In Arthur Machen’s The Hill of Dreams, a young writer is haunted by the presence of a ruin near his rural home. Whenever he visits the ruin, it carries him off to ancient Rome. His visions are vibrant and sensual and all-encompassing. Years later, when he moves to London, the pressure to write something of literary merit and the isolation of being friendless in a metropolis takes their toll on him. He becomes drawn into a whirlpool of altered realities that threaten not only his sanity but his life. The Hill of Dreams is a marvelously atmospheric novel that has influenced writers from Lord Dun