Masquerade Artwork (1979)

I have such fond memories of this strangely occult and pagan-themed book, which I remember leafing through with amazement whilst at Junior school. After decades mostly out of the public eye, the iconic treasure from Masquerade resurfaced on the market and now belongs to a collector once more. In November 2025, Sotheby’s offered the same golden hare at auction again. The pendant originally sold for £31,900 in 1988, but this time it fetched £82,550, well above its pre-sale estimate. It was bought by a private collector in Great Britain.

Masquerade is a beautifully illustrated puzzle book created in 1979 by the English artist Kit Williams. At first glance it looks like a whimsical fairy tale about a small hare named Jack who travels through a dreamlike world, but every page is quietly doing something else: hiding clues. Williams embedded riddles in the paintings, borders, and lettering so that careful readers could piece together a set of directions leading to a real, physical treasure.

That treasure was a small golden hare pendant, made of 18-carat gold and decorated with jewels. Williams buried it somewhere in the English countryside and announced that whoever solved the puzzle in the book could claim it. The idea captured the public imagination. Hundreds of thousands of people studied the illustrations with magnifying glasses, looking for patterns, hidden words, and visual jokes that might reveal the location. After nearly three years, the hare was found in Ampthill Park in Bedfordshire, though the circumstances of its discovery later caused controversy, since it was revealed that the finder had been tipped off rather than having fully solved the puzzle as intended.

The book itself became a cultural phenomenon. It essentially invented what is now called the “armchair treasure hunt,” a genre where readers try to solve elaborate puzzles from home using only what is hidden in a book. Even today, Masquerade is admired not just as a clever game but as a work of art, full of intricate, symbolic paintings that reward close attention.

Kit Williams, the creator of Masquerade, was born in 1946 in Kent, England. Trained as an artist, he wrote and illustrated the book entirely on his own, combining traditional painting techniques with a love of riddles, myths, and visual storytelling. After the success of Masquerade, he went on to design elaborate mechanical clocks for public buildings and continued working as a fine artist, producing detailed figurative paintings in oils. His reputation rests largely on how he merged art, story, and puzzle into a single experience, turning a picture book into one of the most famous real-world treasure hunts in history.

Hitchcock goes Gothic: Stoker (2013)

Good film for the winter break! Park Chan-wook’s Stoker (2013) is drenched in the eerie, simmering suspense that defined Alfred Hitchcock’s best psychological thrillers. While its surface may feel like a gothic coming-of-age story, the film is deeply rooted in Hitchcockian techniques; slow-burning tension, voyeuristic framing, twisted family dynamics, and a creeping sense of menace that lurks beneath polished exteriors. It’s a film that feels like a dark cousin to Shadow of a Doubt (1943), infused with the psychological complexity of Psycho (1960) and the hypnotic dread of Vertigo (1958). But rather than being a simple homage, Stoker takes Hitchcock’s blueprint and warps it into something even more unsettling, merging it with the deep shadows and doomed beauty of Gothic fiction.

From the start, Stoker builds tension not through explosive confrontations but through carefully controlled suspense. The protagonist, India Stoker (Mia Wasikowska), is a quiet, withdrawn teenager struggling with the sudden death of her father. Enter Uncle Charlie (Matthew Goode), a long-lost relative whose charm is as impeccable as his intentions are dubious. Hitchcock was a master of letting danger simmer beneath the surface, and Park follows suit; Charlie’s presence is both alluring and ominous, and every interaction is filled with an unnerving stillness. Like Joseph Cotten’s charming yet sinister Uncle Charlie in Shadow of a Doubt, Goode’s version exudes a calm, predatory patience, luring India into his web with an almost hypnotic control.

Nowhere is Hitchcock’s influence more evident than in the film’s exploration of family as a source of unease. Hitchcock had an enduring fascination with twisted family relationships; whether it was the suffocating bond between Norman Bates and his mother in Psycho, or the psychological control exerted in Rebecca (1940). In Stoker, India’s relationship with her mother, Evelyn (Nicole Kidman), becomes increasingly fraught as both women navigate the unsettling presence of Uncle Charlie. But it’s the relationship between India and Charlie that drips with the most Hitchcockian tension; a mix of seduction, manipulation, and an almost telepathic connection that borders on the supernatural. Like many of Hitchcock’s most memorable characters, India is not a passive victim but someone undergoing a transformation, embracing the darkness within her rather than simply fleeing from it.

