14theditch - Ditch Readers' List of Superlative Ghost Stories

14theditch - Ditch Readers' List of Superlative Ghost Stories

14theditch

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Ditch Readers' List of Superlative Ghost Stories

[Sep. 28th, 2009|07:57 pm]

Here's the list of ghost stories left in the comments section of my post the other day about your favorite ghost story. I'm not familiar with all of them. Some that I am, I'm skeptical as to whether I'd consider them ghost stories, but I'm not about to disabuse anyone of their notion as to what makes a ghost story. Big favorites were "Oh, Whistle and I'll come to you, My Lad" by M.R. James, "The Specialist's Hat" by Kelly Link, "The Beckoning Fair One" by Oliver Onions, and "CommComm" by George Saunders. I didn't have time to match up the links to free online copies or podcasts, but I'd check online with any of these titles, and it looks like about 8 out of every 10 can be found.

The Return of Imray -- Rudyard Kipling

The Hell Screen -- Akutagawa

The Turn of the Screw -- Henry James

Oh, Whistle and I'll Come to You, My Lad -- M. R. James

Number 13 -- M. R. James

The Shadow Man -- Donald Mead

The Monkey's Paw -- W. W. Jacobs

The Yellow Wall Paper -- Charlotte Perkins Gilman

The Specialist's Hat -- Kelly Link

Louise's Ghost -- Kelly Link

How Love Came to Professor Guildea -- Robert Hitchens

Between Sunset and Moonrise -- R. H. Malden

The Uninvited Face -- Michael Asquith

The White People -- Arthur Machen

Ringing the Changes --

The Hospice -- Robert Aickman

The Smoke Ghost -- Fritz Leiber

The Stains -- Robert Aickman

CommComm -- George Saunders

The Wavemaker Falters -- George Saunders

Sea Oak -- George Saunders

Solidity -- Will Ludwigsen

The Breathing Method -- Stephen King

You Know They Got a Hell of a Band -- Stephen King

Sometimes They Come Back -- Stephen King

The Fall of the House of Usher -- E. A. Poe

The Two Sams by Glen Hirshberg

October in the Chair -- Neil Gaiman

Nightcrawlers -- Robert McCammon

Eisenheim the Illusionist -- Steven Millhauser

Elaine Coleman -- Steven Millhauser

Ancestor Money -- Maureen McHugh

Torch Song -- John Cheever

Journey Into the Kingdom -- M. Rickert

The Upper Berth -- Francis Marion Crawford

Chance -- Connie Willis

The Beckoning Fair One -- Oliver Onions

In Camera -- Robert Westall

The Great God Pan -- M. John Harrison

From the fifteenth District -- Mavis Gallant

The Lost Phoebe -- Theodore Dreiser

An Inhabitant of Carcosa -- Ambrose Bierce

The Spider -- Hans Heinz Ewers

The Yellow Sign -- Robert Chambers

Fumes -- Stefan Grabinski

The Haunted Boarding House -- Gene Wolfe

Kevin Malone -- Gene Wolfe

Master of Fallen Years -- Vincent O'Sullivan

Rain -- Dana Burnet

The Lost Ghost -- Mary E. Wilkins Freeman

The Judge's House -- Bram Stoker

Delta Sly Honey -- Lucius Shepard

The Reconciliation -- Lafcadio Hearn

The Deserted House -- E. T. A. Hoffman

Link

Comments:

From:

mlamprey
2009-09-29 12:40 am (UTC)

(Link)

Lots of good stuff. "Sea Oak" is the actual title of that Saunders story, though, not "Sea Land." And it's a zombie story, but such a great one that people shouldn't split hairs--they should just read it.

Some others that haunt me:

Walter De Le Mare's "A.B.O."
Marjorie Bowen's "The Sign Painter and the Crystal Fishes."
Fritz Leiber's "Horrible Imaginings"
Glen Hirshberg's "Struwwelpeter" (http://scifi.kundor.org/originals/originals_archive/hirshberg/hirshberg1.html)

It's endless!

(Reply) (Thread)

From:

14theditch
2009-09-29 02:52 am (UTC)

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Marc: Thanks. It is endless. There are a ton of great stories unmentioned by Kipling, Henry James, Edith the Wart Hog Wharton. I remember a couple of good ones by Capote and Updike, etc. etc.

(Reply) (Parent) (Thread)

From:

mlamprey
2009-09-29 03:05 am (UTC)

(Link)

I was surprised not to see a single Wharton on there, but when I tried to remember one by name or particular image, I couldn't. So I guess I can't blame anyone else.

