Podcasts about hammer horror

With everyone being a bit giddy about Hammer Films releasing a sumptuous 4K remaster of Quatermass 2 that goes into so much detail, we were surprised that nobody thought to investigate the gas masks used in the film so Cev's here to talk about the surprising connection between Blake's 7, potpourri and coconuts...“The House Of Hammer Theme” and incidental music - written and produced by Cev MooreArtwork by Richard Wells All the links you think you'll need & more! https://linktr.ee/househammerpod

It's Hammer Horror time, and if you're a British cinephile you know exactly what that means! It means blood, dread, and bare breasts! An evil countess is killing virgins to maintain her own beauty, but will her upcoming wedding be spoiled by those who know her secret? Join Tom and Ryan as they talk about historical adaptations, inscrutable charatcer motivations, and uneven age makeup. It's our review of Countess Dracula! Time stamps: 0:03:40 - Background 0:30:30 - Summary 0:38:10 - Notable Scenes 0:48:10 - The Good 0:53:10 - The Bad 1:07:00 - The Ugly 1:12:30 - Final Thoughts

Frances Wilson has written biographies of Dorothy Wordsworth, Thomas De Quincey, D.H. Lawrence, and, most recently, Muriel Spark. I thought Electric Spark was excellent. In my review, I wrote: “Wilson has done far more than string the facts together. She has created a strange and vivid portrait of one of the most curious of twentieth century novelists.” In this interview, we covered questions like why Thomas De Quincey is more widely read, why D.H. Lawrence's best books aren't his novels, Frances's conversion to spookiness, what she thinks about a whole range of modern biographers, literature and parasocial relationships, Elizabeth Bowen, George Meredith, and plenty about Muriel Spark.Here are two brief extracts. There is a full transcript below.Henry: De Quincey and Lawrence were the people you wrote about before Muriel Spark, and even though they seem like three very different people, but in their own way, they're all a little bit mad, aren't they?Frances: Yes, that is, I think, something that they have in common. It's something that I'm drawn to. I like writing about difficult people. I don't think I could write about anyone who wasn't difficult. I like difficult people in general. I like the fact that they pose a puzzle and they're hard to crack, and that their difficulty is laid out in their work and as a code. I like tackling really, really stubborn personalities as well. Yes, they were all a bit mad. The madness was what fuelled their journeys without doubt.Henry: This must make it very hard as a biographer. Is there always a code to be cracked, or are you sometimes dealing with someone who is slippery and protean and uncrackable?And.Henry: People listening will be able to tell that Spark is a very spooky person in several different ways. She had what I suppose we would call spiritual beliefs to do with ghosts and other sorts of things. You had a sort of conversion of your own while writing this book, didn't you?Frances: Yes, I did. [laughs] Every time I write a biography, I become very, very, very immersed in who I'm writing about. I learned this from Richard Holmes, who I see as a method biographer. He Footsteps his subjects. He becomes his subjects. I think I recognized when I first read Holmes's Coleridge, when I was a student, that this was how I also wanted to live. I wanted to live inside the minds of the people that I wrote about, because it was very preferable to live inside my own mind. Why not live inside the mind of someone really, really exciting, one with genius?What I felt with Spark wasn't so much that I was immersed by-- I wasn't immersed by her. I felt actually possessed by her. I think this is the Spark effect. I think a lot of her friends felt like this. I think that her lovers possibly felt like this. There is an extraordinary force to her character, which absolutely lives on, even though she's dead, but only recently dead. The conversion I felt, I think, was that I have always been a very enlightenment thinker, very rational, very scientific, very Freudian in my approach to-- I will acknowledge the unconscious but no more.By the time I finished with Spark, I'm pure woo-woo now.TranscriptHenry: Today, I am talking to Frances Wilson. Frances is a biographer. Her latest book, Electric Spark, is a biography of the novelist Muriel Spark, but she has also written about Dorothy Wordsworth, Thomas De Quincey, DH Lawrence and others. Frances, welcome.Frances Wilson: Thank you so much for having me on.Henry: Why don't more people read Thomas De Quincey's work?Frances: [laughs] Oh, God. We're going right into the deep end.[laughter]Frances: I think because there's too much of it. When I chose to write about Thomas De Quincey, I just followed one thread in his writing because Thomas De Quincey was an addict. One of the things he was addicted to was writing. He wrote far, far, far too much. He was a professional hack. He was a transcendental hack, if you like, because all of his writing he did while on opium, which made the sentences too long and too high and very, very hard to read.When I wrote about him, I just followed his interest in murder. He was fascinated by murder as a fine art. The title of one of his best essays is On Murder as One of the Fine Arts. I was also interested in his relationship with Wordsworth. I twinned those together, which meant cutting out about 97% of the rest of his work. I think people do read his Confessions of an English Opium-Eater. I think that's a cult text. It was the memoir, if you want to call it a memoir, that kick-started the whole pharmaceutical memoir business on drugs.It was also the first addict's memoir and the first recovery memoir, and I'd say also the first misery memoir. He's very much at the root of English literary culture. We're all De Quincey-an without knowing it, is my argument.Henry: Oh, no, I fully agree. That's what surprises me, that they don't read him more often.Frances: I know it's a shame, isn't it? Of all the Romantic Circle, he's the one who's the most exciting to read. Also, Lamb is wonderfully exciting to read as well, but Lamb's a tiny little bit more grounded than De Quincey, who was literally not grounded. He's floating in an opium haze above you.[laughter]Henry: What I liked about your book was the way you emphasized the book addiction, not just the opium addiction. It is shocking the way he piled up chests full of books and notebooks, and couldn't get into the room because there were too many books in there. He was [crosstalk].Frances: Yes. He had this in common with Muriel Spark. He was a hoarder, but in a much more chaotic way than Spark, because, as you say, he piled up rooms with papers and books until he couldn't get into the room, and so just rented another room. He was someone who had no money at all. The no money he had went on paying rent for rooms, storing what we would be giving to Oxfam, or putting in the recycling bin. Then he'd forget that he was paying rent on all these rooms filled with his mountains of paper. The man was chaos.Henry: What is D.H. Lawrence's best book?Frances: Oh, my argument about Lawrence is that we've gone very badly wrong in our reading of him, in seeing him primarily as a novelist and only secondarily as an essayist and critic and short story writer, and poet. This is because of F.R. Leavis writing that celebration of him called D.H. Lawrence: Novelist, because novels are not the best of Lawrence. I think the best of his novels is absolutely, without doubt, Sons and Lovers. I think we should put the novels in the margins and put in the centre, the poems, travel writing.Absolutely at the centre of the centre should be his studies in classic American literature. His criticism was- We still haven't come to terms with it. It was so good. We haven't heard all of Lawrence's various voices yet. When Lawrence was writing, contemporaries didn't think of Lawrence as a novelist at all. It was anyone's guess what he was going to come out with next. Sometimes it was a novel [laughs] and it was usually a rant about-- sometimes it was a prophecy. Posterity has not treated Lawrence well in any way, but I think where we've been most savage to him is in marginalizing his best writing.Henry: The short fiction is truly extraordinary.Frances: Isn't it?Henry: I always thought Lawrence was someone I didn't want to read, and then I read the short fiction, and I was just obsessed.Frances: It's because in the short fiction, he doesn't have time to go wrong. I think brevity was his perfect length. Give him too much space, and you know he's going to get on his soapbox and start ranting, start mansplaining. He was a terrible mansplainer. Mansplaining his versions of what had gone wrong in the world. It is like a drunk at the end of a too-long dinner party, and you really want to just bundle him out. Give him only a tiny bit of space, and he comes out with the perfection that is his writing.Henry: De Quincey and Lawrence were the people you wrote about before Muriel Spark, and even though they seem like three very different people, but in their own way, they're all a little bit mad, aren't they?Frances: Yes, that is, I think, something that they have in common. It's something that I'm drawn to. I like writing about difficult people. I don't think I could write about anyone who wasn't difficult. I like difficult people in general. I like the fact that they pose a puzzle and they're hard to crack, and that their difficulty is laid out in their work and as a code. I like tackling really, really stubborn personalities as well. Yes, they were all a bit mad. The madness was what fuelled their journeys without doubt.Henry: This must make it very hard as a biographer. Is there always a code to be cracked, or are you sometimes dealing with someone who is slippery and protean and uncrackable?Frances: I think that the way I approach biography is that there is a code to crack, but I'm not necessarily concerned with whether I crack it or not. I think it's just recognizing that there's a hell of a lot going on in the writing and that, in certain cases and not in every case at all, the best way of exploring the psyche of the writer and the complexity of the life is through the writing, which is a argument for psycho biography, which isn't something I necessarily would argue for, because it can be very, very crude.I think with the writers I choose, there is no option. Muriel Spark argued for this as well. She said in her own work as a biographer, which was really very, very strong. She was a biographer before she became a novelist. She thought hard about biography and absolutely in advance of anyone else who thought about biography, she said, "Of course, the only way we can approach the minds of writers is through their work, and the writer's life is encoded in the concerns of their work."When I was writing about Muriel Spark, I followed, as much as I could, to the letter, her own theories of biography, believing that that was part of the code that she left. She said very, very strong and very definitive things about what biography was about and how to write a biography. I tried to follow those rules.Henry: Can we play a little game where I say the names of some biographers and you tell me what you think of them?Frances: Oh my goodness. Okay.Henry: We're not trying to get you into trouble. We just want some quick opinions. A.N. Wilson.Frances: I think he's wonderful as a biographer. I think he's unzipped and he's enthusiastic and he's unpredictable and he's often off the rails. I think his Goethe biography-- Have you read the Goethe biography?Henry: Yes, I thought that was great.Frances: It's just great, isn't it? It's so exciting. I like the way that when he writes about someone, it's almost as if he's memorized the whole of their work.Henry: Yes.Frances: You don't imagine him sitting at a desk piled with books and having to score through his marginalia. It sits in his head, and he just pours it down on a page. I'm always excited by an A.N. Wilson biography. He is one of the few biographers who I would read regardless of who the subject was.Henry: Yes.Frances: I just want to read him.Henry: He does have good range.Frances: He absolutely does have good range.Henry: Selina Hastings.Frances: I was thinking about Selina Hastings this morning, funnily enough, because I had been talking to people over the weekend about her Sybil Bedford biography and why that hadn't lifted. She wrote a very excitingly good life of Nancy Mitford and then a very unexcitingly not good life of Sybil Bedford. I was interested in why the Sybil Bedford simply hadn't worked. I met people this weekend who were saying the same thing, that she was a very good biographer who had just failed [laughs] to give us anything about Sybil Bedford.I think what went wrong