Story summary
Samenvatting van De nieuwe terreur
- 8 min. leestijd
- 8 parts
- Binnenkort te beluisteren
On her wedding night, Cordélia goes cold and rigid, while her mind walks a moonlit park with a painter.
3 months free · unlimited eBooks, audiobooks and summaries, and print and large print at cost
Nothing to pay today · We mailen je voordat je betaalt · Online opzeggen in twee klikken
De nieuwe terreur in het kort
Samenvatting: 8 min leestijd
- Leestijd
- Ongeveer 2 h 45 min2 h 10 min fast, 3 h 15 min slow
- Lengte
- 38.900 woorden
- Bibliotheekniveau
- Gemiddeld longer sentences, everyday words
Reading time at 238 words a minute (fast 300, slow 200). Hoelang het duurt om de klassiekers te lezen · Bijgewerkt
3 maanden gratis
Ontvang de volledige samenvatting van De nieuwe terreur, gratis
- 200.000+ klassiekers als e-books, luisterboeken en samenvattingen in 15 minuten, en gedrukte boeken, ook in grote letters, tegen drukkosten
- Tot 5 lezers bij je thuis met één plan
De nieuwe terreur in short
The New Terror follows a plain, strong man through a haunting he cannot see. Hector loves Cordélia, but a painter named Patrick holds her mind through letters, a portrait and a power of suggestion. Dr.
What De nieuwe terreur is about
What would you do if your bride went cold in your arms on the wedding night, her lips like stone, while her mind walked somewhere else? That is the problem facing Hector, a broad-shouldered sportsman who trusts muscles, fresh air and common sense. He has no answer for a woman whose soul seems to leave her body.
Gaston Leroux, who also wrote The Phantom of the Opera, wrote The New Terror as a gothic tale of psychic obsession. Hector tells it himself from a prison cell, after a trial that leaves the court baffled. Two short tales follow, each told by someone who has seen a hidden secret.
Voor wie is het?. Readers who love ghostly mysteries, jealous lovers and uncanny science from the age of séances and hypnotism will enjoy this book.
The story in 8 parts
Key idea 1 · free to read
A sportsman loves a girl who paints souls
Hector is twelve and his cousin Cordélia eight when friends call them a charming couple. She once asks him to dream with her, and he stands silent beside her, pretending. She laughs at him.
When the two ask to marry at once, the elders put it off for five years and send Hector to America, then to military service, then to America again. While he is away, both his parents die in an influenza epidemic. He keeps account books, and beside the day's spending he writes short notes about Cordélia.
Cordélia paints him from memory and sends the picture across the ocean. Then her letters change. She asks for it back, because a portrait should show the soul. Hector cannot see how anyone paints something invisible. He decides she thinks too much, and he plans to put her back on a horse. At twenty-four he sails for Havre. She is not on the pier.
A man who trusts only his eyes loves a woman who looks beyond them.
- 2Begin gratis met lezen
An empty house, a stranger, and a gift
At Havre, an old servant named Surdon meets Hector instead of Cordélia.
- 3Begin gratis met lezen
The portrait grows cold and a bride turns to stone
In a quiet corner of the park, Hector's uncle tells him a story he calls of no consequence.
- 4Begin gratis met lezen
Cordélia's double meets Patrick in the golden chamber
By the next morning, Cordélia seems cured, yet Hector cannot explain the gratitude he sees in her eyes.
- 5Begin gratis met lezen
A tour of Europe cannot outrun the polygon
In Paris, Hector meets Dr. Thurel by chance.
- 6Begin gratis met lezen
A dinner for two ends in a challenge
Surdon has followed Patrick's gondola to the Grand Hotel.
- 7Begin gratis met lezen
A one-armed captain tells his one story
The book moves to Toulon.
- 8Begin gratis met lezen
A mourning lady throws a gift into the lake
The last tale is set in Gersau, a small resort on Lake Lucerne, in late autumn.
