The Haunts of Men and Other Tales of Love & War de Robert W. Chambers

The Haunts of Men and Other Tales of Love & War

Robert W. Chambers

THE HAUNTS OF MEN

"It happened so unexpectedly, so abruptly, that she forgot to scream..."

A woman watches a regiment of soldiers trample her garden as war comes to her front door in "The God of Battles." Three soldiers trade shots across the river and discover a common bond in "Pickets." A Union officer finds unexpected aid and unintentional betrayal in "Smith's Battery." A forgotten lover in disguise is a witness to tragedy in "Collector of the Port." A timid art student has his horizons broadened when he seeks a bit of experience in the Latin Quarter in "Another Good Man."

These stories and many others represent Robert W. Chambers at the beginning of his career, when--some would say--he was at the height of his storytelling powers. Here are tales that range from the Revolutionary War to the artist salons of Paris, and from a small upstate village in New York to the Alpine mountains of Europe. Tales of love and loss, of sacrifice and madness; comic tales of the Bohemian art world and grim stories of life during wartime.

Also included are seven additional stories from The King in Yellow, The Maker of Moons and Barbarians, further glimpses into the hearts and minds of men.

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Notă biografică

Robert William Chambers (1865 - 1933) was an American artist and fiction writer, best known for his book of short stories entitled The King in Yellow, published in 1895. Robert was first educated at the Brooklyn Polytechnic Institute and then entered the Art Students' League at around the age of twenty, where the artist Charles Dana Gibson was his fellow student. Chambers studied at the École des Beaux-Arts and at Académie Julian, in Paris from 1886 to 1893 and his work was displayed at the Salon as early as 1889. On his return to New York, he succeeded in selling his illustrations to Life, Truth, and Vogue magazines. Then, for reasons unclear, he devoted his time to writing, producing his first novel, In the Quarter (written in 1887 in Munich). His most famous, and perhaps most meritorious, effort is The King in Yellow, a collection of Art Nouveau short stories published in 1895. This included several famous weird short stories which are connected by the theme of a fictitious drama of the same title, which drives those who read it insane. E. F. Bleiler described The King in Yellow as one of the most important works of American supernatural fiction. It was also strongly admired by H. P. Lovecraft and his circle. Chambers returned to the weird genre in his later short story collections The Maker of Moons, The Mystery of Choice and The Tree of Heaven, but none earned him as much success as The King in Yellow. Some of Chambers's work contains elements of science fiction, such as In Search of the Unknown and Police!!!, about a zoologist who encounters monsters. Chambers later turned to writing romantic fiction to earn a living. According to some estimates, Chambers had one of the most successful literary careers of his period, his later novels selling well and a handful achieving best-seller status. Many of his works were also serialized in magazines.