And No Bird Sings by E F Benson

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Everybody dies, doesn't that? So you've tried to get into
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the long draw today, didn't you? How do that? They'd
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come back by June.
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E. F.
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Benson and no birds sings. The red chimneys of the
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house for which I was bound were visible from just
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outside the station at which I had alighted, and so
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the chauffeur told me the distance was not more than
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a mile's walk. If I took the path across the fields,
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it ran straight until it came to the edge of
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that wood yonder which belonged to my host, and above
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which his chimneys were visible. I should find a gate
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in the paling of this wood, and a track traversing it,
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which debouched close to his garden. So, in this adorable
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afternoon of early May, it seemed a waste of time
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to do other then walk through the meadows and woods,
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and I set off on foot while the motor carried
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my traps. It was one of those golden days which
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every now and again leak out of paradise and drip
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to earth spring. It had been late in coming, but
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now it was here with a burst, and the whole
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world was boiling with the sap of life. Never had
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I seen such a wealth of spring flowers, or such
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vividness of green, or heard such melodious business among the
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birds in the hedgerows. This walk through the meadows was
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a jubilee of a festal ecstasy. And best of all,
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so I promised myself, would be the passage through the
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wood newly fledged with milky green, that lay just ahead.
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There was the gate just facing me, and I passed
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through it into the dappled lights and shadows of the
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grass grown track. Coming out of the brilliant sunshine was
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like entering a dim tunnel. One had the sense of
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being suddenly withdrawn from the brightness of the spring into
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some subaqueous cavern. The tree tops formed a green roof overhead,
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excluding the light. To a remarkable degree, I moved in
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a world of shifting obscurity. Presently, as the trees grew
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more scattered, their place was taken by a thick growth
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of hazels which met over the path, and then the ground.
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Slipping downwards, I came upon an open clearing covered with
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bracken and heather and studded with birches. But though I
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now walked once more beneath the luminous sky, with the
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sunlight pouring down, it seemed to have lost its effulgence.
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The brightness was it some optical illusion, was veiled, as
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if it came through crape. Yet there was the sun
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still well above the tree tops in an unclouded heaven.
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But for all that, the light was that of a
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stormy winter's day, without warmth or brilliance. It was oddly
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silent too. I had thought that the bushes and trees
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would be ringing with the song of mating birds, but
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listening I could hear no note of any sort, neither
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the fluting of thrush or blackbird, nor the cheerful whir
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of the chaffinch, nor the cooing woodpigeon, nor the strident
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clamor of the jay. I paused to verify this odd silence.
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There was no doubt about it. It was rather eerie,
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rather uncanny. But I supposed the birds knew their own
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business best, and if they were too busy to sing,
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it was their affair. As I went on, it struck
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me also that since entering the wood I had not
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seen a bird of any kind, And now as I
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crossed the clearing, I kept my eyes alert for them,
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but fruitless, and soon I entered the further belt of
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thick trees which surrounded it. Most of them, I noticed,
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were beeches, growing very close to each other, and the
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ground beneath them was bare but for the carpet of
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fallen leaves of the few thin bramble bushes. In this
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curious dimness and thickness of the trees, it was impossible
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to see far to the right or left of the path.
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And now, for the first time since I had left
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the open, I heard some sound of life. There came
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the rustle of leaves from not far away, and I
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thought to myself that a rabbit anyhow was moving, But
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somehow it lacked the staccato patter of a small animal.
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There was a certain stealthy heaviness about it, as if
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something much larger were stealing along and desirous of not
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being heard. I paused again to see what might emerge,
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but instantly the sound ceased. Simultaneously, I was conscious of
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some faint but very foul odor reaching me. The smell
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choking and corrupt, yet somehow pungent, more like the odor
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of something alive rather than rotting. It was peculiarly sickening,
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and not wanting to get any closer to its source.
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I went on my way. Before long I came to
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the edge of the wood. Straight in front of me
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was a strip of meadow land, and beyond an iron
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gate between two brick walls, through which I had a
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glimpse of lawn and flower beds. To the left stood
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the house, and over house and garden there poured the
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amazing brightness of the declining afternoon. Hugh Granger and his
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wife were sitting out on the lawn with the usual
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pack of assorted dogs, a Welsh Collie, a Yellow Retriever,
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a Fox Terrier and a Pekinese. The protest at my
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intrusion gave way to the welcome of recognition, and I
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was admitted into the circle. There was much to say,
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for I had been out of England for the last
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three months, during which time Hugh had settled into this
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little estate left him by a close uncle, and he
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and Daisy had been busied during the Easter vacation with
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getting into the house. Certainly it was a most attractive legacy.
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The house through which I was presently taken was a
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delightful little queen Anne manner, and its situation on the
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edge of this heather clad Surrey Ridge quite superb. We
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had tea in a small paneled parlor overlooking the garden,
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and soon the wider topics narrowed down to those of
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the day and the hour I had walked had. I
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asked Daisy from the station, did I go through the
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wood or follow the path outside it? The question she
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thus put to me was given trivially enough. There was
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no hint in her voice that it mattered a straw
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to her which way I had come, But it was
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quite clearly borne in upon me that not only she
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but Hugh also listened intently for my reply. He had
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just lit a match for his cigarette, but held it
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unapplied till he heard my answer.
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Yes, I'd go on through the wood.
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But now, though I had received some odd impressions in
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the wood, it seemed quite ridiculous to mention what they were.
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I could not soberly say that the sunshine there was
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a very poor quality, and that at one point in
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my traverse I had smelled the most iniquitous odor. I
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had walked through the wood. That was all I had
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to tell them. I had known both my host and
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hostess for a tale of many years, and now when
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I felt that there was nothing except purely fanciful stuff
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that I could volunteer about my experiences there. I noticed
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that they exchanged a swift glance and could easily interpret it.
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Each of them signaled to the other an expression of relief,
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they told each other. So I construed their glance that I,
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at any rate, had found nothing unusual in the wood,
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and they were pleased at that. But then, before any
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real pause had succeeded to my answer that I had
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gone through the wood, I remembered that strange absence of birds,
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song and birds, and as that seemed an innocuous observation
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in natural history, I thought I might as well mention it.
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I one odd things struck me. I began, and instantly
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I saw the attention of both riveted again. I didn't
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see a single bird or hear one, from the time
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I entered the wood to when.
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I left it.
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Hugh lit his cigarette. I've noticed that too, he said,
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and it's rather puzzling. The wood is certainly a bit
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of primeval forest, and one would have thought that hosts
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of birds would have nested in it from time immemorial.
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But like you, I've never heard or seen one in it,
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and I've never seen a rabbit there either. I thought
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I heard one this afternoon, said I. Something was moving
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in the fallen beech leaves. Did you see it, he asked.
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I recollected that I had decided that the noise was
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not quite the patter of a rabbit. No, I didn't
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see it, I said, And perhaps it wasn't one. It
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sounded I remember, more like something larger. Once again, and unmistakingly,
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a glance passed between Hugh and his wife, and she rose,
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I must be off, she said. A post goes out
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at seven, and I lazed all morning. What are you
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two going to do something out of doors?
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Please? Said I. I want to see the domain.
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Hugh and I accordingly strolled out again with the cohort
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of dogs. The domain was certainly very charming. A small
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lake lay behind the garden, with a reed bed, vocal
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with warblers, and a tufted margin into which coots and
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moor hens scudded at our approach. Rising from the end
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of that it was a high, heathery gnoll full of
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rabbit holes, which the dogs nosed at with joyful expectations.
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And there we sat for a while, overlooking the wood
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which covered the rest of the estate. Even now, in
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the blaze of the sun near to its setting, it
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seemed to be in shadow. Though like the rest of
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the view it should have basked in brilliance. Not a
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cloud flecked the sky, and the level rays enveloped the
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world in a crimson splendor, but the wood was gray
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and darkling. Hugh also, I was aware, had been looking
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at it, and now, with an air of breaking into
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a disagreeable topic, he turned to me. Tell me, he said,
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does anything strike you about that wood? Yes, it seems
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to lie in shadow, he frowned. But it can't, you know,
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he said. Where does the shadow come from? Not from outside,
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for the skylander on fire, from inside? Then I asked.
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He was silent a moment. There's something queer about it,
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he said at length, there's something there, and I don't
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know what it is. Daisy feels it too. She won't
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ever go into the wood, and it appears the birds
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won't either. Is it just the fact that, for some
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unexpls l reason, there are no birds in it that
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has set all our imaginations at work? I jumped up, Ah,
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it's all rubbish, I said, Let's go through it now
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and find a bird. I bet you I find a bird.
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Sixpence for every bird you see, said Hugh. We went
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down the hillside and walked round the wood till we
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came to the gate where I had entered that afternoon.
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I held it open after I had gone in, for
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the dogs to follow. But there they stood a yard
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or so away, and none of them moved. Come on, dogs,
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I said, and Fifi, the fox terrier, came a step nearer,
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and then, with a little whine, retreated again. They always
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do that, said Hugh. Not one of them will set
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foot inside the wood. Look, he whistled and called, he
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cajoled and scolded, but it was no use there. The
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dogs remained, with little apologetic grins and signalings of tales,
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but quite determined not to come. But why, I asked,
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the same reason as the birds. I suppose, whatever that
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happens to be. There's Fifi, for instance, the sweetest tempered
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little lady. Once I tried to pick her up and
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carry her in, and she snapped at me. They'll have
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nothing to do with the wood. They'll trot round outside
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it and go home. We left them there, and in
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the sunset light, which was now beginning to fade, began
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the passage. Usually, the sense of eeriness disappears if one
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has a companion, But now to me, even with Hugh
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walking by my side, the place seemed even more uncanny
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than it had done that afternoon, and the sense of
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intolerable uneasiness that grew into a sort of waking nightmare
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obsessed me. I had thought before that the silence and
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loneliness of it had played tricks with my nerves, but
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Hugh here it couldn't be that, And indeed I felt
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that it was not any such notion that lay at
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the root of this fear, but rather the conviction that
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there was some presence lurking there, invisible as yet, but
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permeating the gathered gloom. I couldn't form the slightest idea
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of what it might be, or whether it was material
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or ghostly. All I could diagnose of it from my
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own sensations was that it was evil and antique. As
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we came to the open ground in the middle of
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the wood, Hughes stopped, and, though the evening was cool,
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I noticed that he mopped his forehead pretty nasty.