A lot of what I think of a ghost stories do not necessarily feature ghosts--but an eerie sense of immanence.

I read so many ghost stories when I was a kid that when I first read Saki's "The Open Window," I took it all at face value--just like the duped character in the story. You could have called it "The Boy Who Lied Even to Ghosts."

(Reply) (Parent) (Thread)

From:

14theditch
2009-09-29 04:40 am (UTC)

(Link)

For me as well, you don't necessaerily need a ghost, all you need is a haunting.

(Reply) (Parent) (Thread)

From:

mlamprey
2009-09-29 05:24 am (UTC)

(Link)

I hesitated to put "The Bedroom Light" on this list of yours, since it is yours, but there. I'm putting it on there. A haunting indeed.

(Reply) (Parent) (Thread)

From:

nick_kaufmann
2009-09-29 04:25 am (UTC)

(Link)

It's been an awful long time since I read The Fall of the House of Usher, but for the life of me, I can't remember there being any ghosts.

(Reply) (Thread)

From:

14theditch
2009-09-29 04:43 am (UTC)

(Link)

Nick: As far as I can tell there are no ghosts, unless you see the story as a kind of psycho-drama playing out in a head somewhere. The house is likened to a human head and you also have The Haunted Palace poem at the center of the story. The drama between the characters could be haunted thoughts ......maybe. I do think it could be thought of legitimately as a vampire story, though.

(Reply) (Parent) (Thread)

From:

uglychicken
2009-09-29 11:09 am (UTC)

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Oh, geez, The Yellow Wallpaper. I read that and The Monkey's Paw in a collection of classics I got when I was an impressionable teen, and The Yellow Wallpaper obsessed me, because I couldn't work out what the hell was going on. I HAD YELLOW WALLPAPER IN MY ROOM. Freaked me out. The other story I remember from that collection, now that I think of it, is Maupassant's The Horla.

(Reply) (Thread)

From:

14theditch
2009-09-30 05:06 am (UTC)

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Maupassant's story got a lot of play in anthologies of a certain time, and I know I've read it more than once, but like all of his stories, it never made any impression on me. The Yellow Wallpaper is one I don't think I could forget if I tried, no the Monkey Paw, for that matter.

(Reply) (Parent) (Thread)

From:

uglychicken
2009-09-30 11:01 am (UTC)

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I think, to my teenaged mind, the stories lingered in proportion to how much sense they did or did not make to me. The Yellow Wallpaper had an enormous emotional impact, but I failed to grasp that it was about the disintegration of a mind. The Horla, again, it took me a long time to make sense of what it was about, and the overtones of paranoia and madness affected me. The Monkey's Paw on the other extreme, had such a remorseless, perfect, horrible logic, I think it was the first perfectly structured story I ever read.

(Reply) (Parent) (Thread)

From:

rick1844
2009-09-29 07:30 pm (UTC)

Saki

(Link)

I'd been going to suggest a Saki story or two but there are a bunch and none seemed to stand out. Kind of like "Wart Hog Wharton" as she was known when she wrestled as a tag team with Henry James on the old TransAtlantic Circuit.

(Reply) (Thread)

From:

14theditch
2009-09-30 05:10 am (UTC)

Re: Saki

(Link)

Didn't Warts invent the heart punch? Or was it the Manchurian Landslide? I read she was murder in close -- all ball shots and head butts. Henry's pet name for her was The Beast In The Jungle.

(Reply) (Parent) (Thread)

From:

rick1844
2009-09-30 05:41 am (UTC)

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I think you're mixing her up with Wild Oscar Wilde (THE HELL SISSY! as the posters always described him). An honest mistake since their ring styles were much the same and they both latched onto the gimmick of the cape decorated with the scalps of defeated opponents.

(Reply) (Thread)

From:

14theditch
2009-09-30 12:15 pm (UTC)

(Link)

I think the most famous match of that time on the Transatlantic Circuit was Wilde vs. Dickens in the whalebone cage, billed as The Tussle In The Bustle. When a flurry of wit late in the third round left Dickens unconscious, Wilde said of his opponent that he was a dish best served cold.

(Reply) (Parent) (Thread)

From: (Anonymous)
2009-10-06 09:31 pm (UTC)

Saki, Leiber, et al.

(Link)

Saki's "Laura" will do, if we count reincarnation stories as ghost stories...otherwise, not too many ghosts ("The Open Window" doesn't count.)

Fritz Leiber's first masterpiece was "Smoke Ghost," no article.

"The Monkey's Paw" is more properly a zombie or revenant story.

"Shottle Bop" by Theodore Sturgeon.

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