The House on the Borderland

By William Hope Hodgson, Leslie S. Klinger, Eric J. Guignard and Ramsey Campbell

William Hope Hodgson's "cosmic horror" classic continues the Haunted Library of Horror Classics series.

In a ruined house at the edge of an abyss lies the diary of a madman…

Two friends on a fishing trip make an unsettling discovery when the river they've been following abruptly ends and reappears some 100 feet below the edge of an abyss. If that wasn't unnerving enough, the river runs along the remains of an oddly shaped house, half-swallowed by the pit.

Within the ruins, they discover the moldering journal of an unidentified man—the Recluse—who had lived in the house years ago. Its pages reveal the man's apparent descent into madness—why else would he chronicle haunted visions, trips to other dimensions, and attacks by swine-like creatures that have followed him home? After a horrific vision in which he witnesses the end of the earth and time itself, the Recluse awakens in his study to find nothing has changed—except that his dog has dissolved into a pile of dust. And then the "swine things" return...

Introduced by modern horror master Ramsey Campbell as "an enduring classic of cosmic terror," The House on the Borderland has inspired dozens of other classic horror novels and indelibly changed the genre. Influencing writers from H.P. Lovecraft to Terry Pratchett, this 1908 masterpiece shucks the conventions of Gothic horror and presents an eerie mix of sci-fi, fantasy, and the supernatural.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Sourcebooks
• Release date: Nov 3, 2020
• ISBN: 9781492699781

William Hope Hodgson

William Hope Hodgson (1877-1918) was a British author and poet best known for his works of macabre fiction. Early experience as a sailor gave resonance to his novels of the supernatural at sea, The Ghost Pirates and The Boats of the Glen-Carrig, but The House on the Borderland and The Night Land are often singled out for their powerful depiction of eerie, otherworldly horror. The author was a man of many parts, a public speaker, photographer and early advocate of bodybuilding. He was killed in action during the Battle of the Lys in the First World War.

Book preview

Series Volumes of

Haunted Library of Horror Classics:

The Phantom of the Opera by Gaston Leroux (2020)

The Beetle by Richard Marsh (2020)

Vathek by William Beckford (2020)

The House on the Borderland by William Hope Hodgson (2020)

The Parasite and Other Tales of Terror by Arthur Conan Doyle (2021)

The King in Yellow by Robert W. Chambers (2021)

…and more forthcoming

First published in 1908 by Chapman and Hall, Ltd., London

Introduction © 2020 by Ramsey Campbell

Additional supplemental material © 2020 by Eric J. Guignard and Leslie S. Klinger

Cover and internal design © 2020 by Sourcebooks

Cover design and illustration by Jeffrey Nguyen

Cover images © Vector/Shutterstock

Sourcebooks, Poisoned Pen Press, and the colophon are registered trademarks of Sourcebooks.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems—except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews—without permission in writing from its publisher, Sourcebooks.

The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious or are used fictitiously. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental and not intended by the author.

Published by Poisoned Pen Press, an imprint of Sourcebooks

P.O. Box 4410, Naperville, Illinois 60567-4410

[phone]

www.sourcebooks.com

Originally published as The House on the Borderland in 1908 in London, England, by Chapman and Hall, Ltd. This edition based on the edition published in 1908 in London, England, by Chapman and Hall, Ltd.

The original spelling, grammar, and punctuation have been retained.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Hodgson, William Hope, author. | Campbell, Ramsey,

writer of introduction.

Title: The house on the borderland / William Hope Hodgson ; with an

introduction by Ramsey Campbell.

Description: Naperville, Illinois : Poisoned Pen Press, [2020] | Series:

Haunted library of horror classics | First published in 1908 by Chapman

and Hall, Ltd., London.

Identifiers: LCCN 2020023835 | (trade paperback)

Subjects: GSAFD: Horror fiction.

