THE DEEP ONES: "The Specialist's Hat" by Kelly Link
Talk The Weird Tradition
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1gwendetenebre
"The Specialist's Hat" by Kelly Link
Discussion begins September 6, 2023.
First published in the November 15, 1998 issue of Event Horizon.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
https://isfdb.org/cgi-bin/title.cgi?92823
SELECTED PRINT VERSIONS
The Mammoth Book of Best New Horror: Volume Ten
The Weird: A Compendium of Strange and Dark Stories
Stranger Things Happen
ONLINE VERSIONS
https://kellylink.net/specialists-hat
ONLINE AUDIO VERSIONS
No online audio versions found to date.
MISCELLANY
https://kellylink.net/
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2023/04/03/white-cat-black-dog-kelly-link-boo...
https://www.vulture.com/article/kelly-link-white-cat-black-dog-profile.html
https://tinyurl.com/yjdck66j
Discussion begins September 6, 2023.
First published in the November 15, 1998 issue of Event Horizon.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
https://isfdb.org/cgi-bin/title.cgi?92823
SELECTED PRINT VERSIONS
The Mammoth Book of Best New Horror: Volume Ten
The Weird: A Compendium of Strange and Dark Stories
Stranger Things Happen
ONLINE VERSIONS
https://kellylink.net/specialists-hat
ONLINE AUDIO VERSIONS
No online audio versions found to date.
MISCELLANY
https://kellylink.net/
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2023/04/03/white-cat-black-dog-kelly-link-boo...
https://www.vulture.com/article/kelly-link-white-cat-black-dog-profile.html
https://tinyurl.com/yjdck66j
2paradoxosalpha
I just want to say I'm actually reading this one. It's out on my desk now. I know I've been scarce lately, despite some appetizing stories slated for discussion. I'm settling into new habits after my move, and I'm going to try to make time for Deep Ones reading.
4paradoxosalpha
I did enjoy this story, although not as much as the previous Link read "Lull." She really does make the reader work for it. The mood is suitably surreal and dream-bound for the sort of hauntings recounted here.
I realized pretty early on that the babysitter must be (the ghost of) Rash's daughter. The woman in the woods with whom the twins' father goes to picnic is presumably the ghost of Rash's wife.
The difference between dead and Dead puzzled me for a moment, but Dead is evidently undead? By the end of the story, the father is dead in the woods (maybe) and the twins are Dead in the house (almost certainly).
It's interesting to me for some reason that at the end of the story, the viewpoint settles into Samantha, the younger twin.
I realized pretty early on that the babysitter must be (the ghost of) Rash's daughter. The woman in the woods with whom the twins' father goes to picnic is presumably the ghost of Rash's wife.
The difference between dead and Dead puzzled me for a moment, but Dead is evidently undead? By the end of the story, the father is dead in the woods (maybe) and the twins are Dead in the house (almost certainly).
It's interesting to me for some reason that at the end of the story, the viewpoint settles into Samantha, the younger twin.
5paradoxosalpha
Mulatuppu is apparently a town in Guna Yala.
a recent travelogue
Accounts of Guna religion and ritual emphasize its matrifocal, gynolatrous character. The uxoricidal Rash was definitely a "bad magician," and the twins' father has somehow become his heir in this regard. Did he commit a parallel crime? I see no other clue about how the twins' mother died.
The "woman & snake" motif is nicely biblical.
a recent travelogue
Accounts of Guna religion and ritual emphasize its matrifocal, gynolatrous character. The uxoricidal Rash was definitely a "bad magician," and the twins' father has somehow become his heir in this regard. Did he commit a parallel crime? I see no other clue about how the twins' mother died.
The "woman & snake" motif is nicely biblical.
6AndreasJ
I came down with a cold today, which sucks in general, but at least meant I had time to read this this morning.
What's the caretaker's rôle? Did he knowingly procure a ghost for a babysitter?
