Short Fiction · Chapter
The Coming of the Terror explained
The narrator reflects on the secrecy surrounding certain wartime events, describing a mysterious explosion at a munitions factory and a fatal airman accident that may be linked.
What happens
The narrator reflects on the secrecy surrounding certain wartime events, describing a mysterious explosion at a munitions factory and a fatal airman accident that may be linked. He recounts the strict censorship imposed by authorities, including a secret circular that suppressed news of strange occurrences, particularly in the Welsh district of Meirion, where a series of inexplicable calamities began.
Themes in this chapter
The Urban Mystery
The narrator investigates a suspicious explosion in an industrial suburb, encountering a wall of silence and official secrecy.
The Power of Storytelling and Art
The chapter explores how censorship and the suppression of news shape public perception, contrasting printed facts with oral rumor.
Social Decay and Class
The description of Meirion's decaying towns and the contrast between industrial suburbs and sleepy villages highlights social and regional decline.
Key passages
“The horrible detail of faces 'as if they had been bitten to pieces' had made its violent impression on him, that was all.”
The gruesome image of faces appearing as if chewed up had stuck in his mind, but he knew nothing more.
The narrator hears a disturbing secondhand account of the factory explosion.
“For one of those instants which are far shorter than any measure of time there flashed out the possibility of a link between the two disasters.”
For a fleeting moment, he considered that the airman's accident and the factory explosion might be connected.
The narrator begins to suspect a hidden connection between seemingly unrelated events.
“Forbid the Press to mention the fact that Jones has been murdered, and it is marvelous how few people will hear of it, and of those who hear how few will credit the story that they have heard.”
If the press is banned from reporting a murder, remarkably few people learn of it, and even fewer believe the rumors.
The narrator reflects on the power of censorship to suppress knowledge.