Violet Needham, Pandora, and Mr Papadopoulis

Violet Needham wrote some high-quality books for children. They were published between the years 1939 and 1957. 

Apart from a brief mention in the article about Anthony Hope, whose fictional country Ruritania may well have inspired her fictional Empire and surrounding countries, Violet Needham has not previously been featured on here.

Some of her books, the Stormy Petrel stories in particular, are full of exciting and romantic adventures in glamorous settings and some even have supernatural elements, but most of them are not relevant to this blog. 

While working on articles about John Buchan's books, I was reminded of some characters and scenes from one of Violet Needham’s books. I decided to take another look at Pandora of Parrham Royal (1951), which I last read many years ago. 

I bought a copy online and renewed my acquaintance with the material that I vaguely remembered. In the light of what I have since learned about unseen influences, parts of the book seem much more significant now than they did when I first read it. 

Pandora of Parrham Royal may not be one of Violet Needham’s best books when it comes to the characters and storyline - I much prefer the Stormy Petrel series - but it has inspired an article because it has some elements in common with John Buchan's books and it provides yet another example of someone who uses occult powers to get what they want.

Much of the plot and most of the characters in Pandora of Parrham Royal are not relevant to this article. 

The main character of interest is called Themistocles Papadopoulis. 

He has attributes in common with some really horrible black magicians who have been featured on here, although, unlike Stella Gibbons’s occultist Esmé Scarron and Robin Jarvis’s appalling warlock Nathaniel Crozier, he is not really evil nor is he involved with black magic as such.

About Mr Papadopoulis
Mr Papadopoulis has a touch of the typical Luciferian hero/villain about him. He is a man of mystery. He has dark hair and melancholy black eyes that sometimes smoulder with passion; he sometimes gives an impression of great power and arrogance; he is magnetic and charming; he smiles ironically and has a compelling gaze; he also hypnotises people. He makes people like him whether they want to or not.

Elizabeth Goudge’s Linnets and Valerians: Part I

Best-selling novelist Elizabeth Goudge is not one of my favourite authors, although I do like some aspects of some of her books.

I heard of Linnets and Valerians only recently. When I learned that one of the characters is an evil witch, I got a copy in the hope that there would be enough suitable material for an article or two.

I found that much of the book is not about the witch and is not very relevant to this blog. However, some elements are worth a mention and there are a few connections to be made.

Linnets and Valerians

This amusing little book, which was first published in 1964 and later retitled The Runaways, is set in 1912.

In summary, the four high-spirited and resourceful young Linnet children run away from their autocratic grandmother to stay with their eccentric Uncle Ambrose. They enter a wonderful new world filled with magic and superstition and help to lift some long-standing curses.

The main character of interest is Emma Cobley, who is the local witch. There is nothing original about her and her story, but the book provides yet another example of a typical fictional witch.

Emma Cobley

Emma Cobley owns the village general store, which has a low green door. This where the children first meet her: they go in to buy some sweets. They have trouble getting the door open. The light inside is so dim that it is a while before they notice the proprietor, who is knitting.  

She is a little old dame with beady black eyes that notice everything. She wears a white mob cap, a black dress and a red shawl - familiar colours that are connected to the three phases of the moon.

Her sweets of many colours look magical in their glass bottles.

This is all very symbolic.

Elizabeth Taylor’s Angel: some miscellaneous thoughts

This final article in the series inspired by Elizabeth Taylor’s novel Angel includes some more connections and a few miscellaneous points of interest.

Angel Deverell and Esmé Scarron the sorcerer

These two people have generated many articles between them; it would be very easy to produce some more, but enough is enough!

By coincidence, Esmé is the name of Angel’s debt-ridden wastrel of a husband, but she bears more resemblance to Stella Gibbons’s villain Esmé Scarron from The Shadow of a Sorcerer than he does!

Angel shares Scarron’s arrogance and preference for having admiring followers or even worshippers rather than real friends.

She too has a bad effect on the people around her, her mother and husband in particular.

Angel could have improved her inner state and become a better person, but just like Scarron she lacks the necessary humility.

Brothers and sisters

Angel’s husband’s full name is Esmé Howe-Nevinson. He is the brother of Nora Howe-Nevinson, Angel’s companion and assistant.

