#77 The Horla (1887)- Guy de Maupassant
In the lineage of Edgar Allen Poe and an influence on H.P
Lovecraft already reviewed in this blog, Maupassant is a master of the eerie
world of supernatural and horror. Just like Poe, this horror comes from the
depths of the human psyche.
“One might say that man, ever since he has thought, has had
a foreboding and a fear of a new being, stronger than himself, his successor in
this world, and that, feeling him near, and not being able to foretell the
nature of the unseen one, he has, in his terror, created the whole race of
hidden beings, vague phantoms born of fear.”
The narrator spirals quickly into a maddening dementia. He
believes his is being haunted while asleep. He searches for rational reasons
behind his madness, like sleepwalking, hypnosis, etc. But he is aware of the
fragility of the human mind:
“A small disturbance in the imperfect and delicate functions
of our living machinery, can turn the most light-hearted of men into a
melancholy one, and make a coward of the bravest”
As his rational mind is being lost with each dream-filled
night, he wonders if within that world, he can believe in things unproven, unreal, unseen:
“Look here; there is the wind, which is the strongest force
in nature. It knocks down men, and blows down buildings, uproots trees, raises
the sea into mountains of water, destroys cliffs and casts great ships on to
the breakers; it kills it whistles, it sighs, it roars. But have you ever seen
it, and can you see it? Yet it exists for all that.”
The language here is a rich, flowing, gothic style that
makes you want to read aloud in a dark room lit only by candles. I enjoyed this
one. It’s no wonder that Maupassant is considered a father of the modern short
story. Although that title may aptly be given to a dozen other authors as well,
it is well deserved here.
Notable Passage: “Whence come those mysterious influences
which change our happiness into discouragement, and our self-confidence into
diffidence?”
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