“The Yellow Book” A Spectral Mystery in Two Acts

…or Le Roi en Jaune, The King in Yellow, His Tattered Mantle, Decadence, The Pallid Mask...

1893 – A young English heir goes missing in Paris, leading the protagonists through a decadent art scene gripped by the publication of a forbidden play that provokes madness and despair.

The HookHenry Marlborough, a young artist, and son of Lord Marlborough, has disappeared in the decadent art scene of Paris.

The Horrible TruthHenry Marlborough became involved in a Parisian artistic circle, influenced by a decadent play, The King in Yellow, which the government and the Church are desperately trying to suppress. His/Her fate was X.

Exposure to the mysterious Yellow Sign and to the play itself calls into question the nature of truth itself.

(Timeline)1883: Oscar Wilde in France. (Is there an early draft of the KiY in circulation at this time – or The Yellow Sign? Does the Brotherhood form at this time or is it ancient? )1884: Huysmans publishes À Rebours1886: Chambers arrives in Paris1891: Schwob prepares first drafts of Le Roi en Jaune (KiY in French), which he shares with his friend Oscar Wilde. Inspired by Le Roi en Jaune and its effects on people (including himself) OW publishes The Picture of Dorian Gray.1892: Le Roi en Jaune published by Marcel Schwob followed by "Le Roi au masque d'or".1893: Salome (also influenced by King in Yellow) published by Oscar Wilde. Chambers leaves Paris. Death of Schwob’s Louise (Monelle), mourning.Year of events of scenario1894: Schwob becomes ill.1895: Now back in the US, Robert W Chambers publishes his translation The King in Yellow. OW imprisoned. 11 February 1896: Salome premieres in Paris

KiY Story Timeline

The Mask – 1893, ParisRepairer – 1895, NYThe Yellow Sign – 1896, NYThe Court of the Dragon - 1893?, Paris

The SpineAct One

Briefing in LondonInterviews in EnglandInterviews with police in ParisThey find ‘The Portrait of Rue Baree’ (featuring him)Interviews with members of artistic circle in Paris, some people have found strange and troubling fates (use Noir leveraging of weaknesses)Hear of ‘The King in yellow’Hear of ‘Rue Baree’ ?Those who have read the play are followed/investigated a pallid strangerOther supernatural events and growing evidence that apparent reality is a kind of theatrical illusionContacted by French government agent: will they help find/suppress publication? Does he want them to pose as potential customers or similar?Climax at the publication house[How are they – or some of them – exposed to the play?]Clues there to secretive annual meeting/performance in Rome

Act Two

Agent puts them in touch with Vatican agentBriefing by Vatican agent about secret society that holds a masked ball (The White Masquerade) once a year. Asks their help by infiltrating it. The agent cannot do this himself due to his monastic vows. Perhaps they must read the play in order to infiltrate. Perhaps there are police coming in from the outside. Perhaps they are impersonating a specific English nobleman (arrested/delayed at the border)Investigation of secret society membersInfiltration of MasqueVarious IntriguesPerformance of Play is Dark Epiphany: Curtain opens, (to those who have read the play) revealing an audience behind it. Figures in the masked crowd start acting out events from the play, announcing the coming of the king in Yellow etc. The “audience” members gasp and some leave the “theatre”. The investigators must choose to remain

on this side of the curtain or flee. One choice may represent permanent insanity, while the other represents hope.On the other hand, Henry Marlborough (or Rue Baree) is glimpsed in the crowd. Perhaps Henry Marlborough is also glimpsed in the “audience”, depending on who is looking

Act 3?

Will they try to save him? How? This implies that the party may split into two at this stage. Investigators who are missing may be replaced by new characters.

Victory ConditionsFinding out what happened to Henry Marlborough.

Shutting down the French publishers of the play

Identifying the Brotherhood of the Yellow Sign as the origin of the version translated from Italian (Latin?) into French and English.

Disrupting the performance of the play by the Brotherhood of the Yellow Sign in Rome

Remaining sane, or at least staying in contact with the consensual view of reality.

