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Source: (consider it) Thread: Ghost stories and tales of the supernatural
Eigon
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Gracious! Gabriel Woolf played Sutekh and Chief Inspector Parker? I shall never listen to the Lord Peter Wimsey stories the same way again!

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Ariel
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Not a lot of people know this but E. Nesbit also wrote ghost stories. They're not as sophisticated as some, but some of them still pack a bit of a punch.

There was a lot of good ghost and supernatural fiction around in the Victorian era: it seems to be a genre that's altogether less popular these days. Marie Corelli's "The Sorrows of Satan" is a pretty good novel in which the narrator, Geoffrey Tempest, is befriended by a very charming, very handsome, worldly man who helps him to achieve anything he wants. The clues are there early on in the novel, but the bit where Tempest finally realizes the real nature of the "man" who's been his companion is quite spine-chilling - well, I found it so, anyway.

[ 16. November 2012, 18:02: Message edited by: Ariel ]

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Huntress
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Wordsworth publishes the ghost stories of quite a few 19th and early 20th century authors and they seem to be easily available in the county library system. I've so far read 'Uncanny Stories' by May Sinclair and 'The Bell in the Fog' by Gertrude Atherton.

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AdamPater
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I have never been able to track down a ghost story that my teacher read to the class in second grade. Had nightmares for a week.

I think it was called something like "The Blue Light". Something about two boys going to a church grave-yard at midnight on a dare to see the eponymous light, which would show or reflect the face of the next local person to die. One boy is foolhardy enough to see his own face and dies two days later.

I guess it's a common trope - shades of The Ring - but does it ring any bells?

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Ariel
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quote:
Originally posted by Huntress:
Wordsworth publishes the ghost stories of quite a few 19th and early 20th century authors and they seem to be easily available in the county library system. I've so far read 'Uncanny Stories' by May Sinclair and 'The Bell in the Fog' by Gertrude Atherton.

Brilliant, thanks for that, I'm bookmarking it. I see they even have Mrs Gaskell, too.

[ 17. November 2012, 09:27: Message edited by: Ariel ]

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Adeodatus
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quote:
Originally posted by AdamPater:
I have never been able to track down a ghost story that my teacher read to the class in second grade. Had nightmares for a week.

I think it was called something like "The Blue Light". Something about two boys going to a church grave-yard at midnight on a dare to see the eponymous light, which would show or reflect the face of the next local person to die. One boy is foolhardy enough to see his own face and dies two days later.

I guess it's a common trope - shades of The Ring - but does it ring any bells?

That sounds vaguely familiar. When I was a (strange, macabre) kid I read a lot of children's ghost and horror stories. They would've been published by Pan or Puffin or some-such. You could try looking up those sort of sources.

For some reason, when I read you post, a similar story popped into my head. A girl, I think, is dared to go to a haunted meadow at night. There's a rhyme that goes "He who walks on moonlit meadow / Shall live no longer than his shadow." Obviously, the children think, this is nonsense. But when the girl is walking home from the meadow, in full moonlight, she fails to notice that she no longer has a shadow ....

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Huntress
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Did anyone else read Armada Ghost Books? There were at least 12 I think and the paperbacks had quite scary cover illustrations. They were aimed at children but I still reread mine.

Whilst I'm thinking back to children's literature; Moondial, both the book and the BBC TV series, was one of my favourites.

[ 17. November 2012, 12:06: Message edited by: Huntress ]

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Adeodatus
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Armada! That was the series of children's ghost/horror stories I was trying to think of. I don't think I ever had them: I borrowed them from the school library.

I'm sure one of them included E.F.Benson's The Bus Conductor - a classic vignette, which if someone had come up with it now would have become an urban legend.

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churchgeek

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quote:
Originally posted by Mary LA:
Churchgeek I found that extract I quoted so creepy that I felt sheepish about having put it up. Other Internet commenters have remarked that it has elements of Third World call centres as ghost hyperconnections, the paedophile culture (a small girl in a men's toilet) and the echoing of prayer as a kind of diabolic mimicry, flesh-eating monsters. Layers of taboo or phobic material.

It is interesting to remember that Victorian and Edwardian ghost stories were once as topical and disconcerting -- the banshee, a staple of country house hauntings had to do with
stories from colonial India and a screaming Bengali woman in a shawl who would appear and terrify retired colonels after dinner.

A friend of mine working in Kinshasa in the Congo said there are rumours of a haunted derelict hotel near the river with an upstairs bedroom -- guests who open the wardrobe at 6pm in the evening find the small body of a dead child curled up inside like a foetus. She says the story is apocryphal, the hotel closed in the early '80s, and yet the rumours persist because they express a kind of deeply felt cultural trauma in central Africa.