Read all 8 key ideas now
3 months free, then USD 0,14 a day: unlimited eBooks, audiobooks and summaries, and print and large print at cost.
- Nothing to pay today
- We mailen je voordat je betaalt
- Online opzeggen in twee klikken
Characters, plot and themes
Main characters
- Hector A sturdy, sport-loving young man who trusts common sense and wants only to marry his cousin and ride off on a honeymoon.
- Cordélia Hector's cousin and bride, a gifted painter and musician, drawn to the unseen world and pulled between two loves.
- Patrick A gifted English painter with burning eyes, who claims a bond of minds with Cordélia that no wall or distance can break.
- Dr. Thurel A pale old doctor from Rouen who explains the strange events through hypnotism, the aura and the polygon of the mind.
- Surdon The loyal old servant who tells little, watches closely and follows Patrick's trail through Venice for his master.
- Captain Michel A one-armed old sailor in Toulon who has one story to tell and wants to be believed.
- Elizabeth A widow in deep mourning who plays Schumann beautifully and sets out to learn why her kind husband seems so haunted.
- Herbert Gutmann Elizabeth's gentle husband from Todtnau, who keeps a locked study and a secret he cannot bring himself to speak.
How it ends (spoiler)
In the novella, the duel's bullet strikes Cordélia's astral form and kills her in the hotel room. Patrick is tried and acquitted, then visits Hector and soon dies, while Hector plans to follow her. In A Terrible Tale, the castaways of a shipwreck survived by eating one another's limbs and still meet to feast, and they take Michel's arm. In The Gold Axe, Elizabeth's husband is the public executioner who beheads Müller, and he hangs himself.
The whole book is coming to your plan
The full text of De nieuwe terreur opens soon. Keep this summary as a file today.
Paperback, hardcover and large print, printed for you at cost, are on their way. Email me when it is printed
Vragen over De nieuwe terreur
What is The New Terror about?
It is a gothic novella in which a sportsman named Hector marries his cousin Cordélia, only to find that her mind is bound to an English painter. The book adds two short horror tales, A Terrible Tale and The Gold Axe.
Who is Patrick in The New Terror?
Patrick is an English painter with burning, catlike eyes. He teaches Cordélia, sends her a glowing portrait of herself, and claims a bond of minds that lets him draw her sensibility across any distance.
What do the O and the polygon mean in the story?
Dr. Thurel takes them from Dr. Grasset. The O stands for willed, conscious thought. The polygon stands for the lower nerve centers that act almost automatically and can be steered when the O is distracted or controlled by another.
Is The New Terror a true story and when was it written?
No, it is fiction. Leroux, who died in 1927, borrows real names from the psychic science of his day, such as Charcot, Grasset, de Rochas and Crookes, to give Hector's account the feel of testimony.
What other stories are in the collection?
Two short tales follow the novella. A Terrible Tale is told by a one-armed sea captain in Toulon, and The Gold Axe is told by a pianist in mourning beside Lake Lucerne. Both are brief and clearly told.
Verwijs naar deze uitgave
Leroux, Gaston. The New Terror. Library of Alexandria, 2026, libraryofalexandria.com/products/the-new-terror.
Leroux, G. (2026). The new terror. Library of Alexandria. https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/the-new-terror
Leroux, Gaston. The New Terror. Library of Alexandria, 2026. https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/the-new-terror.
@book{leroux2026new,
author = {Leroux, Gaston},
title = {The New Terror},
publisher = {Library of Alexandria},
year = {2026},
url = {https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/the-new-terror}
}
Crime and Punishment
Wuthering Heights
Pride and Prejudice
The Iliad
Romeo and Juliet
The Picture of Dorian Gray3 maanden gratis
Ontvang de volledige samenvatting van De nieuwe terreur, gratis
- 200.000+ klassiekers als e-books, luisterboeken en samenvattingen in 15 minuten, en gedrukte boeken, ook in grote letters, tegen drukkosten
- Tot 5 lezers bij je thuis met één plan
