Re: Eerie, for sure, but not sf or supernatural horror
Posted by:
Platypus (IP Logged)
Date: 23 August, 2020 03:00AM
Cathbad Wrote:
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> Le Fanu is an interesting example of plausible
> deniability - I'm thinking specifically of Green
> Tea. Le Fanu was writing at a time when people
> started to seriously question whether the
> supernatural existed at all, and apparently Green
> Tea was an attempt at a story for which there was
> both a rational and a supernatural explanation:
> either the old clergyman really is being haunted
> by some visitation from Hell, or he's become
> susceptible to hallucinations due to drinking too
> much green tea. The reader can choose which
> version he or she prefers.
I found the final chapter of "Green Tea", in which Dr. Hesselius pontificates to his his friend Van Loo, to be almost comical, as if Le Fanu had written it with tongue firmly in cheek. Hesselius argues that he has never lost a patient to this malady. One would think that Jennings proves otherwise, but Hesselius argues that Jennings was never REALLY his patient. Then Hesselius ends by arguing that Jennings did not die of the malady itself, but of hereditary suicidal mania.
But you may possibly be misremembering Hesselius' theory. Hesselius does not believe that the green tea caused hallucinations, but rather that it opens the inner eye, and allows the sufferer to perceive an actual demon.
But then again, the reader does not have to believe Dr. Hesselius either. He can instead believe Dr. Harley, who thinks the monkey is indeed a hallucination. Alternatively, one could believe Jennings the victim of a real demonic haunting, but still be skeptical of Dr. Hesselius' claimed ability to fix spiritual problems via pseudoscientific remedies.
Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 23 Aug 20 | 03:16AM by Platypus.