“ALAN GRIFF” STORIES
[SHORT-STORIES]
Various short-story readings by Alan Griff, which was the pseudonym of Donald Suddaby, who—
under his own name—wrote juvenile science-fiction in the 1950s and early 60s. (He died in 1964.)
An occasional broadcaster from the Manchester station 2ZY.
[“The House of Desolation”] “Lady Merle and her young daughter are invited to attend the
sixteenth anniversary celebration of the marriage of her friend to a dabbler in the occult. After
arriving at their desolate, oddly-built mansion, Lady Merle and the other guests have trouble
sorting the living from the dead.”
“A group of visitors arrive at Neath's isolated country house - a glacial hall with mazelike
corridors, surrounded by mist. Neath has always had an odd reputation, which he lives up to by
appearing then hiding in the depths of the house when his guests arrive. Even before the death of
his wife, he had been reclusive and strange. If only his wife had been able to bear him a child...”
[The Times, March 20, 1964] “A friend writes: ‘Strongly influenced by H. G. Wells, he was a
brilliantly inventive storyteller. He could picture the planet Venus ruled by a highly intelligent
vegetable life, or a twentieth-century world immobilized through the malicious disintegration of
metal; a man from the future travelling back in time to Edwardian Worcestershire [Village
Fanfare; Magazine version in 1934 was as by Alan Griff], or a group of friends accidentally
diminished in size and fighting out a primitive existence with insects on an English hillside.
“ ‘In everything he wrote…Suddaby showed a distringuished talent for imaginative fantasy.”
[CHRONOLOGY]
(2ZY, MANCHESTER)
[Tuesday—5:00-5:15 PM]
October 12, 1926 “Scarlet Dragon”
[“…a short story written and told by Alan Griff…”]
(2LO, LONDON)
[Saturday—9:15-9:30 PM]
December 3, 1927 “The Castle”
[“…Alan Griff—Reading of a short story…”]
(2GB, DAVENTRY)
[Thursday—8:00-8:30 PM
August 9, 1928 “The Masque of the Red Death” / “The Kingdom”
[“…Two short stories, read by Mr. Alan Griff—‘The Masque of the Red
Death’ (Edgar Allen [sic] Poe); ‘The Kingdom (Alan Griff)…”]
(MIDLAND REGIONAL PROGRAMME)
[Thursday—6:35-6:55 PM]
December 31, 1931 “The Masque of the Red Death”
[“…Alan Griff reading…Edgar Allen [sic] Poe…”]
[Thursday—8:50-9:05 PM]
December 31, 1931 “The Tavern”
[“…Alan Griff reading one of his own stories…”]
[Thursday—8:20-8:40 PM]
February 11, 1932 “The Kingdom”
[“…Alan Griff, reading an original short story, from a studio…”]
[Monday—10:00-10:15 PM]
July 18, 1932 “The Horn”
[“…Alan Griff reading from his own story…”]
[Thursday—10:05-10:35 PM]
January 5, 1933 “The House of Desolation”
[“…a ghost story, written and told by Alan Griff…”]
[SOURCES]
GRIFF, ALAN. “The House of Desolation.” Book (ed. Dorothy L. Sayers).
PERIODICALS: The Times [London].