in that biography was that she just could not give us her opinions. It's as if she just withdrew from her subject as if she was writing a Wikipedia entry. There were no opinions at all. What the friends I was talking to said was that she just fell out with her subject during the book. That's what happened. She stopped being interested in her. She fell out with her and therefore couldn't be bothered. That's what went wrong.Henry: Interesting. I think her Evelyn Waugh biography is superb.Frances: Yes, I absolutely agree. She was on fire until this last one.Henry: That's one of the best books on Waugh, I think.Frances: Yes.Henry: Absolutely magical.Frances: I also remember, it's a very rare thing, of reading a review of it by Hilary Mantel saying that she had not read a biography that had been as good, ever, as Selina Hastings' on Evelyn Waugh. My goodness, that's high praise, isn't it?Henry: Yes, it is. It is. I'm always trying to push that book on people. Richard Holmes.Frances: He's my favourite. He's the reason that I'm a biographer at all. I think his Coleridge, especially the first volume of the two-volume Coleridge, is one of the great books. It left me breathless when I read it. It was devastating. I also think that his Johnson and Savage book is one of the great books. I love Footsteps as well, his account of the books he didn't write in Footsteps. I think he has a strange magic. When Muriel Spark talked about certain writers and critics having a sixth literary sense, which meant that they tuned into language and thought in a way that the rest of us don't, I think that Richard Holmes does have that. I think he absolutely has it in relation to Coleridge. I'm longing for his Tennyson to come out.Henry: Oh, I know. I know.Frances: Oh, I just can't wait. I'm holding off on reading Tennyson until I've got Holmes to help me read him. Yes, he is quite extraordinary.Henry: I would have given my finger to write the Johnson and Savage book.Frances: Yes, I know. I agree. How often do you return to it?Henry: Oh, all the time. All the time.Frances: Me too.Henry: Michael Holroyd.Frances: Oh, that's interesting, Michael Holroyd, because I think he's one of the great unreads. I think he's in this strange position of being known as a greatest living biographer, but nobody's read him on Augustus John. [laughs] I haven't read his biographies cover to cover because they're too long and it's not in my subject area, but I do look in them, and they're novelistic in their wit and complexity. His sentences are very, very, very entertaining, and there's a lot of freight in each paragraph. I hope that he keeps selling.I love his essays as well, and also, I think that he has been a wonderful ambassador for biography. He's very, very supportive of younger biographers, which not every biographer is, but I know he's been very supportive of younger biographers and is incredibly approachable.Henry: Let's do a few Muriel Spark questions. Why was the Book of Job so important to Muriel Spark?Frances: I think she liked it because it was rogue, because it was the only book of the Bible that wasn't based on any evidence, it wasn't based on any truth. It was a fictional book, and she liked fiction sitting in the middle of fact. That was one of her main things, as all Spark lovers know. She liked the fact that there was this work of pure imagination and extraordinarily powerful imagination sitting in the middle of the Old Testament, and also, she thought it was an absolutely magnificent poem.She saw herself primarily as a poet, and she responded to it as a poem, which, of course, it is. Also, she liked God in it. She described Him as the Incredible Hulk [laughs] and she liked His boastfulness. She enjoyed, as I do, difficult personalities, and she liked the fact that God had such an incredibly difficult personality. She liked the fact that God boasted and boasted and boasted, "I made this and I made that," to Job, but also I think she liked the fact that you hear God's voice.She was much more interested in voices than she was in faces. The fact that God's voice comes out of the burning bush, I think it was an image for her of early radio, this voice speaking, and she liked the fact that what the voice said was tricksy and touchy and impossibly arrogant. He gives Moses all these instructions to lead the Israelites, and Moses says, "But who shall I say sent me? Who are you?" He says, "I am who I am." [laughs] She thought that was completely wonderful. She quotes that all the time about herself. She says, "I know it's a bit large quoting God, but I am who I am." [laughs]Henry: That disembodied voice is very important to her fiction.Frances: Yes.Henry: It's the telephone in Memento Mori.Frances: Yes.Henry: Also, to some extent, tell me what you think of this, the narrator often acts like that.Frances: Like this disembodied voice?Henry: Yes, like you're supposed to feel like you're not quite sure who's telling you this or where you're being told it from. That's why it gets, like in The Ballad of Peckham Rye or something, very weird.Frances: Yes. I'm waiting for the PhD on Muriel Sparks' narrators. Maybe it's being done as we speak, but she's very, very interested in narrators and the difference between first-person and third-person. She was very keen on not having warm narrators, to put it mildly. She makes a strong argument throughout her work for the absence of the seductive narrative. Her narratives are, as we know, unbelievably seductive, but not because we are being flattered as readers and not because the narrator makes herself or himself pretty. The narrator says what they feel like saying, withholds most of what you would like them to say, plays with us, like in a Spark expression, describing her ideal narrator like a cat with a bird [laughs].Henry: I like that. Could she have been a novelist if she had not become a Catholic?Frances: No, she couldn't. The two things happened at the same time. I wonder, actually, whether she became a Catholic in order to become a novelist. It wasn't that becoming a novelist was an accidental effect of being a Catholic. The conversion was, I think, from being a biographer to a novelist rather than from being an Anglican to a Catholic. What happened is a tremendous interest. I think it's the most interesting moment in any life that I've ever written about is the moment of Sparks' conversion because it did break her life in two.She converted when she was in her mid-30s, and several things happened at once. She converted to Catholicism, she became a Catholic, she became a novelist, but she also had this breakdown. The breakdown was very much part of that conversion package. The breakdown was brought on, she says, by taking Dexys. There was slimming pills, amphetamines. She wanted to lose weight. She put on weight very easily, and her weight went up and down throughout her life.She wanted to take these diet pills, but I think she was also taking the pills because she needed to do all-nighters, because she never, ever, ever stopped working. She was addicted to writing, but also she was impoverished and she had to sell her work, and she worked all night. She was in a rush to get her writing done because she'd wasted so much of her life in her early 20s, in a bad marriage trapped in Africa. She needed to buy herself time. She was on these pills, which have terrible side effects, one of which is hallucinations.I think there were other reasons for her breakdown as well. She was very, very sensitive and I think psychologically fragile. Her mother lived in a state of mental fragility, too. She had a crash when she finished her book. She became depressed. Of course, a breakdown isn't the same as depression, but what happened to her in her breakdown was a paranoid attack rather than a breakdown. She didn't crack into nothing and then have to rebuild herself. She just became very paranoid. That paranoia was always there.Again, it's what's exciting about her writing. She was drawn to paranoia in other writers. She liked Cardinal Newman's paranoia. She liked Charlotte Brontë's paranoia, and she had paranoia. During her paranoid attack, she felt very, very interestingly, because nothing that happened in her life was not interesting, that T.S. Eliot was sending her coded messages. He was encoding these messages in his play, The Confidential Clerk, in the program notes to the play, but also in the blurbs he wrote for Faber and Faber, where he was an editor. These messages were very malign and they were encoded in anagrams.The word lived, for example, became devil. I wonder whether one of the things that happened during her breakdown wasn't that she discovered God, but that she met the devil. I don't think that that's unusual as a conversion experience. In fact, the only conversion experience she ever describes, you'll remember, is in The Girls of Slender Means, when she's describing Nicholas Farrington's conversion. That's the only conversion experience she ever describes. She says that his conversion is when he sees one of the girls leaving the burning building, holding a Schiaparelli dress. Suddenly, he's converted because he's seen a vision of evil.She says, "Conversion can be as a result of a recognition of evil, rather than a recognition of good." I think that what might have happened in this big cocktail of things that happened to her during her breakdown/conversion, is that a writer whom she had idolized, T.S. Eliot, who taught her everything that she needed to know about the impersonality of art. Her narrative coldness comes from Eliot, who thought that emotions had no place in art because they were messy, and art should be clean.I think a writer whom she had idolized, she suddenly felt was her enemy because she was converting from his church, because he was an Anglo-Catholic. He was a high Anglican, and she was leaving Anglo-Catholicism to go through the Rubicon, to cross the Rubicon into Catholicism. She felt very strongly that that is something he would not have approved of.Henry: She's also leaving poetry to become a prose writer.Frances: She was leaving his world of poetry. That's absolutely right.Henry: This is a very curious parallel because the same thing exactly happens to De Quincey with his worship of Wordsworth.Frances: You're right.Henry: They have the same obsessive mania. Then this, as you say, not quite a breakdown, but a kind of explosive mania in the break. De Quincey goes out and destroys that mossy hut or whatever it is in the orchard, doesn't he?Frances: Yes, that disgusting hut in the orchard. Yes, you're completely right. What fascinated me about De Quincey, and this was at the heart of the De Quincey book, was how he had been guided his whole life by Wordsworth. He discovered Wordsworth as a boy when he read We Are Seven, that very creepy poem about a little girl sitting on her sibling's grave, describing the sibling as still alive. For De Quincey, who had lost his very adored sister, he felt that Wordsworth had seen into his soul and that Wordsworth was his mentor and his lodestar.He worshipped Wordsworth as someone who understood him and stalked Wordsworth, pursued and stalked him. When he met him, what he discovered was a man without any redeeming qualities at all. He thought he was a dry monster, but it didn't stop him loving the work. In fact, he loved the work more and more. What threw De Quincey completely was that there was such a difference between Wordsworth, the man who had no genius, and Wordsworth, the poet who had nothing but.Eliot described it, the difference between the man who suffers and the mind which creates. What De Quincey was trying to deal with was the fact that he adulated the work, but was absolutely appalled by the man. Yes, you're right, this same experience happened to spark when she began to feel that T.S. Eliot, whom she had never met, was a malign person, but the work was still not only of immense importance to her, but the work had formed her.Henry: You see the Wasteland all over her own work and the shared Dante obsession.Frances: Yes.Henry: It's remarkably strong. She got to the point of thinking that T.S. Eliot was breaking into her house.Frances: Yes. As I said, she had this paranoid imagination, but also what fired her imagination and what repeated itself again and again in the imaginative scenarios that recur in her fiction and nonfiction is the idea of the intruder. It was the image of someone rifling around in cupboards, drawers, looking at manuscripts. This image, you first find it in a piece she wrote about finding herself completely coincidentally, staying the night during the war in the poet Louis MacNeice's house. She didn't know it was Louis MacNeice's house, but he was a poet who was very, very important to her.Spark's coming back from visiting her parents in Edinburgh in 1944. She gets talking to an au pair on the train. By the time they