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He said, no, wonder the dogs don't like it. How
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do you feel about it? Before I could answer.
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He shot out his hand, pointing to the belt of
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trees that lay beyond. What's that, he said, in a whisper.
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I followed his finger, and for one half second thought
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I saw against the black of the wood, some vague flicker,
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gray or faintly luminous. It waved as if it had
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been the head and forepart of some huge snake rearing itself.
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But it instantly disappeared, and my glimpse had been so
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momentary that I couldn't trust my impression. It's gone, said Hugh,
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still looking in the direction he had pointed. And as
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we stood there, I heard again what I had heard
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that afternoon, a rustle among the fallen beech leaves. But
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there was no wind, nor breath of breeze astir. He
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turned to me.
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What on earth was it? He said? It looked like
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some you almost slug standing up. Did you see it?
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I'm not sure whether I did or not. I said,
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I think I just got sight of what you saw.
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But what was it? He said again?
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Was it a real material creature or was it something ghostly?
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Do you mean?
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I asked something? Halfway between the two, he said, I'll
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tell you what I mean. Afterwards, and when we've gone
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out of this place, the thing, whatever it was, had
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vanished among the trees to the left of where our
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path lay, And in silence we walked across the open
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till we came to where entered a tunnel like among
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the trees. Frankly I hated and feared the thought of
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plunging into that darkness, with the knowledge that not so
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far off there was something, the nature of which I
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could not ever so faintly conjecture, but which I now
255
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made no doubt. Was that which filled the wood with
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some nameless terror?
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Was it material? Was it ghostly? Or was it?
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And now some inkling of what Hugh meant began to
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form itself into my mind, some being that lay on
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the border line between the two. Of all the sinister possibilities,
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that appeared the most terrifying. As we entered the trees
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again I perceived that reek alive and yet corrupt, which
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I had smelt before, but now it was far more potent.
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And we hurried on, choking with the odor that I
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now guessed to be not the putress of decay, but
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the living substance of that which crawled and reared itself
267
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in the darkness of the wood, where no bird would shelter.
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Somewhere among the.
269
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Trees lurked the reptilian thing that defied and yet compelled cretence.
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It was a blessed relief to get out of that
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tim tunnel into the wholesome air of the open and
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the clear light of evening within doors. When we returned,
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windows were curtained and lampslit. There was a hint frost,
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and Hugh put a match to the fire in his room,
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where the dogs, still a little apologetic, hailed us with
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the thumpings of drowsy tales. And now we've got to talk,
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00:16:41.720 --> 00:16:45.039
said he, and lay our plans for whatever it is
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that is in the wood.
279
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We've got to make an end of it.
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And if you want to know what I think it is,
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I'll tell you.
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Go ahead, said I. You may laugh at me if
283
00:16:56.960 --> 00:17:00.000
you like, he said, but I believe it's an element.
284
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That's what I meant when I said it was a
285
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being halfway between the material and the ghostly. I never
286
00:17:06.480 --> 00:17:08.920
caught a glimpse of it till this afternoon. I only
287
00:17:09.000 --> 00:17:12.200
felt there was something horrible there. But now I've seen it,
288
00:17:12.920 --> 00:17:15.680
and it's like what spiritualists, and that sort of folk
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described as an elemental. A huge phosphorescent slug is what
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00:17:20.319 --> 00:17:23.039
they tell us of it, which at will can surround
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itself with darkness somehow, Now safe within doors, in the
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cheerful light and warmth of the room, the suggestion appeared
293
00:17:29.680 --> 00:17:34.960
merely grotesque out there in the darkness of that uncomfortable wood.
294
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Something within me had quaked, and I was prepared to
295
00:17:38.599 --> 00:17:43.680
believe any horror, But now common sense revolted. But you
296
00:17:43.720 --> 00:17:45.759
don't mean to tell me that you believe in such rubbish,
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I said. You might as well say it was a unicorn.
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What is an elemental?
299
00:17:50.079 --> 00:17:51.680
Anyway? Who has ever seen one?
300
00:17:51.680 --> 00:17:53.799
Except the people who listened to raps in the darkness
301
00:17:53.799 --> 00:17:55.960
and say they made by their aunts?
302
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What is it?
303
00:17:57.160 --> 00:18:01.160
Then, he asked, I should think it's cheap our own nerves,
304
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I said, I frankly acknowledge. I got the creeps when
305
00:18:03.839 --> 00:18:05.880
I went through the wood first, and I've got them
306
00:18:05.920 --> 00:18:06.839
much worse when I went.
307
00:18:06.720 --> 00:18:09.200
Through it with you. But it was just nerves.
308
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We'll frightening ourselves at each other, and other dogs frightening
309
00:18:14.160 --> 00:18:19.200
themselves at each other, he asked, and the birds That
310
00:18:19.359 --> 00:18:20.519
was rather harder to answer.
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In fact, I gave it up.
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Hugh continued, Well, just for the moment, we'll suppose that
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00:18:26.160 --> 00:18:29.440
something else, not ourselves, frightened us and the dogs and
314
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the birds, he said, And that we did see something
315
00:18:32.400 --> 00:18:36.720
like a huge phosphorescent slug. I won't call it an elemental.
316
00:18:36.720 --> 00:18:41.160
If you object to that, I'll call it it. There's
317
00:18:41.200 --> 00:18:44.559
another thing, too, which the existence of it would explain.
318
00:18:45.279 --> 00:18:45.680
What's that?
319
00:18:46.079 --> 00:18:50.519
I asked, Well, it is supposed to be some incarnation
320
00:18:50.599 --> 00:18:55.160
of evil. It's a corporeal form of the devil. It's
321
00:18:55.200 --> 00:18:58.400
not only spiritual, it is material, to this extent that
322
00:18:58.440 --> 00:19:01.160
it can be seen, bodily, informed, and heard, and as
323
00:19:01.200 --> 00:19:04.119
you noticed, smelting, God forbid handled.
324
00:19:04.960 --> 00:19:06.680
It has to be kept alive by nourishment.
325
00:19:06.920 --> 00:19:09.319
And that explains perhaps why every day since I've been
326
00:19:09.359 --> 00:19:11.960
here I found on that No, we went up some
327
00:19:12.039 --> 00:19:16.119
half dozen dead rabbits, stoats and weasels, said I no,
328
00:19:16.359 --> 00:19:19.880
not stoats and weasels. Stoats kill their prey and eat it.
329
00:19:20.759 --> 00:19:26.559
These rabbits haven't been eaten. They've been drunk. What on
330
00:19:26.599 --> 00:19:30.440
earth do you mean, I asked. I examined several of them.
331
00:19:30.839 --> 00:19:32.759
There was just a small hole in their throats, and
332
00:19:32.759 --> 00:19:35.440
they were drained of blood, just skin and bones, and
333
00:19:35.480 --> 00:19:39.079
a sort of gray mash of fiber, like the fiber
334
00:19:39.119 --> 00:19:42.519
of an orange which has been sucked. Also, there was
335
00:19:42.559 --> 00:19:45.920
a horrible smell lingering on them, and was the thing
336
00:19:46.000 --> 00:19:48.680
you had a glimpse of, like a stoat or a weasel.
337
00:19:50.000 --> 00:19:51.880
There came a rattle at the handle of the door.
338
00:19:52.319 --> 00:19:54.759
Not a word to Daisy, said Hugh. As she entered.
339
00:19:55.400 --> 00:19:57.400
I heard you come in, She said, Where did you go?
340
00:19:58.200 --> 00:20:00.839
All round the place? Said I back through the wood.
341
00:20:01.400 --> 00:20:02.079
It is odd.
342
00:20:02.359 --> 00:20:05.279
Not a bird did we see, But that's partly accounted
343
00:20:05.279 --> 00:20:09.359
for because it was dark. I saw her eyes such hues,
344
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but she found no communication there. I guessed that he
345
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was planning some attack on it next day, and he
346
00:20:16.200 --> 00:20:18.039
didn't wish her to know anything was afoot.
347
00:20:19.680 --> 00:20:21.119
The wood's unpopular, he said.
348
00:20:21.160 --> 00:20:23.519
Birds won't go there, dogs won't go there, and the
349
00:20:23.599 --> 00:20:26.599
daisy won't go there. I'm bound to say I share
350
00:20:26.599 --> 00:20:29.119
the feeling too. But having braved its terrors in the
351
00:20:29.200 --> 00:20:30.720
dark eye, I've broken a spell.
352
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Oh quiet, was it? Asked? She quite wasn't the word
353
00:20:36.160 --> 00:20:36.400
for it.
354
00:20:36.519 --> 00:20:38.759
The smallest pin could have been her dropping half a
355
00:20:38.759 --> 00:20:43.160
mile off we talked over our plans that night after
356
00:20:43.240 --> 00:20:46.240
she had gone up to bed. Hugh's story about the
357
00:20:46.240 --> 00:20:49.200
sucked rabbits was rather horrible, and though there was no
358
00:20:49.480 --> 00:20:52.359
certain connection between those empty rinds of animals and what
359
00:20:52.480 --> 00:20:56.400
we had seen, there seemed a certain reasonableness about it.
