I was incredibly lucky yesterday to attend the talk “Eerie East Anglia” with Edward Parnell (many of you know him as the author of a great book-travelogue, “Ghostland,” which I highly recommend to everyone who’s interested in East Anglian history and Gothic folklore) and Daisy Johnson, a novelist who was the youngest nominee in the Booker Prize’s history* : Daisy writes about Fenland extensively**. The event was organised at St. Peter’s Church, which, surprisingly, I’ve never visited before despite going to Ely quite regularly.
The talk—or rather a dialogue between two writers whose love for Fenland and its murkiness, reflected in the works of so many authors, from M.R. James to Robert Aickman***, couldn’t be underestimated—was a true gift for all the Ghostlore, Gothic, Jamesian aficionados, as it was sincerely passionate and full of everlasting admiration and light-hearted humour. It was followed by Q&As, and I felt a bit sad when it was over (the most wonderful things always have the tendency to end way too soon).
We also got our signed copies (a short stories collection, with Daisy Johnson’s story included and edited by Edward Parnell) from the Weird subscription launched by the British Library; our way back on the train through the night fog felt exactly like many of those described in the ghost stories—dark and uncanny.
___________________
* I will drop her series of short ghost stories “Hotel” made for BBC Sounds in the first comment
** See her short story collection entitled “Fen” that was published in 2017
*** It’s true that most of Aickman’s stories take place somewhere in the Midlands, but a few of them still belong to Suffolk
No comments :
Post a Comment