pull into Houston, there's an air raid, and the au pair says, "Come and spend the night at mine. My employers are away and they live nearby in St. John's Wood." Spark goes to this house and sees it's packed with books and papers, and she's fascinated by the quality of the material she finds there.She looks in all the books. She goes into the attic, and she looks at all the papers, and she asks the au pair whose house it is, and the au pair said, "Oh, he's a professor called Professor Louis MacNeice." Spark had just been reading Whitney. He's one of her favourite poets. She retells this story four times in four different forms, as non-fiction, as fiction, as a broadcast, as reflections, but the image that keeps coming back, what she can't get rid of, is the idea of herself as snooping around in this poet's study.She describes herself, in one of the versions, as trying to draw from his papers his power as a writer. She says she sniffs his pens, she puts her hands over his papers, telling herself, "I must become a writer. I must become a writer." Then she makes this weird anonymous phone call. She loved the phone because it was the most strange form of electrical device. She makes a weird anonymous phone call to an agent, saying, "I'm ringing from Louis MacNeice's house, would you like to see my manuscript?" She doesn't give her name, and the agent says yes.Now I don't believe this phone call took place. I think it's part of Sparks' imagination. This idea of someone snooping around in someone else's room was very, very powerful to her. Then she transposed it in her paranoid attack about T.S. Eliot. She transposed the image that Eliot was now in her house, but not going through her papers, but going through her food cupboards. [laughs] In her food cupboards, all she actually had was baked beans because she was a terrible cook. Part of her unwellness at that point was malnutrition. No, she thought that T.S. Eliot was spying on her. She was obsessed with spies. Spies, snoopers, blackmailers.Henry: T.S. Eliot is Stealing My Baked Beans would have been a very good title for a memoir.Frances: It actually would, wouldn't it?Henry: Yes, it'd be great.[laughter]Henry: People listening will be able to tell that Spark is a very spooky person in several different ways. She had what I suppose we would call spiritual beliefs to do with ghosts and other sorts of things. You had a sort of conversion of your own while writing this book, didn't you?Frances: Yes, I did. [laughs] Every time I write a biography, I become very, very, very immersed in who I'm writing about. I learned this from Richard Holmes, who I see as a method biographer. He Footsteps his subjects. He becomes his subjects. I think I recognized when I first read Holmes's Coleridge, when I was a student, that this was how I also wanted to live. I wanted to live inside the minds of the people that I wrote about, because it was very preferable to live inside my own mind. Why not live inside the mind of someone really, really exciting, one with genius?What I felt with Spark wasn't so much that I was immersed by-- I wasn't immersed by her. I felt actually possessed by her. I think this is the Spark effect. I think a lot of her friends felt like this. I think that her lovers possibly felt like this. There is an extraordinary force to her character, which absolutely lives on, even though she's dead, but only recently dead. The conversion I felt, I think, was that I have always been a very enlightenment thinker, very rational, very scientific, very Freudian in my approach to-- I will acknowledge the unconscious but no more.By the time I finished with Spark, I'm pure woo-woo now. Anything can happen. This is one of the reasons Spark was attracted to Catholicism because anything can happen, because it legitimizes the supernatural. I felt so strongly that the supernatural experiences that Spark had were real, that what Spark was describing as the spookiness of our own life were things that actually happened.One of the things I found very, very unsettling about her was that everything that happened to her, she had written about first. She didn't describe her experiences in retrospect. She described them as in foresight. For example, her first single authored published book, because she wrote for a while in collaboration with her lover, Derek Stanford, but her first single authored book was a biography of Mary Shelley.Henry: Great book.Frances: An absolutely wonderful book, which really should be better than any of the other Mary Shelley biographies. She completely got to Mary Shelley. Everything she described in Mary Shelley's life would then happen to Spark. For example, she described Mary Shelley as having her love letters sold. Her lover sold Mary Shelley's love letters, and Mary Shelley was then blackmailed by the person who bought them. This happened to Spark. She described Mary Shelley's closest friends all becoming incredibly jealous of her literary talent. This happened to Spark. She described trusting people who betrayed her. This happened to Spark.Spark was the first person to write about Frankenstein seriously, to treat Frankenstein as a masterpiece rather than as a one-off weird novel that is actually just the screenplay for a Hammer Horror film. This was 1951, remember. Everything she described in Frankenstein as its power is a hybrid text, described the powerful hybrid text that she would later write about. What fascinated her in Frankenstein was the relationship between the creator and the monster, and which one was the monster. This is exactly the story of her own life. I think where she is. She was really interested in art monsters and in the fact that the only powerful writers out there, the only writers who make a dent, are monsters.If you're not a monster, you're just not competing. I think Spark has always spoken about as having a monster-like quality. She says at the end of one of her short stories, Bang-bang You're Dead, "Am I an intellectual woman, or am I a monster?" It's the question that is frequently asked of Spark. I think she worked so hard to monsterize herself. Again, she learnt this from Elliot. She learnt her coldness from Elliot. She learnt indifference from Elliot. There's a very good letter where she's writing to a friend, Shirley Hazzard, in New York.It's after she discovers that her lover, Derek Stanford, has sold her love letters, 70 love letters, which describe two very, very painfully raw, very tender love letters. She describes to Shirley Hazzard this terrible betrayal. She says, "But, I'm over it. I'm over it now. Now I'm just going to be indifferent." She's telling herself to just be indifferent about this. You watch her tutoring herself into the indifference that she needed in order to become the artist that she knew she was.Henry: Is this why she's attracted to mediocrities, because she can possess them and monsterize them, and they're good feeding for her artistic programme?Frances: Her attraction to mediocrities is completely baffling, and it makes writing her biography, a comedy, because the men she was surrounded by were so speck-like. Saw themselves as so important, but were, in fact, so speck-like that you have to laugh, and it was one after another after another. I'd never come across, in my life, so many men I'd never heard of. This was the literary world that she was surrounded by. It's odd, I don't know whether, at the time, she knew how mediocre these mediocrities were.She certainly recognised it in her novels where they're all put together into one corporate personality called the pisseur de copie in A Far Cry from Kensington, where every single literary mediocrity is in that critic who she describes as pissing and vomiting out copy. With Derek Stanford, who was obviously no one's ever heard of now, because he wrote nothing that was memorable, he was her partner from the end of the 40s until-- They ceased their sexual relationship when she started to be interested in becoming a Catholic in 1953, but she was devoted to him up until 1958. She seemed to be completely incapable of recognising that she had the genius and he had none.Her letters to him deferred to him, all the time, as having literary powers that she hadn't got, as having insights that she hadn't got, he's better read than she was. She was such an amazingly good critic. Why could she not see when she looked at his baggy, bad prose that it wasn't good enough? She rated him so highly. When she was co-authoring books with him, which was how she started her literary career, they would occasionally write alternative sentences. Some of her sentences are always absolutely-- they're sharp, lean, sparkling, and witty, and his are way too long and really baggy and they don't say anything. Obviously, you can see that she's irritated by it.She still doesn't say, "Look, I'm going now." It was only when she became a novelist that she said, "I want my mind to myself." She puts, "I want my mind to myself." She didn't want to be in a double act with him. Doubles were important to her. She didn't want to be in a double act with him anymore. He obviously had bought into her adulation of him and hadn't recognised that she had this terrifying power as a writer. It was now his turn to have the breakdown. Spark had the mental breakdown in 1950, '45. When her first novel came out in 1957, it was Stanford who had the breakdown because he couldn't take on board who she was as a novelist.What he didn't know about her as a novelist was her comic sense, how that would fuel the fiction, but also, he didn't recognize because he reviewed her books badly. He didn't recognise that the woman who had been so tender, vulnerable, and loving with him could be this novelist who had nothing to say about tenderness or love. In his reviews, he says, "Why are her characters so cold?" because he thought that she should be writing from the core of her as a human being rather than the core of her as an intellect.Henry: What are her best novels?Frances: Every one I read, I think this has to be the best.[laughter]This is particularly the case in the early novels, where I'm dazzled by The Comforters and think there cannot have been a better first novel of the 20th century or even the 21st century so far. The Comforters. Then read Robinson, her second novel, and think, "Oh God, no, that is her best novel. Then Memento Mori, I think, "Actually, that must be the best novel of the 20th century." [laughs] Then you move on to The Ballad of Peckham Rye, I think, "No, that's even better."The novels landed. It's one of the strange things about her; it took her so long to become a novelist. When she had become one, the novels just landed. Once in one year, two novels landed. In 1959, she had, it was The Bachelors and The Ballad of Peckham Rye, both just completely extraordinary. The novels had been the storing up, and then they just fell on the page. They're different, but samey. They're samey in as much as they're very, very, very clever. They're clever about Catholicism, and they have the same narrative wit. My God, do the plots work in different ways. She was wonderful at plots. She was a great plotter. She liked plots in both senses of the world.She liked the idea of plotting against someone, also laying a plot. She was, at the same time, absolutely horrified by being caught inside someone's plot. That's what The Comforters is about, a young writer called Caroline Rose, who has a breakdown, it's a dramatisation of Sparks' own breakdown, who has a breakdown, and believes that she is caught inside someone else's story. She is a typewriter repeating all of her thoughts. Typewriter and a chorus repeating all of her thoughts.What people say about The Comforters is that Caroline Rose thought she is a heroine of a novel who finds herself trapped in a novel. Actually, if you read what Caroline Rose says in the novel, she doesn't think she's trapped in a novel; she thinks she's trapped in a biography. "There is a typewriter typing the story of our lives," she says to her boyfriend. "Of our lives." Muriel Sparks' first book was about being trapped in a biography, which is, of course, what she brought on herself when she decided to trap herself in a biography. [laughs]Henry: I think I would vote for Loitering with Intent, The Girls of Slender Means as my favourites. I can see that Memento Mori is a good book, but I don't love it, actually.Frances: Really? Interesting. Okay. I completely agree with you about-- I think Loitering with Intent is my overall favourite. Don't you find every time you read it, it's a different book? There are about 12 books I've discovered so far in that book. She loved books inside books, but every time I read it, I think, "Oh my God, it's changed shape again. It's a shape-shifting novel."Henry: We all now need the Frances Wilson essay about the 12 books inside Loitering with Intent.Frances: I know.