Classification: LCC PR6015.O253 H68 2020 | DDC 823/.912--dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020023835

Contents

Front Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Introduction to the Novel: A Cosmic Voyager

Author’s Introduction to the Manuscript

Chapter I

Chapter II

Chapter III

Chapter IV

Chapter V

Chapter VI

Chapter VII

Chapter VIII

Chapter IX

Chapter X

Chapter XI

Chapter XII

Chapter XIII

Chapter XIV

Chapter XV

Chapter XVI

Chapter XVII

Chapter XVIII

Chapter XIX

Chapter XX

Chapter XXI

Chapter XXII

Chapter XXIII

Chapter XXIV

Chapter XXV

Chapter XXVI

Chapter XXVII

Grief

About the Author

Suggested Discussion Questions for Classroom Use

Suggested Further Reading of Fiction

About the Series Editors

Back Cover

This edition of The House on the Borderland is presented by the Horror Writers Association, a nonprofit organization of writers and publishing professionals around the world, dedicated to promoting dark literature and the interests of those who write it.

For more information on HWA, visit: www.horror.org.

Introduction to the Novel:

A Cosmic Voyager

WILLIAM HOPE HODGSON (1877–1918) was a proponent of physical culture and for several years a sailor, none of which prepares the reader for the macabre and cosmic tales he left the world. His best work is as extraordinary as any produced during the visionary flowering of the fantastic that spanned the late Victorian era and the Edwardian, and can hold its own with the tales of Arthur Machen and Algernon Blackwood. Of his four completed novels, The House on the Borderland is the vastest in scope. At times it feels as if the various dimensions—spatial, temporal, spiritual—to which the building is a portal, may burst the narrative apart just as they apparently undermine the house.

The tale seems easily summarised—a fellow living with his equally elderly and unnamed sister in a remote Irish mansion is visited by visions while monsters swarm beneath the foundations—but this account can’t contain its ambiguities and contradictions. For instance, his first vision takes him to a transformed version of the house, located on a distant planet and surrounded by avatars of ancient gods. Which house, if either, is a projection of the other, and how is the solitary inhabitant of the other world, a swinish creature, related to the herd below the Irish residence? Does the vision conjure them into our world or simply help reveal their presence? The copious footnotes supplied by Hodgson (commenting on the journal he and a friend are said to have found, itself called The House on the Borderland) offer no interpretation, and perhaps I’m not alone in being put in mind of another challengingly constructed tale of terror, House of Leaves.

In our field, mystery and enigma can be more satisfying than any explanation, and Hodgson’s novel keeps its secrets as it extends its scope. The afterlife is glimpsed but remains ungraspable, not least because the account of it disintegrates. A journey to the end of time, reminiscent of The Time Machine but vividly reimagined, eventually returns us to the extraterrestrial house and thence to the earthly one. Perhaps these weird voyages destabilise the building, though the foundations may well have been weakened by an onslaught of water in a scene evoking the terrible power of that medium (a recurring motif in Hodgson’s work, drawing on his maritime experiences), but how do they affect the hermit’s mind? In the final sentences of his journal he turns into that strange denizen of uncanny fiction, the impossible narrator, but how unreliable has he already been? One borderland the tale may cross is that of sanity. As with Poe’s The Fall of the House of Usher, the habitation and the tenant’s mind seem inextricably linked, and perhaps collapse together. The unlucky sister appears to fall between the narratives (the hermit’s and the commentator’s), and is heard of no more. Perhaps Hodgson is observing, inadvertently or otherwise, how his structure can’t encompass his themes but instead functions as a metaphor for them.

I leave further interpretation to the Freudians and Jungians, though it occurs to me that the subterranean swine could represent the hermit’s hidden brutish nature, while the familial relationship might stand for his everyday humanity, and the cosmic and uncanny visions could denote spirituality and the aspirations of imagination. Again, how interdependent are they? Ultimately, the hermit is corrupted by a brute before suffering a nameless fate. Anyway, enough analysis! The House on the Borderland is an enduring classic of cosmic terror, decades older than comparable tales by Lovecraft, who read and enthused about it only near the end of his career. I’m delighted to be involved in its revival. May it haunt the reader’s mind and help to resurrect Hodgson’s considerable body of fantastic work.

Ramsey Campbell

October 16, 2019

Wallasey, Merseyside

From the Manuscript, discovered in 1877 by

Messrs. Tonnison and Berreggnog, in the

Ruins that lie to the South of the

Village of Kraighten, in the West

of Ireland. Set out here,

with Notes.

