Mark Hansom Revealed

 An anonymous message (actually by researcher John Herrington) to an old post on Mark Hansom has finally revealed Hansom's identity - an obscure English writer named Ronald Muirden (1898-1981).  John discovered a newspaper article in the Kensington News and West London Gazette, dated 22 January 1954.  The article is about his daughter, a young pianist, and refers to Muirden as the author of about 50 novels under the pseudonym of Mark Hansom, though I suspect the journalist meant to say he has written 50 novels under different pseudonyms including Mark Hansom.  Here is the article in full:

MUSIC REVIEW By DENBY RICHARDS  

Kensington Spotlight No 23 BARBARA MUIRDEN 

Next Sunday January 24th at 7.45 pm in the Recital Room of The Royal Festival Hall a young Kensington artist is giving her first major recital. The programme is an interesting and enterprising one including the Funeral March Sonata in B flat Minor by Chopin, three of the popular Songs without Words by Mendelssohn Liszt’s energetic Spanish Rhapsody and Hindemith’s Sonata No 2. The Recital opens with Bach’s Fifth French Suite in G.

Barbara Muirden began playing the piano at 7 years of age won a Scholarship to the Tobias Matthay Pianoforte School a year later. Her teacher there was that fine pianist-teacher .

In 1946 when Barbara was only 18 she added the letters LRAM and ARCM to her name. In the same year she also gained the Ada Lewis Scholarship to the Royal Academy of Music where she studied .

She is now studying with Frederick Jackson who besides being a first-rate professor is also regarded most highly as the trainer and conductor of the London Philharmonic Choir. 

Barbara Muirden lives in the West Cromwell Road with her parents.  Her father Mr Ronald Muirden is a well-known Kensington personality who has spent most of his life in the publishing world. He has written about 50 novels under the pseudonym of Mark Hansom whose The Wizard of Berner’s Abbey was described by a critic as the "creepiest story since Dracula”.  This is not a reflection on the genial character of its author and his versatility and good-natured humour are shared by Barbara Muirden to whom this column wishes every success in her musical career.

The British Library catalogue shows three novels under his name published by Wright & Brown and a couple of books on stuttering.  A blog post here reveals some more information about him (that he wrote thrillers and westerns) and provides a photograph (though the photo looks a bit too recent to be Ronald, who died in 1981 aged 82):  

He also appears to have been the press officer for the Kensington Liberal Party in the 1950s and early '60s, when he resigned to pursue a career lecturing and giving classes on stuttering.  FreeBMD has entries for Ronald Muirden: born in December 1898 at Marylebone, married to Dorothy Worthy at Hackney in March 1927 and died at Exeter in September 1981.  The Fictionmags index includes a story under his own name, "The Two Victories", published in The Smart Set in April 1925.  Presumably he was one of the stable of prolific writers for W&B in the 1930s who wrote under different pseudonyms.  

Well done to John Herrington!

Thriller serials in the Weekly Times in the 1930s

Australian newspapers are a surprisingly useful source of serials and short stories by popular authors during the heyday of British thrillers and mysteries in the 1930s.  Following is a list of two part serials (presumably heavily abridged) that appeared in the Weekly Times in the later years of the 1930s.  The Weekly Times is a Victorian rural newspaper, now owned by News Limited (like most Australian newspapers), which first appeared in 1859 and for many years had a large fiction section. The information is drawn from advertisements for WT that appeared in the Hobart Mercury.