360
00:20:56.480 --> 00:20:59.640
But anything, as he pointed out, which could feed like that,
361
00:20:59.759 --> 00:21:04.319
was not without its material side. Ghosts did not have dinner,
362
00:21:04.880 --> 00:21:09.599
and if it was material, it was vulnerable. Our plans, therefore,
363
00:21:09.599 --> 00:21:12.119
were very simple. We were going to tramp through the
364
00:21:12.160 --> 00:21:15.559
wood as one walks up partridges and a field of turnips,
365
00:21:15.599 --> 00:21:18.960
each with a shotgun and a supply of cartridges. I
366
00:21:19.000 --> 00:21:22.079
cannot say that I looked forward to the expedition, for
367
00:21:22.160 --> 00:21:24.400
I hated the thought of getting into closer quarters with
368
00:21:24.440 --> 00:21:27.480
that mysterious denizen of the woods. But there was a
369
00:21:27.519 --> 00:21:30.480
certain excitement about it, sufficient to keep me awake a
370
00:21:30.519 --> 00:21:33.720
long time, and when I got to sleep, to cause
371
00:21:33.880 --> 00:21:38.279
very vivid and awful dreams. The morning failed to fulfill
372
00:21:38.319 --> 00:21:41.279
the promise of the clear sunset. The sky was lowering
373
00:21:41.319 --> 00:21:45.160
and cloudy, and a fine rain was falling. Daisy had
374
00:21:45.160 --> 00:21:47.920
shopping errands, which took her into the little town, and
375
00:21:48.000 --> 00:21:50.319
as soon as she had set off, we started on
376
00:21:50.400 --> 00:21:54.000
our business. The yellow retriever, mad with joy at the
377
00:21:54.039 --> 00:21:56.839
side of guns, came bounding with us across the garden,
378
00:21:57.440 --> 00:22:01.200
but on our entering the wood, he plunk back home again.
379
00:22:02.680 --> 00:22:06.160
The wood was roughly circular in shape, with a diameter
380
00:22:06.240 --> 00:22:09.839
perhaps of half a mile. In the center, as I
381
00:22:09.839 --> 00:22:12.640
have said, there was an open clearing about a quarter
382
00:22:12.640 --> 00:22:15.640
of a mile across, which was thus surrounded by a
383
00:22:15.640 --> 00:22:18.440
belt of thick trees and cops a couple of hundred
384
00:22:18.519 --> 00:22:19.359
yards in breadth.
385
00:22:20.240 --> 00:22:22.720
Our plan was first to walk.
386
00:22:22.519 --> 00:22:24.519
Together up the path which led through the wood, with
387
00:22:24.599 --> 00:22:27.640
all possible stealth, hoping to hear some movement on the
388
00:22:27.640 --> 00:22:31.119
part of what we had come to seek. Failing that,
389
00:22:31.160 --> 00:22:33.200
we had settled to tramp through the wood at the
390
00:22:33.240 --> 00:22:35.519
distance of some fifty yards from each other.
391
00:22:35.599 --> 00:22:36.799
In a circular track.
392
00:22:37.200 --> 00:22:39.359
Two or three of these circuits would cover the whole
393
00:22:39.400 --> 00:22:43.160
ground pretty thoroughly. Of the nature of our quarry, whether
394
00:22:43.200 --> 00:22:46.119
it would try to steal away from us or possibly attack,
395
00:22:46.200 --> 00:22:50.720
we had no idea. It seemed, however, yesterday, to have
396
00:22:50.799 --> 00:22:55.079
avoided us. Rain had been falling steadily for an hour
397
00:22:55.119 --> 00:22:57.519
when we entered the wood. It hissed a little in
398
00:22:57.559 --> 00:23:00.359
the tree tops overhead, But so thick was the that
399
00:23:00.400 --> 00:23:03.319
the ground below was still not more than damp. It
400
00:23:03.440 --> 00:23:06.799
was a dark morning outside here, you would say that
401
00:23:06.839 --> 00:23:10.039
the sun had already set, and that night was falling.
402
00:23:11.319 --> 00:23:14.319
Very quietly, we moved up the grassy path, where our
403
00:23:14.359 --> 00:23:17.920
footfalls were noiseless, and once we caught a whiff of
404
00:23:17.960 --> 00:23:22.079
that odor of life corruption. But though we stayed and listened,
405
00:23:22.559 --> 00:23:25.599
not a sound of anything stirred except the sibilant rain
406
00:23:26.000 --> 00:23:29.799
over our heads. We went across the clearing and through
407
00:23:29.799 --> 00:23:32.240
to the far gate, and still there was no sign
408
00:23:33.279 --> 00:23:36.359
we'll be getting into the trees. Then said Hugh, we'd
409
00:23:36.400 --> 00:23:39.440
better start where we've got that whiff of it. We
410
00:23:39.480 --> 00:23:41.839
went back to the place, which was towards the middle
411
00:23:41.880 --> 00:23:45.240
of the encompassing trees. The odor still lingered on the
412
00:23:45.240 --> 00:23:48.920
windless air. Go on about fifty yards, he said, and
413
00:23:48.960 --> 00:23:51.680
then we'll go in. If either of us comes on
414
00:23:51.759 --> 00:23:53.759
to the track of it, we will shout to the other.
415
00:23:55.400 --> 00:23:57.519
I walked on down the path till I had got
416
00:23:57.559 --> 00:24:00.559
the right distance signaled to him, and we stepped in
417
00:24:00.799 --> 00:24:05.759
among the trees. I have never known the sensation of
418
00:24:05.799 --> 00:24:10.599
such utter loneliness. I knew that Hugh was walking parallel
419
00:24:10.640 --> 00:24:13.880
with me, only fifty yards away, and if I hung
420
00:24:13.880 --> 00:24:16.119
on my step, I could faintly hear his tread among
421
00:24:16.160 --> 00:24:19.960
the beech leaves. But I felt as if I was
422
00:24:20.079 --> 00:24:24.599
quite sundered in this dim place from all companionship of man.
423
00:24:25.440 --> 00:24:30.240
The only live thing that lurked here was that monstrous,
424
00:24:30.279 --> 00:24:35.039
mysterious creature of evil. So thick were the trees that
425
00:24:35.079 --> 00:24:37.000
I could not see more than a dozen yards in
426
00:24:37.039 --> 00:24:41.480
any direction. All places outside the woods seemed infinitely remote,
427
00:24:41.559 --> 00:24:45.920
and infinitely remote. Also, everything that had occurred to me
428
00:24:46.200 --> 00:24:50.400
in normal human life, I had been whisked out of
429
00:24:50.440 --> 00:24:56.880
all wholesome experiences into this antique and evil place. The
430
00:24:56.960 --> 00:25:00.480
rain had ceased, It whispered no longer in the tree tops,
431
00:25:01.119 --> 00:25:04.759
testifying that they did exist the world in the sky outside,
432
00:25:05.400 --> 00:25:08.279
and only a few drops from above pattered on the
433
00:25:08.319 --> 00:25:12.519
beach leaves. Suddenly I heard the report of Hugh's gun,
434
00:25:12.559 --> 00:25:13.839
followed by his shouting voice.
435
00:25:14.039 --> 00:25:14.640
I missed it.
436
00:25:14.880 --> 00:25:18.599
He shouted, it's coming in your direction. I heard him
437
00:25:18.759 --> 00:25:21.960
running towards me, the beech leaves rustling, and no doubt
438
00:25:22.000 --> 00:25:25.200
his footsteps drowned a stealthy noise that was close to me.
439
00:25:26.160 --> 00:25:28.440
All that happened now until once more I heard the
440
00:25:28.440 --> 00:25:31.880
report of Hugh's gun. Happened, I suppose, in less than
441
00:25:31.920 --> 00:25:34.119
a minute. If it had taken much longer, I do
442
00:25:34.240 --> 00:25:37.640
not imagine I should be telling it to day. I
443
00:25:37.680 --> 00:25:41.160
stood there then, having heard Hughes shout, with my gun
444
00:25:41.240 --> 00:25:44.119
cocked and ready to put to my shoulder, and I
445
00:25:44.200 --> 00:25:48.039
listened to his running footsteps. But still I saw nothing
446
00:25:48.079 --> 00:25:52.000
to shoot at and heard nothing. Then between the two
447
00:25:52.079 --> 00:25:55.400
beech trees quite close to me, I saw what I
448
00:25:55.440 --> 00:25:59.200
can only describe as a ball of darkness. It rolled
449
00:25:59.279 --> 00:26:02.359
very swiftly towards me, over the few yards that separated
450
00:26:02.400 --> 00:26:05.440
me from it, And then too late I heard the
451
00:26:05.480 --> 00:26:09.119
dead beech leaves rustling below it. Just before it reached me,
452
00:26:09.240 --> 00:26:12.240
my brain realized what it was, or what it might be.
453
00:26:12.359 --> 00:26:14.160
But before I could raise my gun to shoot at
454
00:26:14.160 --> 00:26:18.640
that nothingness, it was upon me. My gun was twitched
455
00:26:18.680 --> 00:26:21.279
out of my hand, and I was enveloped in this blackness,
456
00:26:21.599 --> 00:26:24.440
which was the very essence of corruption. It knocked me
457
00:26:24.480 --> 00:26:26.440
off my feet, and I sprawled flat on my back,
458
00:26:26.480 --> 00:26:28.880
and upon me. As I lay there, I felt the
459
00:26:28.880 --> 00:26:32.599
weight of this invisible assailant. I groped wildly with my
460
00:26:32.680 --> 00:26:36.160
hands and they clutched something cold and slimy and hairy.
461
00:26:36.759 --> 00:26:37.599
They slipped off it.
462
00:26:37.960 --> 00:26:40.960
Next moment there was laid across my shouldern neck something
463
00:26:40.960 --> 00:26:44.559
which I felt like an India rubber tube. The end
464
00:26:44.599 --> 00:26:47.319
of it fastened onto my neck like a snake, and
465
00:26:47.359 --> 00:26:49.079
I felt the skin rise beneath it.
466
00:26:49.240 --> 00:26:49.559
Again.
