Horror Aficionados discussion

http://literaryfictions.com/poetry-co...

Exciting I cannot wait to read it....

Yeah, I haven't read it yet either. Too busy at work. I will this weekend.

Its an interesting story about the power of women's fears. You really feel for the poor lady and her twilight zone predicament.

Was it you who mentioned this story and "The Tooth" just recently? Someone did and I went looking for them to post and discuss. Couldn't find "Tooth" but it's hard to find full-text short stories online, or I just suck at doing it.

Wow. What a sad story that put me at UNease. Guess women were considered old maids back then at age 34?

I always get a little thrill when starting a Jackson story because she makes the public so menacing, more so because it's usually in an everyday setting in which there is an exchange of pleasantries of commerce or greetings. There's always an undercurrent of "you against the world" in her stories.

This reminds me of myself on my first date with my now husband! Damn, that's a scary thought.

Tressa wrote: "Was it you who mentioned this story and "The Tooth" just recently? Someone did and I went looking for them to post and discuss. Couldn't find "Tooth" but it's hard to find full-text short stories o..."

I don't think it was me.

Yeah its sad to consider that your life was effectively limited if you didn't have a committed relationship or marriage by that age in the 50s. They were damned limiting years for a lot of reasons. I'm not sure what the title was but there's a short story in her drama collection that goes along similar lines only with an overweight lady dealing with insecurities at a shopping center.

Obviously not, lol.

I don't know Shirley Jackson, but I'm beginning to think that a lot of her female lead characters (that is, if she even had any male lead characters) eerily mirrored her own insecurities. The woman in the short story, Eleanor from Hill House, and Merricat were trapped in unfulfilling lives. I mean, Eleanor had to steal HER OWN CAR to drive to Hill House and Merricat wasn't even allowed to poison the rest of the family. *sulk*

I'd be interested in reading that shopping center short story. I've got a collection of her stories on my Kindle, I need to read them soon.

Tressa wrote: "Obviously not, lol.

I don't know Shirley Jackson, but I'm beginning to think that a lot of her female lead characters (that is, if she even had any male lead characters) eerily mirrored her own in..."

Just an Ordinary Day: The Uncollected Stories Of Shirley Jackson Here's the book its great :)

Thanks!

I just read this short.....very sad. But quite startling too.....I can definitely see the insecurity.

Just finished reading this. Not sure how sympathetic the woman is, it's hard for me to take into account the type of environment the 50's were for women, and this one seems to have so few inner resources. Still, I have fallen too hard too quickly for unavailable men ... so maybe she's just too relatable for me. In any case, a sad story that also makes me wonder about Shirley Jackson's personal life and attitude toward men.

I was never sure if there was a man at all, especially one who promised to marry her. The people on the street saw a grinning man with flowers go into an apt. building, but that could have been someone else's lover entirely.

I think the woman just made it up in her Miss Lonely Heart's mind. She's come undone.

Ahhhhh ... that certainly makes her more interesting, Tressa! And also much more sympathetic.

But that's just my theory. I think she's so unbalanced that she created this wedding day in her mind, then when, of course, he didn't show, she went out looking for him. She asked the people on the street and in the shops leading questions, and some just to get rid of her or to mock her or for whatever reason told her encouragingly, "Yes, I did see a man with flowers. He was walking on air! That must be some lucky girl he's got there. He went thataway!"

Oh now...I can see the she is coming undone theory, but I can also see maybe another presence teasing and preying on her insecurities to toy with her feelings.

There was someone actually apartment sitting for that couple for a month, wasn't there?

There was someone house sitting, presumably named Jamie Harris. It's hard to take any of the people she runs into at their word. Some are trying to shake her, others egg her on, some just trying to be helpful when they have no clue how to.

Even if there is a real Jaimie Harris, she could have just seen him with his girl and overheard his name and made up this whole engagement.

Or maybe he was real and just likes to taunt women.

I was looking up some opinions about the story, and came across this interesting article:

http://voices.yahoo.com/why-anyone-at...

Also, James Harris is also the Daemon Lover from the old folk song (I used to listen to Joan Baez's "House Carpenter" all the time).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Daem...

Tressa wrote: "http://literaryfictions.com/poetry-co..."

Blast! I went to this link, started to read, and then had to log off and then back into Explorer. Now that essay site is blocked because it's "social networking." This happened yesterday when I tried to access the story from here (work). I won't be able to read the article until the next time I log on at home :(.

In any case, I'm thinking the name of the story, "Daemon Lover" may indicate that he really did exist, and his achieved his goal by making her as miserable as he ultimately did.

You know at the end how she keeps going back to that apartment where loverboy and his girl are supposedly shacked up? She keeps going back and knocking and they NEVER answer the door. I don't think there's anyone at home, there or in the woman's head. Did she even run into the people on the street and talk to them? We have no idea what's in her mind or what's real.

Daemon could just be taken as a "ghost" lover, something that's not really there, not necessarily some chauvinist pig who likes to build women up and tear them down.

I love this story, as with most Shirley Jackson ones I have read. There's a lot of interpretations of it, a lot of ambiguity, and I think that all adds to how unsettling it is.

Have any of you read 'The Beautiful Stranger' by Jackson? It's an interesting one to contrast to this one - another story where relationships are portrayed as odd and sinister.

I'm so literal, and I've been watching "Supernatural" for a long time. I was thinking he was a real demon. Now I'm thinking she's just a nut case. Thinking about the story now, it does seem as though nothing outside her experience was at all real.
The only other story by Jackson I've ever read was The Lottery, and that was a good long time ago.

Lisa, he could be real, that's what's so great about this story. We're all picking up on events and conversations and trying to put the puzzle together. We just interpret those pieces differently.

I thought, Well, there was a boarder and the apartment owners made it out that he was real and even called him James Harris...so I thought maybe I was wrong and he wasn't just a figment of her imagination. Then I thought about her knocking and knocking days, weeks, months, and no one ever answering, even though she'd hear them in there. I would think that even James Harris might slip up once and think it was the pizza delivery guy and open the door. So many things to think about.

She may have really talked to the people in the shops and on the street, but it seems as if maybe she interpreted their glances and answers as mocking and belligerent when that's not what happened at all. Who knows.

Some article I glanced at today mentioned how this story is about how women desire the domestic dream of finding a man who will provide the money and lifestyle a woman is after and how some women can't quite make this happen and as the years go by they get more desperate and anxious.

Hi, James. Maybe we should read "The Beautiful Stranger" and discuss that in this thread, too. Compare/contrast or what have you. I'll seek it out when I've got some time to read it.

Now I'm certain she imagined the whole relationship, and if she's as schizophrenic as that probably means she is, this is something that she may have done before and is probably likely to repeat. And the people in her neighborhood are all laughing at her, humoring her, barely tolerating her. I can't remember ever feeling so bad for a character in a story!

I know. And they make her out to be an old maid at 34, lol. Ah, the good old days. I had just gotten married at that age and considered myself a young bride, lol.

I do feel bad for her, too. Not because she's not married, but that she wants to be this badly.

She's looking so hard for something that doesn't exist and everyone around her knows that.

iTunes has it on audio. I'd love to hear Jackson's stories on audio.

I am leaning toward a real demon. Something who likes to toy with people's emotions and make them "crazy". I think she probably started out ok and then just proceeded to lose her mind because of this game the demon wanted to play.

That's why I love this story: so many interpretations.

I'm posting a favorite Flannery O'Connor short story today.