And I reread Sarah Waters' The Little Stranger again a few months ago -- children and animals remain staples of the ghost narrative. The scene in which the friendly old dog suddenly attacks a child is edgy stuff. Echoes too of Henry James all the way through, the hysterical governess and frightened children in Turn of the Screw.

That is really fascinating. And I think it makes a lot of sense. I wonder how much scholarly attention has been given to that sort of analysis?

(And I think the echoing prayer was the bit that scared me the most - since prayer is my go-to when I'm scared. It's basically saying, "Your prayers can't save you now." Which is really terrifying. Now you make me curious - when that element exists in a ghost tale, especially the ones that purport to be "true" (v. the ones scripted for Hollywood, which knows that trope well), how often is it a commentary on some situation such as colonialism or some similar exploitation?)

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Flossymole
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Posted by Eigon

quote:
I've no idea who wrote it, but the scariest ghost story I've ever come across was made into a Radio 4 play - a group of people meet at a country cottage which has recently been renovated for Christmas celebrations. Two hundred years before, however, the inhabitants of that cottage starved to death because of the cruelty of the local land owner - and although the house is full of food, the present day visitors suffer the same fate.
It's called 'The Exorcism' and is by Don Taylor. It's about the enclosures. We did it at our local amdram theatre one Christmas. An excellent modern morality play (Samuel French hold the performing rights)
Margaret Oliphant wrote some quietly atmospheric Victorian Scottish ghost stories eg 'The Window' and 'The Open Door'. Has anyone read my favourite - 'Marsyas in Flanders' by Vernon Lee - another model of atmospheric story-telling? I wish I could find some more of his works.

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Egeria
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M.R. James stands alone--and he's especially effective for readers who happen to be historians, archaeologists, or museum curators! I can still remember my first James story--"the Mezzotint"--read in a quiet college library, and how it made my flesh creep.

I've read two stories by Vernon Lee, both set in Italy. Excellent, but not quite as convincing as James.

Kipling wrote some pretty spooky stuff, too--"At the End of the Passage" is the one that sticks in my memory.

And "Escort" by Daphne du Maurier (the only one of her works I've read): cargo ship steaming through submarine-haunted waters, a cold dark night, skipper down with appendicitis, and a very strange ship looming up out of the darkness... I don't know why this one doesn't show up in more anthologies.

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Curiosity killed ...

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A lot of Daphne du Maurier's writing is haunting, The House on the Strand remained with me. Rebecca is all about ghostly presences.

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Adeodatus
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A dramatisation of James Herbert's The Secret of Crickley Hall begins this evening at 9pm on BBC1. You can see a trailer here.

I've only ever read one of Herbert's novels - The Ghosts of Sleath - and didn't like it. I'm afraid what let it down was mostly that the errors he made in how the CofE works suggested he'd probably bothered to do less than half an hour's research.

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Enoch
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quote:
Originally posted by AdamPater:
I have never been able to track down a ghost story that my teacher read to the class in second grade. Had nightmares for a week.

I think it was called something like "The Blue Light". Something about two boys going to a church grave-yard at midnight on a dare to see the eponymous light, which would show or reflect the face of the next local person to die. One boy is foolhardy enough to see his own face and dies two days later.

I guess it's a common trope - shades of The Ring - but does it ring any bells?

I seem to remember one or two stories from about fifty odd years ago about people who performed rituals either at Midsummer or New Year's Eve. These were supposed to reveal the future and turned out to reveal their own death. They were presented as being true and an awful warning not to meddle in the supernatural.

I suppose they would now be classified as urban myths. Indeed some of them may still be circulating as such.

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Jane R
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Actually they sound like rip-offs of folk tales, Enoch. Going past the churchyard on some significant date, seeing a parade of people who will die in the coming year and recognising yourself is a fairly well-known trope.

Yes, I read Armada ghost stories too in my misspent youth. I can't believe nobody's mentioned Joan Aiken yet (or did somebody mention her when I wasn't looking?) Hers range from gentle tales of ghosts that you wouldn't mind meeting (Humblepuppy springs to mind) to absolutely terrifying, leave-the-light-burning-all-night stuff (some of the stories in 'A Fit of Shivers', for example).

And then there's Robert Westall. A friend once challenged me to name a good full-length horror story and the only one I could think of off the top of my head was his 'The Wheatstone Pond'.

[ 18. November 2012, 15:54: Message edited by: Jane R ]

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The Intrepid Mrs S
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quote:
Originally posted by Jane R:
Yes, I read Armada ghost stories too in my misspent youth. I can't believe nobody's mentioned Joan Aiken yet (or did somebody mention her when I wasn't looking?) Hers range from gentle tales of ghosts that you wouldn't mind meeting (Humblepuppy springs to mind) to absolutely terrifying, leave-the-light-burning-all-night stuff (some of the stories in 'A Fit of Shivers', for example).