467
00:26:49.720 --> 00:26:52.920
With clutching hands, I tried to tear that obscene strength
468
00:26:52.920 --> 00:26:55.599
away from me, and as I struggled with it, I
469
00:26:55.640 --> 00:26:58.400
heard Hugh's footsteps close to me. Through this layer of
470
00:26:58.519 --> 00:27:01.839
darkness that hid everything. My mouth was free, and I
471
00:27:01.920 --> 00:27:04.960
shouted at him. Here here, I yelled, close to you,
472
00:27:05.319 --> 00:27:08.440
where it is darkest. I felt his hands on mine,
473
00:27:08.480 --> 00:27:11.480
and that added strength detached from my neck, that sucker
474
00:27:11.799 --> 00:27:14.480
that pulled at it, the coil that lay heavier my
475
00:27:14.599 --> 00:27:18.359
legs and chest. Writhed and struggled and relaxed. Whatever it
476
00:27:18.599 --> 00:27:21.400
was that our foehands held slipped out of them, and
477
00:27:21.480 --> 00:27:24.480
I saw Hugh standing close to me. A yard or
478
00:27:24.519 --> 00:27:28.039
two off. Vanishing among the beech trunks was that darkness
479
00:27:28.039 --> 00:27:31.400
which had poured over me. Hugh put up his gun
480
00:27:31.559 --> 00:27:36.079
and with his second barrel fired at it. The blackness disappeared,
481
00:27:36.440 --> 00:27:40.119
and there, wriggling and twisting like a huge worm, lay
482
00:27:40.240 --> 00:27:43.400
what we had come to find. It was alive still,
483
00:27:43.920 --> 00:27:46.240
and I picked up my gun, which lay by my side,
484
00:27:46.240 --> 00:27:50.160
and fired two more barrels into it. The writhings dwindled
485
00:27:50.160 --> 00:27:54.000
into me, shudderings and shakings, and then it lay still.
486
00:27:55.279 --> 00:27:57.599
With Hugh's help, I got to my feet and we
487
00:27:57.680 --> 00:28:02.240
both reloaded before going nearer. On the ground there lay
488
00:28:02.319 --> 00:28:07.039
a monstrous thing, half slug, half worm. There was no
489
00:28:07.160 --> 00:28:10.519
head to it. It ended in a blunt point with
490
00:28:10.599 --> 00:28:15.039
an orifice. In color, it was gray, covered with sparse
491
00:28:15.119 --> 00:28:18.599
black hairs. Its length I suppose with some four feet.
492
00:28:18.839 --> 00:28:21.440
Its thickness at the broadest part was that of a
493
00:28:21.440 --> 00:28:25.480
man's thigh, tapering towards each end. It was shattered by shot.
494
00:28:25.519 --> 00:28:28.160
At its middle there were stray pellets which had hit
495
00:28:28.240 --> 00:28:31.119
it elsewhere, and from the holes they had made there
496
00:28:31.200 --> 00:28:38.079
oozed not blood, but some gray viscous matter. As we
497
00:28:38.119 --> 00:28:42.160
stood there, some swift process of disintegration and decay began.
498
00:28:43.039 --> 00:28:46.400
It lost outline, it melted, it liquefied, and in a
499
00:28:46.519 --> 00:28:49.559
minute more we were looking at a mass of stained
500
00:28:49.599 --> 00:28:54.559
and coagulated beech leaves again, and quickly that liquor of
501
00:28:54.599 --> 00:28:59.000
corruption faded, and there lay at our feet no trace
502
00:28:59.640 --> 00:29:04.000
of what had been there. The overpowering odor passed away,
503
00:29:04.119 --> 00:29:07.119
and there came from the ground just the sweet savor
504
00:29:07.160 --> 00:29:10.640
of wet earth in springtime, and from above the glint
505
00:29:10.640 --> 00:29:15.039
of a sunbeam piercing the clouds. Then a sudden pattering
506
00:29:15.079 --> 00:29:17.599
among the dead leaves sent my heart into my mouth again,
507
00:29:17.640 --> 00:29:20.599
and I cocked my gun, but it was only huge
508
00:29:20.640 --> 00:29:24.240
yellow retriever who had joined us. We looked at each other.
509
00:29:24.640 --> 00:29:27.640
You're not hurt, he said, I held my chin up.
510
00:29:27.799 --> 00:29:30.000
Not a bit, I said to the skin's not broken?
511
00:29:30.079 --> 00:29:34.519
Is it no? Only a round red mark? My god?
512
00:29:34.599 --> 00:29:38.519
What was it? What happened? Your turn? First?
513
00:29:38.599 --> 00:29:41.720
Said I begin at the beginning. I came upon it
514
00:29:41.799 --> 00:29:44.480
quite suddenly, he said. It was lying coiled like a
515
00:29:44.480 --> 00:29:48.200
sleeping dog behind a big beach. Before I could fire,
516
00:29:48.359 --> 00:29:50.960
it slithered off in the direction where I knew you were.
517
00:29:51.480 --> 00:29:53.519
I got a snap shot at it among the trees,
518
00:29:53.519 --> 00:29:56.160
but I must have missed, for I heard it rustling away.
519
00:29:57.000 --> 00:29:59.880
I shouted to you and ran after it. There was
520
00:30:00.000 --> 00:30:02.799
a circle of absolute darkness on the ground, and your
521
00:30:02.880 --> 00:30:05.359
voice came from the middle of it. I couldn't see
522
00:30:05.400 --> 00:30:07.799
you at all, but I clutched at the blackness, and
523
00:30:07.880 --> 00:30:10.920
my hand met yours. That they met something else too.
524
00:30:12.400 --> 00:30:14.119
We got back to the house and had put the
525
00:30:14.160 --> 00:30:17.200
guns away before Daisy came home from her shopping. We
526
00:30:17.240 --> 00:30:20.279
are also scrubbed and brushed and washed. She came into
527
00:30:20.319 --> 00:30:24.200
the smoking room. You lazy folk, she said, it's cleared up,
528
00:30:24.519 --> 00:30:26.799
and why are you still indoors. Let's go out at once.
529
00:30:27.599 --> 00:30:31.039
I got up. Hughes told me you've got a dislike
530
00:30:31.079 --> 00:30:33.279
of the wood, I said, and it's a lovely wood.
531
00:30:33.359 --> 00:30:35.440
Come and see. He and I will walk on each
532
00:30:35.440 --> 00:30:38.039
side of you and hold your hands. The dogs shall
533
00:30:38.079 --> 00:30:41.000
protect you as well. But not one of them will
534
00:30:41.039 --> 00:30:44.039
go a yard into the wood, said she. Oh, yes,
535
00:30:44.240 --> 00:30:48.160
they will, be least, we'll try them. You must promise
536
00:30:48.240 --> 00:30:51.599
to come if they do. Hugh whistled to them, and
537
00:30:51.720 --> 00:30:55.079
down we went to the gate. They sat panting for
538
00:30:55.119 --> 00:30:57.920
it to be opened, and scuttled into the thickets in
539
00:30:57.960 --> 00:30:59.480
pursuit of interesting smells.
540
00:31:00.079 --> 00:31:01.720
And who says there are no birds in it?
541
00:31:01.759 --> 00:31:04.240
Said Daisy. Look at that robin. Why there are two
542
00:31:04.319 --> 00:31:10.799
of them? Evidently house hunting well, here we are in
543
00:31:10.839 --> 00:31:15.519
the library at Rickerby Hall. Again, tea is set, but
544
00:31:15.680 --> 00:31:20.039
nobody's there. I often worry that those candles will set
545
00:31:20.119 --> 00:31:23.519
fire to the books, or the greenery around the fire
546
00:31:23.680 --> 00:31:27.079
just looks really like a fire hazard to me. Normally,
547
00:31:27.119 --> 00:31:29.839
at this point, I try and persuade you to become
548
00:31:29.839 --> 00:31:32.440
a Patreon and go over and support me, because it
549
00:31:32.480 --> 00:31:38.640
makes perfect sense for me to get my viewers, listeners,
550
00:31:38.720 --> 00:31:41.839
fans onto a more channel. Isn't going to just cancel
551
00:31:41.920 --> 00:31:46.200
me for some bizarre reason. But that tires me out,
552
00:31:46.240 --> 00:31:48.559
you know all that. I don't really like self publicity.
553
00:31:49.079 --> 00:31:52.039
You've got to do it because that's what payers the bills.
554
00:31:52.079 --> 00:31:53.960
But I thought we'd just sit and look at the
555
00:31:54.000 --> 00:31:59.480
fire for a bit instead. So the story you just
556
00:31:59.519 --> 00:32:04.000
heard war and No Bird Sings by Edward Frederick Benson,
557
00:32:04.519 --> 00:32:06.880
known as E. F. Benson in the books, I think
558
00:32:07.160 --> 00:32:11.200
Fred to his friends and family. Now, we've done many E. F.
559
00:32:11.279 --> 00:32:14.000
Benson stories, but I'm just going to run you through
560
00:32:14.000 --> 00:32:16.960
his biography for those of you who aren't up to
561
00:32:17.039 --> 00:32:19.799
date on it. And it won't hurt, will it. I mean,
562
00:32:20.200 --> 00:32:22.880
and those of you who are asleep while you're asleep anyway, so.
563
00:32:23.119 --> 00:32:25.960
Edward Frederick Benson was born on the twenty fourth of
564
00:32:26.039 --> 00:32:30.160
July eighteen sixty seven at Wellington College in Berkshire, and
565
00:32:30.200 --> 00:32:33.119
he was the fifth child of Edward White Benson, a
566
00:32:33.119 --> 00:32:36.000
notable figure in the Church of England, and his wife
567
00:32:36.680 --> 00:32:38.000
Fred's mother, Mary Sidgwick.
568
00:32:38.440 --> 00:32:38.640
E F.
