The Link

Richard Matheson

2011년 5월 · Rosetta Books

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From the iconic author of I Am Legend: The fascinating, unfinished teleplay of a saga encompassing the Titanic, Jack the Ripper, and the paranormal.
 
Richard Matheson, the celebrated Twilight Zone scripter, explored his interests in metaphysics, spiritualism, and parapsychology in such stories as Hell House, Somewhere in Time, and What Dreams May Come. In the early 1980s, he approached the ABC television network with a twenty-hour mini-series about such phenomena in contemporary times—and included two in-depth historical accounts of the psychic events related to the Jack the Ripper murders and in the Titanic disaster.
 
Titled The Link, Matheson turned in a 557-page outline that ABC executives requested he condense into seven hour-long episodes. Unable to realize his original vision under such restrictions, Matheson abandoned the television project and attempted to novelize the outline. After writing 800 pages that only comprised the first part of the novel, he decided it was too unwieldy and moved on to other stories.
 
Now, Matheson’s fans can discover what might have been with this publication of The Link, which includes the entire original outline as well as part of the teleplay. The story follows Robert Allright, a writer working with paranormal investigator Cathy Graves to decipher a mystery unearthed by his father in an Arizona archeological dig. Allright’s only clue is the mystifying crystal that his father believes is the key to a great discovery.
 
“The author who influenced me the most as a writer was Richard Matheson.” —Stephen King
 
“Matheson peppers [The Link] with innumerable historical incidents of supposed paranormal activity that make fascinating reading.” —Publishers Weekly

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Richard Burton Matheson (born February 20, 1926) is an American author and screenwriter working primarily in the fantasy, horror, and science fiction genres. Between 1950 and 1971, Matheson produced dozens of stories, frequently combining elements from the different genres in which he works, making important contributions to the further development of modern horror. Matheson wrote fourteen episodes for the American television series The Twilight Zone, including the famous "Nightmare at 20,000 Feet." Notably, Steven Spielberg's first full length film (made for television) was based on the story "Duel," for which Matheson also wrote the screenplay.Matheson's first novel, Someone is Bleeding, was published in 1953. His thirty novels since then include The Shrinking Man (filmed as The Incredible Shrinking Man, again adapted from Matheson's own screenplay), and a science fiction/vampire novel, I Am Legend (made into film as The Last Man on Earth, 1964, The Omega Man, 1971, and I Am Legend, 2007).A new film based on Matheson's story "Steel," entitled Real Steel, is a major motion picture that was released in October 2011. His most recent novel, Other Kingdoms, appeared in March 2011.According to film critic Roger Ebert, Matheson's scientific approach to the supernatural in I Am Legend and other novels from the 1950s and '60s anticipated the "pseudorealistic fantasy novels like Rosemary's Baby and The Exorcist." In 2010, Matheson was inducted into the Science Fiction Hall of Fame, and Stephen King has cited Matheson as a creative influence; his novel Cell is dedicated to Matheson along with filmmaker George A. Romero. Author Anne Rice has said that Matheson's short story, "A Dress of White Silk" was a primary early influence on her interest in vampires and fantasy fiction.