[laughter]Henry: A few more general questions to close. Did Thomas De Quincey waste his talents?Frances: I wouldn't have said so. I think that's because every single day of his life, he was on opium.Henry: I think the argument is a combination of too much opium and also too much magazine work and not enough "real serious" philosophy, big poems, whatever.Frances: I think the best of his work went into Blackwood's, so the magazine work. When he was taken on by Blackwood's, the razor-sharp Edinburgh magazine, then the best of his work took place. I think that had he only written the murder essays, that would have been enough for me, On Murder as a Fine Art.That was enough. I don't need any more of De Quincey. I think Confessions of an English Opium-Eater is also enough in as much as it's the great memoir of addiction. We don't need any more memoirs of addiction, just read that. It's not just a memoir of being addicted to opium. It's about being addicted to what's what. It's about being a super fan and addicted to writing. He was addicted to everything. If he was in AA now, they'd say, apparently, there are 12 addictions, he had all of them. [laughs]Henry: Yes. People talk a lot about parasocial relationships online, where you read someone online or you follow them, and you have this strange idea in your head that you know them in some way, even though they're just this disembodied online person. You sometimes see people say, "Oh, we should understand this more." I think, "Well, read the history of literature, parasocial relationships everywhere."Frances: That's completely true. I hadn't heard that term before. The history of literature, a parasocial relationship. That's your next book.Henry: There we go. I think what I want from De Quincey is more about Shakespeare, because I think the Macbeth essay is superb.Frances: Absolutely brilliant. On Knocking at the Gate in Macbeth.Henry: Yes, and then you think, "Wait, where's the rest of this book? There should be an essay about every play."Frances: That's an absolutely brilliant example of microhistory, isn't it? Just taking a moment in a play, just the knocking at the gate, the morning after the murders, and blowing that moment up, so it becomes the whole play. Oh, my God, it's good. You're right.Henry: It's so good. What is, I think, "important about it", is that in the 20th century, critics started saying or scholars started saying a lot, "We can't just look at the words on the page. We've got to think about the dramaturgy. We've got to really, really think about how it plays out." De Quincey was an absolute master of that. It's really brilliant.Frances: Yes.Henry: What's your favourite modern novel or novelist?Frances: Oh, Hilary Mantel, without doubt, I think. I think we were lucky enough to live alongside a great, great, great novelist. I think the Wolf Hall trilogy is absolutely the greatest piece of narrative fiction that's come out of the 21st century. I also love her. I love her work as an essayist. I love her. She's spooky like Spark. She was inspired.Henry: Yes, she is. Yes.Frances: She learnt a lot of her cunning from Spark, I think. She's written a very spooky memoir. In fact, the only women novelists who acknowledge Spark as their influencer are Ali Smith and Hilary Mantel, although you can see Spark in William Boyd all the time. I think we're pretty lucky to live alongside William Boyd as well. Looking for real, real greatness, I think there's no one to compare with Mantel. Do you agree?Henry: I don't like the third volume of the trilogy.Frances: Okay. Right.Henry: Yes, in general, I do agree. Yes. I think some people don't like historical fiction for a variety of reasons. It may take some time for her to get it. I think she's acknowledged as being really good. I don't know that she's yet acknowledged at the level that you're saying.Frances: Yes.Henry: I think that will take a little bit longer. Maybe as and when there's a biography that will help with that, which I'm sure there will be a biography.Frances: I think they need to wait. I do think it's important to wait for a reputation to settle before starting the biography. Her biography will be very interesting because she married the same man twice. Her growth as a novelist was so extraordinary. Spark, she spent time in Africa. She had this terrible, terrible illness. She knew something. I think what I love about Mantel is, as with Spark, she knew something. She knew something, and she didn't quite know what it was that she knew. She had to write because of this knowledge. When you read her, you know that she's on a different level of understanding.Henry: You specialise in slightly neglected figures of English literature. Who else among the canonical writers deserves a bit more attention?Frances: Oh, that's interesting. I love minor characters. I think Spark was very witty about describing herself as a minor novelist or a writer of minor novels when she was evidently major. She always saw the comedy in being a minor. All the minor writers interest me. Elizabeth Bowen, Henry Green. No, they have heard Elizabeth Bowen has been treated well by Hermione Lee and Henry Green has been treated well by Jeremy Treglown.Why are they not up there yet? They're so much better than most of their contemporaries. I am mystified and fascinated by why it is that the most powerful writers tend to be kicked into the long grass. It's dazzling. When you read a Henry Green novel, you think, "But this is what it's all about. He's understood everything about what the novel can do. Why has no one heard of him?"Henry: I think Elizabeth Bowen's problem is that she's so concise, dense, and well-structured, and everything really plays its part in the pattern of the whole that it's not breezy reading.Frances: No, it's absolutely not.Henry: I think that probably holds her back in some way, even though when I have pushed it on people, most of the time they've said, "Gosh, she's a genius."Frances: Yes.Henry: It's not an easy genius. Whereas Dickens, the pages sort of fly along, something like that.Frances: Yes. One of the really interesting things about Spark is that she really, really is easy reading. At the same time, there's so much freight in those books. There's so much intellectual weight and so many games being played. There's so many books inside the books. Yet you can just read them for the pleasure. You can just read them for the plot. You can read one in an afternoon and think that you've been lost inside a book for 10 years. You don't get that from Elizabeth Bowen. That's true. The novels, you feel the weight, don't you?Henry: Yes.Frances: She's Jamesian. She's more Jamesian, I think, than Spark is.Henry: Something like A World of Love, it requires quite a lot of you.Frances: Yes, it does. Yes, it's not bedtime reading.Henry: No, exactly.Frances: Sitting up in a library.Henry: Yes. Now, you mentioned James. You're a Henry James expert.Frances: I did my PhD on Henry James.Henry: Yes. Will you ever write about him?Frances: I have, actually. Just a little plug. I've just done a selection of James's short stories, three volumes, which are coming out, I think, later this year for Riverrun with a separate introduction for each volume. I think that's all the writing I'm going to do on James. When I was an academic, I did some academic essays on him for collections and things. No, I've never felt, ever, ready to write on James because he's too complicated. I can only take tiny, tiny bits of James and home in on them.Henry: He's a great one for trying to crack the code.Frances: He really is. In fact, I was struck all the way through writing Electric Spark by James's understanding of the comedy of biography, which is described in the figure in the carpet. Remember that wonderful story where there's a writer called Verica who explains to a young critic that none of the critics have understood what his work's about. Everything that's written about him, it's fine, but it's absolutely missed his main point, his beautiful point. He said that in order to understand what the work's about, you have to look for The Figure in the Carpet. It's The Figure in the CarpetIt's the string on which my pearls are strung. A couple of critics become completely obsessed with looking for this Figure in the Carpet. Of course, Spark loved James's short stories. You feel James's short stories playing inside her own short stories. I think that one of the games she left for her biographers was the idea of The Figure in the Carpet. Go on, find it then. Find it. [laughs] The string on which my pearls are strung.Henry: Why did you leave academia? We should say that you did this before it became the thing that everyone's doing.Frances: Is everyone leaving now?Henry: A lot of people are leaving now.Frances: Oh, I didn't know. I was ahead of the curve. I left 20 years ago because I wasn't able to write the books I wanted to write. I left when I'd written two books as an academic. My first was Literary Seductions, and my second was a biography of a blackmailing courtesan called Harriet Wilson, and the book was called The Courtesan's Revenge. My department was sniffy about the books because they were published by Faber and not by OUP, and suggested that somehow I was lowering the tone of the department.This is what things were like 20 years ago. Then I got a contract to write The Ballad of Dorothy Wordsworth, my third book, again with Faber. I didn't want to write the book with my head of department in the back of my mind saying, "Make this into an academic tome and put footnotes in." I decided then that I would leave, and I left very suddenly. Now, I said I'm leaving sort of now, and I've got books to write, and felt completely liberated. Then for The Ballad of Dorothy Wordsworth, I decided not to have footnotes. It's the only book I've ever written without footnotes, simply as a celebration of no longer being in academia.Then the things I loved about being in academia, I loved teaching, and I loved being immersed in literature, but I really couldn't be around colleagues and couldn't be around the ridiculous rules of what was seen as okay. In fact, the university I left, then asked me to come back on a 0.5 basis when they realised that it was now fashionable to have someone who was a trade author. They asked me to come back, which I did not want to do. I wanted to spend days where I didn't see people rather than days where I had to talk to colleagues all the time. I think that academia is very unhappy. The department I was in was incredibly unhappy.Since then, I took up a job very briefly in another English department where I taught creative writing part-time. That was also incredibly unhappy. I don't know whether other French departments or engineering departments are happier places than English departments, but English departments are the most unhappy places I think I've ever seen.[laughter]Henry: What do you admire about the work of George Meredith?Frances: Oh, I love George Meredith. [laughs] Yes. I think Modern Love, his first novel, Modern Love, in a strange sonnet form, where it's not 14 lines, but 16 lines. By the time you get to the bottom two lines, the novel, the sonnet has become hysterical. Modern Love hasn't been properly recognised. It's an account of the breakdown of his marriage. His wife, who was the daughter of the romantic, minor novelist, Thomas Love Peacock. His wife had an affair with the artist who painted the famous Death of Chatterton. Meredith was the model for Chatterton, the dead poet in his purple silks, with his hand falling on the ground. There's a lot of mythology around Meredith.I think, as with Elizabeth Bowen and Henry Green, he's difficult. He's difficult. The other week, I tried to reread Diana of the Crossways, which was a really important novel, and I still love it. I really recognise that it's not an easy read. He doesn't try, in any way, to seduce his readers. They absolutely have to crawl inside each book to sit inside his mind and see the world as he's seeing it.Henry: Can you tell us what you will do next?Frances: At the moment, I'm testing some ideas out. I feel, at the end of every biography, you need a writer. You need to cleanse your palate. Otherwise, there's a danger of writing the same book again. I need this time, I think, to write about, to move century and move genders. I want to go back, I think, to the 19th century. I want to write about a male writer for a moment, and possibly not a novelist as well, because after being immersed in Muriel Sparks' novels, no other novel is going to seem good enough. I'm testing 19th-century men who didn't write novels, and it will probably be a minor character.Henry: Whatever it is, I look forward to reading it. Frances Wilson, thank you very much.Frances: Thank you so much, Henry. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.commonreader.co.uk/subscribe

