The Hunger and Other Stories
Charles Beaumont
Language: English
Pages: 226
ISBN: 1939140420
Format: PDF / Kindle (mobi) / ePub
"A memorable first book of fiction, one which belongs on any shelf of the best contemporary weird tales." - August Derleth, Chicago Tribune
"[E]xtraordinary . . . gives Mr. Beaumont undeniable stature as an artist." - N. Y. Herald Tribune
"Charles Beaumont was a genius . . . and one hell of a storyteller." - Dean R. Koontz
"The name of Charles Beaumont will be honored and recognized for generations yet to come." - Robert Bloch
When The Hunger and Other Stories (1957) appeared, it heralded the arrival of Charles Beaumont (1929-1967) as an important and highly original new voice in American fiction. Although he is best known today for his scripts for television and film, including several classic episodes of The Twilight Zone, Beaumont is being rediscovered as a master of weird tales, and this, his first published collection, contains some of his best. Ranging in tone from the chilling Gothic horror of "Miss Gentilbelle," where an insane mother dresses her son up as a girl and slaughters his pets, to deliciously dark humor in tales like "Open House" and "The Infernal Bouillabaisse," where murderers' plans go disastrously awry, these seventeen stories demonstrate Beaumont's remarkable talent and versatility. This new edition of The Hunger and Other Stories, the first in more than fifty years, includes a new introduction by Dr. Bernice M. Murphy, who argues for reevaluation of Beaumont alongside the other greats of the genre, including Shirley Jackson, Ray Bradbury, and Richard Matheson.
“The Vanishing American” the 1950s writer whom Beaumont most resembles is Shirley Jackson, whose work shares with his a recurrent fascination with the devastating effects of loneliness and the empowering and yet dangerous allure of fantasy. As in Jackson’s oeuvre, there is also a recurrent sense that his protagonists have drifted into acute unhappiness without realizing quite how this state of affairs came to be. One of the most characteristic preoccupations of 1950s horror fiction was the
was saying to your husband, Mrs. L., if you folks had anything special in mind—?” “Well sir, to tell the truth, we ain’t give the matter much thought. Didn’t rightly know we had anything to say about it.” “Why, but you have everything to say about it!” “We do?” “Certainly! Indeedy yes, you do!” Frost was forming heavily on the windows; the room was going dark. “Now Henry,” Mrs. Ludlow said, “that’s right thoughtful of them, ain’t it.” Mr. Ludlow didn’t seem to hear. “I think,” he said, “we
They undid the top button. For some reason, her body trembled. The chill had turned to heat, tiny needles of heat, puncturing her all over. She threw the dress over a chair and removed the underclothing. Then she walked to the bureau and took from the top drawer a flannel nightdress, and turned. What she saw in the tall mirror caused her to stop and make a small sound. Julia Landon stared back at her from the polished glass. Julia Landon, thirty-eight, neither young nor old, attractive nor
my head. Then I’ll come back and sleep. It’s perfectly safe. She started for the door, stopped, returned to the window. Maud and Louise would still be up, talking. She slid one leg over the sill; then the other leg. Softly she dropped to the frosted lawn. The gate did not creak. She walked into the darkness. Better! So much better. Good clean air that you can breathe! The town was a silence. A few lights gleamed in distant houses, up ahead; behind, there was only blackness. And the wind. In
dinner table. Once he had seated himself, a hundred napkins flew listlessly into a hundred laps and seven expressionless men in velvet jackets entered the hall bearing trays. The meal, if it mattered, which it didn’t, was a masterpiece. Mr. Frenchaboy had begun preparations five weeks previous and worked himself into a nervous tic over the selection. Why? He could not say. Force of habit, perhaps, a blind refusal to admit that there was no point to the Gourmet’s Club any more. Honeycomb Tripe à