TO MY FATHER

(Whose feet tread the lost aeons)

Open the door,

And listen!

Only the wind’s muffled roar,

And the glisten

Of tears ’round the moon.

And, in fancy, the tread

Of vanishing shoon—

Out in the night with the Dead.

"Hush! And hark

To the sorrowful cry

Of the wind in the dark.

Hush and hark, without murmur or sigh,

To shoon that tread the lost aeons:

To the sound that bids you to die.

Hush and hark! Hush and Hark!"

Shoon of the Dead

Author’s Introduction

to the Manuscript

MANY ARE THE HOURS IN WHICH I HAVE pondered upon the story that is set forth in the following pages. I trust that my instincts are not awry when they prompt me to leave the account, in simplicity, as it was handed to me.

And the MS. itself—You must picture me, when first it was given into my care, turning it over, curiously, and making a swift, jerky examination. A small book it is; but thick, and all, save the last few pages, filled with a quaint but legible hand-writing, and writ very close. I have the queer, faint, pit-water smell of it in my nostrils now as I write, and my fingers have subconscious memories of the soft, cloggy feel of the long-damp pages.

I read, and, in reading, lifted the Curtains of the Impossible, that blind the mind, and looked out into the unknown. Amid stiff, abrupt sentences I wandered; and, presently, I had no fault to charge against their abrupt tellings; for, better far than my own ambitious phrasing, is this mutilated story capable of bringing home all that the old Recluse, of the vanished house, had striven to tell.

Of the simple, stiffly given account of weird and extraordinary matters, I will say little. It lies before you. The inner story must be uncovered, personally, by each reader, according to ability and desire. And even should any fail to see, as now I see, the shadowed picture and conception of that, to which one may well give the accepted titles of Heaven and Hell; yet can I promise certain thrills, merely taking the story as a story.

WILLIAM HOPE HODGSON

DECEMBER 17, 1907

I

THE FINDING OF THE MANUSCRIPT

RIGHT AWAY IN THE WEST OF IRELAND lies a tiny hamlet called Kraighten. It is situated, alone, at the base of a low hill. Far around there spreads a waste of bleak and totally inhospitable country; where, here and there at great intervals, one may come upon the ruins of some long desolate cottage—unthatched and stark. The whole land is bare and unpeopled, the very earth scarcely covering the rock that lies beneath it, and with which the country abounds, in places rising out of the soil in wave-shaped ridges.

Yet, in spite of its desolation, my friend Tonnison and I had elected to spend our vacation there. He had stumbled on the place, by mere chance, the year previously, during the course of a long walking tour, and discovered the possibilities for the angler, in a small and unnamed river that runs past the outskirts of the little village.

I have said that the river is without name; I may add that no map that I have hitherto consulted has shown either village or stream. They seem to have entirely escaped observation: indeed, they might never exist for all that the average guide tells one. Possibly, this can be partly accounted for by the fact that the nearest railway-station (Ardrahan) is some forty miles distant.¹

It was early one warm evening when my friend and I arrived in Kraighten. We had reached Ardrahan the previous night, sleeping there in rooms hired at the village post-office, and leaving in good time on the following morning, clinging insecurely to one of the typical jaunting cars.²

It had taken us all day to accomplish our journey over some of the roughest tracks imaginable, with the result that we were thoroughly tired and somewhat bad tempered. However, the tent had to be erected, and our goods stowed away, before we could think of food or rest. And so we set to work, with the aid of our driver, and soon had the tent up, upon a small patch of ground just outside the little village, and quite near to the river.

Then, having stored all our belongings, we dismissed the driver, as he had to make his way back as speedily as possible, and told him to come across to us at the end of a fortnight. We had brought sufficient provisions to last us for that space of time, and water we could get from the stream. Fuel we did not need, as we had included a small oil-stove among our outfit, and the weather was fine and warm.

