This story could be read as a realistic tale of a woman who is jilted on her wedding day. But it is also easy to see it as eerie and unsettling. The story begins with a young woman (age 34) trying to decide what to wear for her wedding that day. Her fiance has come into her life recently and the proposal seems to be unexpected. When the time he was supposed to appear comes and goes, she sets out to find out what befell him. She visits the apartment he claims to live in, the florist where he might have bought flowers, the shoe shine man who might have polished his shoes. Eventually she works her way to a building where someone reported seeing him. On the top floor are two doors. One gives way to a dilapidated room. but she can hear laughter behind the other door. She knocks but no one answers. She returns on occasion to this place but he is never there.
Was he ever there? Although she claims to be 34, you can easily see her as much older given the way she is treated. I really expected to find out this had all happened fifty years earlier and she was locked into a Groundhog Day scenario.
Her lover's name is Jamie Harris. Maybe Jackson is establishing a link to this.
"The Daemon Lover", also known as "James Harris", "James Herries", or "The House Carpenter" (Roud 14, Child 243) is a popular Scottish ballad[1] dating to around 1685.[2] Roud records the title as A warning for married women and identifies the woman in the song as "Mrs. Jane Reynolds (a west-country-Woman) born near Plimouth who having plighted her troth to a Seaman, was afterwards married to a Carpenter, and at last carried away by a Spirit."[3]
As always the excellent writing carries this story.
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14 comments:
Oh, I really like Shirley Jackson's writing, Patti, although I admit I've not read this one. Her short stories are great, so I can see how this one appealed. Something else for my reading list.
Thanks, Margot!
Nice. I do remember this one. Always liked Shirley Jackson's writing.
Short story collections do continue to pile up here. I read the Michael Chabon (had to buy his second collection, which is coming) and Robert Walser books mentioned previously. Now I have that Jean Thompson book you reviewed (Who Do You Love), as well as three Crippen & Landru collections (the latest a Q. Patrick) that I haven't yet started. Yesterday I bought (Kindle, $1.99) Brian Garfield's second collection of stories (Suspended Sentences; I liked his first, Checkpoint Charlie). Also recently (after his death) got a John Lutz collection of Kindle stories.
It's gotten so bad that I am borrowing collections only to discover that I've already read them. Very hard to keep up when you read as many stories as I do, even with writing down the stories read, which I've done since 2014.
I have read most of Jackson's fiction and am seldom disappointed. My favorite of hers is The Summer People.
Don't know how you do it, Jeff. I picked up Kavalier and Clay in my library cart. I had it once but lost it in a move.
She is very reliable. My favorite is WE HAVE ALWAYS LIVED IN THE CASTLE.
I read WE HAVE ALWAYS LIVED IN THE CASTLE decades ago. I should find my copy and reread it.
I remember loving LIFE AMONG THE SAVAGES and RAISING DEMONS, at least in part because they were just so different from the dark stories. And, of course, THE HAUNTING OF HILL HOUSE. I remember reading the book and thinking that Julie Harris would be perfect to play Eleanor. Obviously, I was not the only one to think that.
"The Summer People" was the first Jackson story I read (age 8, in GHOSTS AND THINGS edited by Hal Cantor. Starts with Henry James, ends with Jackson).
One of the early editions of the collection THE LOTTERY makes reference to James Harris in the subtitle...this story was very much loved by Jackson and/or one of her editors as well...
I need to read it ("The Demon Lover") again. It has been a while, if not quite 48 years since first read as with "The Summer People"--which has had a reread since by me.
Has everyone who at all likes Michael Chabon read THE FINAL SOLUTION? You must. John Clute agrees.
The story after THE DAEMON LOVER, (The Magic of Shirley Jackson) about working at Macy's was also interesting.
I haven't read KAVALIER & CLAY, but I have read THE FINAL SOLUTION and THE YIDDISH POLICEMEN'S UNION.
And the WONDER BOYS!
Love WONDER BOYS!
I have been wanting to read some short stories by Shirley Jackson and I have WE HAVE ALWAYS LIVED IN THE CASTLE on my shelves to read someday.
Re Chabon, I read and loved THE YIDDISH POLICEMEN'S UNION and have a copy of THE FINAL SOLUTION (but haven't read it yet).
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