This is also what makes Stoker deeply Gothic; not just aesthetically, but thematically. It channels the hallmarks of Gothic fiction: eerie mansions, twisted family secrets, psychological torment, and an overwhelming sense of fatalism. The Stoker estate is a grand, isolated house with shadowy corridors, labyrinthine spaces, and an atmosphere thick with repressed emotions. It’s a classic Gothic trope; the house as both a physical and psychological trap, much like Manderley in Rebecca or Thornfield Hall in Jane Eyre. It’s where dark secrets fester and where characters are slowly consumed by their own desires and fears.

Then there’s the film’s obsession with bloodlines and inheritance; not just of wealth, but of violence. India Stoker’s journey mirrors that of many Gothic heroines, caught in the web of her family’s disturbing past while awakening to her own unsettling nature. Like in Wuthering Heights or The Fall of the House of Usher, the past isn’t just a memory; it’s an inescapable force, shaping the present and dooming the future. Uncle Charlie himself is a classic Gothic figure: the seductive yet menacing stranger who arrives at a vulnerable moment, much like Max de Winter in Rebecca or Count Dracula in Dracula. He exudes charm and danger in equal measure, his presence both irresistible and deeply unsettling. His influence over India is not just psychological but almost supernatural in its inevitability; another key Gothic trait, where fate looms over characters like an inescapable curse.

Visually, Stoker mirrors Hitchcock’s signature use of space and framing to create psychological unease. Park employs voyeuristic compositions, isolating characters in the frame, positioning them just slightly out of sync with their surroundings, making them feel watched even when they are seemingly alone. The film lingers on silent, loaded glances, revelling in what is left unsaid. This is Hitchcock’s Rear Window (1954) voyeurism taken to a new extreme; India is both observer and observed, her transformation unfolding under our gaze like a slow-motion car crash. The film also shares Hitchcock’s love of suggestive symbolism, from the use of shoes as a visual metaphor for India’s evolution to the blood-like spattering of red that punctuates the film’s otherwise restrained colour palette.

At the heart of Stoker is Hitchcock’s signature theme: the duality of human nature. India is not a simple victim, and Uncle Charlie is not just a villain; there’s a shifting power dynamic between them that keeps the film teetering on the edge of eroticism and horror. Hitchcock loved characters whose surfaces betrayed little of the chaos within; James Stewart’s obsessive detective in Vertigo, Cary Grant’s morally ambiguous hero in Notorious; and Park plays with that ambiguity here. Matthew Goode’s Charlie is all charm and poise, but there’s something reptilian underneath, an echo of Anthony Perkins’ performance in Psycho; polite, smiling, and utterly untrustworthy.

While Stoker wears its Hitchcockian influences on its immaculately tailored sleeve, it never feels derivative. Instead, Park Chan-wook takes Hitchcock’s themes and dials them up, stripping away the veneer of restraint that characterized much of Hitchcock’s work. Where Hitchcock would imply, Park lingers. Where Hitchcock would cut away, Park watches. The result is a film that feels both familiar and alien, a love letter to classic suspense cinema that mutates into something even darker.

If The Wonder (2022) is a slow-burning meditation on belief and control, Stoker is its eerie cousin, exploring those same themes through the lens of psychological horror. Both films thrive on tension, lingering in the space between knowing and unknowing, between observer and observed. But where The Wonder ultimately seeks revelation, Stoker embraces the abyss, revelling in the Hitchcockian thrill of descent; only this time, with lace gloves and a funeral veil.

Young America’s Dilemma (1901)

The cartoon “Young America’s Dilemma (Shall I be Wise and Great, or Rich and Powerful?)” is a chromolithograph by Louis Dalrymple that appeared as an illustration in Puck magazine in 1901. It was published in New York by Keppler & Schwarzmann, the firm that owned and issued Puck at the time.

Regrettably, America made its decision.

Before the Diversity Editors Arrived I

 

Ida Rentoul Outhwaite (1888–1960)

Ida Rentoul Outhwaite (1888–1960) was one of Australia’s most beloved illustrators, best known for her enchanting depictions of fairies, elves, and the natural world. Her work helped shape early 20th-century Australian children’s literature and remains admired for its delicate beauty and imaginative charm.