Antagonist ReactionsThe publication house in France

The Brotherhood of the Yellow Sign

Running this ScenarioThis scenario is intended to cause the investigators to become increasingly disorientated about what is and is not real. Are they experiencing something supernatural or are they going mad? Are they delusional or are their companions delusional?

To further this end, investigator Stability and Sanity scores should be kept hidden. When a Stability test is called for, don’t tell the players how many points are at stake; ask the players if they’d like to spend points on the test as usual, but roll secretly on their behalf and keep track of their remaining points. Sanity and Stability scores will have an important effect on their experience of events in the second half of the scenario, after exposure to the Yellow Sign.

Chamber’s The King in YellowI'm unsatisfied with the way they have often been interpreted by post-Lovecraftian writers and I'm trying to recover the feel of the original stories (without repeating them) and I was hoping to hear your impressions 

For me, the King in Yellow him/itself is an archetype or personification of spiritual evil (and death and madness). What I mean is that, it is primarily a private and intensely personal experience - either of being hunted as 'prey' or of entitlement. Some (those who surrender to him? the insane?) experience him as great and majestic. Others experience him as terrifying. He exists 'spiritually' in the mind and through visions of Carcosa, the Lake of Hali etc. Whether that means he exists psychologically or in some spectral dimension or is communicating telepathically from another galaxy not absolutely clear is ambiguous.

As cosmic/spiritual predator (with aspects of judge too) he is somewhat like Bob from Twin Peaks, Freddy Kruger, Satan or the more fearful aspects of Yahweh. Unlike Freddy Kruger however, even in wakefulness there is no escape from his labyrinthine but inevitable hunt. He also seems to manifest on earth or at least act on earth through pale/dead-faced strangers (appearing in two stories and seemingly within the play itself). In at least one of these cases this manifestation seems to have been a possessed corpse. Could this also be why Cassilda thinks the Stranger is wearing a mask when she is actually looking at his face?

The play itself is a device that allows people to see into the King in Yellow's world but allows him to see into them too. The Yellow Sign seems may perform a similar function - granting the KiY and his servants control over people or drawing Him closer to his prey. At other times it seems to have little or no effect. In the Yellow Sign, the painter seems to attract the attention of the KiY without (yet) having read the play or (yet) having found the Yellow Sign (but I need to check this). There is something fateful, inevitable about the influence of the King.

If the visions and beliefs of those affected by the King in Yellow are literally correct then He seems

to emanate from Carcosa - a lost, dead city located near the Hyades or Adebaran in the constellation of Taurus. An alien intelligence that reaches across the gulfs of space to haunt, hunt and control the souls of his victims. If the events hinted at in the play are literally true, it's not clear where they occur or when. But he seems to take over a palace/city/nation/world in some dreadful and inevitable way. The King seems to manifest in the play in a more literal way (although I may be getting confused between what the stories actually say and later elaborations about the play).

The Yellow Sign

The Pallid Mask

The King in Yellow (the Entity)

The King in Yellow (the Play)

Carcosa

Chambers’ ParisBlending of history and fiction

Rule ChangesSanityDrivingCarcosa MythosSeduction

ScenesBriefing

Witnesses of the Disappeared HeirLeads: The Play and its effects, the man in the painting, the Sharer, a copy of the play 

A copy of the playLeads: Marcel Schwob? Robert Chambers? (if the English version), the publisher

The SharerAn influential figure who has been sharing/promoting the play in Paris,Leads: copies of the play (French and English), the book-store, the distributor

The "Author": Marcel SchwobLeads: ancient origins of the play, effects of play on health, Publisher, Distributor, possessed by a work the pre-dated his adaptation

Oscar Wilde

Robert W Chambers

Paris Book StoreIn Latin Quarter, sells all manner of decadent literature, pornography etcLeads: copies of the play, Paris distributor

Paris Distributor of the play the copies disappear before the raid, but maybe a clue is left (the invitation?)

A Break-In

The ShadowLeads: clasp with the Yellow Sign

The Publisher (Rome or the border area with France, the Alps or the Torino area). Do they also publish the English version? This is where the Vatican may get involved. Invitation to the Masque

The Masque