I love, love, love Joan Aiken's work but have never read any of her ghost stories.

/tangent - I wrote her a fan letter once, and she replied so charmingly, enclosing one of her books, that I was her slave for ever. That was for Mortimer and Arabel, and for the Battersea stories of Dido Twite though - incomparable!/end tangent

Mrs. S, lost in happy reverie
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fletcher christian

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Adeodatus, I would agree 'The Ghosts of Sleath' is pretty terrible, but I'm reliably informed that 'The Secret of Crickley Hall' is good.

I'm surprised that nobody has yet mentioned any Stephen King novels. I know I'm lowering the cultural tone though [Hot and Hormonal]

By far his best (although still with some silly bits and bad writing) is 'The Shining'. So many people have seen the film, which did a wonderful job of conveying the broody, black atmosphere of the book, but it's one of the most frightening ghost stories I've ever read. There is one very simple device he uses right through the book that sounds very silly when I describe it, but as the plot develops it becomes a truly spine tingling, skin crawling device. He simply repeats two words, randomly throughout - 'it creeps'.

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Jane R
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<tangent> Many years ago my Other Half was asked to review a CD-ROM about Stephen King. It was very odd - it must have had some games on it or similar, but the only thing I remember about it now is that it featured a video clip of The Great Man typing. [Confused] There is a supernatural element to this story; the CD-ROM must have been possessed, because our old Mac was never the same again after running it... </tangent>

Anybody else ever read 'Companions on the Road' by Tanith Lee? She did some other supernaturalish tales for young adults, but this is the best one.

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Adeodatus
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Well, I really enjoyed* the first part of Crickley Hall. Nicely understated horror, and excellent acting all round - especially, I thought, from Suranne Jones, the great David Warner, and those fantastic girls who played Cally and Loren, the daughters. I'll certainly be watching the rest.


(* "Enjoyed" = "had the crap scared out of me by")

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AdamPater
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quote:
Originally posted by fletcher christian:
By far his best (although still with some silly bits and bad writing) is 'The Shining'.

I haven't been able to look a topiary rabbit in the eye since.

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Pine Marten
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quote:
Originally posted by Adeodatus:
Well, I really enjoyed* the first part of Crickley Hall. Nicely understated horror, and excellent acting all round - especially, I thought, from Suranne Jones, the great David Warner, and those fantastic girls who played Cally and Loren, the daughters. I'll certainly be watching the rest.


(* "Enjoyed" = "had the crap scared out of me by")

Seconded!

And what a great thread - many suggestions for throatgrippingly-fearful reading for a long time to come [Eek!]

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Ariel
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Yes indeed, some great suggestions here!

Mary LA's anecdote about the little girl ghost seems very real in those small-hours trips to the bathroom. [Ultra confused] I'm having to remind myself of Moaning Myrtle by way of antidote.

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Adeodatus
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quote:
Originally posted by Ariel:
Mary LA's anecdote about the little girl ghost seems very real in those small-hours trips to the bathroom.

That's when it gets you too, eh?

It reminds me of a nightmare I once had. I dreamed I woke up in the middle of the night. I could hear someone moving around in my house downstairs. In my dream, I got up and went out of my bedroom. My bedroom door opens onto the landing, and immediately to the right of it and at an angle is the bathroom door.

I could see a dim light downstairs, and could still hear movement. Nervously, I looked over the banisters and down the stairs.

And as I did, out of the very corner of my eye, I saw the bathroom door swing open, and a shadowy figure moved swiftly towards me.

And that's when I woke up.

On Stephen King: I've only ever tried one of his books, Pet Sematary, and didn't much like it. He seemed to spend too much time telling too little story. Worth a second chance, though, and a few weeks ago I picked up a second hand copy of Salem's Lot, which is on my to-read list.

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Kelly Alves

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King talked about a time when he could write anything and people were reluctant to edit him-- he called it his "Bestsellerasaurus Rex" period. I am pretty sure Pet Sematary is one of the books he was talking about. I am positive Tommyknockers is.

Salem's Lot is good, but if you want really amazing, check out The Stand, The Dead Zone, Or Dolores Clayborn.

Also, his collaboration with Peter Straub, The Talisman is amazing.

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Pine Marten
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quote:
Originally posted by Adeodatus:
quote:
Originally posted by Ariel:
Mary LA's anecdote about the little girl ghost seems very real in those small-hours trips to the bathroom.

That's when it gets you too, eh?

