Thomas Owen
Cerimoniale notturno

Thomas Owen, stage name of Gérald Bertot (1910-2002), is, alongside Jean Ray, the most significant representative of horror literature in Belgium. Considered a master of the unusual and the bizarre, his literary corpus, rich in unsettling and dark references to the visual arts of his country, fits well within the context of Belgium's fantastic cultural tradition.
After starting his career in the realm of detective novels, he gradually began to develop a genuinely "weird" streak that led him to publish the anthology Les chemins etranges in 1943 and La cave aux crapauds in 1945.
In the '50s, he also benefited from the reevaluation campaign by the French magazine Fiction, aimed at valuing writers like his compatriot and friend Jean Ray. In 1963, the Marabout collection reissued his first fantastic stories in a single volume that included the aforementioned La cave aux crapauds and Les chemins etranges. On this subject, in a 1994 interview, Owen stated that he made his career thanks to Marabout, which put unknown writers on the same level as classics like Mary Shelley and Stevenson. And it is precisely for Marabout that in the coming years came the anthologies Céremonial nocturne (1966), La Truie (1970), and Le Rat Kavar (1975).
Now the Italian publisher Alcatraz is finally reprinting Céremonial nocturne in the commendable series Bizarre, which reproduces (as it has already done previously with the volumes dedicated to Prévot, Jean Ray, and Ethel Manning) the same graphics as the original Marabout volumes with the mythical covers by Henri Lievens. In our country, until now, only the anthology Le dimore inquietanti had been released in 1994 by Panozzo (edited by Anna Soncini Fratta). This proposal by Alcatraz fills a gap.

The stories present here are all, except for the last one, very short but have the characteristic of being very effective. In "La serata del barone Swenbeck," we find as the main character his friend Jean Ray, who leads him by the hand through an unsettling cemetery in search of a vampire's body. However, Owen is keen to highlight the differences with Ray, emphasizing how, compared to the writer from Ghent, his is a less powerful and frantic fantastic but more calm. As he himself declared: "I don't want to scare. I want to disturb the calm, corrupt an atmosphere of tranquility." In any case, there are certainly no shortages of "grandguignol" effects as in the masterpiece story "La passeggera," where we discover how a manicurist’s pastime is to cut off her clients’ hands. Owen proves to be a master of endings, where he manages to shock and surprise the reader. In the exquisite "Elna 1940," set in Belgium in Bruges during the German occupation of World War II, we are faced with the disturbing ghost of a German soldier. The Belgian writer writes well and manages to create an ambiguous and melancholic atmosphere through a measured yet evocative style. An example of this approach can be found in "La ragazza della pioggia," where he masterfully describes the leaden atmosphere of Belgium and the North Sea. The protagonist's encounter with a mysterious girl, who leads him to a decaying and crumbling villa, preludes to a nightmare ending.
"Il piccolo fantasma" and "La tentazione di Sant’Antonio" have a tone both macabre and humorous, while "La dama di San Pietroburgo" and "Dolci sciocchezze" reveal a perverse erotic dimension. "Straniero a Tabiano" is instead a novella that departs from the atmosphere and tones of the previous stories. It is a somewhat surreal story that could remind one of Borges.

Undoubtedly, we are facing an indispensable volume for those who wish to delve into European fantastic literature, which is certainly less known compared to the Anglo-Saxon and still largely to be rediscovered. The translation by Luca Fassina is certainly to be praised. The introduction is by Max Baroni.

Thomas Owen "Ceremonial Nocturnal" - 254 pages - Euro 14 - 2021 - Alcatraz - Bizarre 5 - 9788885772311