by Anton Von Stefan
Written at the ungodly hour of:
5:20 a.m. on Friday, the 17th of
May, in the year of our Lord, 2013
To those readers who have benevolently taken it upon themselves to read my fictional stories for the very first time, please remember:
“Words are very much like mercury, always fluid, ever changing; yet, when bonded together, that united form chosen by an author, one who creates a new work, conveys meaning to the reader, forming the language as a whole.”
This is to say:
As I have written some of these, hopefully, intriguing tales well over 30 years ago, and their perspective insights take you from the present day back to the beginning of time, set in locales spanning the globe, I have opted to write in a style that is slightly different from what most people would expect today. I am of the opinion that it was, however, the common written form of English literature used in both Britain and the Americas from the mid 1850’s to a period just prior to the end of the First World War. This is not to say that, on occasion, you will find the infiltration of more modern terms within some, or all, of my works. I am, after all, living in the present. Thus, I do have the privilege of drawing from the past those styles of writing so many who love the genre of the fictional, gothic, suspense tale have come to cherish. Yet, I am also bestowed with the blessing and ability of infusing more modern terms into these works, should my whim permit.
From what many readers have termed the first successfully published English, gothic, horror story, ‘The Castle of Ortranto’, written by Horace Walpole and which first appeared in its printed form on Christmas Eve in the year 1764, through to the American grand master, Edgar Allen Poe, my personal ‘mentor’, I personally have enjoyed reading those bizarre tales all of my life. With the stories I have written over the years, a part of which you now have before you in the printed form, I have made a most feeble attempt at emulating those great writers. It is my dearest hope that this poor endeavour, to affect your minds in a similar way, will rekindle some fond memory of the joys of reading a book in private, in the past.
To the very young, I remain firm in my own belief that, when you come upon a word which is not common in our daily use, and whose length may incorporate multiple syllables, you may well ask out loud:
“Why did he not use a much simpler word?”
Yet, to learn one new word a day is an accomplishment that not only broadens your horizons and vocabulary, but it keeps those ‘grey cells’, we commonly call our minds, active, connecting neurons within the brain in a useful way. I am sure all of you have, on occasion, seen one of those ‘dithering old geezers’ and silently smirked as they try to live life with some obvious, mental, debilitating dementia. This condition is so often brought on simply by the lack of using one’s mind pro-actively on a regular basis and not necessarily due to some other illness or stroke. As a result, these people are almost incapable of enjoying even the simplest things in life, actions which render joy and happiness to any human being. As you age, keeping your brain sharp is essential. With daily, mental exercise, you can accomplish this with ease. Thus, when you see your grandparents or older guardians ‘working’ on a crossword puzzle, playing chess, or solving some mathematical riddle like Sudoku, or any other form of a daily, mental challenge, they are actually keeping those parts of their minds functioning effectively. It is something that all of us ought to participate in and will be most useful in our future.
To everyone who reads my romantic ghost stories or vampire tales, both the young and the old, words we often call complex, which may have many syllables or are expressions that are now vague to us, often have their derivatives from other languages. Their origins are often traced back to the Greek, the Latin, the Germanic, the Gallic, or another language altogether. This entanglement enlarges the word which often makes this particular word more specific in its meaning. This may, hopefully, grant a much clearer view of what the often incompetent author is attempting to portray in his or her writing, nes pas?
It is with great mirth, and the occasional smile, that I have penned every one of these often ghastly tales by hand. Hopefully, you too will enjoy them as much as I did when my imagination first brought forth each of the varied stories in this book. Should I, in these pages of fiction, have greatly missed that mark of excellence, that plateau of mental enlightenment and thereby become forever damned by my critics, I hasten to be most apologetic. Lest my utter failure to retain even the slightest glimmer of interest in my published works cast me into dire, financial ruin, I hereby call upon your eleemosynary nature to grant this poor soul your forgiveness in advance.
Your most humble servant,
Anton Von Stefan
May 17th, 2013