Max Dalman: The Hidden Light
Rex Dark: Murder in Berkeley Square
Mark Hansom: Beasts of Brahm, Master of Souls
J. Jefferson Farjeon: Dark Lady, Yellow Devil, The Confusing Friendship
John Kent: Give Me Liberty
Arthur Russell: The Treasure Hunt, The Tragedy of the Strolling Players
John C. Woodiwiss: Ebony Torso
Edgar Jepson: The Woman From Nowhere
Russell Stannard: The Amateur Queen
Mary Howard: Autocrat's Island
Ruby Doyle: Inheritance
C.T. Podmore: The Three Strange Men
Nellie M. Scanlan, Tides of Youth, Pencarrow
J.R. Wilmot: Night Tide
Eardley Beswick: The Lorry Lady
Rowan Glen: The Singer From the Hills
Otwell Binns: The Poisoned Pen
Alroy West: Messengers of Death
John Hunter: House of Whispers
G.H. Teed: The Shadow Crook
Bentley Ridge: Well of Gold
Pierre Quiroule: At Midnight
Guy Thorne: The Fanshawe Murder
Ranger Gull (ie Guy Thorne): Ravenscroft Horror
Carlton Dawe: Live Cartridge
Ben Bolt: Masked Danger
Edgar Roberts: Murder at High Noon
E. Charles Vivian: Man Alone
Louis Brittany: Hand of Vengeance
E. Phillip Oppenheim: Jeremiah and the Princess, Stolen Idols
Vincent Cornier: Sinister Inheritance

Mark Hansom's THE WIZARD OF BERNER'S ABBEY

The Mellifont edition

In my column “Late Reviews” in Wormwood no. 10 (Spring 2008), I reviewed one of Mark Hansom’s novels as follows:

Hansom, Mark.  The Wizard of Berner’s Abbey. (London: Mellifont Press, undated but 1944)

The Wizard of Berner’s Abbey is the second of Mark Hansom’s seven novels, all of which were published by Wright & Brown of London between 1935 and 1939. It came out in May 1935, following the November 1934 publication of The Shadow on the House, an unambitious but readable thriller.  Original Wright & Brown editions of the seven Hansom novels are extremely rare, as are the seven paperback reprints done by Mellifont Press between 1939 and 1951.  According to the British Museum Catalogue, at least some of the Mellifont Press reprints were abridged.  I have not been able to compare the texts of the two editions of The Wizard of Berner’s Abbey, but if the Mellifont edition (which contains approximately fifty-six thousand words in twenty chapters) was abridged, as I suspect (owing to the hazy details of certain aspects of the plot), the cutting was an act of mercy towards the reader.  The Wizard of Berner’s Abbey is a considerable step down from Hansom’s first novel, a descent into hackwork.

            It is the first person narrative of John Richmond, a student of medicine aged twenty-four, who comes unexpectedly to a little Surrey village to visit his cousin, Leonora, who had jilted him two years ago to marry Paul St. Arnaud, a sinister and much older figure completely absorbed in scientific inquiry. John hopes to come to understand why Leonora turned against him and towards the repellant St. Arnaud.  What John discovers is that St. Arnaud believes that his own will is so great that it works in complete independence of his body. St. Arnaud, however, is soon dead and buried, though his influence over his wife, via some sort of mind control, remains. And Leonora unwittingly continues her late husband’s nebulous experiments to create life—these experiments have something to do with the murders of two young women, for evidently brain matter is an essential part of St. Arnaud’s methodology.  Meanwhile John explores St. Arnaud’s library, which contains various occult books, and after reading in one of them John decides that some kind of vampirism is involved with regard to St. Arnaud’s strength of will.

Much of this kind of exposition is padding and deflection. It turns out that St. Arnaud has faked his own death, but is in the end killed in a struggle, leaving John and Leonora to marry.  The reader reaches the final page with relief that this tedious novel, poorly executed and entirely without thrills, is at last finished. 

            Nothing is known of the author. It is possible that the byline is pseudonymous.  Though there are many people with the last name of Hansom in England (particularly in the north), there is no “Mark Hansom” of the appropriate age to be found in the death records for England and Wales from 1938 through 2005.

