Can a book send you mad? The King in Yellow by Robert W Chambers 

I loved this book. You can definitely see where Lovecraft drew inspiration from Chambers, but I think they each have very unique styles of horror. It seems to me the brilliance of both is sort of in giving the reader a set of puzzle pieces to put together for themself. The difference I find is that Lovecraft will give you just enough pieces to see what the picture looks like - and he's really good at giving you *just* enough! - whereas Chambers kind of gives you a lot of pieces which seem like they should fit together, but don't quite, or not neatly. Almost like one of those AI generated images of people's bedrooms, where none of the shapes quite make sense if you look at them closely. Very much - as you say - like a fever dream. I feel this is most true of The Prophet's Paradise. That was my favourite section - really chilling.

I'm writing a novel inspired by these shorts. Thanks for highlighting them.

Yo I read this book last year and it was awesome. There was a good video by Tale Foundry that explored this story and I found interesting.

I always felt this about Lovecraft and Ligotti, that in some way they had information I didn't, that their work was real and seeping into the world through the cracks of another too close to our own, so I very much look forward to reading this. thanks Olly.

Excellent book. The off-kilter obscure(and extremely detailed) mythology contained in this, Lovecraft, and more recently Thomas Ligotti can make even the most skeptical think that they had access to things we aren't supposed to know, or that the idea may have come from "Outside."

One of my most prized possessions is a first edition second printing of this book. Love it.

Q. Can a book send you mad? A. Have you read the twoddle that Prince Harry Wrote?

Yes, The King in Yellow is very strange. I read it and dramatized one of the episodes in it many years ago. (The one about the artist and his model on a bleak winter night, where a strange man is seen in the distance from the studio window, Every time the artist looks out the window the strange old man is still there. It upsets the artist so much that he can't get the picture right and he ends up slashing it to pieces. The violence is so believable.) Chambers wrote in all sorts of genres some of his best work is set in Paris in the Latin Quarter during the time of the Commune. I think he may have invented the character Mr. Keene, tracer of lost persons. Those of you who are old enough may remember that radio drama. Very eerie at times. But my favorite scary story is The Lost Room by Fitz James O'Brien. In that book a man comes home one night a bit three sheets to the wind, and climbs up to his room in an apparently lower class rental unit. Only when he gets there he finds that a party is going on. The guests invite him to join them. He must be mistaken; only it seems he isn't. It's his room, but who are these people. Or is it his room, and if it isn't where is his room ? And he wanders around looking for a room he cannot find while the party goes on. I dramatized this, too and I think I published it in a collection of short playss. O'Brien was an immigrant and contemporary of E.A. Poe, but less well known. Still, his name deserves greater attention in the horror genre.

Read this back in college too many years ago. Loved it then, seems like it might be time for a reread, especially because I can't think of anything more Uncanny.

I read all the stories. Even though the remainder of them probably qualify as some of his romances, even they were sort of skewed. He carried on his trick of linking through devices (and sometimes characters) and there were themes of drugs and drink and sex that were not mainstream fiction material for the time. Also, they just read ... strangely. He has a trick of emphasizing some details and blurring others that is universal across all the stories, and although the weirdness level is variable, there is a degree of weirdness throughout. He's pretty unsettling.

Great review! I agree completely. What was going on in that guy’s head!?

Yay! I suggested this to you in the comments a while ago. So happy to hear what you thought!

The poem "Carcosa" at the start references a short story by Ambrose Bierce, "An Inhabitant of Carcosa" written in 1886, which inspired Chambers. Chambers work, in turn, inspired Lovecraft and other members of his writing circle, contemporary and current. Carcosa, the King in Yellow (or commonly the Yellow Emperor) and the Yellow Sign have since taken on a life of their own, expanding into a modern mythos that have influenced many, including George R. R. Martin whose "Song of Fire and Ice" references a city of Carcosa wherein lives a dark sorcerer called "The Yellow Emperor." Stephen King's Crimson King in his Dark Tower series strongly resembles the King in Yellow. It is a deep rabbit hole indeed and a fun one worth exploring.

I have only read the first two stories so far however I agree with how disturbing it is. Which reminds me that there is a podcast that is about the king in yellow, a fictional story that uses the concept of madness, the King, and the lands of Carcosa. It's called "Malevolent", with its scary notion of not being in control in life and death situations with creatures not from this world.

Good recommendation. House of Leaves story, and the crazy book experience, made me crazy.

Nice one Olly, now I have to read it.

