The Uncanny has become one of the most popular forms of modern horror in recent years, but for many readers – and writers – it remains insubstantial and hard to pin down. We know what it is when we see it – in the stories of Shirley Jackson or Robert Aickman, for example – but if we’re asked to define it we often struggle to explain what it is that makes a particular story Uncanny, beyond that ‘uncanny’ feeling. In Writing the Uncanny, edited by Richard V. Hirst and myself (published 23rd September 2021, Dead Ink Books), we asked thirteen writers of the Uncanny to unpick their craft for us. They explore not only what makes fiction uncanny, but also how writers can approach writing uncanny stories. Here, I ask four of the contributors to the book – co-editor Richard V. Hirst, and authors Alison Moore, Lucie McKnight Hardy and Chikodili Emelumadu – to illuminate the shadowy corners of the Uncanny for us. Dan Coxon: Briefly, how would you define the Uncanny? Richard V. Hirst: I suppose the Uncanny is very broadly a not-quite-rightness about the world, a phenomenon where it seems as though there is a logic and dynamic at play which are inscrutable. And unlike horror, where the object of fear is apparent, the harder that not-quite-rightness is to pin down, the more Uncanny it is. For that reason, landing on a decent definition for the Uncanny is difficult. Alison Moore: I associate it with a sense of strangeness in something familiar, or a weird familiarity in something Other. Lucie McKnight Hardy: For me, it’s that sense that something is not quite right with a situation, but it might be difficult to define exactly what has made the hairs on the back of your neck stand up. A creeping sense of unease that increases in intensity. There doesn’t necessarily have to be any sort of climax for something to be uncanny – rather, the opposite. Chikodili Emelumadu: I think the Uncanny, to me, is anything that unsettles you and makes you question the veracity of your reality. We often walk around like we are the most apex of predators. The Uncanny is the thing that says “Surprise, fucker!” and grabs your ankles, haha. (Do not excuse my French.) Coxon: What in particular appeals to you about writing uncanny stories? What does it offer you as a writer that other forms don’t? Moore: The way the Uncanny captures strangeness can feel perversely truthful and deeply satisfying. I love that it belongs in both realism and horror (as well as other genres) and what it brings to that lovely liminal place in between. Hirst: I think the Uncanny suits authors for whom writing is a kind of collaboration between themselves and their readers. There are many writers for whom the object of their creativity is to deliver their complete vision with the reader there to bear witness. But there are also writers for whom relying on their readers’ imaginations to shoulder some of the work is an integral part of their creative process. Writing which is spare and pregnant with ellipses and apparent non-sequiturs means there are corners and corridors of the story which are dimly lit, necessitating the reader to light their own flame and define for themselves what it is they see. As a reader, these are the kinds of stories which resonate with me the strongest and stay with me for longer. Emelumadu: A lot of people believe – erroneously – that uncanny stories have no rules, which leads to the presumption that it is easy to do, or that it lends itself to lazy thinking or writing. There is freedom in the genre, yes, but it is that of imagination. Ideas, concepts, fears, desires can take any shape or form in an uncanny story. It’s not a lawless wasteland. Hardy: Very simply, it gives you the opportunity to explore your own fears. Writing the Uncanny lets you venture into the dark spaces you might otherwise avoid – some people might say it’s cathartic. Coxon: Being a mode rather than a genre, the Uncanny often pops up in unexpected places. What have you seen/read/experienced that has surprised you with its uncanny effect? Hardy: My phone is full of photos of things I have spotted while out walking that have made me pause because of their incongruity and the uncanny effect this has. A child’s glove upended on a railing; a boot discarded in a hedgerow; a single leafless tree when all its fellows are fully clothed. All things which beg the question: what has happened here to cause this? Moore: I’m impressed when I think back to the children’s TV of the 1970s and ’80s – those eerie dramas that were like a masterclass in the Uncanny long before I knew what the word meant. Hirst: I think one of the uncanniest experiences for me was when I first started to read Robert Aickman. I encountered him when a friend of mine who worked in a library gave me a Faber Finds edition of Cold Hand in Mine which had been removed from circulation. As I read the stories over the course of a week or so, odd things began to happen to me – not outright odd, just not-quite-right: on a number of separate train journeys, all in different locations and times of the day. I encountered the same man, a restaurant owner with whom I ended up lapsing into conversation and hearing about how he was concerned about leaving his business to his younger son – his elder son was more trustworthy but, for reasons I never quite gleaned, was out of the picture. Another train journey brought me into contact with a man who supplied animal brains to medical students and was experiencing problems with his supply chains. Another time I encountered a man with what appeared to be two prosthetic hands who owned a second-hand bookshop I’d entered – he insisted on giving me a pineapple with my purchases yet was unable to pick it up from a bag behind the counter, eventually losing patience with the situation and with me. Each of these encounters had a heightened, unreal quality, as though experienced in a dream. Would they have seemed this way without my having read Robert Aickman? Would they have happened at