It was Tonnison’s idea to camp out instead of getting lodgings in one of the cottages. As he put it, there was no joke in sleeping in a room with a numerous family of healthy Irish in one corner, and the pig-sty in the other, while over-head a ragged colony of roosting fowls distributed their blessings impartially, and the whole place so full of peat smoke that it made a fellow sneeze his head off just to put it inside the doorway.

Tonnison had got the stove lit now, and was busy cutting slices of bacon into the frying-pan; so I took the kettle and walked down to the river for water. On the way, I had to pass close to a little group of the village people, who eyed me curiously, but not in any unfriendly manner, though none of them ventured a word.

As I returned with my kettle filled, I went up to them and, after a friendly nod, to which they replied in like manner, I asked them casually about the fishing; but, instead of answering, they just shook their heads silently, and stared at me. I repeated the question, addressing more particularly a great, gaunt fellow at my elbow; yet again I received no answer. Then the man turned to a comrade and said something rapidly in a language that I did not understand; and, at once, the whole crowd of them fell to jabbering in what, after a few moments, I guessed to be pure Irish. At the same time they cast many glances in my direction. For a minute, perhaps, they spoke among themselves thus; then the man I had addressed, faced round at me, and said something. By the expression of his face I guessed that he, in turn, was questioning me; but now I had to shake my head, and indicate that I did not comprehend what it was they wanted to know; and so we stood looking at one another, until I heard Tonnison calling to me to hurry up with the kettle. Then, with a smile and a nod, I left them, and all in the little crowd smiled and nodded in return, though their faces still betrayed their puzzlement.

It was evident, I reflected as I went towards the tent, that the inhabitants of these few huts in the wilderness did not know a word of English; and when I told Tonnison, he remarked that he was aware of the fact, and, more, that it was not at all uncommon in that part of the country, where the people often lived and died in their isolated hamlets without ever coming in contact with the outside world.

I wish we had got the driver to interpret for us before he left, I remarked, as we sat down to our meal. It seems so strange for the people of this place not even to know what we’ve come for.

Tonnison grunted an assent, and thereafter was silent for awhile.

Later, having satisfied our appetites somewhat, we began to talk, laying our plans for the morrow; then, after a smoke, we closed the flap of the tent, and prepared to turn in.

I suppose there’s no chance of those fellows outside taking anything? I asked, as we rolled ourselves in our blankets.

Tonnison said that he did not think so, at least while we were about; and, as he went on to explain, we could lock up everything, except the tent, in the big chest that we had brought to hold our provisions. I agreed to this, and soon we were both asleep.

Next morning, early, we rose and went for a swim in the river; after which we dressed, and had breakfast. Then we roused out our fishing tackle, and overhauled it, by which time, our breakfasts having settled somewhat, we made all secure within the tent, and strode off in the direction my friend had explored on his previous visit.

During the day we fished happily, working steadily up-stream, and by evening we had one of the prettiest creels of fish that I had seen for a long while. Returning to the village, we made a good feed off our day’s spoil, after which, having selected a few of the finer fish for our breakfast, we presented the remainder to the group of villagers who had assembled at a respectful distance to watch our doings. They seemed wonderfully grateful, and heaped mountains of, what I presumed to be, Irish blessings upon our heads.

Thus we

Reviews for The House on the Borderland

[nadiah2kristensen · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

'The House on the Borderland' is widely acknowledged as a turning-point in gothic fiction, influencing later writers including perhaps Lovecraft himself. For this reason alone it is worth reading, and the language is not nearly as difficult for a modern reader as other works from that era, so there's not much to lose. However, if it were not for the historical place that this work holds, I doubt that it would attract the attention that it does.As several reviewers have noted here, the story does not form a coherent and satisfying whole. Several disparate plot elements are introduced and either insufficiently explored or seemingly abandoned. And one element in particular (the lover) is developed too late in the narrative to justify the significance that it is then given. The reader will not only be left with many unanswered questions, but a sneaking suspicion that they are not so-much "questions" as "holes in the plot". Nevertheless, most parts of the work are either conceptually interesting or genuinely creepy. The second half of the story is particularly interesting for its astronomical scope, something that fans of Lovecraft will recognise and enjoy.

