|
|
 |
by Mickey Bonner
|
|
|
|
|
by Fodor's
|
|
|
|
|
by Viscott
|
|
|
|
|
by Bil Keane
|
|
|
|
|
by John Wesley Howard
|
|
|
|
|
Danse Macabre
by Stephen King
Product Group: Book
Publisher: Berkley (1985-01-15)
ISBN: 0425081109
EAN: 9780425081105
Paperback
SKU: mon0000009682
Condition: Good
|
Editorial Reviews
|
Product Description
Tour of the whole horror genre in books, film, radio, and TV by the most popluar writer in the genre today.
|
Amazon.com Review
In the fall of 1978 (between The Stand and The Dead Zone), Stephen King taught a course at the University of Maine on "Themes in Supernatural Literature." As he writes in the foreword to this book, he was nervous at the prospect of "spending a lot of time in front of a lot of people talking about a subject in which I had previously only felt my way instinctively, like a blind man." The course apparently went well, and as with most teaching experiences, it was as instructive, if not more so, to the teacher as it was to the students. Thanks to a suggestion from his former editor at Doubleday, King decided to write Danse Macabre as a personal record of the thoughts about horror that he developed and refined as a result of that course. The outcome is an utterly charming book that reads as if King were sitting right there with you, shooting the breeze. He starts on October 4, 1957, when he was 10 years old, watching a Saturday matinee of Earth vs. the Flying Saucers. Just as the saucers were mounting their attack on "Our Nation's Capital," the movie was suddenly turned off. The manager of the theater walked out onto the stage and announced, "The Russians have put a space satellite into orbit around the earth. They call it ... Spootnik." That's how the whole book goes: one simple, yet surprisingly pertinent, anecdote or observation after another. King covers the gamut of horror as he'd experienced it at that point in 1978 (a period of about 30 years): folk tales, literature, radio, good movies, junk movies, and the "glass teat". It's colorful, funny, and nostalgic--and also strikingly intelligent. --Fiona Webster
|
Customer Reviews
|
A WORTHWHILE READ
Rating  (3)
Date: 2008-11-26
1 out of 1 customers found this reveiw helpful
I read this book twice. The book is a collection of personal anecdotes, opinions about writing/movie making, and film/book reviews. Embedded in it all are some excellent suggestions about creating horror. I wanted more background for his own creations, but he's already on record confessing that he was zonked when he wrote many of his masterpieces, and is clueless about how he created any of it while under the influence.
I write horror stories and agree with much of what King says, like...only Southerners are capable of pulling off the really bizarre depictions of horror. Others depict horror with human anomalies serving as the monsters. Only in the South do respectable ladies murder their lovers then sleep with his corpse forever. Or spawn the KKK. We dont bury our victims or hide them, we display them with pride. We're natural-born terrorists.
King, here, as everywhere, is painfully candid. He's refreshingly modest and seems to consider his gift 'found money.'
I give the book a '3' because the book/movie reviews are boring.
|
|
A fast and loose, quick and dirty (and not very complete) survey of the horror genre
Rating (3)
Date: 2008-03-29
1 out of 1 customers found this reveiw helpful
Although I wasn't quite as disgusted as El Kabong with this book, it truly is nothing more than Stephen King riffing sloppily (as hell) about the "horror genre." There is no pretense of scholarship, and it has a folky tone which makes it quite easy to imagine what it must have been like back in the day when King got a twelve pack of beer in him, had smoked a joint, and done enough lines of coke to get him on a never ending jag about "the deal" with the genre: to put it bluntly, its about as tight as "the blob," its rambling, and its also somewhat amusing. It's admittedly fun to hear his take on horror, and he occasionally makes a good point, but truly, no-one but a diehard King fan will want to read this, or possibly a horror fanatic. By no means remotely close to a definitive survey of the genre, there are gaping shocking holes: he doesn't say so much as a lick about Horace Walpole, Ann Radcliff, Charles Robert Maturin, Matthew Lewis, Arthur Machen, Lord Dunsany, M.R. James, Algernon Blackwood, Ambrose Bierce, Oliver Onions, H.G. Wells, J. Sheridan Le Fanu, William Hope Hodgson, amongst others- namely, the most important writers in the history of horror. And let's not forget that the book is now out of date- a lot has happened since the late 70's. A far superior book, an indispensible book in my opinion, which consists of a series of wonderful essays by writers discussing their favorite "horror" books, is "Horror 100 Best Books" edited by Stephen Jones and Kim Newman, and its sequel "Horror Another 100 Best Books." Final word- fun, not terribly informative but somewhat, for King fans only, a guilty pleasure for people that love horror, like getting stoned with King and having him talk at you for about five or six hours- a not unpleasant reading experience.
|
|
One of my Classics
Rating  (4)
Date: 2007-11-16
I give this four stars because the book is dated. What was a discussion of where horror/scifi was at that point, and how it got there, is now a point of history.
