One of the books I’m currently reading is titled The King In Yellow. It was first published in 1895, which makes it young in comparison to some of the books I read.
What’s interesting about it (among other things) is that it’s a kind of sci-fi/horror anthology of stories that are all loosely connected by a play they all mention. The title of the play is "The King In Yellow," and it is a most remarkable play. We only get a few snatches of dialogue from it and only the vaguest hints of what it is about, but the characters who read it in the stories have the unfortunate tendency to either go completely insane or suffer a horrible doom of some sort.
The author of The King In Yellow was Robert W. Chambers. It is his best-remembered book and is highly thought of by horror authors, some of whom included references to it and things it mentions in their own works. Unfortunately, they have somewhat less regard for some of Chambers’ later works. Apparently he decided that it was better to be a well-fed best-selling author rather than a starving artist, and he ended up turning his literary output in a more commercial direction.
I don’t know what Chambers’ religion was, but there is a surprising amount of positive material in it about the Catholic Church (so far), and Catholic themes are prominent in several stories (including, obviously, "The Street of Our Lady of the Fields").
It’s interesting reading sci-fi from 1895. The first story in the collection ("The Rapairer of Reputations") is set in 1920, and it’s interesting to see a turn-of-the-century perception of what the futuristic year 1920 would be like. (Among other things, they have euthanasia chambers on public streets in major cities.)
It’s kind of interesting, though, that everybody in 1920 is still riding horses. Chambers didn’t anticipate Henry Ford’s unleashing of the automobile on America. Which brings to mind some
REMARKS MICHAEL CRICHTON MADE.
Chambers also probably didn’t envision (a) that someone in 2005 would be reading his book and (b) that they would be reading it in the way I am: I downloaded the text from the Internet and ran it through my speech-synthesizer to output it as .mp3 files that I can now listen to on my computer or via my iPod or in my . . . pickup. (Sorry; horses don’t typically have .mp3 players installed on them.)
READ THE KING IN YELLOW–IF YOU DARE! (WARNING: There is some material in it that can offend modern sensibilities.)
Reminds me of Benson’s “Lord of the World,” published in 1907-8, which is set in the 21st century. Monsignor Benson correctly anticipated developments like high-speed trains and motor cars, flying machines, cities being illuminated by artificial sunlight, and air conditioning. Also, news alerts would be displayed on large electric billboards. He also anticipated the public acceptance and everyday use of euthanasia, and the development of unimaginably powerful explosives that are dropped or propelled by military flying machines to level entire cities and massacre millions at a single stroke. But he had folks still using typewriters and some form of the telegraph.
The New York Times reported that Chambers’ funeral was to be conducted by an Episcopalian clergyman with burial in the family plot on Chambers’ estate. (Online databases are wonderful. So is working in a library that has access to them.)
Wasn’t Chambers one of H. P. Lovecraft’s buddies? “Hastur,” mentioned in “The Repairer,” is one of the deities in the Cthulhu Mythos, IIRC.