It's the kind of thing that, if you don't know what to expect, you won't be disappointed. So darn weird and as you say, seeming to come from uncanny and bizarre knowing. (shudder!). I kept thinking, not in a judging or dismissive way, of mental illness, as if documenting insights into some stranger's uncanny ability to convey the experience and being haunted by it. Quite a tour-de-force. Brrr!

Just found your channel recently Olly and I really love your book reviews. You have given me a ton of great recommendations and I really appreciate your insights and measured analysis.

Really like this book. Was surprised when you said it was part of your Disturbing Books project as I never thought of it in that way.

Weird you upload this as I'm reading book! It seems fitting with the theme though. Once youre aware of the King in Yellow, the King in Yellow becomes aware of you

Those Futurama booths always remind me of the Final Solution chambers in Barbarella.

The idea of Carcosa is a place where individuals who've lost their minds and have given themselves to their insanity. Hastur isn't just any regular king: he's the King of All; they call him the Envoy because he interacts with humanity more than any of the Old Ones.

Olly, you are in for a treat if you are yet to see Season One of 'True Detective'. Perhaps the oddest book I have read is 'The Night Land' by William Hope Hodgson. Originally published in 1912, it is a very long tale about the last days of Earth set in a very far future. Lovecraft possibly got some ideas from here as well.

Hastur was originally created by Ambrose Bierce in his "HAITA THE SHEPHERD". Since then the deity has resurfaced in various authors' works including King's short story "GRAMMA". The 2018 Indian horror film "TUMBBAD'' also took inspiration and created a deity called Hastar.

I had zero interest in this book until I watched this video. Your description and analysis were so compelling that now I can’t wait to read it!

The few excerpts from the play were tantalizing (I was particularly fond of Cassilda's Song). It makes me wish I could read the play, even knowing what it does to the reader!

Thank you for the podcast link, that sounds like a fun way to experience this book.

was very strange as i began listening to the audiobook from a random recommendation from a horror books site and saying this guy's good, i hope he's making more books and then leanrning this was written more than a hundred years ago... fascinating, really really enjoyed the first story with this weird cyberpunk angle to it including suicide booths... also out of nowhere the exclusion legally of a certain ethnicity was like woah... this is of its era Also was this the origin of the woman in white kind of ghost story then

The King in Yellow reminds me of The Great God Pan. Not that they are the same, but they are of the same time period, sort of, and they are unique. I believe both inspired H.P. Lovecraft.

I read the King in Yellow about 7 years ago, honestly don't remember much. The book that came close to driving me mad was The Purple Cloud by MP Sheil. Harlan Ellison also has some extravagantly bizarre stuff.

If I'm picking yellows I liked Charlotte Perkins Gilman's "The Yellow Wallpaper" more than the Chambers' book. The Gilman story has gotten a lot of new eyes on it in the last few years because of #MeToo.

King in yellow and ito are a perfect combo. Just finished Gyo last night and onto Tomie.

Ethical Suicide Parlors stem from Vonnegut, with FUTURAMA a post-literate reference. The King In Yellow as a play was performed in Paris as an oblique reference to the Grand Guignol theater, where transgressive excess ruled. Chambers manages in those first four stories to evoke an eerie, realistic, surreal adjunct to Lovecraft's work, as you cite. Similarly, "An Inhabitant of Carcosa" by Ambrose Bierce is linked to HPL's work, probably because Lovecraft used Far Carcosa as a referent.

My recommendation for a story along the same lines would be The House on the Borderland by William Hope Hodgson. Very eery story and reminiscent of The King in Yellow and Lovecrafts work.

An interesting note is that the idea of Carcosa comes from an even earlier book where it sort of represents a depressing ruin of an afterlife for those who embraced the ultra-hedonistic movements of the time.

Have you seen "in the mouth of madness?" John Carpenter movie with the tag line "do you read Sutter Kane?" An oblique reference to Stephen King.

Just a brief pedantic note. Suicide is no longer a crime - and so people do not COMMIT (as in perpetrate or carry out: e.g. a mistake, crime or an immoral act) suicide. They take their own lives.

Definitely have to get to this soon.

My favorite story from the collection is the demoiselle D’ys. That one really felt like a fever dream and I just love rereading it

My first brush with King in Yellow was as a preteen in my junior high school library six decades ago. An excerpt, specifically the couple pages regarding the opening of the "Government Lethal Chamber" was included in a book with a title something like, "100 of the World's Greatest Short Stories". Great age to learn about the attractiveness of suicide. The book is out of copyright in the U.S. and can be read online.

