Two friends are midway on a canoe trip down the Danube River. Throughout the story Blackwood personifies the surrounding environment—river, sun, wind—and imbues them with a powerful and ultimately threatening character. Most ominous are the masses of dense, desultory, menacing willows, which "moved of their own will as though alive, and they touched, by some incalculable method, my own keen sense of the horrible."
"The Willows" is one of Algernon Blackwood's best known short stories. American horror author H.P. Lovecraft considered it to be the finest supernatural tale in English literature. "The Willows" is an example of early modern horror and is connected within the literary tradition of weird fiction.
I've been sharing my journey with Lovecraft lately, but the story that brought me back to Lovecraft was Algernon Blackwood's The Willows. I wasn't planning to review The Willows, but it turned out to be such an awesome read I decided it really needed to be shared.
What struck me while reading The Willows was how much Blackwood's writing reminded me of H.G. Wells'. So much so that as soon as I finished reading The Willows I did a search to see if there were any essays comparing their work. What I found was Blackwood and Wells were friends. I don't know how that influenced their writing, but I thought it was interesting nonetheless.
In The Willows, two friends are taking a canoe trip up the river, and the rough water forces them stop for the night on an island among the willow trees.
The build up of tension (not to mention the personification of nature) made this an awesome read for me. I can't wait to dive into more of Blackwood's work in the future.
I was able to get my copy of The Willows free in the Kindle store. It's also available on Project Gutenberg and other places you can typically find these old classics.
9/10: Highly Recommended