[lisamaria_c · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

This 1908 was recommended in the A Reader's Guide to Fantasy on the "Seven-League Shelf" list of the cream of the fantasy genre. It's even on the "1001 Books to Read Before You Die" list of significant literary fiction. So, definitely a book that has classic status, and if you believe the Wiki, a "milestone" in the transition from traditional Gothic to "cosmic horror" that influenced Lovecraft. It's framed as the first person account of a gentleman on a fishing holiday with his friend in Ireland. They come upon a crumbling ruin and his friend finds a partly damaged manuscript, which forms the bulk of the story. Parts are definitely creepy but several things thwarted my involvement in the story. The narrator, known only by an editorial footnote as "the recluse" is a misanthrope. He lives in an ancient pile with his sister Mary--who doesn't get one line of dialogue--and we learn he's suffered a bereavement--it's his lost love that gets the 3 or so lines of the only dialogue in the book. It makes it really hard to care about him--in fact, I'd say by far the most appealing, heart-tugging character in the book is the narrator's dog Pepper--unfortunately, there's not enough of him, or Tip the cat, to redeem the novel. And there's far, far, far too much of a vision of the heat death of the universe that takes up a third of the novel.Perhaps if I were a literary scholar of Gothic and Horror literature, I'd better appreciate how this work is seminal. As a reader, it mostly left me cold.

[sf_addict · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

When I downloaded House on the Borderland (1908) I was expecting a gothic horror tale, and at first it did fit into that kind of gothic horror mold, but then it changed, and became something quite strange! Basically its a tale about an old manuscript discovered in an old house, kind of a journal which describes the character's adventures in and around the house. There is a strange pit in the garden which also leads to the house's cellar. There are strange 'swine faced beasts' and a journey into space! I'm not quite sure where this story fits genre wise but it was quite entertaining! Think Edgar Allan Poe meets the Time Machine meets the stargate sequence in 2001 A space Odyssey! Odd but fun!

[sturlington_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Two fishermen on vacation in the Irish countryside discover an eerie pit, the remains of a house and a mysterious manuscript written by the man who once lived there, describing his voyages through space and time and his battles with bizarre swine-people perhaps from another dimension.This short novel, published in 1908, is an interesting early example of weird fiction. It's quite surreal and doesn't make a whole lot of sense, but it's worth reading just for historical interest, as well as for the lurid descriptions. The character I most sympathized with was the narrator's sister, Mary. She obviously thought her brother was cuckoo, and I tend to agree with her.Reading fantasy classics (2014).

[electrascaife · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

*very slight spoilers ahead*If Edgar Allan Poe and George Romero had a child in whom they were both slightly disappointed because he had fallen in with Stanley Kubrick and lots of psychedelic substances, it would be this book. A fever dream populated with possibly time-travelling pig men, a house that seems to be a portal through time and space, and the sad death of not one but TWO dogs. Weird in a definitely not good way. So yeah, that's a big NOPE from me.

[jannes_16 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

An odd mix of speculative cosmic horror, gothic mystery and monster horror story. More interesting than good, I suppose. In my somewhat limited experience it feels proto-Lovecraftian, but I suspect that might be reductive. Some passages are genuinely chilling, while others is obtuse and a slog to get through even as they fascinates on a conceptual level. Recommended for horror aficionados and those deeply interested in the earliest moments of weird fiction.

[aliciamay_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Two friends embark on a fishing trip to an isolated part of Ireland. In the ruins of an ancient stone house they find the diary of an elderly man who lived alone with his sister and their pets. The fascinating tale that unravels in the diary is about battles with pig/human like monsters, some cryptic lost love of an unknown form, and the extraordinary acceleration of time and the end of the world. This was certainly a departure from anything I have been reading. I enjoyed how some parts of the story I would be reading at face value, but then little doubts would start to creep in and I would have to question what was happening to the narrator or how he was writing such a tale. The language describing the end of the world was phenomenal and some of the battles with the pig creatures had me on the edge of my seat. I’m not rating this higher because some parts of the story dragged on. The narration was also very choppy with several parts of the story not relating to or being useful to the overall plot (assuming there was supposed to be a plot).

