (Not to be confused with the very good “House on Haunted Hill” from 1959, or its own wretched remake in, coincidentally, 1999. ) So there’s a book recommendation and two movie recommendations. I hope someone who reads this will give them a look.
And, the Halloween friend of my childhood, “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow.” Everyone knows that.
I want that book and I want it now!
OK, I’ve calmed down a little, so, ahem…
Yesterday some cited fun Halloween reading. Every October I re-read what I believe is the best haunted house story in the English language, Shirley Jackson’s The Haunting of Hill House. It’s exquisitely creepy: Jackson sets the mood with the first paragraph….
“No live organism can continue for long to exist sanely under conditions of absolute reality; even larks and katydids are supposed, by some, to dream. Hill House, not sane, stood by itself against its hills, holding darkness within; it had stood so for eighty years and might stand for eighty more. Within, walls continued upright, bricks met neatly, floors were firm, and doors were sensibly shut; silence lay steadily against the wood and stone of Hill House, and whatever walked there, walked alone.”
And that third sentence is later echoed in a way that shows that it is the house that persists in power while generations of mortals enter and exit. There was an excellent movie of this in 1963. and a wretched remake in 1999, both just called “The Haunting.” (Not to be confused with the very good “House on Haunted Hill” from 1959, or its own wretched remake in, coincidentally, 1999. ) So there’s a book recommendation and two movie recommendations. I hope someone who reads this will give them a look.
And, the Halloween friend of my childhood, “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow.” Everyone knows that.