569
00:32:38.680 --> 00:32:41.599
Benson emerged from a literary family that included his brother
570
00:32:42.160 --> 00:32:46.119
Arthur Christopher ac Robert Hugh r H and sister Margaret
571
00:32:46.160 --> 00:32:48.079
just Margaret, as far as I know, all of whom
572
00:32:48.079 --> 00:32:50.720
were writers in their own right. E. F. Benson's education
573
00:32:50.799 --> 00:32:54.200
became at temple Grove School, followed by Marlborough College, very
574
00:32:54.240 --> 00:32:57.240
nice place, where he crafted early works and informed his
575
00:32:57.319 --> 00:33:02.119
later novel David Blaize. He completed his studies at King's College, Cambridge,
576
00:33:02.319 --> 00:33:05.880
of course, where our mate Monty had been before, where
577
00:33:05.880 --> 00:33:09.200
he became an active member of the Pitt Club. Benson's
578
00:33:09.240 --> 00:33:12.920
literary career took off with the publication of sketches from Marlborough,
579
00:33:13.240 --> 00:33:16.160
and his first novel, novel was called Dodo, released in
580
00:33:16.200 --> 00:33:20.000
eighteen ninety three and achieved immediate fame, setting the tone
581
00:33:20.039 --> 00:33:23.480
for a career marked by a diverse range of satire,
582
00:33:23.839 --> 00:33:27.559
romance and supernatural themes our focus really. This was followed
583
00:33:27.599 --> 00:33:31.319
by sequels like Dodo the Second and Dodo Wonders, which
584
00:33:31.359 --> 00:33:34.960
reflected the social minieure of pre World War Britain of
585
00:33:35.119 --> 00:33:40.319
his particular stratum of society. His most renowned contributionalized in
586
00:33:40.319 --> 00:33:43.519
the Map and Luchia series, which includes titles such as
587
00:33:43.599 --> 00:33:47.319
Queen Lucia and Miss Mapp. These words are cherished for
588
00:33:47.319 --> 00:33:50.319
their astute observation of social rivalries in the fictional town
589
00:33:50.359 --> 00:33:53.480
of Tilling, drawn from Benson's experience in righte East Sussex,
590
00:33:53.480 --> 00:33:55.440
where he lived for much of his later life, and
591
00:33:55.519 --> 00:33:58.039
he was mayor, and he's buried there as well, and
592
00:33:58.240 --> 00:34:00.160
Henry James came to visit him there in very so
593
00:34:00.240 --> 00:34:02.400
the people I'm going to know this. I knew this anyway,
594
00:34:02.440 --> 00:34:04.920
but Gavin Critchley was a great supporter of the podcast
595
00:34:05.119 --> 00:34:09.480
recently went on a trip to Rye and took some
596
00:34:09.519 --> 00:34:12.000
pictures and sent them to me and a short video.
597
00:34:12.159 --> 00:34:13.519
Now I think i'd.
598
00:34:13.400 --> 00:34:20.000
Also done or I'd just read. No, there was a
599
00:34:20.039 --> 00:34:22.760
cold Comfort farm story. No, I'm talking at the top
600
00:34:22.760 --> 00:34:24.519
of her head, but that was from near there as well.
601
00:34:24.519 --> 00:34:26.880
I think just ignore that a little bit there. I
602
00:34:26.920 --> 00:34:31.800
may edit it out, so benson prowess as a writer
603
00:34:32.039 --> 00:34:35.360
extended to an atmospheric ghost stories often infused with wit
604
00:34:35.480 --> 00:34:38.639
and irony. Among these notable takes is the Bus Conductor,
605
00:34:38.840 --> 00:34:43.320
a premonition story that's seen numerous adaptions or adaptations he's
606
00:34:43.320 --> 00:34:46.800
literally repertoire. Also in Crew includes biographies and memoirs with
607
00:34:46.880 --> 00:34:50.440
a discernible interesting figures, such as Charlotte bronte E f
608
00:34:50.480 --> 00:34:54.039
Benson's ghost stories often begin in a tranquil, upper class
609
00:34:54.119 --> 00:34:57.480
British setting, such as a country house or fishing lodge,
610
00:34:57.719 --> 00:35:00.599
and gradually introduce horror and Like the ghosts in some
611
00:35:00.679 --> 00:35:04.719
other writers' works, Benson's ghosts are decidedly and objectively real,
612
00:35:05.119 --> 00:35:07.760
so they're not the Henry James psychological type, or even
613
00:35:07.880 --> 00:35:12.000
Oliver Onions or Onions psychological type, so they're not merely
614
00:35:12.000 --> 00:35:13.719
a mental aberration of the characters.
615
00:35:14.079 --> 00:35:15.280
So his tales can be quite.
616
00:35:15.239 --> 00:35:19.360
Varied, featuring traditional ghost, vampires, and even malevolent elementals as
617
00:35:19.400 --> 00:35:21.760
we've just heard in the form of slugs. I'm going
618
00:35:21.760 --> 00:35:24.159
to talk a bit slightly bit more about that later.
619
00:35:24.559 --> 00:35:27.320
He also wrote some stories with benign hauntings. I think
620
00:35:27.320 --> 00:35:30.960
how fair departed the Long Gallery would be that that
621
00:35:31.079 --> 00:35:34.599
offer consolation and spiritual healing, distinguishing his work from others.
622
00:35:35.039 --> 00:35:37.400
In his personal life, he was gay, but he had
623
00:35:37.400 --> 00:35:37.639
to be.
624
00:35:37.599 --> 00:35:39.559
Discreet because you went to prison for that in those
625
00:35:39.679 --> 00:35:43.280
days in the Great Britain, and his relationships heavily influenced
626
00:35:43.280 --> 00:35:46.119
his work, which often contained elements of homo eroticism and
627
00:35:46.159 --> 00:35:47.360
camp humor on.
628
00:35:47.519 --> 00:35:48.440
He didn't see that.
629
00:35:49.000 --> 00:35:51.719
Hugh Granger is a character that appears in a couple
630
00:35:51.800 --> 00:35:53.280
of his stories, and a few of his stories, I
631
00:35:53.280 --> 00:35:53.880
think in the.
632
00:35:53.840 --> 00:35:56.440
House with the Red Brick kiln as well and various others.
633
00:35:56.639 --> 00:36:00.320
And I often wonder if Hugh Granger, who's married, wasn't
634
00:36:00.360 --> 00:36:02.280
some kind of I don't know this, of course, but
635
00:36:02.320 --> 00:36:04.079
there wasn't some kind of love interest. I'm sure that
636
00:36:04.079 --> 00:36:06.920
it's a biography of Benson, which I should read. Really
637
00:36:07.320 --> 00:36:09.360
would maybe go into that in more detail. But I
638
00:36:09.400 --> 00:36:11.840
always smile when Hugh comes back. But I didn't find
639
00:36:11.880 --> 00:36:15.320
that at all camp that story. His residence, Lamb House
640
00:36:15.360 --> 00:36:17.719
in Rai served as a creative sanctuary for multiple writers
641
00:36:17.800 --> 00:36:20.440
we mentioned this, including Henry James, and he was mayor
642
00:36:20.440 --> 00:36:23.039
of Ryan, a benefactor of the community. He has a
643
00:36:23.119 --> 00:36:26.079
memorial windoward Saint Mary's Church in memory of his brother.
644
00:36:26.880 --> 00:36:29.480
His family are really interesting. Actually, he passed away in
645
00:36:29.519 --> 00:36:32.360
the twenty ninth of February nineteen forty two to throat cancer.
646
00:36:32.840 --> 00:36:35.280
It was interred at the cemetery at Rye for leaving
647
00:36:35.320 --> 00:36:37.320
him behind the legacy with charm and the keen eye
648
00:36:37.320 --> 00:36:39.960
for the nuances of social interaction. So his brothers are
649
00:36:40.000 --> 00:36:42.719
all and his sister are all characters as well. And
650
00:36:42.800 --> 00:36:45.400
I think we've done an ac Benson story. In fact,
651
00:36:45.400 --> 00:36:48.360
I know we have. We haven't done anything by it.
652
00:36:48.519 --> 00:36:51.960
I don't think his sister wrote ghost stories ac rh
653
00:36:52.119 --> 00:36:55.039
rather did. I've got a volume of the Benson brother
654
00:36:55.159 --> 00:36:58.360
the other two Benson brothers stories. Our h became a
655
00:36:58.599 --> 00:37:01.960
Catholic priest, I think, and so I find his story
656
00:37:02.000 --> 00:37:05.199
is a little bit preachy from the converted point of view.
657
00:37:05.360 --> 00:37:08.960
His father, the Benson's father was Archbishop of Canterbury. Rose
658
00:37:09.039 --> 00:37:12.159
to be Archbishop of Canterbury, so the top person in
659
00:37:12.199 --> 00:37:15.880
the Anglican community. He was for a while Bishop of Truro.
660
00:37:16.400 --> 00:37:18.679
And so the Benson's new corn will pretty well. And
661
00:37:18.719 --> 00:37:21.719
if you notice, many of Benson's Fred Benson's stories are
662
00:37:21.760 --> 00:37:25.159
set in Cornll Actually also R. H and Acs stories.
663
00:37:25.440 --> 00:37:26.960
A number of them are set in Cornwall as well,
664
00:37:27.000 --> 00:37:28.880
so it was a place that they knew and cherished.
665
00:37:28.880 --> 00:37:31.519
To be fair, they knew very well. Might I just
666
00:37:31.559 --> 00:37:34.039
go on to this story, Ma, this is off the top.
667
00:37:34.079 --> 00:37:36.519
I've done a little bit research on it, but I'm
668
00:37:36.559 --> 00:37:39.039
talking without the benefit of notes, and so I may
669
00:37:39.159 --> 00:37:39.840
get things wrong.
670
00:37:40.119 --> 00:37:42.599
But you know, there we are, we all, don't we.
671
00:37:43.159 --> 00:37:46.039
This is a very slight story in lots of ways.
672
00:37:46.039 --> 00:37:50.079
And I don't mean that it is ineffective. What I
673
00:37:50.119 --> 00:37:53.599
mean is that it's very about a very narrow thing.