Born Ida Sherbourne Rentoul in Melbourne, she grew up in a creative and literary family. Her father, the Reverend Dr. John Laurence Rentoul, was a noted Presbyterian minister and academic, and her sister, Annie R. Rentoul, became a writer. The two sisters often collaborated; Annie writing the stories and Ida illustrating them. From a young age, Ida showed remarkable artistic talent; her first published illustration appeared when she was just 15.

Outhwaite rose to prominence during the Edwardian and interwar periods, when fairy art and children’s fantasy were enjoying great popularity. Her illustrations often featured ethereal fairy figures nestled in distinctly Australian landscapes; among gum trees, native flowers, and animals like koalas and kookaburras. This blend of European fairy imagery with Australian flora and fauna gave her work a unique identity.

Some of her most famous works include “Elves and Fairies” (1916), “The Enchanted Forest” (1921), “Fairyland” (1926), and “The Little Green Road to Fairyland” (1922). These books combined her luminous pen-and-ink drawings and watercolours with stories by her sister Annie or other collaborators. Elves and Fairies in particular was a landmark; one of the first large-format art books printed in Australia, and an expensive luxury edition at the time, now highly collectible.

In 1909, Ida married Arthur Grenbry Outhwaite, who became both her supporter and a frequent collaborator; some works were credited jointly to “Grenbry and Ida Rentoul Outhwaite.” Together they had four children, who occasionally served as models for her fairy illustrations.

Her art is characterised by fine, detailed linework and soft washes of colour, creating an otherworldly but tender atmosphere. Critics have often noted her ability to balance whimsy with a sense of quiet realism; her fairies seem to belong to the bush as naturally as any native bird. This helped root fantasy art in an Australian sensibility and made her a pioneer of what might be called Australian fairy imagery.

By the late 1930s, her style fell somewhat out of fashion as modernism took hold, and she produced fewer works after World War II. However, her illustrations remain iconic in Australian visual culture. Today, original Outhwaite books and prints are treasured collectors’ items, and her influence can still be seen in Australian fantasy illustration.

Kloster Antoniusstein & Wolfsschlucht

Hidden deep in the Brohltal valley, where steep cliffs of volcanic tuff and moss-covered stones bear the marks of ancient eruptions, lie the quiet remains of Kloster Antoniusstein, also known as the Tönisstein Monastery. Today, it is only a ruin; a hauntingly beautiful echo of a time when monks prayed in its vaulted halls and pilgrims climbed through the valley to seek healing, solace, and perhaps a miracle.

According to legend, the story began around the year 1388. A shepherd from the nearby village of Kell stumbled upon a strange vision: a burning thorn bush in which a Pietà appeared; the Virgin Mary cradling the body of Christ; while St. Antonius knelt in prayer before her. It was said that this miraculous sign marked the place as holy, and soon a small chapel was built there, dedicated to Mary, St. Antonius, and St. Wendelin. When it was consecrated in 1390, the valley began to draw pilgrims who came to see the sacred image and to pray in the solitude of the forested gorge.

By 1465, the site had gained enough renown that the Carmelite Order received permission to establish a full monastery on the spot. Over the following decades, the monks constructed a church and convent buildings out of the volcanic stone that surrounded them. They led a contemplative life, but they were also practical men, drawing water from nearby springs such as the Helpert source, which was already known by 1501 for its supposed healing powers. Centuries later, the same mineral waters would help turn the surrounding area into a spa region under the Elector-Archbishops of Cologne, linking faith and health in the fertile imagination of the Eifel landscape.

For several hundred years the monastery flourished quietly. Pilgrims came and went, the monks tended their gardens, and the sound of the nearby Tönissteiner Bach mingled with the chanting of psalms. But in 1802, everything changed. During the period of secularization that swept across German lands in the wake of Napoleon’s campaigns, Kloster Antoniusstein was dissolved. The Carmelites were forced to leave, and the property passed into state hands. The Prussian authorities later sold it in 1819, and without its caretakers the monastery began to decay. Stones were taken to build other structures, and the site slowly turned from sacred ground into a picturesque ruin.