I am now able to confirm, by comparison with the Wright & Brown original (courtesy of James Doig), that the Mellifont edition of The Wizard of Berner’s Abbey is, as I suspected, significantly abridged, and I am able to make some generalized statements about Mellifont’s process of abridgement, which (presumably) is common with other Mellifont texts.  Basically, what the editor at Mellifont seems to have done is to cut whole paragraphs throughout the book, mostly of narrative description. In some instances, a sequence of paragraphs, including some dialogue, might be excised wholly, even running to a number of pages; but for the most part, it was common for a paragraph or two  to be snipped out here and there in each chapter to reduce the amount of text enough to fit in the standard Mellifont 96-page format.  Additionally, all italics in the original Wright & Brown edition are dropped from the Mellifont.

As an example, here are my notes about the cuts from the twenty chapters of the Wright & Brown edition of The Wizard of Bernard’s Abbey. Very occasionally one sentence might be cut out of a paragraph otherwise retained in the Mellifont edition (marked with a + below), or a sentence from a paragraph otherwise excised might be retained (such instances are marked with a - below).

Chapter I:  6 paragraphs cut

Chapter II: 2 paragraphs cut

Chapter III:  3+ paragraphs cut

Chapter IV:  4 paragraphs cut

Chapter V:  5- paragraphs cut

Chapter VI:  10 paragraphs cut

Chapter VII:  no cuts

Chapter VII: 3 paragraphs cut

Chapter IX:  47 paragraphs cut (including one stretch of 6 pages)

Chapter X:  16 paragraphs cut

Chapter XI:  16 paragraphs cut (including one stretch ~ 3 pages)  

Chapter XII:  18 paragraphs cut

Chapter XII:  17+ paragraphs cut

Chapter XIV:  20 paragraphs cut (+ one new transitional sentence)

Chapter XV:  no cuts

Chapter XVI:  5 paragraphs cut

Chapter XVII:  6- paragraphs cut

Chapter XVIII:  16 paragraphs cut

Chapter XIX:  1 paragraph cut

Chapter XX:   5+ paragraphs cut

I think it’s safe to call the Mellifont edition hacked to pieces! The currently available edition published by Ramble House is reproduced from the Mellifont edition, and thus identically abridged. Potential readers are hereby alerted!   

Mark Hansom

I've mentioned the enigmatic Mark Hansom before. In recent times Golden Age thriller publisher, Ramble House, has been reprinting the novels in affordable paperback editions. Hansom appears to have been particularly popular in Australia. The publisher, Wright & Brown, sent copies of its publications to Australian newspapers where they were reviewed or noted. A few examples of thumbnail Hansom reviews are given below. Such was Hansom's popularity that the Australian Women's Weekly published a short story, a crime thriller titled "The Last Trick", on Saturday 1 May 1937.
Reviews
The West Australian, Saturday 9 November 1935

The Ghost of Gaston Revere, by Mark Hansom. Wright and Brown, London. 3/6. From the publishers.

Conceived somewhat to the spirit ot Mary Shelley's 'Frankenstein,' Mr. Hansom's weird story concerns the in genious Dr. Gale's treatment of a patient's brain previous to an operation, that has the startling and unforeseen effect of letting loose a monstrous apparition on the world. The author is out to make his readers' flesh creep; but he a little overdoes it; and not everyone will have the patience to persevere with the book until Sir Bertram Knotts, the famous brain specialist, finally lays the unquiet spirit of Gaston Revere.


The Hobart Mercury, 13 December 1937

Master of Souls, by Mark Hansom, published by Wright and Brown, London; price, 3s 6d.

Labelled a "horror novel" in the publisher's blurb, the name is apt. A lightless ship in the Channel, a wrecked swimmer climbing on board, a man who plunges over the side to his death, are merely the preliminaries. These are followed by an introduction to the "Master of Souls" and a corpse which he partially revives, also the disembodied spirit of an ancient Egyptian woman, malignant and vile. With this setting follows a series of nerve-racking adventure sufficient to delight the heart of every lover of horror and crime.


