Gothic Tales (Oxford World's Classics Hardback Collection)

by Arthur Conan Doyle

Darryl Jones (Editor)

'There was a rumour, too, that he was a devil-worshipper, or something of that sort, and also that he had the evil eye...'

Arthur Conan Doyle was the greatest genre writer Britain has ever produced. Throughout a long writing career, he drew on his own medical background, his travels, and his increasing interest in spiritualism and the occult to produce a spectacular array of Gothic Tales. Many of Doyle's writings are recognised as the very greatest tales of terror. They range from hauntings in the polar wasteland to evil surgeons and malevolent jungle landscapes.

This collection brings together over thirty of Conan Doyle's best Gothic Tales. Darryl Jones's introduction discusses the contradictions in Conan Doyle's very public life - as a medical doctor who became obsessed with the spirit world, or a British imperialist drawn to support Irish Home Rule - and shows the ways in which these found articulation in that most anxious of all literary forms, the Gothic.

• ISBN10: 0198734298
• ISBN13: 9780198734291
• Publish Date: 27 October 2016
• Publish Status: Out of Print
• Out of Print: 4 December 2019
• Publish Country: GB
• Imprint: Oxford University Press
• Format: Hardcover
• Pages: 592
• Language: English

Reviews

[brokentune]

While ACD is, of course, best known for the Sherlock Holmes stories, he also left an abundance of other stories to us, many of them quite Gothic and featuring ghosts and mummies and other evil characters.

This edition of Gothic Tales contains 34 short stories of horror and suspense that are not related to the Holmes canon.
As with any collection of short stories, some are better than others.

Btw, all of the stories are available online for free, some are even available as audio narrations on Youtube.

The 34 Stories:

The American's Tale - 3.5* - fun, in a cryptozoological way
The Captain of the "Polestar" - 4.5* - Wow. So much atmosphere.
The Winning Shot - 3.5* - Necromancy?
J. Habakuk Jephson's Statement - 2.5* - Interesting but too dragged out, also very dated.
John Barrington Cowles - 4.5* - So good. So dark.
Uncle Jeremy's Household - 1* - Thriving on Indian mysticism and some stereotyping.
The Ring of Thoth - 4* - spooky
The Surgeon of Gaster Fell - 2* - Boring.
A Pastoral Horror - 3.5* - Haha. Gory, but with a fun twist.
"De Profundis" - 4* - Grim, in a plague way.
Lot No. 249 - 4.5* - Classic, fun mummy horror.
The Los Amigos Fiasco - 4* - Truly grim. A story about electrocution.
The Case of Lady Sannox - 3* stomach turning tale. Also, ironic that the stereotyping backfires.
The Lord of Chateau Noir - 2* - Meh.
The Third Generation - 2* Meh. Medical superstition.
The Striped Chest - 3* - Good, fun, maritime superstition.
The Fiend of the Cooperage - 1* - VERY colonial creature feature.
The Beetle-Hunter - 4* - Atmospheric. This could be at home in the Holmes canon. Also: Brooke Street!
The Sealed Room - 2* - Ghostly.
The Brazilian Cat - 4* - Another one that reads Holmesian in nature. Also: Pernambuco! :D
The New Catacomb - 3* - another one where archaeology features
The Retirement of Signor Lambert - 2.5* - Operatic ripper story.
The Brown Hand - 2* - Draaaagging on a bit.
Playing with Fire - 3.5* Paranormal fun.
The Leather Funnel - 4* - pure Gothic horror based on historical fact
The Pot of Caviare - 3* - "It was the salmon mousse."
The Terror of Blue John Gap - 2.5* - too drawn out. Fits with the Lost World.
Through the Veil - 3* - Supernatural Scotland.
How It Happened - 4.5* - Aww. Cute.
The Horror of the Heights - 2* - too much like Lovecraft for me
The Bully of Brocas Court - 3* - Regency bare-knuckle fighting.
The Nightmare Room - 4* - Ha. A very 1920s twist.
The Lift - 2* - Evangelical.