Victorian Ghost Stories
Subtitle: An Oxford Anthology
Contributors: Michael Cox (Editor); R. A. Gilbert (Editor)
Edition: First edition
Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
Published: October 10, 1991
Language: eng
Format: Hardcover
Number of pages: 497
ISBN-13: 9780192142023
Description: There's nothing like a good ghost story. And in Victorian Ghost Stories, Michael Cox and R.A. Gilbert bring together thirty-five well wrought tales of haunted houses, vengeful spirits, spectral warnings, invisible antagonists, and motiveless malignity from beyond the grave. The Victorians excelled at the ghost story, it was as much a part of their literary culture as the realistic novel, and it was practiced by almost all the great writers of the age. Cox and Gilbert here provide samples from Charles Dickens, Robert Louis Stevenson, Rudyard Kipling, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Henry James, and Wilkie Collins, as well as such classic ghost-story specialists as M.R. James and J.S. Le Fanu (whose "Account of Some Strange Disturbances in Aungier Street," considered one of the best haunted-house story ever written, is excerpted above), plus one or two genuine rarities for the supernatural fiction enthusiast to savor. The editors also reveal the key role played by women in the growth of the genre, including stories by Elizabeth Gaskell, Mrs. Craik, Mrs. Henry Wood, Amelia B. Edwards, Charlotte Riddell, and many others. Finally, they offer an informative introduction, detailed source notes, and an extensive survey of ghost-story collections from 1850 to 1910.
Traditional in its forms, but energetically inventive and infused with a relish of the supernatural, these classic ghost stories still retain their original power to unsettle and surprise. Every one is guaranteed to satisfy what Virginia Woolf called "that strange human craving for the pleasure of feeling afraid."
Table of contents: label: ix
title: Introduction (Victorian Ghost Stories)
pagenum: essay by Michael Cox and R. A. Gilbert; label: 1
title: The Old Nurse's Story
pagenum: (1935)|novelette by Mrs. Gaskell [as by Elizabeth Gaskell]; label: 19
title: An Account of Some Strange Disturbances in Aungier Street
pagenum: (1964)|novelette by Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu [as by J. S. Le Fanu]; label: 37
title: The Miniature
pagenum: (1853)|short story by John Yonge Akerman [as by J. Y. Akerman]; label: 44
title: The Last House in C— Street
pagenum: (1856)|short story by Dinah Maria Mulock Craik [as by Dinah Mulock]; label: 55
title: To Be Taken with a Grain of Salt
pagenum: (1865)|short story by Charles Dickens; label: 65
title: The Botathen Ghost
pagenum: (1867)|short story by R. S. Hawker; label: 74
title: The Truth, the Whole Truth, and Nothing But the Truth
pagenum: (1868)|short story by Rhoda Broughton; label: 83
title: The Romance of Certain Old Clothes
pagenum: (1868)|short story by Henry James; label: 100
title: Pichon & Sons, of the Croix Rousse
pagenum: short fiction by uncredited [as by Anonymous]; label: 115
title: Reality or Delusion?
pagenum: [Johnny Ludlow]|(1868)|short story by Mrs. Henry Wood; label: 130
title: Uncle Cornelius His Story
pagenum: (1864)|short story by George MacDonald (variant of Uncle Cornelius, His Story 1869); label: 150
title: The Shadow of a Shade
pagenum: (1869)|short story by Tom Hood; label: 163
title: At Chrighton Abbey
pagenum: (1871)|novelette by Mary Elizabeth Braddon; label: 190
title: No Living Voice
pagenum: (1872)|short story by Thomas Street Millington; label: 198
title: Miss Jéromette and the Clergyman
pagenum: (1875)|short story by Wilkie Collins; label: 218
title: The Story of Clifford House
pagenum: (1878)|short fiction by Anonymous; label: 239
title: Was it an Illusion?: A Parson's Story
pagenum: (1881)|short story by Amelia B. Edwards (variant of Was It an Illusion?); label: 256
title: The Open Door
pagenum: (1882)|novelette by Mrs. J. H. Riddell [as by Charlotte Riddell]; label: 283
title: The Captain of the "Pole-Star"
pagenum: (1971)|novelette by Arthur Conan Doyle (variant of The Captain of the Polestar 1883) [as by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle]; label: 303
title: The Body-Snatcher
pagenum: (1895)|short story by Robert Louis Stevenson (variant of The Body Snatcher 1884); label: 319
title: The Story of the Rippling Train
pagenum: (1887)|short story by Mary Louisa Molesworth; label: 328
title: At the End of the Passage
pagenum: (1890)|novelette by Rudyard Kipling; label: 346
title: "To Let"
pagenum: (1890)|short story by B. M. Croker; label: 360
title: John Charrington's Wedding
pagenum: (1891)|short story by E. Nesbit; label: 367
title: The Haunted Organist of Hurly Burly
pagenum: (1891)|short story by Rosa Mulholland; label: 379
title: The Man of Science
pagenum: (1892)|short story by Jerome K. Jerome (variant of A Ghost Story); label: 385
title: Canon Alberic's Scrapbook
pagenum: (1895)|short story by M. R. James; label: 396
title: Jerry Bundler
pagenum: (1897)|short story by W. W. Jacobs; label: 403
title: An Eddy on the Floor
pagenum: (1899)|novella by Bernard Capes; label: 431
title: The Tomb of Sarah
pagenum: (1900)|short story by F. G. Loring; label: 442
title: The Case of Vincent Pyrwhit
pagenum: (1901)|short story by Barry Pain; label: 445
title: The Shadows on the Wall
pagenum: (1903)|short story by Mary E. Wilkins Freeman [as by Mary E. Wilkins]; label: 459
title: Father Macclesfield's Tale
pagenum: (1907)|short story by R. H. Benson; label: 466
title: Thurnley Abbey
pagenum: (1907)|short story by Perceval Landon; label: 480
title: The Kit-Bag
pagenum: (1908)|short story by Algernon Blackwood; label: 490
title: Sources (Victorian Ghost Stories: An Oxford Anthology)
pagenum: essay by uncredited; label: 493
title: Select Chronological Conspectus of Ghost Stories: 1840-1910 (Victorian Ghost Stories)
pagenum: essay by uncredited