Anonymous – Ghost Stories

[dem]

Anonymous (Mary Danby?) – Ghost Stories ( Cathay, 1984: Octopus, 1982)

llustrations by Ian McCraig

H. P. Lovecraft – The Music of Erich Zann
Charles Dickens – The Ghost in the Bride’s Chamber
M. R. James – A School Story
Oscar Wilde – The Canterville Ghost
Edgar Allan Poe – The Tell-Tale Heart
R. Chetwynd-Hayes – The Cat Room
Catherine Crowe – The Monk’s Story
Saki – Laura
Fritz Leiber – Smoke Ghost
Frederick Marryat – The Phantom Ship
Leon Garfield – An Adelaide Ghost
E. Nesbit – Man-Size In Marble
Hugh Walpole – A Little Ghost
Rosemary Timperley – The Mistress in Black
Guy de Maupassant – An Apparition
Penelope Lively – The Ghost of Thomas Kempe (extract)
Algernon Blackwood – The Occupant of the Room
Jerome K. Jerome – The Haunted Mill
Elizabeth Le Fanu – The Harpsichord
J. S. Le Fanu – The White Cat of Drumgunniol
W. W. Jacobs – The Three Sisters
Joan Aiken – Sonata For Harp and Bicycle

Another of the 'eighties supermarket specials (Mary Danby's 65 Great series, Deborah Shine's Haunting Ghost Stories, Tales From Beyond The Grave, Chamber Of Horrors & Co.), not one of the essential titles, perhaps, but a solid compilation, makes for a decent introduction to the genre.

R. Chetwynd-Hayes – The Cat Room: (Armada Ghost Book #12, ed. Mary Danby, 1980: Frights and Fancies, 2002). When the Goodridges move into Balaclava Cottage, young Sabrina insists on taking the room with the creepy wallpaper, despite her parents' warning that "those cat's heads will drive you crazy." So it nearly proves. At night, the wall-paper comes alive, each of the felines opening their mouths wide in silent scream as a huge black monster moggy materialises before the fireplace. Mrs Coggins the housekeeper, who speaks like nobody on earth, lets on that Sabrina's recently deceased Great-Great Grandfather was a Warlock. All is explained in a passage from Conrad Von Holstein's Elemental Entitiies And Their Retainment (RCH's answer to The Necronomicon).

Saki - Laura: Laura isn't one to let a minor hindrance like death come between her and persecution of the despised Egbert. Reincarnated as an otter, she takes up where she left off, butchering his beloved Speckled Sussex hens and trampling the prize flowerbeds. Egbert sets loose the hounds, but that only makes things worse.

Rosemary Timperley - The Mistress In Black: Miss Joanna Carey was an excellent teacher, popular with staff and pupils until the collapse of her ten year affair with a married man. Miss Carey became so disillusioned with her lot that she soaked the gym curtains in petrol and attempted to burn down the school. Tragically, Jane Hanley, a girl who had developed an obsessive crush on her, died along with the mad mistress.

Miss Anderson, the young woman who takes over her class, has no inkling of this tragedy when she begins her new job, but she's not to be kept in the dark for long. Happy ending put me in a bad mood.

Leon Garfield - An Adelaide Ghost: "From his outlandish costume, I took him to be a disused actor, who, having fallen on bad times, was busy making the most of them." Two hundred years ago, career thief 'Gentleman George' Barrington was transported to Botany Bay. Now he picks pockets in the hope some spectral magistrate will deport him back to Dublin for a reunion with his true love, actress Mary Egerton, the original 'Sweet Molly Malone.' Another cheery one, though Gentleman George has the class to present a truly revolting spectre when caught in a certain light.

[Jojo Lapin X]

Who is Elizabeth Le Fanu?

[dem]

According to the notes at back of The Times Anthology Of Ghost Stories:

"Elizabeth LeFanu is better known as the composer Elizabeth Machonchy. Her husband, William, is a great-nephew of J. S. LeFanu, author of Uncle Silas. The Harpsichord was written as a diversion for her older daughter. Anna, her younger daughter is also a composer."

I'm not sure Elizabeth has written anything else in the field bar this gentle ghost story, incredibly preferred by Times Ghost Story judges Kingsley Amis, Patricia Highsmith & Sir. C. Lee over Ramsey Campbell's In The Bag and Roger Johnson's The Scarecrow.

[Jojo Lapin X]

Thanks! She certainly knew which name to use in this particular context.

