EnCrypted Episode 9: 'The Pale Man' by Julius Long


The American magazine Weird Tales, which first published in 1922, holds an unparalleled position in the history of genre fiction, having done much to popularise horror, sci-fi, fantasy, and that which we might broadly call "weird".  A platform for such legends as H.P. Lovecraft, Clark Ashton Smith, Seabury Quinn, Robert E. Howard, and (later) Ray Bradbury, it served for years as a leading purveyor of short stories.
 
While lengthy and illustrated page counts would go to star writers like Lovecraft, the magazine was also a treasure trove of minor gems buried between the covers, thankfully preserved for prosperity on the Internet (here, for example, and here).  Some of the stories, considered filler at the time, lingered in readers' minds and went on to grow in reputation.  The Night Wire by H.F. Arnold, episode 5 of the EnCrypted series, is one such story.  This - The Pale Man by Julius Long - is another.

A fairly obscure literary figure, Long was a qualified and practising lawyer who wrote, mainly, detective and horror stories, of which The Pale Man is the best remembered.
 
It tells the story of a sadsack assistant university professor sent on a forced vacation for the good of his own health.  The lonely man, in lieu of any company or other diversion, becomes obsessed with the eccentric behaviour of another hotel resident - a strikingly tall and unnaturally pale man whose identity is only hinted at in the closing paragraphs.
 
You can read some of Long's other stories here (a lovely little website called Famous (and forgotten) Fiction), alongside biographical information about the author.  It seems pertinent, somehow, to note that Long died an untimely death.
 
Yours grimly,
 
Jasper
 
 

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About the episode:

"The Pale Man" by Julius Long was first published in Weird Tales, Volume 24, Issue 3.

Theme music: The Black Waltz by Scott Buckley | www.scottbuckley.com.au Music promoted by https://www.chosic.com Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0) https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/  

Incidental music: 

Open Season by Weary Pines.

Music from Uppbeat (free for Creators!):
https://uppbeat.io/t/weary-pines/open-season
License code: IJMJ8WGSKAGY0AMD

Raw Meat by Weary Pines

Music from Uppbeat (free for Creators!):
https://uppbeat.io/t/weary-pines/raw-meat
License code: NCPOEGO3F9OYV09M

Sound effect attributions: 

https://freesound.org/ 

The recording was created using Audacity and distributed via Anchor.

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