Holy Ghosts: Classic Tales of the Ecclesiastical Uncanny

Fiona Snailman (ed)
British Library Tales of the Weird

Churches, monasteries and convents have long been associated with sanctuary: sacred spaces should offer protection from evil in all its forms. This new anthology raises questions about the protection offered by faith, bringing together a collection of tales in which holy places are filled with horror; where stone effigies come to life and believers are tormented by terrifying apparitions. In a host of uncanny stories published between 1855 and 1935, Holy Ghosts uncovers sacrilegious spectres and the ecclesiastically eerie. 

The British Library continues apace with it's collections of the strange and the supernatural with a collection of stories based around churches and those who inhabit them.  These collections have on the whole been pretty solid and some indeed have been excellent - the Pan and the occult detective collections spring to mind - this one is somewhere in the middle.

Theme wise it seems strange that it's taken them this long to get around to a churchy collection and I'm glad they have as there were a couple of stories in here that I didn't know and enjoyed very much.  Sheridan Le Fanu opens the book strongly with the temptations of 'The Sexton's Adventure' and John Wyndham's rather slight 'The Cathedral Crypt' is good pulpy fun to finish the book.  In the intervening pages both Amelia B. Edwards' 'In The Confessional' and Robert Hichens' 'The Face of the Monk' provide engaging stories of redemption and I'm reminded that I need to further explore Hichens who was the author of one of the great strange tales, 'How Love Came to Professor Guildea'.

While we're on the subject of classics, there's a line in Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman's 'Good Omens' about how every cassette left long enough in a car will eventually turn into 'Best of Queen' well, I'm making a corresponding prophecy that into every unsuspecting supernatural anthology will eventually appear Edith Nesbit's 'Man-Size in Marble'.  I'm pretty sure the number of copies of this story I have in my collection far exceeds the number of books I have.  It's fabulous and deserves it's reputation but by god it's also ubiquitous and it is, of course, here.

Most of the other stories here are quite readable but perhaps not re-readable such as Edith Wharton's devious but obvious 'The Duchess at Prayer' and Mrs Henry Woods' equally obvious 'The Parson's Oath' but Elizabeth Gaskell's 'The Poor Clare' is far, far too long for it's scanty plot and Marguerite Merington's 'An Evicted Spirit' is sentimental claptrap rescued by an occasional enjoyably pithy phrase.

In summary a solid but stolid collection that I can't help but think would have been enlivened by replacing Gaskell's 70 pages with something a little more maverick like 'The Cicerones' by Robert Aickman or enigmatic like Arthur Machen's 'Opening the Door'.

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The Vampire Lovers

The first installment in what's known as Hammer's 'Karnstein Trilogy' - followed by 'Lust For A Vampire' (buy it here)with The Vampire Lovers) and 'Twins of Evil' (buy it here) - 'The Vampire Lovers' is an adaptation of Sheridan le Fanu's novella 'Carmilla'.

In both the novella and the movie the vampire Mircalla Karnstein (Ingrid Pitt), using the subtly cunning pseudonyms of 'Marcilla' and 'Carmilla' and whilst wearing a ruby necklace in the shape of a drop of blood, preys on the young women she befriends (Pippa Steel & Madeline Smith) as part of a ruse whereby her accomplices manipulate events so that she is left in the keeping of an aristocratic family; seemingly using them as a long drawn out meal whilst snacking on the local village girls and assorted servants (including the Rani herself  Kate O'Mara). Ranged against her are the combined forces of Peter Cushing, Douglas Wilmer, Minder's George Cole and The Final Programme's Jerry Cornelius Jon Finch who travel to her ancestral home to finally end her murdery ways.

le Fanu's story is the perfect source material for Hammer, the novella's lesbian subtext allowed the studio to help their ailing fortunes by getting lots of pretty young actresses to take their clothes off - for art's sake obviously.  It's sumptuously made and the sets, like the cleavages, are extravagant and displayed to maximum effect but the film does drag.  The source material, as good as it is, just doesn't have the scope and with Mircalla / Carmilla / Marcilla employing the same tactic with both families it does feel like we're treading water slightly the second time around.

It is though, in many ways, classic Hammer, embracing the subject matter and the style that made their name but amping the eroticism up to the max in a move that was to define the next few years for the studio.

Buy it here - UK /  US - or watch it below.

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The Best Ghost Stories

Various
Hamlyn

With a title as seemingly clear and straightforward as that one up there you'd imagine that this here 750 page house brick of a book would be chock full of ghostly mayhem but you'd be fairly wrong in your assumption.  There's a little note at the beginning to the effect that they've played fast and loose with the term 'ghost story' and they're not lying. 