After a short archeological dig under the rose bushes, Adam's uncovered this timely knowledge nugget that's probably more like THE Curse Of The Mummy's tomb than the film of the same name...“The House Of Hammer Theme” and incidental music - written and produced by Cev MooreArtwork by Richard Wells All the links you think you'll need & more! https://linktr.ee/househammerpod

It's time for one of those huge episodes. Well, it's a three parter anyways. 1970 was, I would say a less than average  year for horror movies. But those top slots are so strong it's unreal. But, what do I think was the very greatest horror movie that came out during 1970? Well, here we have the top 5. The worst 10. A slew of also rans, a few J&B whiskey's and a 4 hour running time. This is 1970, A Year In Horror. It's a pretty long journey this one, part 2 of 3 in fact. I am going to give you the time codes below so if you don't want spoilers then, please, avert your eyes.0.29 - Sci-Fi Corner  6.01 - Beneath The Planet of the Apes (w/ Father Malone)47.22 - Also Rans (Part 2)58.38 - Scars of Dracula (w/ Paul Chanter)  You can now support A Year in Horror via the Patreon.Theme Music by Max Newton & Lucy Foster.Email the podcast at ayearinhorror@gmail.comFollow me on Instagram.Follow me on Letterboxd.

It's time for one of those huge episodes. Well, it's a three parter anyways. 1970 was, I would say a less than average  year for horror movies. But those top slots are so strong it's unreal. But, what do I think was the very greatest horror movie that came out during 1970? Well, here we have the top 5. The worst 10. A slew of also rans, a few J&B whiskey's and a 4 hour running time. This is 1970, A Year In Horror. It's a pretty long journey this one, part 1 of 3 in fact. I am going to give you the time codes below so if you don't want spoilers then, please, avert your eyes.0.00 - Intro14.16 - The Worst 10 Horror Movies of 197020.19 - Also Rans (Part 1)26.30 - Trog (w/ John Tantalon)1.01.23 - Scream and Scream Again (w/ Lono) You can now support A Year in Horror via the Patreon.Theme Music by Max Newton & Lucy Foster.Email the podcast at ayearinhorror@gmail.comFollow me on Instagram.Follow me on Letterboxd.

The Devil Rides Out (1968) – Hammer Horror & the Final Christopher Lee Chapter! This week on the Scary Spirits Podcast, Greg continues his thrilling journey through the legendary Hammer horror filmography with the 1968 occult classic, "The Devil Rides Out". This milestone episode marks the final Hammer horror film starring Sir Christopher Lee to be reviewed by our hosts! Join Karen and Greg as they dive into the dark world of satanic cults, supernatural suspense, and Lee's unforgettable performance. As always, they pair their spooky cinema with a themed cocktail — this time, it's the "Death Angel", a devilishly delicious drink that perfectly complements the film's eerie vibes. Whether you're a die-hard Hammer horror fan or just love a good scary movie with a spirited twist, this episode is a must-listen!

As The Curse Of The Mummy's Tomb has now being well and truly put to rest, here's a timely reminder of both a previous mummy and co-host stalked these halls...“The House Of Hammer Theme” and incidental music - written and produced by Cev MooreArtwork by Richard Wells All the links you think you'll need & more! https://linktr.ee/househammerpod

The Curse Of The Mummy's Tomb. A veritable cornucopia of discoveries that range from the dictionary definition of the word 'Adam' to the existential threat of ageing with so much in-between, but how good is the film at the end of all this?There's only one way to find out...“The House Of Hammer Theme” and incidental music - written and produced by Cev Moore Artwork by Richard Wells All the links you think you'll need & more! https://linktr.ee/househammerpod

As Hammer seem to be going a bit Quatermass crazy recently, here's Smokey with a timely reminder of the man who brought it all into the world: Nigel Kneale...“The House Of Hammer Theme” and incidental music - written and produced by Cev MooreArtwork by Richard Wells All the links you think you'll need & more! https://linktr.ee/househammerpod

The Gorgon, a figure from Greek mythology who literally lost her head to a young warrior apparently got better and went to deepest , darkest Hammerland to convalesce before once again getting up to her old masonry based tricks.Join the team as they dig deep into this often overlooked Hammer Gothic.Is it a gem or just a shiny pebble?“The House Of Hammer Theme” and incidental music - written and produced by Cev MooreArtwork by Richard Wells All the links you think you'll need & more! https://linktr.ee/househammerpod

A big cidery welcome to new Patrons : Kathryn, Alison, Colin and Kath.Join Keri and Matthew this week as they discuss where you can go to get away from it all for 7-9 minutes when Ambridge life gets too much. David has a spoken word event coming up and Susan's got a book in her, apparently. We've got a decent selection of absolute bangers for you:Cop Out : Harrison is missing presumed a bit daft.Resident Evil : Is this chap an Arthurian legend?Pond Life : Justin has a dip in form.Produced by Matthew WeirWilliam Shatner with Joe Jackson 'Common People' : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KXWEM4gZhg4Become a beautiful patron of The Cider Shed and receive early ad-free episodes and our exclusive Patreon-only midweek specials. It really REALLY helps us out.https://www.patreon.com/thecidershedTo help us out with a lovely worded 5 star review hit the link below. Then scroll down to ‘Ratings and Reviews' and a little further below that is ‘Write a Review' (this is so much nicer than just tapping the stars

It's another installment of the Karnstein vampire drama from the Hammer Horror world!Go check out the two episodes that are YouTube only at The Beautiful Dead Podcast - YouTube

We head to England again, following Larry as he leads us into a land replete with hot potatoes on every street corner, as well a singing prostitutes and murderers left and right. Hammer Horror is back and we are diving right in to the deep end!!