674
00:37:54.159 --> 00:37:57.039
There's a haunted wood, that's about it. So he goes
675
00:37:57.079 --> 00:38:00.760
to visit these old friends at this lovely house. I'm
676
00:38:00.760 --> 00:38:03.800
gonna if I don't say this now, I will forget.
677
00:38:04.159 --> 00:38:06.800
This is why I do digressions like this, because if
678
00:38:06.800 --> 00:38:08.480
I don't say them now and I'll talk to you
679
00:38:08.480 --> 00:38:11.119
about that later, I won't because I'll have forgotten. And
680
00:38:11.239 --> 00:38:13.280
actually I was looking at I was reading an article
681
00:38:13.280 --> 00:38:16.840
about ADHD, which is they call it attention deficit, but
682
00:38:16.880 --> 00:38:18.960
actually when they look at the brain scans, that isn't
683
00:38:18.960 --> 00:38:23.280
what's happening. It's more been sensitized to novelty. So seeking
684
00:38:23.480 --> 00:38:26.679
novelty in sensations, always jumping to the next thing that
685
00:38:26.719 --> 00:38:29.559
grabs your attention, whatever gives you a shot of dopamine,
686
00:38:29.559 --> 00:38:31.559
you run to it. So your mind skips to the
687
00:38:31.599 --> 00:38:33.480
next thing and you have to really think to come
688
00:38:33.519 --> 00:38:36.159
back to the thing, which is now relatively dull. I'm
689
00:38:36.199 --> 00:38:38.880
reading a book called Moths by Rosalind Ash came out
690
00:38:38.880 --> 00:38:41.079
in nineteen seventy five. I'm reading at the moment, and
691
00:38:41.119 --> 00:38:43.639
I think it's pretty good. It's a haunted house story. Now,
692
00:38:43.679 --> 00:38:46.320
I've read lots of haunted house novels that you can imagine.
693
00:38:46.840 --> 00:38:50.320
Most haunted house stories are not novels. They're just short stories,
694
00:38:50.679 --> 00:38:53.800
so they deal with one idea. So usually what you
695
00:38:53.840 --> 00:38:57.559
can think about I'm digressing upon digression here you realize
696
00:38:57.559 --> 00:39:01.719
that what I'm thinking about is that a short story
697
00:39:01.760 --> 00:39:06.079
has one idea, therefore haunted wood or haunted room. And
698
00:39:06.119 --> 00:39:09.199
that suits the ghost story because the ghost story it
699
00:39:09.239 --> 00:39:12.519
comes from Gothic fiction, of course, which were huge doorstoppers.
700
00:39:12.840 --> 00:39:16.880
But the ghost story developed has another ancestry, I think,
701
00:39:17.159 --> 00:39:20.599
and that is in the real ghost story, the real
702
00:39:20.639 --> 00:39:23.320
supernatural experience of the campfire ghost story. You will all
703
00:39:23.360 --> 00:39:26.079
have friends who say, well, the funny thing happened to me.
704
00:39:26.159 --> 00:39:26.960
I went to this house.
705
00:39:27.039 --> 00:39:30.159
Everybody's got stories like that, either you've got them yourself
706
00:39:30.639 --> 00:39:33.960
or you've been told them, and they are usually very bitty.
707
00:39:34.159 --> 00:39:37.559
So say you're at the Rollright Stones in Oxfordshire and
708
00:39:37.679 --> 00:39:41.519
you see a carriage from the eighteenth century coming down
709
00:39:41.559 --> 00:39:44.280
the road and then it disappears, and.
710
00:39:44.199 --> 00:39:46.599
That is the nature of most ghost stories.
711
00:39:46.679 --> 00:39:48.599
I went to this house and I saw this or
712
00:39:48.639 --> 00:39:51.320
I heard this, and they don't really go anywhere, so
713
00:39:51.360 --> 00:39:55.639
they tend to be very circum prescribed. Real ghost story
714
00:39:55.960 --> 00:39:58.599
or the experience that somebody has tends to be one incident.
715
00:39:59.000 --> 00:40:02.920
And I think as as well as descending from Gothic literature,
716
00:40:02.920 --> 00:40:08.119
which it clearly do, the ghost story also inevitably is
717
00:40:08.159 --> 00:40:10.519
linked to this tradition because one of the things that
718
00:40:10.559 --> 00:40:14.119
people will contact me and they'll think I'm a paranormal channel,
719
00:40:14.679 --> 00:40:18.920
because most ghost story channels are that kind of paranormal experience.
720
00:40:19.119 --> 00:40:21.280
I must say that I find them interesting, but I
721
00:40:21.320 --> 00:40:25.840
find them also dull, because most ghost stories are pointless,
722
00:40:25.880 --> 00:40:30.239
like this happened. Yeah, So what it's like saying I
723
00:40:30.280 --> 00:40:32.639
went out for a walk on a sort of tree.
724
00:40:32.840 --> 00:40:36.679
Good nice tree, good I'm interested in trees. Yeah, but
725
00:40:36.679 --> 00:40:38.840
it doesn't go anywhere, does it, because it's an observation
726
00:40:38.960 --> 00:40:41.559
from nature if you like, and nature doesn't.
727
00:40:41.639 --> 00:40:43.480
Usually we are great.
728
00:40:43.239 --> 00:40:46.679
Storytelling creatures humans, and we like to have a beginning
729
00:40:46.679 --> 00:40:48.880
and middle and end, and we like things to mean things,
730
00:40:48.920 --> 00:40:50.880
and we like to observe things that have a meaning
731
00:40:50.920 --> 00:40:53.199
for us that put us in relation with something else,
732
00:40:53.320 --> 00:40:55.599
or a moral message, which is to do with meaning
733
00:40:55.679 --> 00:40:58.800
because it has meaning for us. And most ghost stories
734
00:40:58.840 --> 00:41:02.400
are observations of nature in the same way. But you
735
00:41:02.440 --> 00:41:05.440
can make meaning of you can actually create a story
736
00:41:05.480 --> 00:41:07.800
from I knew a guy I worked with, a guy
737
00:41:07.840 --> 00:41:12.840
in his PhD, was measuring pebbles on a beach, and
738
00:41:12.920 --> 00:41:16.360
he then statistically analyzed them and showed that it was
739
00:41:16.400 --> 00:41:19.199
predictable whether this, So he made a story out of it.
740
00:41:19.480 --> 00:41:21.920
But most observations on nature aren't that. I went out
741
00:41:21.960 --> 00:41:25.559
to dinsours and crocuses. That was great, loved it, end
742
00:41:25.559 --> 00:41:28.800
of story. So what I'm saying is that this, the
743
00:41:28.800 --> 00:41:33.000
ghost story, comes from this real ghost story, which is
744
00:41:33.000 --> 00:41:37.239
an observation in nature all right. Now, clearly in the
745
00:41:37.239 --> 00:41:40.039
hands of a writer, it can't just be that. So
746
00:41:40.119 --> 00:41:46.760
when we tell a story, the traditional professional storyteller. And remember,
747
00:41:46.840 --> 00:41:50.039
for most societies, I think all human societies, we had
748
00:41:50.079 --> 00:41:53.280
storytellers before they got well, then they got paid because
749
00:41:53.320 --> 00:41:55.719
they were given bored and lodge and it was their living.
750
00:41:55.840 --> 00:41:58.440
So they were like we talked about early societies splitting
751
00:41:58.519 --> 00:42:02.639
into puff from everybody went hunting, everybody went picking berries.
752
00:42:03.119 --> 00:42:04.760
Oh well the women can pick berries and men can
753
00:42:04.800 --> 00:42:06.559
go hunting. Well that's true or I don't know, but
754
00:42:06.639 --> 00:42:08.360
that's how we see it. And then oh yeah, we
755
00:42:08.400 --> 00:42:10.880
have the warrior class. Then we have the I mean
756
00:42:10.880 --> 00:42:14.440
think of the Indian caste system, which arises from Indo
757
00:42:14.440 --> 00:42:18.840
European society structures. So we have the priestly class who
758
00:42:18.880 --> 00:42:22.159
don't they have to be supported by other people because
759
00:42:22.159 --> 00:42:23.880
they don't cook their they don't get their own food.
760
00:42:24.000 --> 00:42:26.119
And the warriors are supported by other people because their
761
00:42:26.199 --> 00:42:29.280
job is fighting and the priests do religious things.
762
00:42:29.280 --> 00:42:30.039
You see what I'm saying.
763
00:42:30.719 --> 00:42:34.800
But the storyteller emerges quite early as a role. The
764
00:42:34.840 --> 00:42:37.760
storyteller is faed about other people because of their stories.