[ireed110 · Rating: 1 out of 5 stars]

Okay. So these 2 chums go on a fishing expedition in a strange little town. They find a creepy old brokedown house and an old journal and take it back to the tent. The next 90% of the book is the legible contents of the journal.The journal relates a tale of woe by the former occupant of the house. He runs into a bunch of scary monsters and has some adventures with them. Then he embarks on a journey through time and space where he catches a glimpse of the heretofore unmentioned love of this guy's life. And we're back to the fishing buddies who wonder briefly if the writer is nuts, but then decide ohhh, no, OF COURSE it was real. Uhh, yeah. This is supposed to be a "classic tale of fantasy and horror". I dunno. I have to say I truly enjoyed the parts where the scary dudes were storming the castle - I thought "wow, this book doesn't suck after all." But, then the scary dudes went away and the time warp part of the story started. How unfortunate that reading about time moving very very quickly can make my own time move very very slowly. Every agonizing detail - and it was the same every day - was eked out, over and over and over again. The sun rose. It flashed across the sky. It disappeared in the west. The moon rose. It flashed across the sky. It disappeared again. The sun rose. Yadda yadda yadda, ad infinitum. Oh man it was tedious. Every few pages he'd make an interesting discovery (like formerly live things turning to dust), but otherwise he just stood at the window for a bunch of centuries and watched. I just don't get it. This book has been given a whole boatload of 4 and 5 star ratings by readers who clearly have a lot more patience than I do. The story as a whole is interesting, true, but the drudgery of getting through it for me was unbearable. I'm going to give it one point for having some good ideas. This is a true 1/2-pointer for me, but I'll give up the other 1/2 just because it's supposed to be a "classic."

[nsenger-1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

The House on the Borderland is an eerie novel that ultimately leaves many questions unanswered. Written in 1908, it is often cited as an influence on writers like H.P. Lovecraft and Terry Pratchett, and it is listed in Fantasy: The 100 Best Books, edited by James Cawthorn and Michael Moorcock.I really wanted this book to be good. The beginning starts off promising: two men on a fishing holiday in a remote part of Ireland discover the ruins of a mysterious house and among the debris they recover a rotting journal. The journal records the thoughts of an unnamed man referred to only as the Recluse. The Recluse lived in the House with his sister Mary and his dog Pepper, and after some bizarre and terrifying events happened to him, he decided to keep this journal. The two men on fishing holiday begin to read the journal to each other, and this journal forms the bulk of the novel.Some of the events the Recluse describes are heart-pounding and page-turning, while others are hallucinatory experiences that drag on and on. You know, kind of like Doctor Who episodes from the 1980s. Or like 2001: A Space Odyssey.The best scenes are those that take place in the House, which is almost a character in its own right, and there are some truly chilling moments involving creatures called the Swine-Things.While there were many portions of the book that I really enjoyed, it ultimately left me unsatisfied. There were many unanswered questions, and I wasn't interested enough in the story to try and figure them out through deeper analysis of the text--assuming there is something deeper in the text.To me it is one of those books that are more important because of its influence than because of its artistic merit. Still, it's a fairly quick read and I would recommend it to anyone interested in the roots of the horror or fantasy genres.