Kurt Vonnegut in Timequake (one of his last books) also has the suicide booths unsure if Futurama came first also I'm a new sub! Love your descriptions and conceptualizations!

Strange seeing you mention this book, I just yesterday added it to my TBR after seeing it mentioned in a Lovecraft book that I am currently reading!

Thanks Olly! I just ordered a nice hardcover edition from Amazon. Can't wait to read it.

I learned of it in the 1980s, when it was mentioned in a biography of Aleister Crowley I read. The concept of a book, or some other item, which, when read or understood, causes madness, was something I had always found fascinating. In the 10th Grade, I wrote a short story called, "The Curse of the Claw," about a strange sculpture, which caused insanity when an individual finally understood its meaning. I would recommend watching the movie, "Into the Mouth of Madness." It's plot could be described as, "H.P. Lovecraft meets 'The King in Yellow'." Do YOU read SUTTER KANE? :)

i guess you saw "In the mouth of Madness"?! if not...( one of favs)

I read this book many years ago and was disappointed that the stories within didn't make me go mad. Just a little nutty.

This sounds like an interesting premise. It reminds me of an episode of the 1980s Twilight Zone entitled "Need to Know," where someone claims to have discovered the secret of existence, and everyone that they tell it to immediately goes insane.

That was great. Would love to see you do a Lovecraft video sometime. I’ve just finished the 2008 Necronomicon collection and feel like I’m not getting it

I read The King In Yellow when I was a teen. I'm glad I read it then, when a lot of horror was still new to me. I enjoyed it then. I'm not sure how I'd feel about it decades later. I think of any weird writers off the top of my head. Some literary weird writers include Julio Cortazar, Dino Buzzati and Bruno Schulz.

Junji Ito has a manga Cat Diary which was a fun read.(I'm here for the crime...not the horror.) I had never heard of him before trying cat manga.

Pygmy by Chuck Palahniuk is possibly the weirdest book I have read.

Along the shore the cloud waves break, The twin suns sink beneath the lake, The shadows lengthen, in Carcosa. Strange is the night where black stars rise, And strange moons circle through the skies. But stranger still, is lost Carcosa. Songs that the Hyades shall sing, Where flap the tatters of the King, Must die unheard, in dim Carcosa. Song of my soul, my voice is dead; Die thou, unsung, as tears unshed, Shall dry and die, in lost Carcosa.

sounds fascinating! just ordered it from the library

I do get mad once a month as soon as I look at my checkBook and see the money I spent on things that I shouldn’t .

THE MOST DISTURBING BOOK EVER WRITTEN IS "MISS MACINTOSH, MY DARLING"

If you like “The King in Yellow”, then I recommend: “The Masque of the Red Death”, by Edgar Allan Poe, “An Inhabitant of Carcosa”, by Ambrose Bierce, “The King in the Golden Mask”, by Marcel Schwob, “Salome”, by Oscar Wilde, “The Seven Old Men” (A poem from “The Flowers of Evil”), by Charles Baudelaire, “Trilby”, by George Du Maurier, “The Three Impostors”, by Arthur Machen, “One of Cleopatra’s Nights”, by Theophile Gautier, “Lalla Rookh”, by Thomas Moore, and-if you can stomach it-“The Songs of Maldoror”, by Le Comte de Lautrémont. A similar creepy vibe can also be found in “Arabian Nights”, “The Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám” and the weird stories of H.P. Lovecraft.

I can’t wait to read this book again now

I'm envious that you haven't seen season 1 of True Detective yet, I wish I could erase my memory of it and watch it for the first time again.

I’ve been reading this book and am nearing the end. I enjoyed hearing your insights. Very thought provoking!

I wonder what Chambers' female readers thought, presuming this was just another of his popular romance novels. The title even suggests romance. Makes one wonder what the sly fox was up to.

Chambers did write more weird fiction than just those four stories, and I believe someone put together a collection of them at some point. There are some things in common between Chambers, and Arthur Machen (pronounced Macken), and both were an influence on Lovecraft. There's more to discover, in that others have added to the yellow mythos. I strongly recommend the collections edited by the late Joseph S. Pulver Sr.. There's a review of one such in ODM#9. For more out there weird, I recommend 'The Circus of Doctor Lao', by Charles G. Finney, and, of course, 'The House on the Borderland', by William Hope Hodgson. If you fancy a more challenging read, try Hodgson's 'The Night Land'.