all? I’ve mentioned this occurrence to others and have heard reports – by no means with any uniformity – of readers of Aickman experiencing what felt to them similarly strange encounters. Coxon: For those who are looking to read more uncannily, what stories, novels or writers would you recommend? Emelumadu: Octavia Cade, Catriona Ward, Lesley Nneka Arimah, Paul Tremblay, Helen Oyeyemi, Priya Sharma. Moore: Definitely Shirley Jackson’s fiction, some of which I’ve written about in my essay in Writing the Uncanny. One of the most outrageously uncanny novels I've read is Kazuo Ishiguro’s The Unconsoled. I love the uncanny quality of Tove Jansson’s Moomin books. And a couple of very recent pleasures include ‘Dead Relatives’, the novella-length title story of Lucie McKnight Hardy’s debut collection, and ‘The Angle of Horror’ by Cristina Fernández Cubas, translated by James D. Jenkins and published in The Valancourt Book of World Horror Stories. Hardy: I would suggest reading anything and everything by Alison Moore, Nicholas Royle, Andrew Michael Hurley, Claire Dean, Sue Rainsford, and Joyce Carol Oates. And any chapbooks published by Nightjar Press. Hirst: Writing the Uncanny features a very handy ‘further reading’ section which lists 100 Uncanny short stories. Of those, I personally think that Oliver Onions’s long 1911 ghost story ‘The Beckoning Fair One’ is the finest and one of the most unsettling ghost stories there is, and a perfect example of the power that revealing very little can exert on the reader. Coxon: So does the Uncanny have to scare us, or do you look for something else in uncanny stories? Emelumadu: Fear, unease, discomfort and stupefaction are great reactions to horror. A lot of great horror sticks with you long after you’ve finished reading it. Moore: I think the real power of the Uncanny is often a slow-burn, under-the-skin kind of horror or unease. I have a couple of stories that my husband really enjoyed reading but then he had a hard time trying to get to sleep afterwards, thinking about them, and I’m half very sorry and half delighted that the story works. Hirst: Uncanny experiences – and stories which attempt to harness the Uncanny – frighten us because they suggest that things are not as they appear. That figure standing at the end of the room turns out to be a robe hung on a peg; the pile of clothing spotted in a busy city centre turns out to be an elderly woman. Inanimate objects are briefly invested with life and the living are briefly inanimate. More than simply wrongfooting us, these experiences also lead us to question the nature of what surrounds us – a simple mistake of cognitive perspective feels like the trailing glimpse of some cosmic glitch, a glancing contact with the mystery which we all, at one time or another, feel underpins our reality. Hardy: Rather than trying to instil horror in a reader, I find writing that is unsettling or unnerving to be much more effective in triggering a reaction. An insidious sense of unease, for me, is, perversely, much more enjoyable than jump scares and gore. Uncanny stories don’t have to terrify us – they can confound, disturb and alarm us, and the effect of that will remain long after the reading has ended.  Writing the Uncanny is published on 23rd September 2021, by Dead Ink Books. Edited by Dan Coxon and Richard V. Hirst, it features brand new essays on the Uncanny by Jeremy Dyson, Catriona Ward, Alison Moore, Nicholas Royle, Robert Shearman, Lucie McKnight Hardy, Chikodili Emelumadu, Jenn Ashworth, Gary Budden, Claire Dean, Michèle Roberts, Timothy J. Jarvis and Rowan Hisayo Buchanan. Or purchase a copy direct from Dead Ink Books here https://deadinkbooks.com/product/writing-the-uncanny/ Dan Coxon Dan Coxon is an award-winning editor and writer based in London. His anthology This Dreaming Isle was shortlisted for both a Shirley Jackson Award and a British Fantasy Award, and his debut collection Only The Broken Remain (Black Shuck, 2020) is currently shortlisted for two British Fantasy Awards. His fiction has appeared in Black Static, Nightscript, The Lonely Crowd, Unthology, Not One of Us, Humanagerie, Nox Pareidolia, and is forthcoming in Mark Morris’s Beyond the Veil. He is lead editor at Unsung Stories, and works freelance at momuseditorial.co.uk. Richard V. Hirst Richard V. Hirst is based in Manchester. He is the editor of We Were Strangers: Stories Inspired by Unknown Pleasures and That’s the Colour: Stories Inspired by Low, both published by Confingo Publishing. His writing has been published in The Guardian, the Big Issue, Time Out and others. Alison Moore Alison Moore’s short fiction has been included in Best British Short Stories, Best British Horror and Best New Horror, broadcast on BBC Radio and collected in The Pre-War House and Other Stories. Her first novel, The Lighthouse, was shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize and the National Book Awards, winning the McKitterick Prize. Recent publications include a series for children, beginning with Sunny and the Ghosts. Her fifth novel, The Retreat, will be published in 2021, and a second collection will be published in 2022. www.alison-moore.com Chikọdili Emelumadu Chikọdili Emelumadu was born in Worksop, Nottinghamshire, and raised in Nigeria. Her work has been shortlisted for the Shirley Jackson Awards (2015), the Caine Prize for African Literature (2017 & 2020) and won a Nommo award (2020) . In 2019, she emerged winner of the inaugural Curtis Brown First Novel prize for her manuscript Dazzling. She tweets as @chemelumadu. Lucie McKnight Hardy Lucie McKnight Hardy’s stories have featured in various publications, including Best British Short Stories 2019, Black Static, The Lonely Crowd, and as a limited edition chapbook from Nightjar Press. Her debut novel, Water Shall Refuse Them, was published in 2019 by Dead Ink Books, who will also publish her short story collection, Dead Relatives, in late 2021.
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