A Ghost Story ● Mark Twain
Channel: The Public Narrator
Date: 22/10/2022

"A Ghost Story" by Mark Twain (the pen name of Samuel Clemens) appears in his 1875 Sketches New and Old. The story is based on the infamous 19th-century hoax of the Cardiff Giant, in which a "petrified giant" was carved out of stone and buried in the ground for others to "discover." People came in droves to pay money to see the giant. After a failed bid to buy the statue, the legendary promoter P.T. Barnum made a replica of it and claimed it was the .

The narrator rents a room in New York City, in "a huge old building whose upper stories had been wholly unoccupied for years." He sits by the fire awhile and then goes to bed. He wakes in terror to discover that the bed covers are being slowly pulled toward his feet. After an unnerving tug-of-war with the sheets, he finally hears footsteps retreat.

He convinces himself the experience was nothing more than a dream, but when he gets up and lights a lamp, he sees a giant footprint in the ashes near the hearth. He goes back to bed, terrified, and the haunting continues throughout the night with voices, footsteps, rattling chains, and other ghostly demonstrations.

Eventually, he sees that he is being haunted by the Cardiff Giant, whom he considers harmless, and all his fear dissipates. The giant proves himself to be clumsy, breaking furniture every time he sits down, and the narrator chastises him for it. The giant explains that he has been haunting the building, hoping to convince someone to bury his body—currently in the museum across the street—so he can get some rest.

But the ghost has been duped into haunting the wrong body. The body across the street is Barnum's fake, and the ghost leaves, deeply embarrassed.

Link to the text⏵https://americanliterature.com/author/mark-twain/short-story/a-ghost-story

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