765
00:42:37.840 --> 00:42:39.800
That's in fact what you do to me, those of
766
00:42:39.800 --> 00:42:43.119
you who support me, either through watching and watching ads
767
00:42:43.199 --> 00:42:45.880
so I get a shared of that or actually directly
768
00:42:45.920 --> 00:42:48.840
contributing through patrion or whatever. You're paying me to be
769
00:42:48.920 --> 00:42:51.639
your storyteller. So it's a very ancient role. So when
770
00:42:51.639 --> 00:42:54.519
we get a storyteller, we get an observation on nature,
771
00:42:54.679 --> 00:42:57.840
which is the ghost, and we tweak it so it
772
00:42:57.960 --> 00:43:01.800
has meaning, and because we know the structures of the stories. Ah,
773
00:43:01.960 --> 00:43:04.119
and you know what the structures of the stories are. Also,
774
00:43:04.159 --> 00:43:07.079
there's a guy drilling downstairs. Hopefully it isn't too loud,
775
00:43:07.119 --> 00:43:10.159
Hopefully you can't really hear it, because this is why
776
00:43:10.159 --> 00:43:12.960
I haven't been able to make any progress, which stresses
777
00:43:13.000 --> 00:43:16.760
me out really but not too much. Stopped now. So anyway,
778
00:43:17.840 --> 00:43:19.639
there we are. So it's a slight story. It's about
779
00:43:19.639 --> 00:43:22.159
a haunted wood. That's the first thing I have to
780
00:43:22.159 --> 00:43:23.760
say about it. I have to say about Hugh Granger,
781
00:43:23.880 --> 00:43:25.440
and I've spoken about him. I have to say I
782
00:43:25.519 --> 00:43:28.000
was saying about Roslyn Dash, wasn't I We did get
783
00:43:28.039 --> 00:43:31.639
back to it eventually, so roslyin Dash Moths. I've read
784
00:43:31.639 --> 00:43:34.639
a lot of haunted house stories. Most of them are
785
00:43:34.760 --> 00:43:38.000
short stories, which led to that whole digression about the
786
00:43:38.119 --> 00:43:41.880
nature of the ghost stories a short story, but some
787
00:43:42.000 --> 00:43:49.320
are novella's. The very few are there are full novel
788
00:43:49.400 --> 00:43:55.679
length because they don't have enough material to support a
789
00:43:55.760 --> 00:43:58.599
work of that length. You're only saying one thing. You remember,
790
00:43:58.599 --> 00:44:02.119
it's an observation from nature. She can tweak it, and
791
00:44:02.119 --> 00:44:04.159
that's why they remain short stories. But when we make
792
00:44:04.199 --> 00:44:06.559
a I think of the Haunting of Hill House. She
793
00:44:06.639 --> 00:44:08.920
puts some other themes in the old Hirley Jackson does
794
00:44:08.920 --> 00:44:11.960
a good job, but it's a short it's a novella
795
00:44:12.159 --> 00:44:14.880
really rather than a novel. And then we have Richard
796
00:44:14.920 --> 00:44:20.400
Matheson's Hell House slightly longer, but he pads it out
797
00:44:20.519 --> 00:44:23.800
with and in fact Shirlie Jackson with the interactions between
798
00:44:23.840 --> 00:44:26.000
the characters. So we've got the ghost story, but also
799
00:44:26.280 --> 00:44:29.719
we've got the interactions between the characters. Now other famous
800
00:44:29.880 --> 00:44:32.400
haunted house stories, so we have The Little Stranger by
801
00:44:32.559 --> 00:44:36.159
Sarah Waters again, which is a novel length haunted house story,
802
00:44:36.519 --> 00:44:41.000
and now again manages to fill its space by having
803
00:44:41.000 --> 00:44:43.159
all sorts of love affairs and stuff like that. So
804
00:44:43.239 --> 00:44:46.360
let's return to Rosalind Dash's Moths, which is a haunted
805
00:44:46.360 --> 00:44:50.760
house story set in the seventies, and I'm really enjoying it.
806
00:44:51.679 --> 00:44:57.000
I enjoyed the introduction was beautifully written. The first chapter
807
00:44:57.840 --> 00:45:02.639
was a sublime Why was it sublime because basically it's
808
00:45:02.719 --> 00:45:07.679
the story of this Oxford professor in the seventies who
809
00:45:07.920 --> 00:45:11.960
goes to He travels to Oxford and he hears this great,
810
00:45:12.000 --> 00:45:14.760
big house called the Dower House, which is Queen Anne,
811
00:45:14.760 --> 00:45:17.599
I think, or maybe earlier. And it's a beautiful house
812
00:45:17.639 --> 00:45:19.719
and it's up for sale and it's been neglected. So
813
00:45:19.920 --> 00:45:22.239
he cons his way into. He doesn't get into the
814
00:45:22.280 --> 00:45:24.719
house to start off with, but he starts going there
815
00:45:24.840 --> 00:45:28.199
every day for as long as it's for sale, and
816
00:45:28.239 --> 00:45:31.039
he eats his picnic there and he drinks his bottle
817
00:45:31.079 --> 00:45:33.440
of wine and it's a beautiful setting looking down onto
818
00:45:33.480 --> 00:45:36.239
the River Thames, and it's just idylic and he talks
819
00:45:36.239 --> 00:45:39.679
about one point he's drinking He's drinking white wine from
820
00:45:39.760 --> 00:45:40.320
the bottle.
821
00:45:40.639 --> 00:45:43.039
Who did it, obviously not chilled.
822
00:45:43.159 --> 00:45:46.079
And he he says it's like drinking the sun shining
823
00:45:46.119 --> 00:45:48.519
through it. And he says it's like drinking sunshine. And
824
00:45:48.559 --> 00:45:51.599
I just thought, wow. And maybe it's because I long
825
00:45:51.719 --> 00:45:53.960
for summer, and I long in a sense for the
826
00:45:54.000 --> 00:45:56.920
summers of the nineteen seventies when I was a boy,
827
00:45:57.440 --> 00:46:02.000
and which always in memory a much much warmer and
828
00:46:02.079 --> 00:46:04.480
much sunnier. And I know you're going to say all
829
00:46:04.519 --> 00:46:06.639
global warming, et cetera, cester but in my memory, they
830
00:46:06.639 --> 00:46:09.679
were great summers we have. We've had trash summers recently,
831
00:46:09.840 --> 00:46:12.440
very damp, cold bits of sunshine.
832
00:46:12.519 --> 00:46:14.960
I think it's better down south, but there we are. Yeah.
833
00:46:15.079 --> 00:46:17.719
What captured me about Rosalie Dash's book Moths and I'm
834
00:46:17.760 --> 00:46:19.000
not finished it yet.
835
00:46:19.119 --> 00:46:20.239
Is just that summer.
836
00:46:20.480 --> 00:46:22.400
And of course there was that book I read called
837
00:46:22.480 --> 00:46:25.440
Lost in the Garden by Adam Leslie, and that is
838
00:46:25.480 --> 00:46:28.840
set in this extended summer that never ends, this extended
839
00:46:28.880 --> 00:46:31.719
English summer that never ends. And I know there's horror
840
00:46:31.719 --> 00:46:33.960
bit in it, but I loved it for the summer.
841
00:46:34.039 --> 00:46:35.519
And I've said many times we read.
842
00:46:35.400 --> 00:46:37.800
A lot of books. We say, why do you read books?
843
00:46:37.800 --> 00:46:40.199
While we're reading for the characters. Yes, we're reading them
844
00:46:40.239 --> 00:46:42.239
for the narrative, for the plot, Yes we do. We
845
00:46:42.360 --> 00:46:44.119
read them for the vibe as well.
846
00:46:44.400 --> 00:46:46.039
I mean, one of the reasons people love a Lord
847
00:46:46.039 --> 00:46:47.360
of the Rings is because they want to go to
848
00:46:47.400 --> 00:46:50.400
the Lot Laurian and the Shire or even Mirkwood.
849
00:46:50.440 --> 00:46:52.960
We love them for the vibe. And I wanted to
850
00:46:53.000 --> 00:46:53.800
go to that house.
851
00:46:53.880 --> 00:46:57.039
I wanted to be that Oxford Don in the nineteen seventies,
852
00:46:57.079 --> 00:46:59.960
sitting eating my picnic in the grounds of this absolutely
853
00:47:00.039 --> 00:47:04.800
wonderful house. Bad things happen later on. Anyway, that was
854
00:47:04.840 --> 00:47:10.599
a long digression about how most haunted house stories are short,
855
00:47:11.239 --> 00:47:14.360
or ghost stories are short. However, there are exceptions in
856
00:47:14.480 --> 00:47:18.800
the haunted house genre, but they're always filled up with.
857
00:47:20.400 --> 00:47:23.119
Love. Don't have a lot of time for love.
858
00:47:23.480 --> 00:47:26.360
I remember in my twenties I read The Megas by
859
00:47:26.440 --> 00:47:29.000
John Fowls, and I was a kind of romantic young
860
00:47:29.079 --> 00:47:31.280
chaplain and I loved it. And then I read it
861
00:47:31.360 --> 00:47:33.159
much later when I was in Greece, to be honest,
862
00:47:33.599 --> 00:47:37.119
on holiday, and I was older, I was married, I
863
00:47:37.119 --> 00:47:41.159
had kids. Didn't do it for me. Now I'm wondering,
864
00:47:41.199 --> 00:47:43.519
I've got a copy there. I'm wondering if Foster read
865
00:47:43.519 --> 00:47:46.719
it again as a sixty four year old man, whether
866
00:47:48.039 --> 00:47:51.119
howard feel about it? Because the books speaks to us
867
00:47:51.119 --> 00:47:53.239
a different periods of our time. I haven't read a
868
00:47:53.239 --> 00:47:54.639
Lord of the Rings for a long time. I read
869
00:47:54.679 --> 00:47:57.920
it first when I was a teenager, and I changed
870
00:47:57.920 --> 00:48:00.599
my world. Really, what would it be like now? I
871
00:48:00.639 --> 00:48:03.360
probably would still like it, but it wouldn't be the same.
872
00:48:03.400 --> 00:48:07.000
It's not the same me reading it anyway. So that
873
00:48:07.079 --> 00:48:08.880
is a long, long, long talk about this story. I've
874
00:48:08.920 --> 00:48:10.599
just said there's not a lot to say about the story.
875
00:48:11.119 --> 00:48:12.920
The final thing I want to say about it, however,
876
00:48:13.199 --> 00:48:17.599
is the monster. So this elemental. Now, from what I
877
00:48:17.639 --> 00:48:19.440
know about elementals, they're usually like water.
878
00:48:19.960 --> 00:48:21.280
This is from Dungeons and dragons.
879
00:48:21.000 --> 00:48:24.960
Probably water elementals and fire elementals and earth elementals.
880
00:48:25.000 --> 00:48:27.840
But this is not quite that. It's more some kind
881
00:48:27.880 --> 00:48:30.199
of shell, a clip off.
