Hello,

Does anybody know about a good classic horror story taking place in a polar area, something like At The Mountains of Madness, In Amundsen´s Tent or Who Goes There?



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 31 Jan 17 | 12:53PM by Minicthulhu.

Poe's The Narrative of Athur Gordon Pym of Nantucket, of course, is a fine and unusual novel, partly set in the Antarctic.

"Beyond the Pole" by A. Hyatt Verrill, about lobster people in the Antarctic.

Mary Shelley's Frankenstein is partly set in the Arctic.

For me, At the Mountains of Madness and "Who Goes There?" sum up the polar region weird tale formula to satisfaction.
You might also try The Resident's, somewhat humorously grotesque, ESKIMO, a narrative musical performance piece, with fine atmospheric tellings of inuit culture and myth. In one of its stories, "The Angry Angakok", an eskimo wizard wards off a sea serpent from attacking the tribe.

May be you should try writing your own story, just for the personal satisfaction of developing some teasing idea. Because no else will ever do exactly that for you.



Otherwise, I think Africa holds more potential for ripe settings of weird horrors, than the polar regions. The nightmare of being stuck in Congo or Somalia, for example, with nowhere to turn to for help, among completely alien cultures and species, floundering in the outgrowths of yeasty bubbling procreant overflow. E. R. Burroughs and Robert E. Howard wrote some excellent adventure pulp work in this setting, though they never had even been to Africa. ... The vast African continent sheds prodigious energy, trembling the Earth's crust afar, and affects us all on a psychological level. Finer authors, could make some real interesting weird fiction out of this, if they dare enter the territory and let their imaginations roam uninhibited.

China also holds enormous potential for weird nightmare horrors! The tradition of Fu Manchu could be expanded upon, exploring into the hidden reaches of terrifyingly refined and grim ancient culture.

Thanks for the tip about "Beyond The Pole".

Speaking of which, the part of "The Purple Cloud" where the character finds the strange lake with the inscribed pillar in its center is also great, so is the short story called "The Captain of the Pole-Star" by A.C.Doyle.

To be honest, I do not like stories set in Afrika but I am fond of tales from South America.

China? I cannot remeber reading a good horror story set in there but I like the movie "The Mummy: The Tomb of the Dragon Emperor" and I am looking forward to see "The Great Wall" with Matt Damon which also takes place in China and looks promising.

There is of course Klarkash-Ton's Hyperborean tales, set in the Arctic region in between the ice ages. A few of these depict the coming ice. There is one fabulous scene (don't remember now which story it was), in which the men see a city frozen deep below their feet inside the glacier.

Minicthulhu Wrote:
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> Thanks for the tip about "Beyond The Pole".

I doubt it is very good, because it was only published once, in Amazing Stories. Which has very nice cover art, but if you want to buy it, you need to pay up several hundred dollars on Ebay.

Here is the two-part serial in the Amazing Stories 1926 October and November issues, in pdf.

Part 1: [archive.org]
Part 2: [archive.org]

I seem to recall that George Allan England (of "Darkness and Dawn" fame) wrote a polar horror story about non-chlorophyll-based lifeforms discovered somewhere in the Arctic (or was it the Antarctic?) I never actually read the story, and am mining my memory of 30+ years ago.

MiniCthulhu: you might want to check out some of the classic Hong Kong supernatural films such as the "A Chinese Ghost Story" series, "Mr. Vampire", "The Seventh Curse" and "Zu-Warriors from the Magic Mountain".



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 3 Feb 17 | 12:21AM by Ken K..

This board was the last place on earth where I would have expected a reference to The Residents... Readers of weird fiction never fail to surprise!

Avoosl Wuthoqquan Wrote:
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> This board was the last place on earth where I
> would have expected a reference to The
> Residents...

But why is that, precious?

I would rather expect, that those obsessed with plunging the genuinely weird and terrifying in literature, would also be attracted to hearing weirdly measured notes in music that disrupt the senses.

The Madness of Cthulhu, edited by S. T. Joshi, was initially dedicated to new stories that pay homage to At the Mountains of Madness and take place in polar regions; although, in his Introduction, S. T. confesses that not all ye tales follow the initial editorial theme. It has some superb stories nonetheless.

"I'm a little girl."
--H. P. Lovecraft, Esq.

"The Terror" by Dan Simmons. 2009, so perhaps it hasn't had time to become a classic yet, but it is, as the blurb says "...a novel that will chill you to the core.

Sitting quietly, doing nothing,
Spring comes, and the grass grows by itself.

Though I read it only once years ago, I remember enjoying the 1929 novel, The Greatest Adventure by John Taine (the pen name of Eric Temple Bell). It is set in Antarctica, but is more of an adventure story than a horror story.