“The Gorgon” (1964) – Hammer Horror, Birthdays & a Medusa-Inspired Cocktail! This week on the Scary Spirits Podcast, hosts Karen and Greg dive into the chilling world of classic British horror with a review of the 1964 Hammer Films gem, "The Gorgon". Starring horror legends Sir Christopher Lee, Peter Cushing, and the iconic Barbara Shelley, this eerie tale blends gothic atmosphere with mythological terror. As Greg checks another Hammer horror classic off his list, the episode also celebrates the birthdays of both Lee and Cushing—two titans of the genre. And what better way to honor them than with a themed cocktail? Sip along with the hosts as they enjoy “The Medusa”, a spine-tingling drink inspired by the film's monstrous muse. Whether you're a die-hard Hammer Horror fan or just love spooky cinema with a twist, this episode is packed with frightful fun, film trivia, and spirited sips.

So, would you believe it. Today we are back to the world of metal on A Year In Horror. Yes! We welcome UK Symphonic Black Metal heads Cradle of Filth to the house of the heinous. Their latest album is entitled 'The Screaming of the Valkyries' and it came out on March 21st on Napalm Records. Plus they are about to embark on a massive tour to boot. Today we speak with vocalist Dani Filth about the band, his history with horror and of course the Hammer Horror masterclass that is Curse of the Demon. CRADLE OF FILTH spotify // Instagram // Dani Filth

Scary Spirits Podcast: Dive into Hammer Horror with Sir Christopher Lee! This week on the Scary Spirits Podcast, join hosts Karen and Greg as they tick off another classic Hammer film from Greg's list. We're reviewing the spine-chilling 1968 masterpiece, "Dracula Has Risen From the Grave," starring the legendary Sir Christopher Lee. Tune in for an in-depth discussion on the film's eerie atmosphere, standout performances, and unforgettable moments. Plus, we'll be sipping on a specially crafted cocktail, "The Veronica," inspired by the enchanting Veronica Carlson. Don't miss out on this thrilling episode filled with horror insights and delicious drinks! Subscribe now and join the conversation.

Lainey Schooltree is a musician, comedian, streamer, and former half of the musical comedy duo The Steamy Bohemians. She then formed the solo art rock project Schooltree. When the pandemic hit, she began performing on Twitch and found that live-streaming offered the interdisciplinary playground she'd been after. What began as a temporary pivot became a long-term transformation and these days she captains a spaceship on Lainey Schooltree TV - a live show where she’s an “astro-streamer” assigned to deliver packages while improvising music with analog synthesizers, electronic drums, and layered vocals in a show that blends surreal comedy, retro-futurist visuals, and themes of corporate absurdity and creative resistance. SONG 1: Kashmir by Led Zeppelin from their 1975 album Physical Graffiti.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tzVJPgCn-Z8 SONG 2: Bartók: Concerto for Orchestra, Sz. 116: IV. Intermezzo interrotto. Allegretto performed by the Chicago Symphony Orchestra in 1993.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kUZ83BzCQNM SONG 3: Hammer Horror by Kate Bush off her album Lionheart released in 1978.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XR4KnfcgLm0 PARTING TUNE: Cat Centipede by Schooltree from the album Heterotopia released in 2017.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PF14v_qeVu8See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

In this episode of General Witchfinders, we take a close look at The Creeping Flesh (1973), a British horror film from cult studio Tigon British Film Productions. Best known for low-budget horror that ran alongside the likes of Hammer Horror and Amicus, Tigon was founded in 1966 by Tony Tenser and operated out of Hammer House on Wardour Street in London. This marks our first dive into their back catalogue—and what a place to start.The Creeping Flesh stars Peter Cushing and Christopher Lee (#BigChrisLee) as brothers on opposing ends of a bizarre scientific discovery involving an ancient skeleton, reanimation, and some very shaky ideas about inherited evil. Lorna Heilbron plays opposite them as the increasingly disturbed Penelope.The film was directed by Freddie Francis, a key figure in British horror cinema. Francis replaced Don Sharp at the last minute and brought his usual visual flair, having previously directed Paranoiac, The Evil of Frankenstein, Dracula Has Risen from the Grave, and Tales from the Crypt. He's also better known in wider circles for his cinematography—earning two Academy Awards and five BAFTAs for work on Sons and Lovers, The Elephant Man, The Innocents, Return to Oz, and Glory. He also worked on Dune, Cape Fear, and even music videos for All Saints and Jimmy Nail. Cinematographer Norman Warwick handled the visuals on The Creeping Flesh. Warwick was also behind the camera for The Abominable Dr. Phibes (see Episode 10), Dr. Jekyll and Sister Hyde, and Confessions of a Window Cleaner. The film was shot at Shepperton Studios and Thorpe House in Surrey.We believe The Creeping Flesh was the 20th film pairing Cushing and Lee, likely falling between Horror Express (Episode 7) and Nothing but the Night (Episode 42). We're happy to be corrected—find us on BlueSky @generalwitch.Subscribe, listen, and join us as we explore the world of British cult horror, Tigon films, and everything in between. Get bonus content on PatreonSupport this show http://supporter.acast.com/general-witchfinders. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

(00:00:00) Introduction & Plot Synopsis (00:07:25) The Round Table (01:20:13) Masked Balls (01:27:42) Vampire Rules OK? (01:34:33) Top 5 Rubber Bats! In this episode, the lads happen across a couple of newlyweds stranded in deepest, darkest Hammerland at the turn of the century and the AA can't help them there. Maybe the inhabitants at the castle on the hill can assist?What could possibly go wrong?All the links you think you'll need & more! HERECev's the dusty receptionist at the local inn while Philip goes to the ball, Smokey hits the books and Adam goes a bit batty...“The House Of Hammer Theme” and incidental music - written and produced by Cev MooreArtwork by Richard Wells 

This week, we have a special guest--actor, producer, and writer, Allison Claye! First we talk about recent viewings like HELL OF A SUMMER, CANNIBAL MUKBANG, and THE RULE OF JENNY PENN, and then.....STOP! It's hammer Time! No, not that kind of Hammer, I mean the iconic series of Gothic horror films produced by the British film company Hammer Film Productions from the mid-1950s to the 1970s! These classics are still influencing directors and studios today. These movies are simply too legit to quit!

276 Hammerama Ep. 27: The Legend of the 7 Golden Vampires w/Michael WorthWelcome to Hammerama! Hammerama is a subsidiary series of the DieCastMovie Podcast. Please join Alistair Hughes and Steven Turek as they analyze the wonderful movies of Hammer Films, from opposite ends of the world! On this episode, we are joined by Filmmaker, Actor, and Martial Artist - Michael Worth!Please send feedback to DieCastMoviePodcast@gmail.com.Al is the author of Infogothic: An Unauthorized Graphic Guide to Hammer Horror. A special thanks to Reber Clark for allowing us to use his music! You can purchase Mr. Clark's music at reberclark.bandcamp.com.

We're off to the circus, and dipping into the magical, as we look at Hammer's penultimate non-Dracula vampire film.

Aaron and Darlene watch some classic sci-fi from the 1950s and '60s, good and bad. They talk about what makes these films memorable and fun, and if you should take a trip back in time and enjoy these films as well.Feedback for the show?:Email: feedback@thisweekingeek.netTwitter: https://twitter.com/thisweekingeekBluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/thisweekingeek.bsky.socialSubscribe to our feed: https://www.spreaker.com/show/3571037/episodes/feediTunes: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/this-week-in-geek/id215643675Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/3Lit2bzebJXMTIv7j7fkqqWebsite: https://www.thisweekingeek.net

The Horror 101 crew finally spotlights a Hammer film.  A Terence Fisher film by a Richard Matheson script from a Dennis Wheatley novel.  This is a rare time Christopher Lee is the hero in a Hammer Horror.,  We hope you enjoy our coverage of The Devil Rides Out.  Show Highlights:01:00 Prelude to Terror...05:00 The Life and Deaths of Christopher Lee...06:00 Our First Rated G film...07:30 Favourite Lee films...13:30  Where's Simon?17:00  A Most Dangerous Game...21:15  Don't Look at the Eyes...24:24  Pursuing Tanith...29:00  The Goat of Mended...38:10  Mocata's Visit...45:00  The Circle of Protection...52:00  Scarcely in the Name of God...54:15  Zero Consequences...58:30  Scoring the film...70:00  Conclusion!  Thanks for Listening!