It is not just Esmé’s name that has a connection to Stella Gibbons: his personality and behaviour resemble those of her younger brother Lewis.

As mentioned in the first article in the series, the novelist Marie Corelli was one of the inspirations for Angel. Corelli’s half-brother Eric was a wastrel who was always demanding money from her; Elizabeth Taylor probably created Esmé from what she knew of Eric, but he is also a classic, textbook case.

Many of us will encounter people like Esmé, who go through life leaving a trail of failures, debt and destruction behind them and who are forever taking on new initiatives without the resources and reserves to back them up. They make life hell for anyone they can get a hold over.

Both Stella and the fictional Nora kept house for their brothers;

Both Stella Gibbon’s brother Lewis and the fictional Esmé were unstable; they got into financial and other messes and left it to their sisters to sort it all out.

Same game, different players yet again.

Cults, occultists and Stella Gibbons: Part VII

The material inspired by Stella Gibbons’s novel The Shadow of a Sorcerer has stretched to one more article.

Her occultist villain Esmé Scarron is a classic, textbook case. Much of what he says and does is scripted; it is all very predictable. Changing for the better is not part of the script, but it is an interesting exercise to think about things that he could have done and people who could have shown him the way.

What does Esmé Scarron really need?

Scarron needs to think about the inner differences between him and healthy, wholesome, decent human beings. He may be far above most people in some ways - wealth and scholarship for example - but he is far below in others.

Scarron needs to learn how to get what he wants using normal methods, not manipulation, psychological black magic and the ‘neutral force’ that he allows to run through him. He says that this force gives him his power and enables him to heal people, but he uses it to influence them against their will and best interests and to damage them.

He needs to realise that this force is a two-edged sword. Using it may have a damaging effect on him. For example, by influencing people around him so that they can’t make connections, he may be blocking himself from making some key connections.

Esmé Scarron needs to realise that he is on a path that leads to Hell.

In theory, he could redeem himself by losing some arrogance, showing some humility and looking at what other people have done to get off this path. People like him rarely do this though. In any case, he is a prisoner and hostage. The evil forces he has called up may not let go of him that easily.

Some positive role models

Esmé Scarron could have learned a lot from people he probably wouldn’t have given the time of day to. It is amusing to imagine him taking tea with and advice from a few fictional witches - not that he 

ever would.

Cults, occultists and Stella Gibbons: Part VI

This is yet another article in the series inspired by Stella Gibbons’s novel The Shadow of a Sorcerer.

Even though this book has already generated a lot of material, there are still a few more connections to be made, a few more ideas to be explored and a few more familiar scenarios to be described.

Esmé Scarron: energy vampire

It is not just Scarron’s victims who become cold, pale, tired and drained.

Stella Gibbons tells us that Scarron becomes cold and pale after expending energy cursing the group of young soldiers who made fun of him. Just like Helen Penclosa in Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s story The Parasite, he has temporarily used up all his resources.

He soon recovers and returns to normal after holding Meg’s hand for a short time.

He has to live off other people: no wonder he cannot bear to be alone; no wonder he fills his house with ‘friends’ and followers. Perhaps the extra work this involves is why his subordinates always look sulky!

Providential interventions

The above reference to Conan Doyle’s story has reminded me of another connection:

The anonymous traveller who delays Esmé Scarron reminds me of the talkative vicar in The Parasite who makes Agatha late for her meeting with Austin Gilroy.

She thought that the vicar would never go, but he is her unwitting saviour: by preventing her from going to Gilroy, he saves her from having acid thrown over her. His intervention was providential.

Cults, occultists and Stella Gibbons: Part V

Four articles so far; what more can there be to say about Stella Gibbons’s novel The Shadow of a Sorcerer?

One element of particular interest is something I think of as the big anomaly, where people who seem to have everything behave as if they have nothing. They are the exact opposite on the inside of what they appear to be on the outside. They are a combination of glamorous image and empty desperation.

I have some ideas to explore about this phenomenon.

Only one thing to live for

I said in a previous article that it is perfectly natural for some people to feel that there is nothing for them but a life of unbearable drabness. Their lives may indeed be very restricted, and there may be little hope of any improvement in the future.

