OK, Robert W Chambers was… hrm, how to put it? OK. Imagine that Danielle Steel had started out her career writing horror fiction that was dramatically different* than what she’s known for now, and that’s pretty much Chambers in a nutshell. Dude wrote a bunch of short stories that we still read and draw from: he was also a trained painter before he took up writing. And he apparently painted the picture below:
Ken Hite, naturally, blinked at the “impossibly on the nose” nature of the piece. Basically, the themes in this painting — the yellow coloration, the depiction of a masquerade ball, and the general sense of being slightly different — is just a little too Chambers. More accurately, it’s too Chambers-as-modern-literary-life sees him. But the painting seems… legit?
Which makes this rather exciting! If we can find out about when this piece was done and what sparked it, we can perhaps get more insight into the weird fiction aspect of Chambers’ career. Is this the painting that eventually sparked the King in Yellow? Or did The King In Yellow spark the painting? I don’t know, but in that kind of neat way that sets up new questions. In other words, somebody do this, for reals:
It might be useful literary research. And really, what’s money for if not to fund somebody’s neat-o project?
Moe Lane
*I will refrain from saying ‘and much better,’ because at the end of the day she has a multitude of best-selling books and I do not. You gotta respect the skill set, at least.
The woman knows what her audience wants and delivers it.