Hauntings and Other Fantastic Tales - Supernatural Horror Stories Collection for Halloween, Campfire Nights & Thriller Book Lovers

Vernon Lee was a learned young woman. At age twenty-four, she published a critical study of eighteenth-century Italy that made her name in the literary and artistic circles of 1880. The very erudition that impressed her contemporaries, however, calls for the help of editors today. Broadview, as usual, has done a great job of explaining Lee's allusions and putting her into context.At the same time, I must confess I sometimes skimmed the footnotes. Vernon Lee's tales have a quirky emotional energy that swept me along irresistibly.This edition combines a story collection called Hauntings and miscellaneous tales that showcase Lee's eccentric imagination.One of the longer stories, "Oke of Okehurst; or The Phantom Lover," is to my mind a masterpiece of the literature of obsession. I would urge readers to buy this book for "The Phantom Lover," if nothing else. The prose style is technically dazzling and the psychological complexity of the characters unbelievably rich.The narrator is an artist who's been commissioned to paint Mr. and Mrs. Oke. Alice Oke confounds him with her absent gaze and far-away smile. The atmosphere in the Oke mansion is heavy with ancestors, and in fact, the painter soon discovers that Alice Oke of 1880 is consumed by the spirit of Alice Oke of 1626, a proud and dangerous woman. This mania will lead to no good.Vernon Lee, in her introduction to Hauntings, declares her preference for ghosts from the remote past. In "Amour Dure," a young Polish historian falls under the spell of a terrifying beauty dead three hundred years. In "A Wicked Voice," it's the musical spirit of an androgynous eighteenth-century singer who unhinges the mind of the protagonist.The introduction paints an intriguing picture of Vernon Lee, who did her best to mystify future biographers. She eludes categorization - too decadent to be a true Victorian, too exotic to be a strict Modernist.Lee's luscious prose is not always easy reading. But having dived into it, I'm glad I did.