It’s hard to review the King in Yellow by Robert Chambers without at least a brief mention of its role and its place in the weird fiction/horror world. Written back in 1895 it is one of almost 90 books Chambers would write but is the only one that is really remembered. Part of the reason for this is that Lovecraft would include it in his essay Supernatural Horror in Literature, a pretty fascinating synopsis of horror literature up to that time and worth a read itself. Lovecraft would also go on to include some aspects of the book such as the Yellow Sign among others in his stories about the Cthulu mythos. In turn Lovecraft himself would be kept from obscurity by August Derleth and Donald Wandrei who would start Arkham House publishing in 1939 with the express purpose of keeping Lovecraft’s works in print. Both men were prolific authors and would add to (and rework) the Cthulu mythos. This included folding in the King in Yellow (the character) as an avatar of Hastur, a great old one, among other things. At this point aspects of the King in Yellow have become so intertwined with the Cthulu mythos that most assume they have always been there and while I realize that this is a bit of “ six degrees of separation” it’s really rare to be able to connect the dots in this fashion among multiple authors stretching for over a century.
The book can basically be divided into two sections. The first part deals with stories tied together through the theme of “The King in Yellow” which is the title of a play known to bring madness to those who read it. The second part of the book deals with stories that I would roughly characterize as romances, which were common to the late 1800’s.
Focusing on the first part of the book the reader is given a glimpse into the capabilities of Chambers. In “The Repairer of Reputations” he starts off describing a fascinating version of an alternate America. Cuba, Hawaii and Samoa are all part of the US, the independent state of Suanee has been established for African-Americans, there is a cabinet position for a Secretary of Fine Arts and as our story begins a Government Lethal Chamber has opened up in the town square so people with mental illness can kill themselves for society’s benefit. A few years prior a fall from a horse results in our protagonist being evaluated by a doctor and pronounced, “brain affected”. He is placed in an asylum to treat his insanity and there encounters and reads the play “The King in Yellow”. After being released he becomes friends with a Mr. Wilde, also a reader of the play, an owner of what is apparently a psychotic cat, and a man who is paid to repair reputations. While they both dream of the King in Yellow overthrowing the government, our protagonist has another dream as well, the desire for Constance who, unfortunately for him, loves his cousin.
In “The Mask” an artist discovers an elixir, which turns objects to stone when they are dipped in it. Experiments soon turn toward living creatures with what the artist describes a spectacular success. The results in stone are perfection, better than any sculptor can accomplish. Our narrator discovers a copy of The King in Yellow and absently reads it not wondering how it came into the studio. Soon thereafter he becomes ill and nightmares of the tattered King fill his sleeping hours. When he awakes he finds that his love is gone and his best friend has shot himself.
Normally most would consider a church to be a place to go for quiet contemplation or perhaps a place to listen to and enjoy the organist performing some spectacular piece of ecclesiastical music but “In the Court of the Dragon” the narrator is looking only for peace of mind as he has spent the last three days in turmoil, suffering both physically and mentally after reading the play. Unfortunately there seems to be no respite. The preacher isn’t making sense and the organist is behaving suspiciously. Trying to shake off his hanging gloom he decided to follow the organist as he leaves the church but soon becomes unsure of who is following whom and why.
“The Yellow Sign” starts as a jaded artist and his young model remark on the general unhealthy appearance of a watchman of the local church. Something about his mere presence casts a pall and makes observers uneasy. His model soon starts having dreams that the man is driving a hearse and the artist is lying in the coffin inside. The situation becomes almost intolerable when the artist asks his apartment’s bellboy about the watchman. The bellboy responds with a story about how he confronted the watchman one evening, and as he was striking him the watchman grabbed him with his mushy hands. As the bellboy pulls free, one of the watchman’s fingers comes off in the bellboy’s grasp. The situation only gets worse when his model offers him a gift of a pendant she found. Initially thinking it’s a letter in an alphabet he doesn’t know only later does he realize it doesn’t correspond to any human language.
The final story in the first part of the book is “The Demoiselle D’ys”. This story actually doesn’t include the play at all but a woman encountered by a hunter in Brittany is named Jeanne D’ys a homophone on the word jaundice and thus continuing the theme of yellow. Jeanne invites Phillip who has been hunting back to her castle inhabited only by her, her aged nurse, four falconers and her beater (a person whose job is to flush out game for the falcons). After being bitten buy a snake Phillip is unsure about the event at all.
Finally while I’m not going to go into detail about the second part of the book, which as I mentioned are romances, I do want to say that I was surprised to find myself liking them. I found them innocently charming about a time when women flirted by showing their ankles and every word a man said was weighed against his character. Perhaps the world has not left me as jaded as I thought!
While “The Repairer…” shows evidence of brilliant alternative world making and real weirdness with Mr. Wilde’s interactions with his cat, the strongest story is probably “The Yellow Sign”. In that story Chambers talents really come out with a strong sense of weirdness and encroaching horror especially as the protagonists get caught up in nightmare. “The Demosielle D’ys” story will be recognizable to most readers but that is only because its “type” has become commonplace in writing although I believe that Chambers was the first to come up with it. H.G Wells used a variation in his story “ A door in the wall” which is much better known.
After this book Chambers turned more and more to novels and romances. Apparently weird fiction didn’t pay the bills. By any measure he was a successful author. His books were widely read and popular but none of those really showed the flash of originality revealed in The King In Yellow. One of the most famous lines about him was a backhanded insult from Lovecraft who would go on to remark that Chambers was “… equipped with the right brains and education but wholly out of the habit of using them.” After reading The King in Yellow one does wonder what other stories Chambers could have produced if he had focused his energies on what was definitely his most original work. Despite its significance as one of the foundation books of weird literature I don’t know if I can really recommend this book for everyone. For those with an interest in Lovecraft and his influences or those who enjoy a little archeology of literature (I like both) this is a good book, for others there may be other, not better, horror novels to occupy your time.
© 2017 George Anadiotis
The Moore stories led me to the book. The first story is cool in its suggestiveness. But the rest are boring and suggest early CAMP, tho I mite be reading Moore ‘s interpretation (Providence) back into the original text