I also gave examples of cases where this feeling was not natural and not based on reality: it was induced by an unscrupulous black magic practitioner.

The feeling some people have that there is only one thing to live for and that if they lose it or don’t get it they will be destroyed is also understandable in some, perhaps extreme, cases. The last ship might really have sailed or be about to sail. Sometimes one chance is all we ever get. Some people may be devastated because they know very well that they could have made the world a better place for many others if they had only got what they wanted.

However, it is very strange when people with many options, people such as Madeleine L’Engle’s Zachary Grey and Stella Gibbons’s Esmé Scarron, feel this way and behave like desperate predators who have pounced and missed, howling in rage and disappointment because now they will starve to death.

What is going on here? We can only speculate.

Cults, occultists and Stella Gibbons: Part IV

This article covers more elements that Stella Gibbons’s sorcerer Esmé Scarron and Madeleine L’Engle’s Zachary Grey have in common and goes into more detail about the final betrayal and showdown.

Zachary Grey, Esmé Scarron and the big anomaly

These two people are very different when it comes to attributes such as age, generation, nationality, background and lifestyle yet they both have the power to remotely influence people, they both have a similar bad effect on the girls they target and they both behave in much the same way when faced with the loss of the girl. Once again, the similarities are uncanny.

I described a big anomaly in Zachary Grey’s life here. Sometimes his glamorous image disappears and he becomes lost and frightened.

Scarron is much the same. He begins by appearing mysterious, glamorous and charming, then he is shown to be sinister and malevolent and finally he is seen as empty and pitiable.

Just as Zachary tells Vicky Austin that she is all that stands between him and chaos and she is his reason to live, Scarron begs Meg Lambert to help him and says that she is his only hope.

Describing this anomaly and making connections is much easier than finding answers to the questions it raises:

If they are so superior and their lives are so marvellous, why are they so desperate, why do they stake everything on one outcome and why are they destroyed when they lose?

I have had some ideas about this, which will appear in the next and final article in this series.

Cults, occultists and Stella Gibbons: Part III

A few of the common elements in Stella Gibbons’s Shadow of a Sorcerer and the Madeleine L’Engle books in which Zachary Grey appears have been mentioned in the first two articles.

There are more similarities to come, but first here is a summary of the remainder of the Sorcerer story:

How the story ends

The arrival at the language school of a young man called Humphrey gives Meg Lambert someone other than Esmé Scarron to think about. Humphrey is a worthy, dependable type and only 10 or so years older than Meg. Her mother likes him very much. Unfortunately he is engaged, and his fiancée Ruth soon comes out to join him at the guest house/language school in Austria.

Meg, her mother and some of the other students including Humphrey and Ruth take a short sightseeing trip to Venice.

An attempt by Ruth to make Meg see reason about Scarron backfires; her well-meaning criticism pushes Meg into doing something drastic. She tells Scarron on the phone that she will give him her final answer in person at his palazzo. Then, in revenge for the pressure to forget Scarron, she hits back by telling the others in her party a big lie: she says that she has just got engaged to him over the phone. This hurts her mother terribly and confounds the others.

Scarron sets out for Venice. He has asked his ex-wife and daughter to keep away from his palazzo, but this backfires and they go there to sabotage his plans. This is their big chance to take some revenge for what he has done to them. They reveal many of Scarron’s secrets to the Lamberts, including his age and his experiments on his son and daughter.

Scarron makes one last attempt to capture Meg by bombarding her with more waves of pity, but it doesn’t work.

Cults, occultists and Stella Gibbons: Part II

Going through Stella Gibbons’s novel The Shadow of a Sorcerer in the light of what I have learned about cults, occultists, energy vampires and other relevant topics since I first read it has provided enough material for a whole series of articles.

I am particularly interested in the connections I can now see between some of the material in this book and material in previous articles about cults, very different books and very different people.

The first article introduced the two main characters and ended with a description of some of the harm Esmé Scarron had done by abusing his powers and knowledge.

The next topics to be covered are the dreadful effect that Scarron’s attempts to influence her have on his chosen disciple Meg Lambert and the cult leader/cult member aspect of their relationship.