I read The King in Yellow in my early 20s. I'm currently listening to an audiobook here on RU-vid. I love weird fiction, with my favorite writer being H.P. Lovecraft.

The one thing that really drew me to the king in yellow and especially repairer of reputations was the implementation of an unreliable narrator. Like the more you read the less you trust the narrators judgement and start to question everything that is presented to you. And while the other stories of the king in yellow don’t explicitly follow this trend of an unreliable narrator i do catch myself wondering whether some parts are purely delusions or actually accrue the way they are described. Anyways Iam late to the Party but still thank you for covering one of my favorite authors!

Great review. Though the word wasn't in the vocabulary in 1920, let alone in 1895 when The King in yellow was written, the setup for The Repairer of Reputations, the geopolitcal situation he describes especially in the United States...is pretty much a perfect description of a fascist state. It's pretty ingenious that this is the first story in the collection. This is the story that describes what happens when teh King in Yellow becomes spread through a society. Think of Mr. hastane's obsession with napoleon, too. It's rather brilliant. I do like some of thel ater stories in the collection too. "The Street of the Four Winds" is a haunting little tale and I really enjoyed "The Street of the First Shell", too. Chambers was in paris during the period and saw some of the results of the Franco-Prussian war firsthand. Maybe taht's why this, his second and most well-regarded book today, is also his weirdest and most intense. That said his later fiction can be quite diverse. As well as romantic fiction there's "proto" science fiction and ghost stories, and some, what we might now call political thrillers. Still, nothing quite on this level, so far as I've seen so far.

There used to be a great blog called Conceptual Fiction that had an interesting if less kind perspective on the gulf between this book and Chambers’ others. He theorised that Chambers didn’t have the drive or ambition enough to take his vision to the fullest expression of it, and so fell back on easy pieces that would sell, hence why only 4 stories in the book are weird.

Enjoyed the video, i love this series, some of the best horror of all time. After reading the inspiration for this book (carcossa by ambrose bierce) i feel it helps knit it all together. (My opinion/theory/spoilers ahead) Carcosa is the ruins of a paradise, ruled by the king in yellow, hastur. This paradise was likely reached by the initial traveler, by dying (animals could not notice him). This land I believe is heaven, that was stripped and ruined by human greed. With god no longer in charge, the only paradise left is through the illusions provided by the king in yellow. Repairer of reputations, After his head injury the main character begins to accept the illusions over reality. And violenty refuses to let go of them, because reality is too much for him. The mask and prophets paradise are kind of linked, showing the uncanny ways of preservation leading to the play mentioned in the prologue. Showing time can be stopped or manipulated (and beautiful) also shown in Demoiselle d'Ys. Court of the Dragon and Yellow Sign are clear depictions of the illusion of the church vs the illusions of the yellow king (and we know how those end). Since we know from the court of the dragon, carcossa is where souls go when they die. And hastur calls himself the living god, implying the god we know is dead. So the knowledge driving people mad upon seeing the yellow sign is to see the truth. Mankind ravaged and overthrew heaven. Hastur now gives only the illusion of paradise, and malice to those who seek the old god. And knowing that only hastur can preserve that which we love, or turn back the clock, their faith and belief in society is useless, as are their efforts. The only truths left are illusion... or ruin. Sorry for the rant, wondering what others think of the theory

Perhaps check out Ligotti as well. Some of his stories are in need of an editor (IMO),k but a lot is right on target.

Cities of the Red Night by William Burroughs was the weirdest book I have read. It does not completely work, at one point I could not tell what was going on, but it is definitely uncanny

I just finished listening to a reading of it. It took me a long time to get through. There's a lot to process. I really loved the stories at the end

If you get a Lovecraft vibe from this, you should check out Chambers' story "The Maker of Moons", which he wrote a year after King in Yellow and is, I think, better than anything in that book. I remember it being very Lovecraftian avant la lettre. Chambers did write other fantastic/weird stuff but none of it was as well received in its time, and I think Lovecraft's advocacy is the main reason that he's remembered at all now.

Cool video!

I'm reading Vonnegut's _Breakfast of Champions_ just now, so the answer to your question is "yes".

Can a book send you mad? Yeah actually it was The Exegesis of Philip K. Dick

I honestly really loved this book

Wondering if you ever saw the 1994 film " In the Mouth of Madness" which is about a famous horror author who writes books that are slowly driving his readers insane. It's a Lovecraftian inspired story and got mediocre reviews but I love it. Sounds like something similar to what you are talking about.

