When the winds blow…autumn! The wind was spectacular last night while I was out walking my dog. Gusty, shaking the trees, which still have most of their color-changing leaves, like they were being assailed by invisible giants. Very spooky and refreshing. The winds are from the West still, so Pacific air, not the Arctic stuff we will get in about a month.
Rather an obvious spur, but it got me thinking on stories that feature evil wind and wind creatures. I thought of August Derleth’s Ithaqua but then remembered fondly Carl Jacobi’s “The Face in the Wind” as the best story in a collection of his. Of course, Lovecraft had been there earlier than both with “The Music of Erich Zann”.
Most of these wind opera appeared in Weird Tales, though their competitors offer some examples too.
“The Wind in the Rose Bush”(Everybody’s Magazine, February 1902) and later collected in The Wind in the Rose Bush and Other Stories of the Supernatural, 1903) by Mary E. Wilkins was praised by H. P. Lovecraft in “The Supernatual Horror in Literature” (1927): “Horror material of authentic force may be found in the work of the New England realist Mary E. Wilkins; whose volume of short tales, The Wind in the Rose-Bush, contains a number of noteworthy achievements.” Wilkins (who would become Wilkins-Freeman when she married) has a ghost that uses the rose-bush to show its presence. “What makes that rose-bush blow so when their isn’t any wind?”
“The Wind That Tramps the World” (Weird Tales, April 1925) by Frank Owen has John Stepperling in China where he encounters a devilish wind. The story ended with an ad for the next story. The story was so popular, Farnworth Wright reprinted in June 1929.
“The Music of Erich Zann” (Weird Tales, May 1925) by H. P. Lovecraft has an enchanted musician who can summon up the winds of other dimensions.
“The Swooping Wind” (Weird Tales, December 1927) by Wilford Allen has a man whose life is controlled by a powerful wind. I wrote more on Allen here.
“The Thing that Walked on the Wind” (Strange Tales, January 1933) by August Derleth features Ithaqua, the Walker on the Winds. Not really a killer wind, but a demon that flies about in the wind. This Cthulhu Mythos tale tied Algernon Blackwood’s “The Wendigo” to Lovecraft’s circle. More on all these authors here.
“The Face in the Wind” (Weird Tales, April 1936) by Carl Jacobi stars Peter Woodley who has come to Royalton Manor and faces the terror in the wind. Jacobi is often thought of as an also-ran but the other stories in Revelations in Black (1947) tell another story.
“Child of the Winds” (Weird Tales, May 1936) by Edmond Hamilton was described by Hamilton’s wife, Leigh Brackett: “‘Child of the Wind’ … is sheer fantasy, a beautiful and graceful tale that leaves the reader with a poignant sense of loss even though the love story involved has a happy conclusion — or has it?”. She included it in his collection The Best of Edmond Hamilton (1977). Hamilton creates a kind of Elephants’ Graveyard for wind in Turkistan. Brent falls for Lora, Child of the Winds. The whole thing is very A. Merritt.
“Voices in the Wind” (Strange Stories, December 1939) by Robert Emerick is a tale of ghostly revenge. When the mate murders the captain to take his place, the ghosts won’t be quiet. Emerick was a one-hit wonder.
“Laughter in the Wind” (Thrilling Mystery, May 1940) by Carl Jacobi is quite different than his previous tale. This one has Loring in India going into the Whispering Valley. Being a Shudder Pulp tale, the ghosts will be explained away… The spirit of Talbot Mundy hangs over this one.
“The Wind” (Weird Tales, March 1943) by Ray Bradbury was the master’s second sale to “the Unique Magazine”. John Colt, while in Tibet, visited the sacred Mountain of the Winds. Back in America, he is haunted by a windy terror. This is his last stand. Like “The Candle”, this early effort is not often reprinted.
By no means was 1943 the end of fantastic wind stories. J. G. Ballard wrote The Wind From Nowhere in the 1960s, a disaster novel in which the wind blows constantly and dangerously.