The Launceston Examiner, 4 September 1937

The Beasts of Brahm, by Mark Hansom (Wright and Brown, London). Here be thrills a-plenty so long as one does not ask that the author should stick to possibilities. Mark Hansom exploits the macabre to the utmost. This tale opens with the finding of the dead and mangled body of a man in a lonely lane in Surrey. It is thought to have been mauled by an escaped wild beast, and the inhabitants live through a reign of terror wondering where the next blow will fall. The "horror," however, is something more loathsome than any wild beast. The mysticism of the East, magnified many times over for the purpose of the horror, is used freely until the accomplished Jeremy arrives on the scene to take charge, and free the district from its terrors.

The Hobart Mercury, 16 November 1937

THE BEASTS OF BRAHM, by Mark Hansom; published by Wright and Brown, London; price, 3s 6d.

"The Beasts of Brahm" is a good example of Mr. Hansom's work, which has come into prominence since the publication of "The Wizard of Berner's Abbey." The dead and mangled body of a man is found in a lonely valley in Surrey, and it is thought that he has been mauled by an escaped wild beast. The inhabitants find themselves in the midst of a reign of terror, which continues until one of their number who has a knowledge of Eastern mysteries discovers the solution. The plot is carefully constructed and the identity of the murderer is not revealed until the last.


The Launceston Examiner, 29 June 1935

In "The Wizard of Berner's Abbey," by Mark Hansom, published by Wright and Brown (London), the assertion of Paul St. Arnaud, the wizard of Berner's Abbey, is that will is the supreme force in the universe - that will can transcend even death - gives the keynote of this tale of mystery and horror. John Richmond, a young medical student, finds himself faced with the apparently hopeless task of freeing a girl from the power of a man who has departed from this life. The ghost of Paul St. Arnaud is finally laid, and the mystery is scientifically ex plained; but in the meantime those concerned pass through horrifying experiences - experiences that the reader shares because of the skill with which the story is told.

The Launceston Examiner, 14 May 1938

"The Madman," by Mark Hansom (Wright and Brown, London). Perhaps it was inevitable that the author of "The Wizard of Berner's Abbey" should turn to the theme of insanity for one of his novels, and in his latest book, "The Madman," he has treated this theme with a high degree of artistic skill, providing a story of unusual interest. The story opens with a piano recital given by Margaret Kerr, a famous artist, where her fiance, a solicitor, learns that an old man has claimed to be a distant relative. He finds that this person is one Silas Goser, destined to be a client of his firm. The career of the mad man provides some exciting episodes before he is finally unmasked in a sensational climax. The narrative is absorbing and well written, dominated by an atmosphere of horror. There is a strong human interest in Mr. Hansom's work-an interest that reaches its height in the superficially casual but tragic conclusion.

Mark Hansom

One writer of supernatural thrillers who remains unidentified is Mark Hansom. Hansom wrote seven novels for the publisher Wright & Brown between 1934 and 1939. The novels are fairly crude but quite entertaining and invariably include sorcerers, magicians and Black Magic, as well as the inevitable girl in distress.

The accepted wisdom is that ‘Mark Hansom’ was a pseudonym, as no eligible person with this name has turned up in genealogical records. The 1911 English census website, now complete and which allows a free name search, has no Mark Hansom though there are several dozen Hansoms listed.

The usual way of tracing author identity is via publishers' records. Unfortunately, the records of Wright & Brown were destroyed along with its offices in 1940 during the Blitz. Ward Lock went up with it. W&B survived the war and continued to publish popular novels, particularly romance, until it wound up in about 1969/70. No one seems to know the whereabuts of the W&B archive following its dissolution and it may have been dumped or destroyed, a great shame if true. A number of W&B authors moved on to Robert Hale, but inquiries there revealed no connection between the two publishers.

