Essays in Books

Barker, Clive.  "Ramsey Campbell: An Appreciation."  Clive Barker's Shadows in Eden. Ed. Stephen Jones.  Lancaster, PA:  Underwood-Miller, 1991.

A fond and appreciative memoir of Barker's encounters with Campbell over the years.  Notes Campbell's simultaneous use of humor and horror. Says of Campbell, "he finds the shadows with unerring skill, and picks out from the scenes and situations that most of us would find unremarkable pieces of darkness embedded there like glass shards in a car wreck victim."

Crawford, Gary William.   "Urban Gothic:  The Fiction of Ramsey Campbell."  Discovering Modern Horror Fiction I.  Ed. Darrell Schweitzer.  Mercer Island, WA: Starmont House, 1985.

An essay for the general reader that notes that Campbell modernizes the Gothic by placing it in urban settings.

Joshi, S.T. "Ramsey Campbell:  Before and After Lovecraft." The Count of Thirty:  A Tribute to Ramsey Campbell.  Ed. S.T. Joshi.  West Warwick, RI:  Necronomicon Press, 1993.

A study of Campbell's early fiction based Lovecraft's work, and the matured work in Demons by Daylight.  Joshi remarks that these works appear to have been written in two different centuries.

Klein, T. E. D. "Ramsey Campbell: An Appreciation." Discovering Modern Horror Fiction II.  Ed. Darrell Schweitzer.  Mercer Island, WA:  Starmont House, 1988.

Reprints Klein's essay in Nyctalops (above).

MacCulloch, Simon.  "Glimpses of Absolute Power: Ramsey Campbell's Concept of Evil."  The Count of Thirty:  A Tribute to Ramsey Campbell.   Ed. S.T. Joshi.  West Warwick, RI:  Necronomicon Press, 1993.

Using Robert Aickman's story "Larger Than Oneself" as a spring board, argues that in such stories as "Potential" and the novel The Doll Who Ate His Mother,  Campbell presents his ideas about evil, which is stronger and greater than mankind, something outside himself that overpowers him.

Lamb, Hugh.  "Ramsey Campbell:  An Editor's Dream." Fantasy Readers Guide to Ramsey Campbell.  Ed. Mike Ashley.  Wallsend, England:  Cosmos, 1980.

A personal reminiscence of Lamb's relationship as an editor of Campbell.  Discusses his prolific horror tales and their consistent quality.  Notes that Campbell's stories are stylistic successes.  Mentions some of Lamb's favorite Campbell stories.

Lane, Joel.  "Beyond the Light:  The Recent Novels of Ramsey Campbell."  The Count of Thirty:  A Tribute to Ramsey Campbell. Ed. S.T. Joshi.  West Warwick, RI:  Necronomicon Press, 1993.

Studies Obsession and The Hungry Moon to show how these most recent novels show a sense of community and positivism that is not present in the earlier works.  These novels are more critiques of our society and culture rather than personal narratives of individual paranoia as Campbell explored in earlier works.

Lane, Joel.  "Negatives in Print:  The Early Novels of Ramsey Campbell." The Count of Thirty:  A Tribute to Ramsey Campbell.  Ed. S.T. Joshi.  West Warwick, RI:  Necronomicon Press, 1993

A reprint of Lane's article in Foundation (see above).

Menegaldo, Giles. "Gothic Convention and Modernity and John Ramsey Campbell's Short Fiction."  Modern Gothic: A Reader.  Ed. Victor Sage and Allan Lloyd Smith.  Manchester, England:  Manchester University Press, 1996.

Takes the idea of "urban Gothic" that I set forth in my own writing on Campbell and explores the contradiction between the terms "Gothic" and "urban."  Notes that Campbell's Gothic develops "character ambivalence and by subverting conventional narrative patterns."  Argues that Campbell subverts modernism and the conventional as much traditional Gothic fiction does.  At the same time, there is a blurring of traditional ideas about "good" and "evil."

Ruber, Peter.  "John Ramsey Campbell."  Arkham's Masters of Horror.  By Peter Ruber.   Sauk City, WI: Arkham House, 2000.

A detailed essay preceding one of Campbell's stories that chronicles Campbell's relationship with August Derleth as critic and editor of his fiction. Provides excerpts from their correspondence and the publication of Demons by Daylight.  Essential reading for the student of Campbell.

Sullivan, Jack.  "Ramsey Campbell:  Premier Stylist."  Fantasy Readers Guide to Ramsey Campbell. Ed. Mike Ashley.  Wallsend, England:  Cosmos, 1980.

Studies Campbell's prose style and imagery, showing his use of atmosphere.

Sullivan, Jack.  "Ramsey Campbell: No Light Ahead." Shadowings:  The Reader's Guide to Horror Fiction, 1981-1982. Ed. Douglas E. Winter. Mercer Island, WA: Starmont House, 1983.

Reprints Sullivan's essay from the magazine Whispers.  Stresses the unrelenting darkness of his fiction and his prose style, which links him to the great masters of spectral fiction.