[edwinbcn · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Firstly, I should say that I am not very interested in science fiction and fantasy novels, neither do I like the genre of horror and detective. Nonetheless, I do ocassionally read novels belonging to each of these categories, usually when they are considered classics.William Hope Hodgson was a prolific writer, mainly of horror, fantastic fiction, and science fiction, and many of his stories involve adventures at sea. He is most widely remembered for two works, The house on the borderland (1908) being one of them.The house on the borderland has a layered story frame. An introduction to the manuscript precedes the table of contents, followed by chapter 1 describing the discovery of the manuscript. Each of these sections is preceded by a poem, with a footnote saying the second poem was found written in pencil on the fly-leaf of the manuscript. It is the story of two men travelling to an area where they encounter suspicious local. In what appears to be an overgrown garden belonging to a lost estate they discover the manuscript. They read the manuscript aloud.The landscape of the overgrown garden, the house (unseen) and some other aspects of the landscape appear as echos in the story in the manuscript, in the dreams of the writer of the manuscript, in the dream of the man and in the landscape of the setting of the top frame.Although the manuscript and the story seem to suggest fact, very little in the story is factual, and it often seems all of it only happens in the imagination of the main character, to the effect that subtle self-doubt makes the reader wonder about the sanity of the main character. Suggestion and suspense are everything.The story consists of five episodes that seem to be interconnected, but their interconnectedness is possibly just imagined. The presence of the sister and her behavior suggests that all events only exist in the mind of the narrator. One of the episodes (Chapt. 14) breaks up into fragments and has a dreamlike quality. However, among the five episodes, two major parts stand out. The first is the long coherent story of the siege by the swain-things, and the other is the jump to the end of time. Barely traceable story elements suggest these parts are interconnected, but only very faintly, and again much to be imagined. The last part of the travel to the end of time must have been mindboggling to readers a hundred years ago, while now it has been done much more convincingly visually on film and tv.As an historic fantasy story The house on the borderland remains very readable and exciting. The author cleverly constructs a story in which the imagination is the driving force of the story.

[readingover50 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

I enjoyed the first half of the book. It was more of a conventional, linear horror story. At a little past the half way point, the book suddenly turned very strange. The best word I can use to describe it is "trippy." I thought the travels through time and space went on too long. It was interesting and unique at first, but then became tiresome. The swine faced creatures were a ruthless adversary to the old man. This book gave me a lot to think about.

[chibitika-1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I found this book to be fascinating and spooky and atmospheric and original and just plain fun to read. There were long descriptive passages I skipped over because I felt they belabored the point and did nothing to carry the story forward, but it was well worth it because the payoff in chills was great. This is one of those great old horror novels (from 1908) that still delivers if one overlooks just a few passages. One thing - it strongly reminded me of Odd Apocalypse by Dean Koontz, in a good way. It is almost as if Koontz was paying homage to Hodgson. Highly recommended.

[dreesie-1 · Rating: 1 out of 5 stars]

This book started off so promising--it was creepy in a science fictiony 1900 kind of way.And then it got weird. Not science fiction weird. More like Carl Sagan narrating a tour of the universe as imagined by some guy in 1900. For chapters and chapters and chapters.And then it goes back to part one, kind of. But now the terror is caused by something completely different.All in just 186 pages.WHY OH WHY is this book on the 1001 list?

[kristelh_15 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Story written in 1908 about a recluse living in a house on the Borderland. The story is on the surface about a place that is built over a pit where swine like beast live. The man fights of the beast then has a couple of time travels where he visits his lost love and another where he sees the end of the world and solar system and another visit to his lost love. The message is turn from bestial lust (the pit) to the pure undemanding love of the virginal figure (the white sea). Two fishermen on a trip to Ireland, find a manuscript in an old ruin. So this story could be epistolary as it is the reading of this recluses diary. Is this the story of man's journey into madness. It is an example of weird fiction.

[prop2gether · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Listened to the Libravox recording by Alan Winterrowd--very nicely done.

[dinadansfriend · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

An early experiment in trans-dimensional existence. A classic read for completeness. written in 1908.

[pidgeon92_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Excellent storytelling.

[chrisriesbeck · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

If you couldn't make it through The Night Land, never fear. The House on the Borderland is much shorter, much faster paced, and in places quite exciting. The framing device, so common to stories a century ago, is fairly quickly told. The meat is the tale told in a found volume, written by the Recluse who lives in the titular house, with a sister who makes so few appearances that for chapters at a time it's not clear if she still lives. Two primary sequences dominate: the siege of the house by swine-people, and an extended visionary voyage to the far far future and the eventual death of the solar system. Interestingly, a third sequence is referred to, involving a reunion with a long-lost love. This sequence though is part of the "lost" pages manuscript. Why Hodgson chose to do this is not clear, but from the painful to read remnants that are presented, these are pages well lost. Virtually nothing is explained. Once, it didn't seem to matter to authors that things remained beyond our ken. The over-written prose still manages to evoke a sense of fear, in the first half, and amazement in the second.