Interestingly, all of Hansom’s books were reprinted by Mellifont, which specialised in cheap, abridged reprints. A Canadian book seller has a copy of the Mellifont The Shadow on the House for US$550, a fair whack for a 96 page abridgment. Mellifont had offices in London and Dublin – its entry in the 1953 Writers and Artists Year Book says, “Cheap editions of novels…also cheap edition rights of books previously published.” I’ve no idea if a Mellifont archive survives somewhere, or who, if anyone, acquired the company. Interesting that all the Hansom books were reprinted by Mellifont, at least one as late as 1951. Perhaps he/she was hard up and sold the rights cheaply?

Anyway, without contracts or letters or other documentation Hansom seems doomed to obscurity. Can we tell anything about him/her from the books? Not a lot, I think. He may have been well educated. Hansom includes a Latin quote in Beasts of Brahm, a fun horror tale reprinted by Midnight House in 2001. Arthur and Jeremy break into the evil Count’s house and find a book from which Jeremy reads: "Cum animi e corporum vinculis, tamquam e carcere evolaverint", which is from Cicero's Somnium Scipionis: “Immo vero inquit hi vivunt, qui e corporum vinculis tamquam e carcere evolaverunt.” He had a liking for black magic plots. Probably English.  He knew London well, and was acquainted with the theatre scene.

Why did he stop writing in 1939? Called up to fight? Possibly, though it may well be that he was cut from the W&B list as a result of war time paper restrictions. There is at least one Mark Hansom story in a popular magazine of the day, so he must have had a certain popular profile.

Ascribing authorship is a fun game to play over a pint, but in reality a complete waste of time. So let’s have a go. Are there any obvious contenders? There were dozens of thriller/mystery writers around at the time who churned out novels for W&B, Herbert Jenkins, Jarrolds, Ward Lock etc etc for the circulating library market. What about E. Charles Vivian, born Charles Henry Cannell in 1882? He wrote a celebrated series of supernatural thrillers for W&B under the name Jack Mann - there were 8 Gees novels published between 1936 and 1941. Vivian wrote an Inspector Head novel called Shadow on the House, which was published in the same year as Hansom’s The Shadow on the House. Was he playing games? It’s possible, but the learned opinion of experts is that Hansom’s writing style is less polished than Vivian's.

Who else? The execrable Sydney Horler? Walter S. Masterman, author of some off-beat thrillers? The equally mysterious "Rex Dark" whose Wright & Brown career coincided with Mark Hansom's and whose books were similarly reprinted by Mellifont?  Alan Grant (Gilbert Alan Kennington) of It Walks in the Woods (1936) fame, which was also published by Mellifont. The prolific John Robert Stuart Pringle, who wrote crime thrillers under the name Gerald Verner, amongst other pseudonyms, under which name he edited the anthology of witchcraft stories, Prince of Darkness? Certainly, one of his pseudonyms was "Nigel Vane", which is playfully self-referential, as is "Mark Hansom".  J. Jefferson Farjeon, whose short stories and novels appeared in many of the same places as Hansom's, such as the Australian Woman's Weekly and the Weekly Times, and who published some novels with Wright & Brown? Brenda Cecilia Hopwood, who under the name Patrick Leyton wrote mystery thrillers like Haunted Abbey? Gilderoy Davison, who wrote the Twisted Face novels for Herbert Jenkins? Gret Lane, Francis Duncan, Wyndham Martin, etc etc?

What about Frank King (1892-1958), a doctor from Halifax who turned to writing in the late 1920s? One of his early books was The Ghoul (1928) which was turned into the classic Boris Karloff film in 1933. He also wrote Cagliostro: The Last of the Sorcerers (1929) and the ‘creepy’ Terror at Staurs House (1927). Later he turned to rather innocuous detective stories featuring “The Doormouse”, a Raffles style private detective. He was educated at Rishworth and Bradford schools before studying medicine at Leeds University. He also wrote for Windsor, Story Teller, Cassells, New, Passing Show, amongst others magazines. An interesting guy, worth reading. Is he Mark Hansom? Probably not. In all likelihood Hansom is a complete unknown, someone who turned to writing to make a quick buck in straitened times and managed to do okay for a short period before the war intervened.