Few literary figures are harder to pin down than Horace Walpole. He was Earl of Oxford but went to Cambridge. He was a member of Parliament representing Callington in Cornwall—but never visited Callington. He might have been a womanizer, and he might have been gay, or according to some, he was asexual. He was a Whig, but how many Whigs are also Goths? Indeed, Walpole’s The Castle of Otranto is considered the first Gothic novel and his home Strawberry Hill House anticipated the later gothic revival architecture style. He also was an art historian, a publisher (he installed a printing press in his home), and invented the word 'serendipity'.
A strange resume, no? But the strangest part of it all is a little known literary work, entitled Hieroglyphic Tales . Walpole wrote these stories in 1766 and 1772, but waited until 1785 before publishing them. Even then, he only printed seven copies, including proofs. One can hardly blame Walpole for not circulating the book more widely. The only surviving response from someone who saw the work during his lifetime comes from Madame du Deffand, who accused the author of being raving or delirious.
In another letter, Walpole explains that these tales were "written while I was out of my senses." A present day reader perusing the Hieroglyphic Tales will be reminded of Italo Calvino or Eugène Ionesco and other exponents of absurdism, surrealism and outré experimental literary movements of the 20th century. Yes, you might conclude that the stories were written in the late Sixties and early Seventies…but not of the eighteenth century.
Certainly some precedents exist for these tales—Walpole's Hieroglyphic Tales will remind readers, to some extent, of various colorful or extravagant works such as The Arabian Nights , The Decameron , Gargantua and Pantagruel , Tristram Shandy or Rasselas . But even these daring narratives seem controlled and calculated compared to the unhinged, free-association style of storytelling pursued by Walpole. Our author starts with a style halfway between a fairy tale and those long-winded jokes known as 'shaggy dog tales', but then he adds in contradictions, absurdities, anachronisms, arcane references and every other kind of distraction or obstacle.
Here’s a typical opening:
There was formerly a king who had three daughters—that is, he would have had three, if he had had one more, but some how or other the eldest never was born. She was extremely handsome, had a great deal of wit, and spoke French in perfection, as all the authors of that age affirm, and yet none of them pretend that she ever existed....
Of course, a story of this sort requires a romantic interest—even for a non-existent princess. In this instance, the suitor is the prince of Quifferiquimini, who "would have been the most accomplished hero of the age, if he had not been dead, and had spoken any language but the Egyptian, and had not had three legs."
Thus, more than a century before Dracula and 220 years before Twilight , Walpole casts an undead man as his romantic lead. Unfortunately the Church intervenes in this courtship, deeming that "a woman that never was, and a man that had been" were first cousins under canon law, and thus unable to marry without the dispensation of the Pope.
Marriage and miscegenation are a frequent theme of these stories. We meet Mi Li, prince of China, who is told by his fortune-telling fairy mother that “he would be the most unhappy man alive unless he married a princess whose name was the same as her father’s dominions.” He accepts this cryptic prognostication and sets out for Ireland and England, where he aims to find a bride who matches this description. The conclusion of Walpole's odd story is more like the punchline to a silly joke. The same is true, but with even more silliness, in Walpole's account of the romances between the handsome Orondates of Milan and Azora, a lovely African slave. "Afric never produced a female so perfect as Azora; as Europe could boast of but one Orondates." I won’t spoil the ending for you, but if you are expecting another Othello, you will be sorely disappointed.
Again and again we encounter the familiar ingredients of myths and folklore in these tales. Magic and prophecy, eccentric kings, witches and devils, young lovers and interfering adults—the tried-and-true memes of populist storytelling are the basic ingredients here. But Walpole takes such liberties with the material that even fantasy lit seems down-to-earth and predictable by comparison.
But don’t jump to the conclusion that these Hieroglyphic Tales are all playfulness, without serious intent. Like many of the magical realism novels of more recent years, Walpole believes that fanciful stories can also incorporate elements of social satire and political commentary. Some of the notes Walpole added to his copy of the first edition indicate that he drew on real-life role models for many of his fairy tale characters, and even the strangest passages—for example, the above quoted church ruling on marriage between the undead and the never existent—are meant to call attention to incongruities and absurdities in real life.
I might be inclined to add that Walpole wanted to show "truth is stranger than fiction.” But if that allegation is often correct, the Hieroglyphic Tales are the counter example of fiction that pushes so far beyond the plausible and realistic as to break free of their gravitational pull. In his postscript to the book, Walpole notes that "works of invention" are "almost always devoid of imagination." He concludes, in the final sentence, that "there is infinitely more invention in history, which has no merit if devoid of truth, than in romances and novelty which pretend to none."
No one could make that accusation of his Hieroglyphic Tales . Could Walpole have been any more daring in this work? Well, yes he might have taken one more bold step…and distributed these stories widely during his lifetime. Who can guess what the results would have been? I suspect that, with more bravado on his part, Horace Walpole might no longer be viewed today as a jack-of-all- trades or the 'original goth'. Instead, his most lasting claim to fame would be his extraordinary anticipation of many of the leading avant-garde literary movements of modern times.
Ted Gioia writes on music, literature, and popular culture. His newest book is The Jazz Standards: A Guide to the Repertoire .