THE DEEP ONES: "The Dead Man's Hand" by Manly Wade Wellman
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1gwendetenebre
"The Dead Man's Hand" by Manly Wade Wellman
Discussion begins February 1, 2017.
First published in the November 1944 issue of Weird Tales.
ONLINE VERSIONS
http://www.unz.org/Pub/WeirdTales-1944nov-00074?View=PDF
BIBLIOGRAPHY
http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/title.cgi?87930
SELECTED PRINT VERSIONS
The Complete John Thunstone
The Third Cry to Legba
Weird Tales: Seven Decades of Terror
Lonely Vigils
MISCELLANY
http://clarkesworldmagazine.com/wellman_interview/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Thunstone
http://www.thepulp.net/pulpsuperfan/2014/04/07/john-thunstone-occult-detective/
https://www.blackgate.com/2012/02/20/the-nightmare-men-the-enemy-of-evil/
http://www.manlywadewellman.com/
http://david-drake.com/topic/01-about-me/08-manly-wade-wellman/
http://tinyurl.com/zck953k
Discussion begins February 1, 2017.
First published in the November 1944 issue of Weird Tales.
ONLINE VERSIONS
http://www.unz.org/Pub/WeirdTales-1944nov-00074?View=PDF
BIBLIOGRAPHY
http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/title.cgi?87930
SELECTED PRINT VERSIONS
The Complete John Thunstone
The Third Cry to Legba
Weird Tales: Seven Decades of Terror
Lonely Vigils
MISCELLANY
http://clarkesworldmagazine.com/wellman_interview/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Thunstone
http://www.thepulp.net/pulpsuperfan/2014/04/07/john-thunstone-occult-detective/
https://www.blackgate.com/2012/02/20/the-nightmare-men-the-enemy-of-evil/
http://www.manlywadewellman.com/
http://david-drake.com/topic/01-about-me/08-manly-wade-wellman/
http://tinyurl.com/zck953k
2gwendetenebre
I have this story in three of the books listed above, but I'm gong to read it online.
3housefulofpaper
I've read this story in Weird Tales: Seven Decades of Terror, but this discussion seemed like a good reason to start reading The Complete John Thunstone.
6RandyStafford
Online for me too.
7elenchus
I enjoyed this story very much: the writing, the characters, the backstory. I'm not clear on which (if any) other Thunstone tales I've read, so the Wiki link on him was useful in sussing out the relevance of such particulars as Rowley Thorne, named in the final sentence.
The reference to Lewis Spence's Encyclopedia of Occultism and the Ingoldsby quote as epigram (perhaps from The Ingoldsby Legends) were masterful touches. At first I thought each no more than fictional conceits, but a little online reading assures me I was mistaken. Anyone read either of these?
A favourite line was perhaps not even supplied by Wellman: "The Shonokins took this country from creatures too terrible to imagine -- they themselves were none less evil" could have been an editorial addition. It hints at the rich backstory that Thornstone is curious about, himself.
ETA I wonder if the Ingoldsby tales might not be worthy of nomination for a future Deep Ones read ....
The reference to Lewis Spence's Encyclopedia of Occultism and the Ingoldsby quote as epigram (perhaps from The Ingoldsby Legends) were masterful touches. At first I thought each no more than fictional conceits, but a little online reading assures me I was mistaken. Anyone read either of these?
A favourite line was perhaps not even supplied by Wellman: "The Shonokins took this country from creatures too terrible to imagine -- they themselves were none less evil" could have been an editorial addition. It hints at the rich backstory that Thornstone is curious about, himself.
ETA I wonder if the Ingoldsby tales might not be worthy of nomination for a future Deep Ones read ....
8AndreasJ
Online for me too. Somewhat surprised the story didn't involve poker.
Our previous Wellman story - "Oh Ugly Bird!" - didn't appeal greatly to me, and I can't say I liked this one much either. The Shonokins are too nebulously described to be very interesting, and that Thunstone would arrive in the nick of time to save the Conleys was so obvious I half expected a twist.
Acc'd WP, the Shonokins are Wellman's own invention rather than anything picked from folklore; they apparently occur in other stories and perhaps achieve greater definition there. I feel little need to find out, however.
Our previous Wellman story - "Oh Ugly Bird!" - didn't appeal greatly to me, and I can't say I liked this one much either. The Shonokins are too nebulously described to be very interesting, and that Thunstone would arrive in the nick of time to save the Conleys was so obvious I half expected a twist.
Acc'd WP, the Shonokins are Wellman's own invention rather than anything picked from folklore; they apparently occur in other stories and perhaps achieve greater definition there. I feel little need to find out, however.
