Classic Ghost Stories

Overview

As the winter nights draw in and you settle in front of a cozy fire, it's the perfect time for a dash of fear...spine-chillers from Charles Dickens, H.G. Wells, Edith Wharton and many more.

Do you believe in ghosts? Not monsters, not floating objects or unexplained coincidences, but an actual presence - a flicker in the corner of the eye, a shadow in a darkened hallway, a hand pressed against the window, or a figure at the end of the bed. Sometimes they are a malevolent warning, or they come seeking revenge, or as a horrible reminder of past misdeeds. But ghosts can visit on the brightest summer's day, or on a lonely stretch of beach, making themselves felt just when you least expect it.

The great writers of the nineteenth and early twentieth century, from Elizabeth Gaskell to Rudyard Kipling, also produced some of the most influential ghost stories ever written, shaping the conventions of the genre for generations of writers to follow. Collected here are some of the most iconic of these Victorian ghost stories, from Charles Dickens's The Signalman to M.R. James's A Warning to the Curious, alongside more unexpected contributions from masters of the form such as J.S. Le Fanu and H.G. Wells. You may think you don't believe in ghosts, but these stories will haunt you nonetheless.

Author Biography

Charles Dickens (Author)
Charles Dickens was born in Hampshire on February 7, 1812. His father was a clerk in the navy pay office, who was well paid but often ended up in financial troubles. When Dickens was twelve years old he was send to work in a shoe polish factory because his family had been taken to the debtors' prison. His career as a writer of fiction started in 1833 when his short stories and essays began to appear in periodicals. The Pickwick Papers, his first commercial success, was published in 1836. The serialisation of Oliver Twist began in 1837. Many other novels followed and The Old Curiosity Shop brought Dickens international fame and he became a celebrity in America as well as Britain. Charles Dickens died on 9 June 1870. He is buried in Westminster Abbey.

Arthur Conan Doyle (Author)
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle was born on 22 May 1859 in Edinburgh. He studied medicine at the University of Edinburgh and began to write stories while he was a student. Over his life he produced more than thirty books, 150 short stories, poems, plays and essays across a wide range of genres. His most famous creation is the detective Sherlock Holmes, who he introduced in his first novel A Study in Scarlet (1887).

Henry James (Author)
Henry James was born on 15th April 1843 in Washington Place, New York to a wealthy and intellectual family and as a youth travelled between Europe and America. His first novel, Watch and Ward, was published in 1871 after first appearing serially in Atlantic Monthly. After a brief period in Paris, James moved first to London and then later to Rye in Sussex. He became a British citizen in 1915 to declare his loyalty to his adopted country as well as to protest against America's refusal to enter the war on behalf of Britain. Henry James was a prolific writer and critic and from around 1875 until his death he maintained a strenuous schedule of publications in a variety of genres: novels, short story collections, literary criticism, travel writing, biography and autobiography. He died in 1916.

Edith Wharton (Author)
Edith Wharton was born in New York City on January 24, 1862. Edith married Teddy Wharton, who was 12 years older. They lived a life of relative ease with homes in New York, Rhode Island, and Massachusetts. Edith became a prolific writer and produced over 40 books in 40 years.
Edith divorced Teddy in 1912, having no immediate heirs, and never married again. She was the first woman awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, an honorary Doctorate of Letters from Yale University, and a full membership in the American Academy of Arts and Letters. Her novels became so popular that Ms. Wharton was able to live comfortably on her earnings the rest of her life. Edith continued to write until a stroke took her life in August 1937.