[jseger9000 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

The House on the Borderland (1908) is a landmark in horror fiction. An obvious inspiration to Lovecraft and a bunch of his Weird Tales cronies. It broke away from the old Gothic horrors and introduced cosmic terror.A couple of guys on a sporting holiday in secluded Northern Ireland stumble across the ruins of an old structure on the edge of a large pit. In the wreckage they find a tattered and damaged diary which makes up the rest of the narrative.The ruins used to be a large, oddly designed house and the diary belonged to its owner, an unnamed narrator who lived there with his spinster sister. They got the manor cheap as it has a reputation for being haunted. We follow the narrator and his strange experiences both inside the house and in a large and growing pit in his back garden.I enjoyed Hodgson's writing. The language is a little antiquated, but it isn't that purposely archaic and baroque H.P. Lovecraft stuff that grates after a while. He did a very good job creating an uncomfortable atmosphere. His word choice creates a general sense of eeriness that really worked, even when nothing outright 'scary' is happening. There is some very strong work where our narrator encounters visitors from the pit. At this point, the book was rockin'.But then we fall in to an extended scene where our narrator stares out the window as the house reveals the future of the universe. I know that this may count as a spoiler, but it has to be part of the review as this section is the weight around the book's neck. It is page after page of repetitive description that (ironically considering what the book is describing) drags on and on. Reading through this section really made me want to give up on the book. I have very little patience for stories where the disembodied hero floats along describing weird goings-on. It's like the StarGate section of the film 2001 but stretched out beyond my ability to care. That's also why I don't like Lovecraft's 'dream' stories.The last twenty pages of the book were back on track and it did have a strong finish.The book has a few quirks that should be pointed out: Hodgson is an atmospheric writer as I mentioned. But, I've noticed, the author, William Hope Hodgson, has a love affair, with the comma, that makes me want to break out a red pencil, as I read it. The commas were often unnecessary and out of place, and I found myself reading the booking in the rhythm it was written in, pausing at each comma. It could become... hypnotic after a while.Also, I know the unnamed narrator was a gimmick of a lot of early twentieth century horror, but it made it very hard to connect with the character. Hodgson would also throw in major plot twists from out of nowhere, which made it feel like he was making up the tale as he went along.If anyone is considering reading the book, but is unsure, I'd recommend it. Just understand that my rec is based more on its short length and its place in horror history than its quality of writing, characterization or story telling.

[litfan_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

My head is still spinning from this trippy little novel, in a good way. I don't think I've read anything quite like it. Part supernatural, part horror with a smidge of sci fi, it defies convention. Definitely a book that can be read in one sitting, so you can really get absorbed into the story.The basic plot consists of two friends on holiday, who find a muddied manuscript in the ruins of a very creepy house perched over an abyss. The manuscript is written by a recluse who lived in the house, to provide an account of the eerie goings-on in his home. The suspense builds slowly, and quite deliciously. (I got so absorbed that at one point when something fell in my house, I thought I was in danger from one of the creatures in the book until I remembered where I was-- that's good writing!) Some of the book focuses on the recluse's experiences in his home, and the later part focuses on a journey he takes through time and space. This later part dragged a bit for me, as it lacked the suspense and energy of the scenes set in the house. But things picked up again, and the ending left me shivering.

[whitewavedarling · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This is a strong page-turner that I'm still processing. A mix of psychological suspense and horror, the book combines eery situations and beautiful images to create an atmosphere that's enthralling. What seems fairly nondescript at first is a plot and set of situations that quickly become engrossing, drawing you along even when you can't quite tell why you're so fascinated by what's going on in front of you. Structurally, Hodgson formed this perfectly to keep readers both attached and believing in what's going on, despite themselves. If you're looking for a creepy read that you may well finish in one eery sitting, I highly recommend this. For the depth and beauty of language and reading, I'll be revisiting it in the future.

[skiewulfy · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This is an interesting story, best thought of as two short stories. The first half deals with an old house under seige from otherworldly creatures and makes an entertaining read. The second half, which goes off the deep end of pre-Lovecraftian "fear of insignificance" themes, is too dense to be enjoyed, but worth reading nonetheless.