Spectral types do figure but they are mostly conspicuous by their absence.  In their stead we have a veritable smorgasbord of the grim, gruesome and ghastly; black magicians (Edward Bulwer-Lytton's 'The House and the Brain' and M.R. James' 'Casting the Runes'), werewolves (Saki's 'Gabriel-Ernest'), other dimensions (Algernon Blackwood's 'The Willows'), ancient evil (H.P. Lovecraft's 'Rats in the Wall'), death itself (Edgar Allan Poe's 'The Masque of the Red Death'), Pan (Arthur Machen's 'The Great God Pan' and E.M. Forster's 'The Story of a Panic'), vampires (J. Sheridan le Fanu's 'Carmilla') and even a spirit or two (Oliver Onion's 'Are You Too Late Or Was I Too Early').

Amongst these are a host of other tales with certain authors featuring multiple times - there are 3 Machen's and 4 Lovecraft's for instance.  There are a few stories that keen anthology readers like myself will know well like W.W. Jacobs' 'The Monkey's Paw' but in general this is an intriguing selection that isn't afraid to sit a longer tale such as the Machen or le Fanu I mentioned earlier alongside a more fleeting tale such as Guy de Maupassant's 'Was It A Dream'.

It's all the better for it too.  The size of the book kept me subsumed in it's various world's for the best part of a fortnight, I even read some of it whilst holidaying at Baskerville Hall which seemed appropriate.  It is a delightfully atmospheric and absorbing read and I applaud the decision for multiple tales as it allowed for a deeper immersion in both an particular writer and in the book itself.

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Roald Dahl's Book of Ghost Stories

Penguin Books

Who better to investigate the literary spirit world than that supreme connoisseur of the unexpected, Roald Dahl? Of the many permutations of the macabre, Dahl was always especially fascinated by the classic ghost story. For this superbly disquieting collection, he selected fourteen of his favorite tales by such authors as E.F. Benson, Rosemary Timperley, and Edith Wharton.

In his introduction to this collection Dahl makes a big thing about how he read 749 ghost stories and had only found 32 that he deemed to be any good; of those he includes 14 here. One of them, 'Playmates' by A.M. Burrage, is my favourite of all the ghostly tales I've read over the years and a few of them - Robert Aickman's 'Ringing the Changes', Edith Wharton's 'Afterward' and Marion Crawford's 'The Upper Berth' - are staples of these sort of books. Of the rest they can best be described as a tepid selection.

A.M. Burrage

Of these remaining stories a couple such as L.P. Hartley's 'W.S.', Rosemary Timperley's 'Harry' and Cynthia Asquith's 'The Corner Shop' have a flavour of those 'unexpected tales' that Dahl himself was famous for. A few such, such as the ever readable J. Sheridan le Fanu's 'The Ghost of a Hand' are a little cliché or lovely but a little bit twee like Timperley's other tale 'Christmas Meeting'. Some are just bad - 'Elias and the Draug' by Jonas Lie and 'The Telephone' by Mary Treadgold - and a couple proved to be a delightful surprise - E.F. Benson's 'In The Tube' and A.M. Burrage's 'The Sweeper'.

It must be said I was expecting more from this collection. I thought a writer like Dahl would be able to assemble a collection to beat all others but this one rarely seemed to sparkle and was often a bit of a chore. It did serve to remind me though that what I really need to do is more fully explore the writing of A.M. Burrage.

Buy it here:  Roald Dahl's Book of Ghost Stories

Ghosts, Spooks and Spectres

Charles Molin (ed)
Puffin Books

A collection of horror stories, many with a humorous turn.

One of the real joys of reading for me these days is cracking open another of these anthologies of late 19th / early 20th century ghostly fiction especially when it turns out to be full of stories I've not read before.  This one transpires to be a really nice cross section of the famous and the less so with Wilde, Dickens and Wells rubbing shoulders with folks such as Dora Broome and Richard Bartram.

The book opens with the venerable Oscar Wilde and his lovely tale of penance paid as a thoroughly modern American family drive the resident spirit to despair in 'The Canterbury Ghost', a story I must have read before as many years ago I read the complete works of Mr. Wilde but I had no memory of whatsoever.

Next up is one of several anonymous stories, none of which really bear much scrutiny but here goes. 'Teeny-Tiny' tells of a stolen bone and the disembodied voice demanding it's return, 'The Strange Visitor' is a truly dreadful piece of poetry, 'A Ghostly Wife' finds a ghost taking the place of a Brahman's wife whilst 'The Ghost- Brahman' finds the husband being replaced.  The final one, 'The Ghost Who Was Afraid of Being Bagged' is a silly folk tale about a barber tricking a gullible spirit into helping improve his fortunes and is easily the best of the five but as I said none are really worth the bother.

J. Sheridan Le Fanu

Charles Dickens is represented by one of his most famous and ubiquitous stories, 'The Signal-man', the story of a man haunted by a ghostly figure at the head of a railway tunnel whose appearance precedes a disaster of some kind.  This is followed by J.Sheridan Le Fanu's 'Madam Crowl's Ghost' where a young girl hired to work in the house of the dying Madam Crowl experiences several terrifying events that eventually bring forth the grim truth about the old lady.