9AndreasJ
>7 elenchus:
Spence had some wild theories about Atlantis an European prehistory, which, IIRC, inspired REH's Atlantean and Hyborian settings. I haven't read him, but he seems likely to be interesting to WT members.
Spence had some wild theories about Atlantis an European prehistory, which, IIRC, inspired REH's Atlantean and Hyborian settings. I haven't read him, but he seems likely to be interesting to WT members.
10housefulofpaper
I read the first seven John Thunstone stories over the weekend, "The Dead Man's Hand" being the seventh. I enjoyed them, but recovering from a heavy cold, or some other unpleasant bug, I was in the mood for something light and comforting (in the way that Golden Age detective fiction is comforting).
Ramsey Campbell, in his introduction to The Complete John Thunstone, quotes from Wellman's own introduction to an earlier collection Lonely Vigils, in which Wellman explains how, in 1943, Weird Tales editor Dorothy McIlwraith and her associate Lamont Buchanan (Farnsworth Wright had retired by this time) had a lot of creative input into the character; he was designed as a series character like Jules de Grandin and most of his stories appeared regularly between late 1943 and summer 1946.
Knowing that, the teasing mentions of de Grandin, and one mention of the Necronomicon, in the stories looks not so much an in-joke as an early example of a "shared universe" like the Marvel, DC (and Hasbro toys!) film franchises. Is it notable that Thunstone operates in an explicitly Christian universe, or is it actually the Weird Tales "big three" - Lovecraft, Robert E Howard, Clark Ashton Smith - who are the exceptions?
Weldon's dropping into his stories of actual folklore and non-mainstream belief systems (e.g. Voodoo, in the first Thunstone story) looks a bit clunky today, but I presume it was thrilling for his readers in the '40s. He (and Thunstone) are notably courteous and respectful to the shamans and so on that Thunstone encounters (or, it seems, already knows in the suave know-all hero way). Any belief system is to be respected if it's used for good, it seems. It's an attractive aspect of these stories.
The first six stories have Thunstone much more front-and-centre; putting him in the background and foregrounding the Conleys, and their lack of defence against the Shonokin, this feels more like a ghost or weird tale, less like a slightly mutated hard-boiled "Black Mask" adventure story (although I recognise that at heart it's a fairly standard plot and a non-supernatural menace could be substituted).
I actually thought the Shonokin was pretty effective; a low-key introduction with the subtle "wrong notes" - the strange fingers, sharp teeth, the suit made out of some kind of skin (human?) - getting more uncanny as the threat increased.
I'm not sure about the animated furniture though; I couldn't help but be reminded of the killer piano in the Amicus portmanteau horror film Torture Garden (scripted by Robert Bloch, though, and from one of his own stories, so maybe it can work in print, just as long as no one ever tries to film it?).
>7 elenchus:
I'm pretty sure I've read a couple of the Ingoldsby Legends in anthologies of ghost stories or Gothic fiction. I can't remember much about them but i've a feeling they tend towards "pawky humour" rather than Weird or even "genuinely aiming to be scary".
Ramsey Campbell, in his introduction to The Complete John Thunstone, quotes from Wellman's own introduction to an earlier collection Lonely Vigils, in which Wellman explains how, in 1943, Weird Tales editor Dorothy McIlwraith and her associate Lamont Buchanan (Farnsworth Wright had retired by this time) had a lot of creative input into the character; he was designed as a series character like Jules de Grandin and most of his stories appeared regularly between late 1943 and summer 1946.
Knowing that, the teasing mentions of de Grandin, and one mention of the Necronomicon, in the stories looks not so much an in-joke as an early example of a "shared universe" like the Marvel, DC (and Hasbro toys!) film franchises. Is it notable that Thunstone operates in an explicitly Christian universe, or is it actually the Weird Tales "big three" - Lovecraft, Robert E Howard, Clark Ashton Smith - who are the exceptions?
Weldon's dropping into his stories of actual folklore and non-mainstream belief systems (e.g. Voodoo, in the first Thunstone story) looks a bit clunky today, but I presume it was thrilling for his readers in the '40s. He (and Thunstone) are notably courteous and respectful to the shamans and so on that Thunstone encounters (or, it seems, already knows in the suave know-all hero way). Any belief system is to be respected if it's used for good, it seems. It's an attractive aspect of these stories.
The first six stories have Thunstone much more front-and-centre; putting him in the background and foregrounding the Conleys, and their lack of defence against the Shonokin, this feels more like a ghost or weird tale, less like a slightly mutated hard-boiled "Black Mask" adventure story (although I recognise that at heart it's a fairly standard plot and a non-supernatural menace could be substituted).
