Ginger Classics, $9.95, ISBN 979-8378625727
Horror, 2023 (Reissue)
Ambrose Bierce’s Can Such Things Be? is a collection of 25 short stories written in the late 19th century, back when people apparently had nothing better to do than die of consumption, write existential horror, or—if they were really ambitious—both.
This collection includes what is arguably his most famous tale, The Damned Thing, a story that answers the age-old question: “What if something invisible killed you and no one cared?”
Now, calling this a horror or supernatural collection is a bit like calling the Titanic a minor boating accident. It’s technically correct, but it ignores the sheer weight of cynicism and dark humor that Mr Bierce weaves through these stories. He doesn’t just write horror; he writes horror with a smirk, like a man who has seen the abyss, taken notes, and is now aggressively judging the rest of us for not keeping up.
For cosmic horror fans, the real MVP here is An Inhabitant of Carcosa, where the narrator wanders through a bleak and mysterious landscape that later inspired The King in Yellow by Robert W Chambers. If you ever wanted to experience the sensation of slowly realizing you’re already dead but in the most poetic way possible, this one’s for you.
Meanwhile, Haita the Shepherd introduces Hastur not in the creepy, tentacled Lovecraftian sense, but in a way that suggests Mr Bierce was possibly trolling us all along. It’s more of a fable than a horror story, but hey, even eldritch horrors need a soft launch.
Other standout stories include The Boarded Window and The Middle Toe of the Right Foot, both of which remind us that Ambrose Bierce didn’t just master the short horror story; he surgically removed anything resembling unnecessary words and left behind only the raw, undiluted dread. These tales are short, like “oops-I-accidentally-read-the-whole-book” short. You sit down to nibble on one, and before you know it, you’ve consumed the entire collection like some kind of eldritch book goblin.
And yes, the stories are that good. Mr Bierce had the gift of ending a story exactly at the right moment—not a sentence too soon, not a paragraph too late—leaving you either awestruck or slightly unnerved, often both. It’s as if he was genetically engineered in a lab to write eerie, unsettling ghost stories. If he were alive today, he’d probably be writing horrifyingly accurate Yelp reviews.
The only downside is that if you’re a modern horror fan who’s read everything from Edgar Allen Poe to The Babadook, you might find some of the twists predictable. But that’s not Mr Bierce’s fault. It’s just that every horror writer after him stole his ideas and ran with them so hard they became clichés. Reading Ambrose Bierce now is like watching an old horror movie where the “shocking twist” is that the call is coming from inside the house. You know it’s coming, but you also have to respect the OG for getting there first.
Ultimately, Ambrose Bierce is cited as one of the most influential horror writers for a reason. If you haven’t read Can Such Things Be?, consider this your formal invitation to experience one of the most delightfully grim, brilliantly written collections of supernatural horror out there!