But I like Stephen King's voice best when he is just being Stephen King. I like Danse Macabre and On Writing more than many of his novels, because he comes off as someone it would be enriching to know.
Mr. King has knowledge of writing and knowledge of his chosen primary genre(s) and it's interesting when he holds court.
When I first read DM I was a kid -- early teens, and I went on to read it in whole or in part many times, which is quite interesting since I have no shared love of 50s schlockers. I was interested in how they molded his man though. And quite interested in his insights about Dracula, Frankenstein, Ira Levin, etc.
This book is not for everybody. Younger folks might not like it unless they're a fan of the man and can appreciate discussion of fiction and some discussion that might have been dated by the time they were even born.
However, I think people who like analysis of fiction in book and movie form, told in a conversational tone could do a whole lot worse than to pick up a copy.
|
|
Fun read but...
Rating (4)
Date: 2007-10-08
So far, one of the more entertaining reads from King, providing you know that this is not a fiction. It has some good insights who did know something about this field of work. What I like is how personal the writing is and how it make you feel like you are talking with a slightly mad excitable uncle on a camp fire at late night. I like King in his casual mode as much. And the texture and density of details, like his best works, are still here.
Having said all that, there are a couple of things that should be mentioned. The book is outdated. An updated edition is seriously needed. The said casual tone sometimes bordering on sloppy, even if it's never reach the point of incoherent.
It can also function as a very good guide for the genre. Again, the recommended list needs some updates, but as it is, it shall took a couple of months at least to get yourself familiar with all the works mentioned.
|
|
Dead rats in Lucite
Rating  (5)
Date: 2006-12-15
3 out of 4 customers found this reveiw helpful
"Danse Macabre" should have been subtitled "Horror Fiction in Cinema, TV, and Books: 1950 - 1979" so that Stephen King's fiction fans wouldn't accidentally pick it up and start reading it. They might be horribly disappointed.
At what is supposed to be the climax of this nonfiction book, at the sentence in which the author is summing up everything he has been trying to teach us for 397 pages, there is a riotous typo:
"...When the creator of horror is finally stripped all the way to his or her core of being we find not an agent of the norm but a friend--a capering, gleeful, red-eyed agent of chaos..."
Maybe the author does have a few red-eyed and capering friends (and readers), considering his written output. As he says about his own horror fiction: "I recognize terror as the finest emotion and so I will try to terrorize the reader. But if I find that I cannot terrify, I will try to horrify, and if I find that I cannot horrify, I'll go for the gross-out."
I sure felt like cutting a few capers while reading "Danse Macabre." King was able to draw me into a sometimes vociferous argument about his thesis and choices for great horror. It was like sitting at the bar, drinking beer and arguing with an occasionally gross friend.
Unfortunately like that slightly inebriated friend, this author tends to ramble tediously off-subject: the war in Vietnam; Patty Hearst; the fate of MGM; many not-so-hilarious anecdotes about Harlan Ellison (no, Mr. King you haven't written the longest footnote in history--see "Rats, Lice, and History" by Hans Zinsser); dismissive critiques of certain pulp authors (well, I guess that's what I'm doing now, but who is going to read this?); a rant about grammar; and a whole chapter entitled, "An Annoying Autobiographical Pause."
(Actually, some of the side-essays are minor gems if you're in the right mood, but they do bulk up King's discourse on horror.)
"Danse Macabre" is both purposefully funny (see the movie review of "Robot Monster") and inadvertently hysterical (the typos). If you are a baby boomer and have seen at least some of the 'B' movies and TV shows that Stephen King has seen, or have read a few of the horror novels he reviews, this is a humorous, thought-provoking book--a 421 page in-joke.
This book is about us, dear Boomers.
If you're not the right age, "Danse Macabre" will probably bore you with its ravings on vanished TV shows, decayed celluloid flicks, and out-of-print horror stories. King warns us in his two forenotes that he is going to concentrate on horror produced between the late fifties and early eighties. If you weren't able to read, watch TV or go to the movies back then, this book might not appeal to you.
|
|
|
|
|