John Kendrick Bangs

"That is true," said Ward. "And they do do you, my beloved William. It's a wonder to me you are not dizzy turning over in your grave the way they do you." Everyone who has ever died has had to cross the River Styx in the underworld. But even after death, men will be men. On the suggestion of Queen Elizabeth, some put a houseboat on the river Styx to be an exclusive men's club. But their club may not be as stuffy and quiet as the ones found on the mortal plane. No one can stop teasing Shakespear regarding the authorship of his plays. They wonder if Adam ever had a tail. And, of course, no women are allowed.

"Olympian Nights" written by John Kendrick Bangs a novel about an American traveler of the twentieth century finds himself stranded in Greece, robbed and alone, and takes sanctuary in a cave. .. that proves to be the entrance to the home of the gods. As the gods' guest, he learns just what the immortal divinities are up to in modern times, with hilarious results. The author portrays the gods going about their duties and personal affairs in the terms of American high society, with all the elegance, archness, wit, jealousy, and pettiness of the idle rich. Mythic grandeur and modern wit prove a perfect fit in this sharp satire.

The Dreamers is a literary pastiche and travesty, the club that is formed merely an excuse to make good fun of the literary stylings (and stylers) of Bangs' day. A group of characters are convinced that literary inspiration comes in dreams. They decide to form a club, meeting once a month to consume a marvelous meal, then head home to sleep -- and dream. The plan is then to record the dreams, and read the results at the next meeting. The beginning amusingly reveals the misconceptions the group labours under: most of the difficulty of writing, they're sure, is in the mechanical setting down of the words on the page -- a problem they surmount through the use of a stenographer. Creative writing ? "These things require very little intellectual labor", they believe -- and if anyone could prove this claim, they could.

The Idiot returns along with Ms Idiot and their two children, Mollie and Tommy, move into their first house in suburbia. What follows are encounters with his companions from his boarding house days, Coffee and Repartee, along with new characters that inhabit suburbia with the unassailable logic of the Idiot and Mrs Idiot regarding various aspects of life in the suburbs, starting with why the knowledge of an egg beater is more important than that of Wagner. Which story is your favourite?

The premise of the book is that everyone who has ever died (up to the time in which the book is set, which seems to be about the time of its publication) has gone to Styx, the river that circles the underworld. The book begins with Charon, ferryman of the Styx being startled-and annoyed-by the arrival of a houseboat on the Styx. At first afraid that the boat will put him out of business, he later finds out that he is actually to be appointed the boat's janitor. What follows are eleven more stories (for a total of twelve) which are set on the house boat. There is no central theme, and the purpose of the book appears to be as a literary thought experiment to see what would happen if various famous dead people were put in the same room with each other. Each chapter is a short story featuring various souls from history and mythology. In the twelfth chapter the house boat disappears, leading into the sequel, Pursuit of the House-Boat.

Sherlock Holmes -- a fictional character -- was never alive, at least in the usual sense . Yet here he is to be found, engaging in sharp-witted conversation with the shades of various and sundry famous souls of our historic past -- and trying to prove that a certain cigar fragment does, indeed, belong to Captain Kidd -- that shady shade of Hades who has absconded with the Houseboat of the Associated Shades.

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