Judge Pursuivant

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Judge Keith Hilary Pursuivant is a fictional character and a supporting character in a series of stories (1938–41) by American author Manly Wade Wellman (1903–1986). Pursuivant is a retired judge, author, and occult scholar who investigates mysterious supernatural events.

Fictional character biography

Pursuivant is more a mentor to and helper of characters who have become embroiled in occult adventures than a hero per se. He first appears in the short story "The Hairy Ones Shall Dance," first published in 1938 in the weird-fiction

Although referred to in several stories, Judge Pursuivant only actually appeared in four short stories or novellas by Wellman: "The Hairy Ones Shall Dance" (1938), "The Black Drama" (1938), "The Dreadful Rabbits" (1940), and "The Half Haunted" (1941) – all originally published in Weird Tales – and as a supporting character in Wellman's 1982 Silver John novel The Hanging Stones and the John Thunstone novel The School of Darkness. All Wellman's Judge Pursuivant short stories have been collected in Lonely Vigils, and later in Fearful Rock and Other Precarious Locales, Night Shade Books (2001).

Judge Pursuivant also appears as a supporting character in the story "Chastel", not collected in the above volume but in volume one of that series (Third Cry to Legba and other Invocations), originally published in The Year's Best Horror Stories VII (1979).

Judge Pursuivant and his book, "The Unknown that Terrifies" is mentioned in "The Poltergeist of Swan Uppin", a short story of Jules de Grandin by Seabury Quinn.

Bibliography

• "The Hairy Ones Shall Dance," Weird Tales, January, February, and March 1938
• "The Black Drama," Weird Tales, June, July, and August 1938
• "The Dreadful Rabbits", Weird Tales 1940
• "The Half Haunted", Weird Tales 1941

References

External links

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Judge Pursuivant

• Voice of the Mountains - fan site