[dem]

Joan Aiken - Sonata For Harp and Bicycle: Yet another insanely jolly one, this time a Christmas Ghost rom-com. the gloomy Grimes building, Clerkenwell, closes at 5pm sharp every day by which time all employees are contractually obliged to be off the premises. It's for their own safety. After hours the building is haunted by the ghosts of a suicide, William 'The Wailing Watchman' Heron, and his lover, Daisy Bell, harpsichord tutor, who pined away after he threw himself over the fire-escape in the mistaken belief he'd been jilted. They've spent fifty years failing to find each other in the vast building before young Jason Ashgrove and Berenice Golden of the Oat Crisps advertising debt intervene on their behalf.

Very cute, but you can't help but be grateful for the inclusion of the remorselessly mean-spirited:

W. W. Jacobs – The Three Sisters: Malletts Lodge, a dreary, desolate house on the marshes and home to Ursula, Tabitha and Eunice, three loveless spinsters living out their days in mutual misery. On her death-bed Ursula, the eldest, instructs Tabitha to leave her room untouched as she will require it when she returns to fetch her sisters when their time comes. Tabitha isn’t best pleased at these demands, less so when she learns the old coot has left her money to Eunice who promptly decides it will remain unspent until enough interest has been acquired to sponsor a children’s hospital!

The years pass and the lodge becomes ever more depressing. Encouraged by the faithful servant, Eunice decides to move out. Ursula’s presence has infested the place and her weak heart can no longer take the strain of waiting for her spectre to come calling. On the eve of Eunice's departure, however, a ghastly figure steals into her room …

Jerome K. Jerome - The Haunted Mill: An old miser reputedly stashed a vast quantity of gold about his Surrey Mill but no-one has been able to find it. New owner Joe Parkins is of a mind that the story is nonsense - until the spectre of a wrinkled old man appears at the foot of his bed and shows him which walls and ceilings to demolish if he wants to locate it ....

Catherine Crowe – The Monk’s Story: A bit more like it. Doom and gloom. In his childhood, Brother Lazarus witnessed his mother's vicious murder as they happened to be sharing a bed at the time. On his testimony, Ripa, his no good brother-in-law is executed for the crime.

Several years on at the Pierre-Châtel Monastery. Brother Lazarus, now in middle age, is locked in his cell each night as, a somnambulist, he is forever attempting to recreate the crime in his sleep. Prior Jolivet, who had a particularly narrow escape from the sleepwalker's knife, assures Charles Lisle, a young English traveller, that no harm can befall him, Brother Lazarus is close to death and the monks keep him under guard after dark. As Charles departs for Spain, Lazarus is placed in his coffin and lowered into the sod, so no need to fret over any silent assassin at the next Monastery on his route ....

[Jojo Lapin X]

Sept 29, 2012 17:17:18 GMT dem said:

I'm not sure Elizabeth has written anything else in the field bar this gentle ghost story, incredibly preferred by Times Ghost Story judges Kingsley Amis, Patricia Highsmith & Sir. C. Lee over Ramsey Campbell's In The Bag and Roger Johnson's The Scarecrow.

"In the Bag" is the story about children suffocating from putting plastic bags on their heads. In fact, I am aware of no other serious treatment of the topic.

[dem]

The one good thing about In The Bag's omission from the Times Anthology Of Ghost Stories is that it provided Hugh Lamb with the opportunity to give it first publication in Cold Fear: New Tales Of Terror (Severn House, 1981). Think its been mentioned before, but the story has vague similarities with another proper horror classic, Charles Birkin's The Lesson from The Smell Of Evil.

Ghost Stories and Deborah Shine's Haunting Ghost Stories were among several books inexplicably charity-shopped when I used to worry about such trivial things as this flat collapsing under the weight of all the accumulated junk. Am inordinately delighted they found their way home.

[Jojo Lapin X]

Oct 1, 2012 8:50:20 GMT dem said:

Think its been mentioned before, but the story has vague similarities with another proper horror classic, Charles Birkin's The Lesson from The Smell Of Evil.

I am at an age where I find it comforting to go over the same things over and over again. Also, I tend to forget that I have gone over them before. Also, I think I have THE SMELL OF EVIL, but I do not recall having read this story.

[helrunar]

Thanks, Dem, for pointing me to this thread. As it happens, I had the day off today, and I was able to borrow this book from the local box because it was still there.

There are a number of tales here that are new to me. The book has wandered far (though not as far as some) since it was originally published in London back in 1984, and now has been discovered, quietly minding its own affairs, in a book box in Medford, Mass., in 2023.

The book includes illos by one Ian McCraig. I look forward to delving into it.

cheers, Hel.