I actually thought the Shonokin was pretty effective; a low-key introduction with the subtle "wrong notes" - the strange fingers, sharp teeth, the suit made out of some kind of skin (human?) - getting more uncanny as the threat increased.
I'm not sure about the animated furniture though; I couldn't help but be reminded of the killer piano in the Amicus portmanteau horror film Torture Garden (scripted by Robert Bloch, though, and from one of his own stories, so maybe it can work in print, just as long as no one ever tries to film it?).
>7 elenchus:
I'm pretty sure I've read a couple of the Ingoldsby Legends in anthologies of ghost stories or Gothic fiction. I can't remember much about them but i've a feeling they tend towards "pawky humour" rather than Weird or even "genuinely aiming to be scary".
11paradoxosalpha
I liked this one, except for the Thunstone-continuity elements, which I felt no fondness for, and in fact felt like they were trying to sell me on a somewhat irrelevant series. It was sort of like the serial teases in superhero comic books, which I found intriguing when I was a pre-teen, and irritating now.
The story was good in itself, though. I thought the Shonokin were decidedly more interesting than Machen's Little People, who might be their literary progenitors (separate folk sources notwithstanding). The fellow in the white suit had a nice developmental arc where he went from being quite friendly and intriguing (albeit with pronounced dramatic irony) to progressively more threatening postures. I'm quite sure we are to conclude that the suit was made from human skin.
The story was good in itself, though. I thought the Shonokin were decidedly more interesting than Machen's Little People, who might be their literary progenitors (separate folk sources notwithstanding). The fellow in the white suit had a nice developmental arc where he went from being quite friendly and intriguing (albeit with pronounced dramatic irony) to progressively more threatening postures. I'm quite sure we are to conclude that the suit was made from human skin.
12gwendetenebre
The Shonokins do turn up elsewhere, most notably encountering Wandering John in several stories, including the 1980 novel After Dark. Wellman lived in the mountains of North Carolina (along with neighbor/pal Karl Edward Wagner) and he's able to convey an astounding level of folkloric, woodsy atmosphere.
The urban, urbane Thunstone provides a nice counterpoint to the stories featuring John. Or Judge Pursivant, for that matter.
I thought it was a great, gruesome touch to have the shotgun-shredded body of "Mr. Shonokin" buried at the front of the Conley's walk as a magical ward. Good thing that Thunstone was there to suggest it, although it sounds like something they might not want to mention to any future realtors.
The urban, urbane Thunstone provides a nice counterpoint to the stories featuring John. Or Judge Pursivant, for that matter.
I thought it was a great, gruesome touch to have the shotgun-shredded body of "Mr. Shonokin" buried at the front of the Conley's walk as a magical ward. Good thing that Thunstone was there to suggest it, although it sounds like something they might not want to mention to any future realtors.
13elenchus
I am surprised that Mr Shonokin suffers such unadulterated defeat.
While I wasn't expecting both Conleys (Berna and Ward) to be killed, I anticipated they'd be run off the land after a rescue by Thunstone, or perhaps Ward killed while Berna survives. The ending does leave room to wonder how they'll fare with other Shonokins in the future, that magical ward notwithstanding. Still, they are unarguably the vanquisher here, and not the vanquished.
Do the Thunstone stories generally (or for that matter any other of Wellman's stories) result in humanity triumphant?
While I wasn't expecting both Conleys (Berna and Ward) to be killed, I anticipated they'd be run off the land after a rescue by Thunstone, or perhaps Ward killed while Berna survives. The ending does leave room to wonder how they'll fare with other Shonokins in the future, that magical ward notwithstanding. Still, they are unarguably the vanquisher here, and not the vanquished.
Do the Thunstone stories generally (or for that matter any other of Wellman's stories) result in humanity triumphant?
14gwendetenebre
>13 elenchus:
Do the Thunstone stories generally (or for that matter any other of Wellman's stories) result in humanity triumphant?
That's pretty much the way things go in Wellman's horror fiction, although several creatures/villains return later on after being fought to a draw. I don't think you read Manly looking for existential dread, but rather for the setting and the novelty of the situations. And the monsters. Let's not forget the monsters.
Do the Thunstone stories generally (or for that matter any other of Wellman's stories) result in humanity triumphant?
That's pretty much the way things go in Wellman's horror fiction, although several creatures/villains return later on after being fought to a draw. I don't think you read Manly looking for existential dread, but rather for the setting and the novelty of the situations. And the monsters. Let's not forget the monsters.
15RandyStafford
>13 elenchus: Yes, I too didn't expect a Shonokin could die with a shotgun blast.
I actually own Lewis Spence Encyclopedia of Occultism and have idlly looked up entries now and then in it.
I actually own Lewis Spence Encyclopedia of Occultism and have idlly looked up entries now and then in it.