The weirdest book I've read would probably be "I'm Thinking of Ending Things." It's a very well written book with seamless transitions, but the ideas it inspires when you read it are kind of a mix of profound thought, deep thinking, and despairing truths. There really isn't much of a plot and the narrative kind of jumps all over the place, but there is a reason for it. An unnerving read, for sure.

I read a biography on Lovecraft and a lot of his work was based on dreams. The author of the bio thinks he was astral projecting.

The Un-Nigeled Title: Can a book make you mad?

For weird I always point to Ann and Jeff Vandermeer's The Weird: A Compendium of Strange and Dark Stories. Maybe not the best recommendation for the weird genre, but I'd love to see you pick up some Brian Evenson, he is one of my favorites for horror and short stories and I really think you'd like his works. He is criminally underread in my opinion.

An excellent short story, IMO, inspired by "The King in Yellow" is, um, "The King in Yellow" (2011, 4.79 out of 5 stars) by Literotica writer TamLin01. It is every bit as disturbing as the Chambers stories though it does contain, as you might expect, certain elements common to mostly every story on the Literotica site. Mostly. In the story a young man wants to impress a girl who is interested in the play and so he fabricates what he claims is the most complete edition of the play and presents it to the girl. She is delighted and refuses to believe that the text is fake. Spoilers: Sex, violence and madness ensue.

I know it's a while ago but for those interested I just picked up a copy of The King in Yellow at my local Waterstones. It is a hardback copy of the four stories that are connected, not the full book of short stories. It is a lovely book and is published by Pushkin Press, it cost me £9.99, you may be able to get it cheaper elsewhere.

It’s free on kindle unlimited!!

Tonto went on to invent parkour and slam poetry.

Based off Inhabitant of carcosa (Ambrose bierce)

Love the trope too!

Look into the work of M John Harrison. Strangeness and weirdness abounds within his style of writing

You mentioned that you used to write, do you still? Ever published anything?

Was a good book I enjoy it . But nothing weird happened to me after reading it 🤗 Maybe I was already lost before reading it. Found nothing disturbing about it 🤪😶

Borges & Lafferty did the job for me. I'm mad.

Weirdest book I've ever read - Peter Roebuck's autobiography. A book about nothing. 🤔

Just bought it for my cosmic horror collection! It might help tip you over but not drive you mad? Think you have to be halfway there already lol

I liked "The Yellowv Sign" best. Fans of Chambers and Lovecraft might like Don Webb and Adam Neville.

Might get in the Wordsworth edition as it’s under a fiver. Tried to read these as a teenager because of the lovecraft stuff but didn’t like them because they made much less sense to me than HPL stories.

I didn’t feel right after reading it felt like the book Manchurian candidates you

😊

Mh 👀 I'm always frustrated with Lovecraft... Like it never seems to get to the point and only hint at things or tippy toe around them mainly just making me feel grumpy and never being fully intrigued or entertained. Which is a shame as I like the ideas and background... I just rather wish he'd actually show us more and tell us more. Make it more exciting and thrilling. I'd love to read more about his world just from somebody else

It's almost as if there was/is something outside trying to " get in" to our world that HP Lovecraft ,Chambers and others tuned into. I know this is absurd!

Haven't read it yet but it's on the pile. Another person who many say may have written from experience is Whitley Strieber. Haven't read him either to make an opinion, but I've had my own experiences and dreams that in no way could have been made up by my feeble brain. So I'll give him the benefit of the doubt. As far as a disturbing, dark book I'll mention Babyf***** by Urs Allemanne. I may have misspelled his name. You're pretty smart, I know you can figure out what is under the asterisks. Oddly enough it is freely available on Amazon, and for a reasonable price, though I don't know for how long once word gets out. It's a small book, roughly 12 centimeters x eight or thereabouts. And short, about 80 pages, with German version on the left and English on the right. Doubt it would take you half an hour to read. It is pretty exclusively just this one guy's inner thoughts, I guess that's stream of consciousness. I would like another's take on it as I don't know what to make of it. No one likes censorship, but this thing makes you question, maybe some books should be put up on a high shelf at least? Don't quite know if it should be as available as I found it. But I guess anyone can find anything these days if they just want to look for it.

Waiting for the day one of your reviews starts off kind of banal, reviewing some nondescript book, and then gradually you go bad, collapse into goo, and someone has to come in, sweep you up, and turn off the camera. OLLY’S LAST WORD, a hit on #WeirdTube.

Obviously books can send you mad. Look at the Harry Potter fandom, or the Twighlight fandom.