What remains today are fragments of that once-spiritual world; walls up to eight meters high, traces of vaulted cellars, and outlines of the old cloisters. The ruins stand quietly amid trees and ferns, with the murmur of the Tönissteiner Bach flowing past, the same stream that once powered the monastery’s mill below. If you wander here, you can still sense the shape of the old church and imagine the lives that unfolded within its walls: the rituals of prayer, the echo of bells, the rhythm of devotion against the backdrop of volcanic cliffs.

The famous Pietà that inspired the founding of the monastery no longer rests in the gorge. It now resides safely in the parish church of St. Lubentius in Kell, a few kilometers away, still drawing quiet reverence from those who know its story. Visitors today reach the site by forest trails that weave through the Brohltal Geopark; paths that not only lead to the ruins but also reveal the geological wonders of the Eifel, where layers of ash and pumice tell the story of fire beneath the earth.

To visit Kloster Antoniusstein is to step into a landscape where nature and history intertwine. The forest reclaims the stones, ivy drapes over crumbling arches, and the sound of water echoes through the gorge just as it did six hundred years ago. It is a place of stillness, where the spiritual past feels close enough to touch, and where the silence of the monastery lives on in the whisper of the wind and the flow of the stream.

English translation:

Board 1 – Route U “Lower Brohl Valley” – Point U6: Tuff Wall and Cascades

National Geopark VULCANIC LAND EIFFEL
Brohltal Volcanic Park / Laacher See

Because of deposits from glowing clouds (pyroclastic flows) during the Laacher See eruptions, this valley was also filled up.

Over thousands of years, the stream has cut its way back into the deposits. When observing the tuff wall – also quarried in this area – one can recognize a repeated alternation between fine ash and coarse pumice layers.

The deposits occurred in surges, so that the flow was made up of multiple flow units.
In the nearby “Wolfsschlucht” (Wolf’s Gorge), one can observe in just a few hundred meters how smaller stream forms emerge from these flows, during the cutting process of the stream.

In this side valley, the stream cuts through ash streams from the Laacher See eruption down to the underlying bedrock.

Photo captions:

• View of alternating layers of material flows

• Light pumice pieces in the upper area of a flow unit

• Cascades of the Tönisstein stream

The valley continues downward over several small waterfalls, merging from several smaller sections where the stream has little gradient.

At a small slope, streams and creeks often form many winding bends, called meanders. Such formations can also be seen here.

In some areas, the valley forms a stepped structure, where the stream flows in cascades (from the Latin cascata = fall). At the foot of these cascades, the water often carves deeper into the soft ash layers and creates hollows and small caves.

The water flow accelerates locally in small rapids due to the unevenness of the bed. When such rapids occur in a larger river, they are called cataracts (from Greek katarrhous = waterfall). Famous, much larger examples are the Cataracts of the Nile in Egypt and Sudan.

Information and guidebook
for the Geo-Routes are available at:
Tourist Information Brohltal
Kapellenstraße 12, 56651 Niederzissen
Tel. 0 26 36 / 1 94 33
www.brohltal.de · tourist@brohltal.de

English translation:

Board 2 – Route U “Lower Brohl Valley” – Point U7: Waterfall at the End of Wolf’s Gorge

“Stream Fall” at the End of the Quarry Area

The small Tönisstein stream, coming from higher up, had difficulty cutting its way through the tuff into the water-rich Brohlbach, into which it flows.

Over its course, it has created three steps, between which there are relatively flat sections. The uppermost of these steps forms a waterfall, which the stream “overcomes”.

This wild-romantic waterfall step has gradually receded upstream over time, as can also be observed with larger waterfalls.

A famous example of such a retreating waterfall are the Niagara Falls in North America.

Photo captions:

• Cascades

• Cross-section through the ash flow in the Wolf’s Gorge

Above the waterfall step, the Tönisstein stream flows in a wide, flat bed of stream gravel about 2–3 m thick, which in turn lies on the surface of the ash flow.

Cross-section through the Wolf’s Gorge

This diagram shows how the Tönisstein stream has cut its way through the relatively soft tuff down to the Devonian bedrock.

The basaltic blocks that hikers can find along the stream-bed come from the reinforcement of the road embankment.