Many of the unpleasant symptoms that Meg experiences are very familiar: they are typical of the negative effects that energy vampires and black occultists have on their victims.

The unbearably drab existence

Early on in the book, thinking about the delightful and exciting life that Scarron could offer her makes Meg’s life and future in England appear unendurably drab in comparison. It seems that there will be nothing for her back home but ordinary people and pastimes, ageing morons, a dull colourless existence with no beauty and no sense of romantic excitement and nothing to look forward to.

Many people have had a taste of this feeling, especially ambitious people of ability who feel trapped in a limiting environment and are desperate to escape from a godforsaken place full of deadbeat losers, but in Meg’s case there is something sinister at work.

Another look at Madeleine L’Engle’s Zachary Grey

I thought at the time that my article about Zachary Grey - or Gray - contained all the relevant material of interest; I have since found a few more significant points and incidents and noticed some intriguing connections.

The bad boys are a bad omen

In The Moon By Night, Vicky Austin and her family stay in a series of camping grounds as they travel across the USA. 

There are some unpleasant incidents during these stopovers. The first one happens just before Zachary Grey comes into Vicky’s life, and it could be interpreted as a bad omen.

Vicky feels edgy and rather scared when they arrive at one campsite, and these feelings are soon justified. As Vicky and her family are eating a meal, a car drives by very fast. It passes them again, and one of the occupants throws a glass bottle out of the window; it hits the side of the Austins' station wagon, shattering with a sound like a bomb going off. The car comes back again, and a gang of young ‘hoods’ gets out. One of them is wearing black trousers and a black leather jacket, a cheap copy of what Zachary Grey often wears.

Vicky’s father gets rid of them, but not long afterwards the Austins hear a vehicle approaching and are afraid that the gang of thugs is returning. This time, it is Zachary Grey and his parents. This is Zachary’s first appearance in Vicky’s life.

The black bear is a bad sign

I described Vicky’s symbolic encounter with a skunk and its connection with a letter from Zachary in the first article; this time around I noticed an incident involving a black bear.

Soon after meeting Zachary for the first time, Vicky walks around the campsite with him and hears his cynical and pessimistic philosophy of life. Later that evening, while walking back from the wash-room, she sees something dark behind her. At first she thinks it is one of the gang, but then realises that it is an animal, probably a bear. Her family don’t believe that she saw a bear.

Twice during the night they are wakened by a loud crash: something keeps knocking their ice-box over. In the morning they see large paw marks everywhere. The ranger tells them that it was a black bear and it was looking for food.

Cults, occultists and Stella Gibbons: Part I

I have both learned about and been reminded of many things since I produced the article about white and black magic in the books of Stella Gibbons. 

While re-reading her biography recently, I saw something that prompted me to take another look at her novel The Shadow of a Sorcerer. I noticed a lot more relevant material this time around and made some new connections, so there is something to add to what I have previously written about this book.

First, what I saw that gave rise to this article:

Stella Gibbons and Aleister Crowley

When I first read Out of the Woodshed by Reggie Oliver, I was mainly interested in the details of Stella Gibbons’s early life. Much of the other information didn’t register, and I overlooked two references to infamous people. This time around, their names jumped out at me. One was Adolf Hitler - his connection with Stella Gibbons has been described elsewhere - and the other was the occultist Aleister Crowley. 

Her nephew tells us that Stella Gibbons once saw Crowley outside the Café Royal in central London. I don’t know the date, but guess that it was in the 1930s. 

Her impression was unfavourable. When her nephew asked hopefully if this was because of Crowley’s air of supernatural malignancy, she said no, what repelled her was that he had the look of a man who was desperately trying to attract attention. 

This is spot on. Such people have forfeited their inner sources of sustenance and are often disconnected and empty, so they need to live off others to fill the void. They may be prisoners and hostages too, desperate for someone or something to save them. 

After reading about this encounter, I remembered Esmé Scarron, the evil occultist in The Shadow of a Sorcerer, and wondered whether Stella Gibbons had used Crowley as the inspiration for this character. Her book was published in 1955, so there were many years after the sighting in which she could have talked to people and done some research.

Whatever the source, Esmé Scarron is a person of great interest.