I expected the twins' obsession with numbers to lead up to something, but it didn't near as I could tell.
I probably liked this better than "Lull", which was a bit too labyrinthine for my tastes.
What's the caretaker's rôle? Did he knowingly procure a ghost for a babysitter?
I expected the twins' obsession with numbers to lead up to something, but it didn't near as I could tell.
I probably liked this better than "Lull", which was a bit too labyrinthine for my tastes.
7paradoxosalpha
The caretaker Mr Coeslak was kind of hilarious to me. He knows about the ghosts (and the snakes), and treats them like an annoyance to which he is long accustomed. I don't think he's in collusion with them at all. He had "given Samantha and Claire permission to explore the whole of the house," but also "told them to stay out of the attic" which was locked anyhow. It's not clear that he could unlock it, since the (only?) key was in the chimney.
I think chimneys are somewhat Freudian here. A girl going up a chimney is retreating from life, becoming Dead.
I think chimneys are somewhat Freudian here. A girl going up a chimney is retreating from life, becoming Dead.
8RandyStafford
>6 AndreasJ: I took the many references to numbers and even the shapes of numerals was to highlight that, for the twins at the end, the numbering has stopped because they are truly dead.
9RandyStafford
I can't say I liked this story. I seem to not be on Link's wavelength. The story generated no awe or horror for me.
I have a general question for the group: do you think the use of present tense is a hinderance in weird tales? It seems to be increasingly favored these days. I suspect authors are going for something like the immediacy of film and are under the mistaken impression that it's novel -- which it increasingly isn't.
I think this story might have worked better in the past tense though I haven't decided why exactly.
I have a general question for the group: do you think the use of present tense is a hinderance in weird tales? It seems to be increasingly favored these days. I suspect authors are going for something like the immediacy of film and are under the mistaken impression that it's novel -- which it increasingly isn't.
I think this story might have worked better in the past tense though I haven't decided why exactly.
10paradoxosalpha
>9 RandyStafford: present tense
All other things being equal, I don't care for the use of present tense in the main narrating voice of a piece of fiction. Still, I can think of several works that I really like that have it. The Jack Price books of Aidan Truhen, David Mitchell's Slade House, and Charles Stross's Accelerando (along with its quasi-sequel Glasshouse) are all good examples. The Engines of Light series did some interesting things with a pair of narrative registers distinguished by present versus past tense.
I think that the effect leans more toward conversation than cinema.
This is the third Link story I've read (I think). "Lull" really needed present tense to do the strange business of time and reversibility that it did. Her story "Catskin" has more of a fairytale sensibility, and uses a traditional sort of past tense, although with occasional interruptions by the narrator to directly address the reader, like, "If you are looking for a happy ending in this story, then perhaps you should stop reading here ... ."
All other things being equal, I don't care for the use of present tense in the main narrating voice of a piece of fiction. Still, I can think of several works that I really like that have it. The Jack Price books of Aidan Truhen, David Mitchell's Slade House, and Charles Stross's Accelerando (along with its quasi-sequel Glasshouse) are all good examples. The Engines of Light series did some interesting things with a pair of narrative registers distinguished by present versus past tense.
I think that the effect leans more toward conversation than cinema.
This is the third Link story I've read (I think). "Lull" really needed present tense to do the strange business of time and reversibility that it did. Her story "Catskin" has more of a fairytale sensibility, and uses a traditional sort of past tense, although with occasional interruptions by the narrator to directly address the reader, like, "If you are looking for a happy ending in this story, then perhaps you should stop reading here ... ."
11AndreasJ
I have no strong feelings about the use of present tense, and I didn’t reflect at all about this story being written in it.
It does offer a way out of the implication that a story in the 1st person past must have been survived by the narrator to subsequently recount it. But this story is in the 3rd person, of course.
It does offer a way out of the implication that a story in the 1st person past must have been survived by the narrator to subsequently recount it. But this story is in the 3rd person, of course.
