Dark Domain (Dedalus European Classics) |
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Stefan Grabinski
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Pages: 153 (Paperback)
ISBN: 1903517419
Pub: Dedalus Ltd
Pub date: 2005-07-26
Amazon.co.uk Sales Rank: 205168
Reader Reviews:
A Connoisseur's Delight (6/7 people found this helpful)
Far from just being a "Polish Poe", Grabinski occupies a space of his own somewhere between the European Decadents and more modern weird writers like Kafka and Aickman. His writing makes a knowing use of horror tropes, and his stories often move through several quick twists in succession, being closer to surrealism or nightmare than traditional horror.
In the best story in the volume, "The Glance", Grabinski refines the fear of the unknown into its purest form, as the protagonist tries to banish all doors, corners and mirrors from his life so as never to be surprised by anything unpleasant, then ends up being just as fearful of the terrible solipsism a totally predictable life engenders. The bizarre "Szamota's Mistress" is more sexually (and psychologically) explicit than anything that could have been published in England at the time; but it is the ideas behind Grabinski's stories that I really like - the debate on how we perceive time in "Saturnin Sektor", and the many ideas sparked off by trains: the train as symbol of freedom from the self-constraints and fears of everyday life in "The Compartment", the train as embodiment of abstract, pure motion in "The Motion Demon", the train as unrestrained madness in "The Wandering Train".
Grabinski is an original, taking an intelligent approach to the psychologically charged weirdness that comes from his own inner dark domain, and showing insight rare in the genre considering the age in which he wrote.
One of the great names of european fantasy & the absurd (6/7 people found this helpful)
For everyone interested in fantasy in its purest state this is a gemm. This anthology mixes the many themes that cross the polish author's short stories. The pure horror, the ghost story, the surrealist (before its time), really erotic images, all of this with just enough hints of a certain modernism or post-modern that rends the stories an extra quality.
It's a must and will certainly fill a gap on fantasy literature.
The train stories are just amazing - This guy wrote one collection of stories just around trains he worked with the modern concept of speed as a moto for the future society which would be obliterated by it... I wonder if he didn't just get it right...
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Categories
Amazon.co.uk places this book into the following categories:
Books -> Subjects -> Fiction -> General
Books -> Subjects -> Science Fiction & Fantasy -> Fantasy
Books -> Subjects -> Science Fiction & Fantasy -> Science Fiction -> Classic
Books -> Refinements -> Language (feature_browse-bin) -> English
Books -> Refinements -> Age (feature_two_browse-bin)
Books -> Refinements -> Format (binding_browse-bin) -> Paperback