My ‘horror moments’ examine horror-inflected scenes and themes in unexpected places. They are published weekly on Thursdays and come out in series of ten articles focussing on a particular source e.g. ‘Wallace & Gromit,’ ‘Shakespeare,’ or ‘Kate Bush Songs’. Catch up with the current series on Edward Gorey here and browse the full back catalogue of horror moments here.
Are you afraid of liminal spaces? Empty rooms where the absence of other people feels eerie or even dangerous? How about walking through the corridors and hallways of the western wing of a seemingly abandoned mansion, a place where every turn signals something odd or wrong, and where you never quite find out exactly what has happened in that strange and gloomy maze…
Edward Gorey’s The West Wing is a wordless picture book made up of 30 meticulously cross-hatched images of different rooms in the titular house. The order of the pictures implies that we are being taken on a journey, the first image shows a pair of feet vanishing into the shadowy doorframe, but there is seemingly no narrative logic to the path we take.
Some of the views are practically empty, some hold strange clues about what might have taken place. Look at that set of three shoes lying discarded on the floor — who left them there?
What about those legs of a chair poking out from behind a corner. what pushed it over?
There are occasionally human figures, but there is always something detached about them, they turn away from us or their eyes are downcast. No one in the house ever acknowledges our presence. Are we walking like a ghost in the house or peeking somehow through the veil of time into the building’s history. Are we about to glimpse something we shouldn’t like the secret sex act Wendy Torrance sees as The Overlook Hotel conjures visions of the past.
Increasingly, the rooms betray a surreal otherworldliness. One corridor is half full of water, sheets take on a life of their own and float like something out of ‘Whistle and I’ll come to You.’
The most horrible thing we see is a mummy wrapped in bandages, but he just shuffles past us, his vacant sockets staring on as if he has made the journey many time before.
You find yourself flicking back and forth between the pages of The West Wing trying to figure out the story, catching new glimpses as you do so of peeking ghosts and figures trailing off in mirrors…
There’s something disconcerting about the total lack of words given how important the dry couplets usually are in Gorey’s more typical picture books. No one is holding our hand in The West Wing, Gorey is leaving us alone with our imagination, and that, as always, is far more disturbing than any explanation.
Do you dare to take a stroll through The West Wing? What other picture books have you found scary or unsettling? If you’re interested in the horror of liminal spaces, have a read of the article I wrote on the beautiful game Botany Manor which, though far more colourful and far less macabre, struck me as strangely eerie like this Gorey gem.
Next week, a theatrical spectacle with an Edward Gorey twist. Until then, happy nightmares everyone!
Horror moments are published on Thursdays and a wide variety of articles exploring the history of magic, theatre, storytelling, and more are published on Mondays.
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Love this beautiful exploration of a unique artist. Another knock-out article, Dr. King! The style and atmosphere of Gorey (nominative determinism in action, perhaps!?) reminds me of Junji Ito's work. But if we want to talk about the scariest picture book ever, we need look no further than "Mr. Wrong" by Robert Hargreaves. No more sinister or terrifying tome exists.
I’m def getting a copy for myself after reading this!