Aaron and Darlene watch some classic sci-fi from the 1950s and '60s, good and bad. They talk about what makes these films memorable and fun, and if you should take a trip back in time and enjoy these films as well.Feedback for the show?:Email: feedback@thisweekingeek.netTwitter: https://twitter.com/thisweekingeekBluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/thisweekingeek.bsky.socialSubscribe to our feed: https://www.spreaker.com/show/3571037/episodes/feediTunes: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/this-week-in-geek/id215643675Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/3Lit2bzebJXMTIv7j7fkqqWebsite: https://www.thisweekingeek.net

As part two of our accidental Pierce Brosnan double feature, we get to "enjoy" Death Train! (aka, Detonator). If you ever asked the powers that be for a movie with an all star cast (Brosnan, Patrick Stewart, Christopher Lee, Ted Levine), but you wanted them in a ridiculous plot, and made for TV, well, all aboard! DISCLAIMER: Language and Spoilers!!DEATH TRAIN (DETONATOR)dir. David Jacksonstarring: Pierce Brosnan; Patrick Stewart; Ted Levine

Brace yourself, Robert Campbell is back for one last (probably) round of industry wisdom, outrageous stories and brutally honest predictions. If you haven't taken notes yet, now's your chance before your boss pretends they invented everything he says. This time, we dive into getting sued by Sir Martin Sorrell, ageism, Hammer Horror, Nils Leonard and... The Wombles? (Yes, really.)

In episode 488, the "survival experts" go out for a nice get away too the woods, only to be ambushed by a spooky wolfman! Chris has not eaten dinner and Jack wants to know the difference between a werewolf and a wolfman. E-mail your survival suggestions to us at wecouldsurvivethat@gmail.com or Twitter @WeCouldSurvive or find older episode on Youtube at: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCXAa8-wNqv1G14ts_DHenkg/feed

In the second episode of our new monthly spinoff series, Patrick Stratford is joined by our friend and sponsor Mark Bennett of Vanguard Comics, who shares his top Sgt. Bob Cryer episodes in a podcast jam-packed with love for Sun Hill. Please enjoy the first few minute of the podcast and join us for the full 50-minute Obbo for just £2.99 on patreon.com/thebillpodcast where you will also instantly unlock hundreds of Reaction videos, Reunion highlights and sample episodes of The Evidence Room 1999. In this clip, Mark Bennett tells us about working with several "The Bill" stars at Gosport Comic Con 2024 and looks ahead to this year's event, taking place place at St Vincent College Gosport on Sunday 13th April 2025, where special guests include "Doctor Who" legends Peter Davison and Janet Fielding, James Bond and Hammer Horror icons Caroline Munro and Madeline Smith and "Red Dwarf" and "The Brittas Empire" star Chris Barrie! Find out more and book your tickets at vanguardcomics.co.uk The Bill Podcast is brought to you in proud association with georgefairbrother.com shop.saturdaymorningpress.co.uk vanguardcomics.co.uk gibconsultancy.co.uk and mcr-seo.com

In a 1963 thriller that takes in rape, murder, asbestos and France, you'll probably not be so surprised that the lads focus on welding and not much more. This is normally the bit where there's a look ahead to what's on the way, but it's just welding.“The House Of Hammer Theme” and incidental music - written and produced by Cev MooreArtwork by Richard Wells"Car horn = corpse"

Black leather, Britain's Area 51, a dinosaur, a Ferrari, witch trails, the Black Death and Keith Moon. What could all these possibly have in common?Well dear listener, prepare to be baffled by The Damned. Possibly the most adventurous outing yet, but is it any good?Listen on, but beware: there be spoilers ahead!Weymouth in all it's glory: https://youtu.be/8MBxu0VAAWE?si=Z1f-aLpjFaDACdBa“The House Of Hammer Theme” and incidental music - written and produced by Cev MooreArtwork by Richard Wells

STEVIE AND JO ARE BACK! Sally Rogers returns to The Bill Podcast with her good friend, the mighty Lucy Speed (DS Stevie Moss), a bona fide legend of screen and stage. Interviewing the legends is one of our own: TV historian and The Bill Podcast executive producer Patrick Stratford, who does a fantastic job in his first-ever podcast recording! This is the first of a two-part interview where the legends take a fond look back at their time at Sun Hill, plus discuss some of their recent work. The Bill Podcast is brought to you in proud association with georgefairbrother.com shop.saturdaymorningpress.co.uk vanguardcomics.co.uk gibconsultancy.co.uk and mcr-seo.com Vanguard Comics are proud to present Gosport Comic Con 2025 Special guests include Doctor Who legends Peter Davison and Janet Fielding, James Bond and Hammer Horror icons Caroline Munro and Madeline Smith and Red Dwarf and The Brittas Empire star Chris Barrie Gosport Comic Con takes place at St Vincent College Gosport on Sunday 13th April 2025. Find out more and book your tickets at vanguardcomics.co.uk

"To the Devil a Daughter" Hammer Horror Movie Review with Natassja Kinski Birthday Tribute In this episode of the Scary Spirits podcast, Greg continues his epic journey through the Hammer Horror filmography with a deep dive into the 1976 cult classic, "To the Devil a Daughter." Starring the legendary Sir Christopher Lee, this episode celebrates the upcoming birthday of the film's captivating star costar, Natassja Kinski (January 24th). Enjoy a "Morphine Drip" cocktail with our hosts as they dissect this chilling tale of Satanism and explore its place within the iconic Hammer Films legacy.

Church Of Mabus Bruce G Hallenbeck The Kinderhook Creature And Beyond & Hammer Horror Films

What's up, revellers and weirdos! This episode we discuss not one, but two Hammer Horror movies, THE CURSE OF FRANKENSTEIN (1957) and THE HORROR OF DRACULA (1958), both directed by Terence Fisher. Did these movies forever convince Americans us Brits have bad teeth? Please rate and review us, it's always appreciated. And of course... stay safe out there tonight. follow us: @scaringsampod

We try to avoid rumors. We have no issues talking about speculation from unnamed sources, but just straight up gossip and fan casting isn't really our thing. That is what the internet and social media is for. But if it involves a couple of our favorites, we have not choice but to chime in.There are a number of criminally overlooked characters in Hollywood. The most underused may be the Universal monsters. Everyone knows who they are - Dracula, Frankenstein, the Wolf Man - but they never seem to get their just due. This is especially true of the Mummy. Are things about to change?Heist movies tend to be a lot of fun. Unfortunately, we have not covered many bank robbery movies on our humble little podcast. And this year's attempts at Christmas horror have frankly fallen flat. To end the year, we found something that checks off both boxes.There are a lot of shocking things about 1961's Cash on Demand. And the fact it was made by the renowned Hammer Film Productions may be the least. The story of a cold bank manager who has to deal with a charming bank robber does not sound all that original. Cash on Demand makes it work with strong performances, wit, and great characters. Adventures in Movies! is a part of the Morbidly Beautiful Podcast Network. Morbidly Beautiful is your one stop shop for all your horror needs. From the latest news and reviews to interviews and old favorites, it can be found at Morbidly Beautiful.Adventures in Movies! is hosted by Nathaniel and Blake. You can find Nathaniel on Instagram at nathaninpoortaste. Blake can be found on Twitter @foureyedhorror and on Instagram at foureyedhorror. You can reach us personally or on Twitter @AdventuresinMo1.Music in the background from https://www.FesliyanStudios.com

256 - Hammerama Ep. 26: The Abominable Snowman Welcome to Hammerama! Hammerama is a subsidiary series of the DieCastMovie Podcast. Please join Alistair Hughes and Steven Turek as they analyze the wonderful movies of Hammer Films, from opposite ends of the world! Please send feedback to DieCastMoviePodcast@gmail.com. Al is the author of Infogothic: An Unauthorized Graphic Guide to Hammer Horror. A special thanks to Reber Clark for allowing us to use his music! You can purchase Mr. Clark's music at reberclark.bandcamp.com.

Join Justin as he chats with actor Cam Clarke about growing up in a family of entertainers, Hammer Horror, his new book, Tales from the Crypt, Ninja Turtles, Metal Gear, and more!Buy Cam Clarke's new book here!Cam Clarke bio:“Cam Clarke is an American voice actor, known for his work in animation, video games and commercials. Among his notable roles are Leonardo and Rocksteady in the 1987 Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles animated series, Shotaro Kaneda in the 1989 original Streamline Pictures English dub of Akira, and Liquid Snake in the Metal Gear series. He often serves as a voice double for Matthew Broderick and served as Broderick's singing voice of Simba in The Lion King II: Simba's Pride.”Monsters, Madness and Magic Official Website. Monsters, Madness and Magic on Linktree.Monsters, Madness and Magic on Instagram.Monsters, Madness and Magic on Facebook.Monsters, Madness and Magic on Twitter.Monsters, Madness and Magic on YouTube.

This time around Philip is the friendlier phantom, here to guide you through the sewers to room 84 whilst Adam practices his arias, Cev plays with organs and Smokey becomes Madame Smutterfly for one night only.Elsewhere there's all kinds of Phantoms Of Operas and a look into why there were only 3 Hammer Films released in 1962...“The House Of Hammer Theme” and incidental music - written and produced by Cev MooreArtwork by Richard WellsAll the links you think you'll need & more!https://linktr.ee/househammerpod

It's just a great month for Aussie writers on the pod! We had the best chat with the lovely Lisa Tirreno ⁠@lisatirrenoauthor⁠ about her gorgeous debut PRINCE OF FORTUNE

Jeremy Selenfriend and Brian Spears return to talk about working on the prosthetic FX on the 2024 horror hit Smile 2! Eric Yoder joins us to talk about his upcoming 70's Hammer Horror style The Abomination of Frankenstein! https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/the-abomination-of-frankenstein-finishing-funds --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/withoutyourhead/support

Yo ho ho and a bottle of rum! Or is that a coffin full? Along with all the rest of the gin, snuff, cigarettes, them weird stuffed donkeys with the big eyes and tulips from Amsterdam, you could count on Captain Clegg and his cohorts to sneak them under the noses of the taxman.Has he met his match with the King's best busies? Let's find out!Cev's cockahoop about everything, Philip's gone poetic, Adam's all about a paddlin' and Smokey's sniffing something in this feature length adventure!“The House Of Hammer Theme” and incidental music - written and produced by Cev Moore Artwork by Richard Wells All the links you think you'll need & more! https://linktr.ee/househammerpod

253 - Hammerama Ep. 25: She Welcome to Hammerama! Hammerama is a subsidiary series of the DieCastMovie Podcast. Please join Alistair Hughes and Steven Turek as they analyze the wonderful movies of Hammer Films, from opposite ends of the world! Please send feedback to DieCastMoviePodcast@gmail.com. Al is the author of Infogothic: An Unauthorized Graphic Guide to Hammer Horror. A special thanks to Reber Clarke for allowing us to use his music! You can purchase Mr. Clark's music at ⁠⁠reberclark.bandcamp.com.

