The Red Umbrellas

Translated from the Danish, these Gothic tales in the original had a success d'estime. The device is a familiar one. Three people come together to celebrate the birthday of the youngest , a middle aged professor, Charles Iselin; the other two are elderly ladies. The Marchioness Hermione Schnell, who at 80, is still lively, audacious, and in having this party in the midst of cholera struck Copenhagen, defies tradition; and Madame van Hoogland, who is held to her ladyship by some mysterious threat. As the evening progresses they exchange tales, increasingly morbid, and oddly fascinating. One is the story of Charlotte Corday- and her ultimate triumph in revenge. One of the satanic Marques of Zarpada. But the most important of the stories revolves around Alex von Fersen, reputed lover of Marie Antoinette and his closing years. It is on this story that the title is based. The stories told, with their unexplained implications, the trio goes on to the amusement park, Tivoli, and there the Marchioness is, they think, stricken. (That it turns out to be something quite different supplies part of the irony of the finale.) On what is presumably her death bed, her ladyship exchanges confessions with Madame Conradine van der Hoogland - and their youthful past catches up with them. The book has its morbid fascination, but somehow the stories don't quite measure up to the inevitable comparison, Seven Gothic Tales. They lack the finish, the perfection. But- in the midst of most writing today- they have their own distinction. For a definitely intellectual market. (Kirkus Reviews)