Richard Bartram's 'Legend of Hamilton Tighe' is the second, and thankfully last, poem in the book.  Now, I'm not averse to poetry but this was a load of old 'dum-de-dum-de-dum' tosh but it's nautical theme does filter nicely in Captain Marryat's tale of the Flying Dutchman, 'The Phantom Ship'.

H.G. Wells

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's 'The Brown Hand' makes a fairly common appearance but it's story of a ghost seeking the return of the titular appendage is one that stands up to an occasional reread as does Richard Middleton's jokey romp 'The Ghost Ship'.  Less successful but continuing the watery theme is 'The Water Ghost' by John Kendrick Bangs which tells of the vindictive ghost of a drowned woman and the attempts to thwart her.

H.G. Wells goes for the more whimsical route as should be expected from a story titled 'The Inexperienced Ghost'.  Here a drunk man finds, berates and eventually aids a pitiful ghost he finds lurking in the corridors of his club in an amusing little ditty of a tale with an ending you can see coming a mile off.

W.F. Harvey

Dora Broome's 'The Buggane and the Tailor' has the feel of a folktale about it and, as is often the case with stories of that ilk, ends poorly.

Another author who is a regular in these books is Saki, especially in the form of his werewolf tale, 'Gabriel-Ernest' but this time out it's a story about vindictiveness and reincarnation as the titular 'Laura' continues her habit of picking on her friends husband in various forms following her demise.

R. Blakeborough's 'The Betrayal of Nance' is another folktale-esque story this time filled to the brim with betrayal, loss and attempts at redemption from beyond the grave whilst redemption is the last thing on the mind of 'The Beast With Five Fingers' as W.F. Harvey spins a terrific yarn about the murderous creature and the attempts to thwart it.

Andrew Lang

Harvey's tale is really the last hurrah of this fun collection as the final two stories, 'The Night the Ghost Got In' by James Thurber and Andrew Lang's 'The Story of Glam' are amusing but very slight in the case of the former and veering once more into pesky folktale territory with the later which is hardly surprising given his status as the author of the 25 collections of variously coloured 'Fairy Books'.

And so the book ends - for me at least - on an undeserved low note.  Undeserved because for the most part this was a thoroughly enjoyable set that offered a number of highlights whilst the few disappointments were also relatively short lived.

Ghostly Experiences

Susan Dickinson (editor)
Armada Lion

Apart from having just about the most glorious cover art - by Antony Maitland - of any book I've ever bought this collection of supernatural tales turned out to be great fun. There are some fabulous authors behind that cover, a few of whom I know well and a couple I'd been looking forward to checking out.

This collection was originally published as half of  much longer anthology called both 'The Restless Ghost' and 'The Usurping Ghost' which was subsequently split into this and a second anthology called 'Ghostly Encounters' - which I've just noticed I have on my shelf waiting it's turn.  It's  lovely discovery because if it's half as good as this one then it'll be a good ride.

Opening proceedings is 'Feel Free' by Alan Garner wherein a young artist finds himself physically in harmony with the creator of an ancient Greek dish.  It's beautifully executed and straight off the bat a very unusual, sympathetic and human take on the idea of a haunting.

Quatermass creator Nigel Kneale is up next with a haunted house tale, 'Minuke', which felt like a home counties version of 'Poltergeist' and is very much in the modern day rural horror vein that he explored in shows such as 'The Stone Tape' and 'The Murrain'.

'Witches Bone' by the one author in the book I'd not heard of, W. C. Dickinson, followed on with a slightly silly tale about a wishing bone and the mayhem it leaves in it's wake.  It was entertaining enough in a 'Tales of the Unexpected' sort of way.

H. R. Wakefield's 'Lucky's Grove' is a dark and bloodthirsty little tale about a Christmas tree inadvisably transplanted from a grove of trees with a dark reputation.

Continuing the rural horror is H. P. Lovecraft's, 'The Moon Bog', as two Americans attempts to clear an Irish marsh lets loose entities who are otherwise inclined.#

Sheridan Le Fanu (here billed as J. S. Lefanu) is represented by what is by far the weakest story in the collection, 'The White Cat of Drumgunniol', with it's story of a cat that foreshadows death for a particular family.  It's not bad, it's just a bit of cliche.

I'd never read any Robert Louis Stevenson before so his 'The Bottle Imp' came as a very nice surprise as a couple desperately try to rid themselves of a malign magical bottle.  It's wonderfully constructed and I was almost cheering for them by the end.

Closing the book was a real treat, Joan Aiken's, 'The Apple of Trouble'.  It's light, funny, inventive and fully silly as two resourceful children attempt to rid themselves of the apple from the Garden of Eden, a cantankerous uncle and the three Furies (or Erinyes) who follow the apple around and exact vengeance on whoever is unfortunate to own it.  It's a joyous read and by the time I was halfway through I'd already made the decision to track down more in the series.

In all it's a great little collection filled with variety and invention featuring some great writers and stories written over at least a century that feel entirely at home in each other's company.