882
00:48:30.239 --> 00:48:33.760
If you know anything about the Cabbala, particularly dark Cabala,
883
00:48:33.960 --> 00:48:36.400
I think at Kenneth Grant and stuff like that, these
884
00:48:36.679 --> 00:48:39.800
rather awful things. But what I wanted to say was
885
00:48:40.880 --> 00:48:45.280
how where we have Mr James, and we have some
886
00:48:45.360 --> 00:48:48.800
odd things happening in Mr James. We have the whistle,
887
00:48:49.800 --> 00:48:53.320
the thingy there, the sheet, the shirt. Then we have
888
00:48:53.599 --> 00:48:56.559
that in the mist mpreason Inheritance is an ink plot,
889
00:48:56.599 --> 00:48:58.760
isn't it. There's a weird thing crawling across the ground
890
00:48:58.800 --> 00:49:01.360
in the Metal thing. They're very weird, an odd, and
891
00:49:01.559 --> 00:49:07.199
at his best I think Benson does this, but he
892
00:49:07.360 --> 00:49:12.559
does in the Cornish one about the black thing. A
893
00:49:12.639 --> 00:49:16.960
CAMRA's got a Latin Negotians. I can't remember, but you
894
00:49:17.000 --> 00:49:19.639
know it, I've done it. And in this one he
895
00:49:19.719 --> 00:49:26.000
goes very lovecraft a suckery rubbery suckerry monstery earthing, and
896
00:49:26.360 --> 00:49:29.360
this is quite an odds with the rest of his stuff.
897
00:49:29.639 --> 00:49:32.440
Actually I did the Tom wrote story Elties. He wrote
898
00:49:32.480 --> 00:49:35.119
story Holy Bank Foundry, and we have a kind of
899
00:49:35.920 --> 00:49:39.000
Lovecraftian monster in that. So we I mean this idea
900
00:49:39.039 --> 00:49:42.920
that monsters who thought before Lovecraft that monsters have tentacles.
901
00:49:43.480 --> 00:49:45.639
I think he invented it. I think he invented the
902
00:49:45.719 --> 00:49:49.920
tentacled monster something deep from his psyche, and then we
903
00:49:50.039 --> 00:49:52.920
find them popping up in other people's work, so clearly
904
00:49:52.920 --> 00:49:56.000
they're influenced by love I've done. I've used the tentacled
905
00:49:56.000 --> 00:49:58.840
monster myself in some of my stories. But you know,
906
00:49:58.920 --> 00:50:00.840
so that's the final thing I wanted to say about
907
00:50:00.840 --> 00:50:04.440
this story and how it's at odds with the country House.
908
00:50:04.639 --> 00:50:07.679
I keep returning to the country House. There is the
909
00:50:07.719 --> 00:50:10.960
house beautiful genre, and there was a whole bunch of
910
00:50:11.039 --> 00:50:15.719
stories about the beautiful House. Of these great I'm not
911
00:50:15.800 --> 00:50:17.880
sure if they're completely English. There may have been the
912
00:50:17.920 --> 00:50:25.559
French ones as well, but certainly Anglo Irish English to
913
00:50:25.599 --> 00:50:28.280
an extent Scottish. I'm thinking of The Open Door by
914
00:50:28.280 --> 00:50:32.480
Margaret Oliphant, and Bucken of course was scott But his
915
00:50:32.639 --> 00:50:35.760
Open House Full Circle, his house Beautiful story Full Circle
916
00:50:36.159 --> 00:50:40.880
is set in Oxfordshire, in the Cotswolds, Gloucestershire potentially, And
917
00:50:41.320 --> 00:50:42.960
so this there was a whole genre and he didn't
918
00:50:43.000 --> 00:50:45.719
have to have ghosts and monsters. You could just have
919
00:50:45.800 --> 00:50:48.519
the house. I mean it Brideshead revisited, really, isn't it.
920
00:50:48.519 --> 00:50:50.880
It's the house beautiful. It's a house beautiful story.
921
00:50:50.880 --> 00:50:53.760
You know, magazines there still are about the house beautiful.
922
00:50:54.039 --> 00:50:59.760
So in this story it's a little hotchpotch of I
923
00:50:59.760 --> 00:51:02.079
don't think it's homo erotic to be honest of a
924
00:51:02.119 --> 00:51:07.599
friendship with Hugh Grainger. And then we have that's just
925
00:51:07.639 --> 00:51:08.199
a little.
926
00:51:08.039 --> 00:51:10.320
Dash, if you would just sit as a recipe.
927
00:51:10.719 --> 00:51:13.639
Then we have the house Beautiful, which stands behind it,
928
00:51:13.679 --> 00:51:15.960
which obviously I like because we keep talking about it.
929
00:51:18.039 --> 00:51:25.039
Then we have the Lovecraftian suckery monstery thing. And also
930
00:51:25.159 --> 00:51:28.280
another aspect is the haunted wood. I mean, there are
931
00:51:28.320 --> 00:51:31.360
a lot of haunted wood stories, and I'm bad about
932
00:51:31.400 --> 00:51:34.639
remembering things about the how John Dixon Carter, the house
933
00:51:34.679 --> 00:51:37.639
at Goblin Corner or something like that, done that, and
934
00:51:38.199 --> 00:51:42.880
of the nes Bit story the house behind wood, this
935
00:51:43.000 --> 00:51:46.119
one of the haunted wood. The child has a haunted
936
00:51:46.159 --> 00:51:49.519
wood in it. So the haunted wood is also a trope,
937
00:51:49.519 --> 00:51:51.239
I think, And if you ever go on a CYC
938
00:51:51.280 --> 00:51:54.280
called TB tropes, they're fantastic for doing things like this.
939
00:51:54.639 --> 00:51:57.159
But so I think this is the recipe the haunted wood,
940
00:51:57.159 --> 00:51:58.880
which you see in other stories. A bit of that
941
00:51:59.079 --> 00:52:01.039
bit of the house beautiful, bit of the kind of
942
00:52:01.119 --> 00:52:04.360
male friendship crack, and then a bit of lovecraft thrown
943
00:52:04.440 --> 00:52:07.239
in and add them all together and you get this
944
00:52:07.320 --> 00:52:11.840
story and no bird sings. There's also that trope of
945
00:52:11.880 --> 00:52:14.880
a place where no bird sings again comes up time
946
00:52:14.920 --> 00:52:17.519
and time again in literature. So it's just like a recipe.
947
00:52:17.880 --> 00:52:20.360
Did I like the story? What did I like about
948
00:52:20.360 --> 00:52:23.880
the story best? I like the vibe, I like the house,
949
00:52:24.639 --> 00:52:27.519
I like the wood, I like woods in general. I
950
00:52:27.599 --> 00:52:33.239
like Hugh Granger and his lovely wife. Yeah, so I
951
00:52:33.360 --> 00:52:34.000
like the story.
952
00:52:34.360 --> 00:52:37.280
Was I scared lovecrafting?
953
00:52:37.320 --> 00:52:40.440
These monsters don't really scare me. In fact, stories don't
954
00:52:40.480 --> 00:52:43.000
scare me generally anyway. But you know, it.
955
00:52:43.079 --> 00:52:44.440
Was all right. I quite liked it.
956
00:52:44.480 --> 00:52:46.280
I mean, there are some stories I read and I
957
00:52:46.280 --> 00:52:49.360
think we didn't like that, or I didn't like it much.
958
00:52:50.000 --> 00:52:52.400
Usually for hating, I don't do it, and some I
959
00:52:52.480 --> 00:52:54.719
really love. And I would give this what would I
960
00:52:54.760 --> 00:52:57.320
give this? I'd give this a six out of ten,
961
00:52:58.400 --> 00:53:00.679
potentially edging up to a seven odes something funny.
962
00:53:00.679 --> 00:53:03.159
Now, actually, I'm going to close with this. So I
963
00:53:03.280 --> 00:53:04.599
told you about Roslin Dashes.
964
00:53:04.800 --> 00:53:07.320
So Rosalin Dash was a quite a prolific writer in
965
00:53:07.360 --> 00:53:09.880
the seventies, et cetera. And she wrote this story that
966
00:53:09.920 --> 00:53:13.280
I'm reading, Moths is drilling in downstairs, and I really
967
00:53:13.360 --> 00:53:15.840
like it. Now, I went on Goodreads. Good Reads is
968
00:53:15.880 --> 00:53:20.519
a cess pit. People are brutal on Goodreads anyway, So
969
00:53:20.599 --> 00:53:23.199
I read this. I'm reading the reviews of Moths by
970
00:53:23.400 --> 00:53:27.599
Rosslyn Dash and the second one is four stars, four stars,
971
00:53:27.599 --> 00:53:30.760
not bad. It's not bad for good Reads, and it
972
00:53:30.840 --> 00:53:34.519
says my grandmother was a writer, but I've only got
973
00:53:34.639 --> 00:53:37.760
this was her first novel and I've only got around
974
00:53:37.760 --> 00:53:39.519
to reading it. And I thought, oh, it's the grandson who's
975
00:53:39.559 --> 00:53:43.239
reading his grandma's novel. But it gives a four out.
976
00:53:43.280 --> 00:53:45.360
He gives a four stars out of five.
977
00:53:45.400 --> 00:53:47.119
Why they give you a roll she's dead, But give
978
00:53:47.159 --> 00:53:49.639
your old grandma five because it is a good book.
979
00:53:50.159 --> 00:53:53.239
I'll give you four point five. But I'm not her grandson.
980
00:53:53.280 --> 00:53:54.239
It's always her grandson.
981
00:53:54.239 --> 00:53:57.960
I'd give it five just because blood is sticker than water.
982
00:53:58.159 --> 00:54:02.039
Anyway, that's it for another week. Hopefully next week things
983
00:54:02.039 --> 00:54:04.679
won't be as fraught in the house. Sheila has taken
984
00:54:04.719 --> 00:54:07.400
it badly. She's out at the moment with the dogs.
985
00:54:07.599 --> 00:54:10.599
Probably for the best, anyway, Tatar.
986
00:54:18.320 --> 00:54:25.880
Everybody dies, that's isn't that sort You've tried to get
987
00:54:25.880 --> 00:54:28.679
into the locker drouble today? Didn't you try? How do
988
00:54:28.840 --> 00:54:31.639
that they'd come back, didn't you? What's the secrets of