“The Hoard of the Gibbelins” (1911)

Here’s another good one from Lord Dunsany, also very short. Most of his stories are short, though he also wrote novels. It is typically biting in its mordant humor, opening with, “The Gibbelins eat, as is well known, nothing less good than man.” Their hoard consists of jewels and gold in vast amounts, a great temptation to humans living nearby. People are forever trying to rob them and forever failing. I’m giving nothing away when I say this is the story of another failure. But the knight making this attempt, Alderic, certainly gets the A for effort, among other things enlisting a dragon and getting himself past the Unpassable Forest. Something about the “Lord” in Dunsany’s name—he was authentically heir to an ancient Irish peerage—chips in to the work for me: he’s cynical and sophisticated in ways recognizably of the rich. Perhaps the title evokes some reflexive class deference. His stories are silly yet fun to read. Dunsany is better than the more uneven Saki, for example, because his stories are so well done, a light touch with the humor and always a straight face. “Cheeky” might be the operative term, but the violence can be abrupt and bracing. In my internet travels on Dunsany and his work I found an interesting forum called The Weird Tradition, with a weekly reading and discussion group called The Deep Ones. They chew over stories at about the rate of one per week. Dunsany is a regular focus of attention and I’ve learned some interesting things about him. He worked on his books and stories with illustrators, notably Sidney Sime, who created the image above and seemed to function as a sort of Jack Kirby to Dunsany’s Stan Lee. That is, many specific stories proceeded from Sime’s illustrations, which came first. The Deep Ones is very good about including these illustrations in their discussions. They illuminate the stories in interesting ways. The stories on their own, as I’ve seen with kindle products, lose a little something without the pictures. At the same time, Lord Dunsany is one of those writers who get better with more reading—you have to kind of tune into his world with a little practice. Thus, in this case, we can be pretty sure Alderic never has a chance. But he has an elaborate plan, and it’s working, and then: “... there were the Gibbelins waist-deep in the water, with torches in their hands! And, without saying a word, or even smiling, they neatly hanged him on the outer wall—and the tale is one of those that have not a happy ending.” THE END. Beautiful.

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