'I was conscious of a most horrible smell of mould, and of a cold
kind of face pressed against my own...' Considered by many to be
the most terrifying writer in English, M. R. James was an eminent
scholar who spent his entire adult life in the academic
surroundings of Eton and Cambridge. His classic supernatural tales
draw on the terrors of the everyday, in which documents and objects
unleash terrible forces, often in closed rooms and night-time
settings where imagination runs riot. Lonely country houses, remote
inns, ancient churches or the manuscript collections of great
libraries provide settings for unbearable menace, from creatures
seeking retribution and harm. These stories have lost none of their
power to unsettle and disturb. This edition presents all of James's
published ghost stories, including the unforgettable 'Oh, Whistle
and I'll Come to You, My Lad' and 'Casting the Runes', and an
appendix of James's writings on the ghost story. Darryl Jones's
introduction and notes provide a fascinating insight into James's
background and his mastery of the genre he made his own. ABOUT THE
SERIES: For over 100 years Oxford World's Classics has made
available the widest range of literature from around the globe.
Each affordable volume reflects Oxford's commitment to scholarship,
providing the most accurate text plus a wealth of other valuable
features, including expert introductions by leading authorities,
helpful notes to clarify the text, up-to-date bibliographies for
further study, and much more.
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Review This Product
Polite and Chilling Ghosts
Mon, 2 Feb 2015 | Review
by: Judy Croome | @judy_croome
Written in a more innocent and graceful era, MR James's ghost stories are subtle, with very polite and, at times, utterly chilling ghosts.
I enjoyed most of them, with some of the stories giving me delicious goosebumps (The Ash Tree, Number 13, Oh Whistle & I'll come to thee, my Lad, The Uncommon Prayer Book, Wailing Well and others).
One issue I had with this particular text, was that the explanatory notes were by means of an * (no differentiaton within each story) and the note itself was at the back of the book, rather than at the foot of the relevant page, which would have made reading the explanations without interrupting the pace and tension of the story a lot easier. In the end, I stopped looking at the notes and just enjoyed the stories, although I would have liked to know what some references meant.
Quaint and appealing, these ghost stories are a great in bed late at night ...!
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