Celebrate 54 Years of Hammer Horror with a “Bat Blood” Themed Review of “Scars of Dracula“ On November 8th, 1970, Hammer Films released the classic horror film “Scars of Dracula.” To commemorate this milestone, we're dedicating this week's episode to a special review of this cult classic. Join your hosts Karen and Greg as they delve into the depths of Dracula's lair, discussing the film's enduring legacy and its impact on the horror genre. But that's not all! To enhance the experience, they'll be downing a “Bat Blood” themed shot while they chat. So, grab your favorite vampire-inspired beverage and join us for a chilling journey through the world of Hammer horror. Here's what you can expect in this episode: A detailed analysis of “Scars of Dracula,” exploring its themes, characters, and visual style. A discussion of Sir Christopher Lee's amount of screen time in the film. A lively conversation about our personal experiences with the film and the Hammer horror franchise. A special “Bat Blood” cocktail recipe to enjoy while you listen. Whether you're a fan of classic horror or just looking for a fun and spooky way to spend an evening, this episode is sure to be a treat. So, tune in and join us as we raise a glass to the 54th anniversary of “Scars of Dracula.”

Hello! And welcome to the 81st and last regular episode of Hammer House of Podcast, where Paul Cornell (Doctor Who, Elementary) and L.M. Myles (Verity!) discuss, in order of UK release, every horror movie made by Hammer Film Productions from The Quatermass Xperiment through to Doctor Jekyll. This month, we review the last Hammer Horror movie to date, Doctor Jekyll (2023).

Adam's your guide through The Terror Of The Tongs, a wild and blood soaked adventure from 1961 that bears a few similarities with a previous Hammer film. Will this be wild and blood soaked enough to stand on its own? Only a level headed roundtable discussion will get to the bottom of that.Elsewhere Philip's love for all things Yvonne sends him multilingual, Smokey gets ganged up on and Cev gets plastered...“The House Of Hammer Theme” and incidental music - written and produced by Cev MooreArtwork by Richard WellsAll the links you think you'll need & more!https://linktr.ee/househammerpod

Welcome to a special Halloween edition of THE ARCHIVE on the CINEMATIC SOUND RADIO PODCAST Today's show focuses on the music of the house of horror, HAMMER FILMS. Yes, all of the music comes from the studio best known for a series of Gothic horror and fantasy films made between the mid-1950s and the 1970s. Many of these feature classic horror characters like Baron Victor Frankenstein, Count Dracula, and the Mummy, whom Hammer reintroduced to audiences by filming them in vibrant colour for the first time. Composers featured include David Whittaker, Harry Robinson, Laurie Johnson, Franz Reizenstein and the great James Bernard. The show is scripted by acclaimed film music journalist Jon Mansell, who, with the help of your host Jason Drury, will take you on a journey through the best music this renowned studio has ever produced. Enjoy! —— Special thanks to our Patreon supporters: Matt DeWater, David Ballantyne, Joe Wiles, Maxime, William Welch, Tim Burden, Alan Rogers, Dave Williams, Max Hamulyák, Jeffrey Graebner, Don Mase, Victor Field, Jochen Stolz, Emily Mason, Eric Skroch, Alexander Schiebel, Alphonse Brown, John Link, Andreas Wennmyr, Matt Berretta, Eldaly Morningstar, Jim Wilson, Glenn McDorman, Chris Malone, Steve Karpicz, Deniz Çağlar, Brent Osterberg, Jérôme Flick, Sarah Brouns, Aaron Collins, Randall Derchan, Angela Rabatin, Michael Poteet, Larry Reese, Thomas Tinneny, William Burke, Rudy Amaya, Stacy Livitsanis, Rick Laird, Carl Wonders, Nathan Blumenfeld, Lee Wileman, Daniel Herrin, Scott Bordelon, James Alexander, Brett French, Ian Clark, Ron, Andy Gray. —— Cinematic Sound Radio is fully licensed to play music by SOCAN. Support us on Patreon https://www.patreon.com/cinematicsoundradio Check out our NEW Cinematic Sound Radio TeePublic Store! https://www.teepublic.com/stores/cinematic-sound-radio Cinematic Sound Radio Web: http://www.cinematicsound.net Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/cinsoundradio Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/cinematicsound Cinematic Sound Radio Fanfare and Theme by David Coscina https://soundcloud.com/user-970634922 Bumper voice artist: Tim Burden http://www.timburden.com

SCREAM Drafts 2024 comes to a shocking conclusion as Screen Drafts Legend Bryan Cogman (Game of Thrones) is joined by B.J. Colangelo (This Ends at Prom) and Chris Hewitt (Empire Magazine) to rank the 13 (oooo scary) best HORROR films made by HAMMER studios in the CLASSIC era!

In this episode, I sat down with Jon Spira to dive deep into the making of his latest documentary, The Life and Deaths of Christopher Lee. If you're a regular listener, you know Jon's been on the podcast a couple of times before, and it's always a treat to hear him talk about his work.This time around, he takes us through the journey of bringing Christopher Lee's story to life—literally.Jon kicked things off by sharing what drew him to this project in the first place. Inspired by a mix of fascination and intrigue, he became captivated by Lee's enigmatic presence, especially after rewatching a rather unusual "This Is Your Life episode" featuring Lee. Jon's documentary doesn't just skim over Lee's storied career, from Hammer Horror to The Lord of the Rings, but it digs into the emotional layers of a man who, despite his towering on-screen persona, was often plagued by self-doubt and a desire to control how the world perceived him.We spent a good amount of time talking about the challenges Jon faced in portraying someone as multifaceted as Christopher Lee. It's no small feat to condense a career that spanned over six decades into a single film. Jon wanted to avoid the usual biographical pitfalls—just ticking off achievements and movie titles—and instead aimed for something more intimate and emotionally resonant. He wanted viewers to come away with a sense of who Christopher Lee really was, beyond just the roles he played.One of the more fascinating parts of our conversation was Jon's decision to use a marionette puppet to represent Lee. It was an unconventional choice, but as Jon explained, it made perfect sense for a subject who was so concerned with how his story was told. He originally toyed with the idea of CGI but felt that it lacked the emotional warmth he was looking for. So, he collaborated with Andy Gent, known for his work with Wes Anderson and Tim Burton, to create a beautifully crafted puppet of Lee. And who better to provide the voice than Peter Serafinowicz, whose deep, rich tones helped bring that puppet to life. Jon's approach allowed Lee to narrate his own story, with other voices occasionally chiming in to add a touch of warmth and gentle contradiction. It's this kind of creative storytelling that sets Jon's work apart—finding new ways to tell familiar stories.Jon and I also delved into some of the broader challenges facing filmmakers today. The industry is in a strange place right now, with budgets tightening, streamers changing their strategies, and the rise of new technologies like AI reshaping the landscape. We had a lively discussion about the role of AI in filmmaking. For one specific sequence in the film—recounting a moment when Christopher Lee witnessed the last public execution by guillotine in France—Jon's team used AI-assisted animation to breathe life into archival photos. It's a decision that has sparked some controversy, especially from certain corners of the American press, but Jon sees it as just another tool in the creative toolkit. He acknowledges the fears around AI and the impact it might have on jobs, but he also believes that, when used thoughtfully, it can elevate storytelling in new and exciting ways.Throughout our conversation, a recurring theme was empathy—something that Jon clearly values in his approach to documentary storytelling. He talked about how he always aims to create a sense of connection between the audience and his subjects, to show their humanity in all its complexity. For Jon, it's not just about documenting facts; it's about exploring how those facts feel, and how they shape the person behind the public image. In The Life and Deaths of Christopher Lee, this approach results in a film that isn't just a tribute to a cinematic legend but also a portrait of a man grappling with his own insecurities, just like the rest of us.We also touched on the state of cinema today—how trends are shifting, the uncertain future of theatrical releases, and what that means for filmmakers who, like Jon, are passionate about telling unique, challenging stories. It's clear that Jon sees the current moment as both a challenge and an opportunity—a chance to push boundaries and keep audiences engaged in new ways, even if it means embracing some unconventional methods along the way.All in all, our chat was a rich, multi-layered conversation, touching on everything from the intricacies of puppetry to the big questions about where the film industry is headed. It's a must-listen for anyone interested in the art of documentary filmmaking, the evolving landscape of cinema, and the enduring allure of a complex, larger-than-life figure like Christopher Lee.