This volume contains the weird stories of two leading American short story writers of the early 20th century, Irvin S. Cobb (1876-1944) and Gouverneur Morris (1876-1953). Both are known for a single weird tale, "Fishhead" and "Back There in the Grass," respectively; but both produced several additional weird specimens in their variegated short story collections, ranging from grim tales of psychological suspense ("The Gallowsmith") to tales of Nietzschean supermen ("The Bride's Dead"). This volume constitutes the first time that their weird work has been collected.
The
Classics of Gothic Horror
series seeks to reprint novels and stories from the leading writers of weird fiction over the past two centuries or more. Ever since the Gothic novels of the late 18th century, weird fiction has been a slender but provocative contribution to weird fiction. Edgar Allan Poe, Ambrose Bierce, the Victorian ghost story writers, the "titans" of the early twentieth century (Arthur Machen, Algernon Blackwood, Lord Dunsany, M. R. James, H. P. Lovecraft), the
Weird Tales
writers, and many others contributed to the development and enrichment of weird fiction as a literary genre, and their work deserves to be enshrined in comprehensive, textually accurate editions.