It reminds me of a nightmare I once had. I dreamed I woke up in the middle of the night. I could hear someone moving around in my house downstairs. In my dream, I got up and went out of my bedroom. My bedroom door opens onto the landing, and immediately to the right of it and at an angle is the bathroom door.

I could see a dim light downstairs, and could still hear movement. Nervously, I looked over the banisters and down the stairs.

And as I did, out of the very corner of my eye, I saw the bathroom door swing open, and a shadowy figure moved swiftly towards me.

And that's when I woke up.

Goblins and ghosties and ghoulies, oh my!

quote:

On Stephen King: I've only ever tried one of his books, Pet Sematary, and didn't much like it. He seemed to spend too much time telling too little story. Worth a second chance, though, and a few weeks ago I picked up a second hand copy of Salem's Lot, which is on my to-read list.

I haven't read Pet Sematary but I did once see the film, which gave me the willies, especially the buried cat that comes back to life - I can see it now, running into the house... yuk! [Eek!]

I have read several other Stephen Kings, and Bag of Bones scared me witless, as I recall. It was the thing in the woods...<shiver>

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Hilda of Whitby
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quote:
Originally posted by Kelly Alves:


Also, his collaboration with Peter Straub, The Talisman is amazing.

Peter Straub's 'Ghost Story' stayed with me for a long, long time and I have re-read it several times. One of the best ghost stories I have ever read.

'The Haunting of Hill House' by Shirley Jackson is a masterpiece.

"The Turn of the Screw" is way up there on my list of creepiest stories I have ever read.

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Ariel
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quote:
Originally posted by Ariel:
quote:
Originally posted by Huntress:
Wordsworth publishes the ghost stories of quite a few 19th and early 20th century authors and they seem to be easily available in the county library system. I've so far read 'Uncanny Stories' by May Sinclair and 'The Bell in the Fog' by Gertrude Atherton.

Brilliant, thanks for that, I'm bookmarking it. I see they even have Mrs Gaskell, too.
Have now asked for some of these for Christmas. I want to spend some of the festive season totally spooking myself out. [Eek!]
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AdamPater
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quote:
Originally posted by Adeodatus:
There are stories by M.R.James that I seriously won't read if I'm home alone at night. I've never read anyone who can use mere words to create a feeling of skin-crawling unease better than James can. ...

With James it's all about building the atmosphere. ...

You inspired me to chase him up. I skimmed through some reviews and went to the Book Depository. James' Collected Ghost Stories turned up today, seems to have a Weeping Angel on the cover.

And now I might be too scared to look past the contents page. [Hot and Hormonal]

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Kelly Alves

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OK, when I say what I am about to say, please read it understanding I am a huge horror buff, and have been so all my life, and I do not run toward the squeamish in my reading choices.

I read Haunted by Chuck Palahniuk a few years back, which is a quasi-haunted house story about a bunch of would-be writers on a retreat that they suspect is a reality show, in what may or may not be a haunted house, trying to top each other with horrifying stories. Two stories in this book disturbed me so much that I had to put it in the waste basket, put stuff over it so I couldn't see the cover, and carry it out of the house the next day. I was going to provide a link to the Wikipedia summary of the book, but the summary alone is ghastly.

Don't look it up. I mean it. Palahniuk makes Steve King look like Beatrix Potter.

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Firenze

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quote:
Originally posted by Kelly Alves:

Don't look it up. I mean it.

Kelly, if people paid any attention to the Don't open that door/ read those runes/ spend the night in that house/ dig up that pharaoh instructions, there would be no horror genre.
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Adeodatus
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quote:
Originally posted by Firenze:
quote:
Originally posted by Kelly Alves:

Don't look it up. I mean it.

Kelly, if people paid any attention to the Don't open that door/ read those runes/ spend the night in that house/ dig up that pharaoh instructions, there would be no horror genre.
"Don't eat that apple..."

AdamPater, we clearly need to find you a "safe" M.R.James to start with. I'm sure that there are some that aren't too scary. I've never found The Mezzotint too creepy, and there's one I've never read called The Haunted Doll's House which can't be too bad, as it was commissioned for the Queen's Doll's House back in the 1930s or whenever.

I think the problem with James is that he plugs into a whole range of people's suppressed fears, so different people are scared by different stories. He also has this thing about touch and texture - a man resting his hand on a carved wooden cat suddenly feels he's touching fur, for example. And peripheral vision, too - Denniston in Canon Alberic's Scrapbook thinks he sees something resting on his desk, out of the corner of his eye; and the archaeologist in A Warning to the Curious reports seeing someone watching him digging, but again only ever out of the corner of his eye ...

Actually, maybe there isn't a "safe" story to start with!

Oh, and when you look at the cover of that book ... don't blink. [Biased]

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"What is broken, repair with gold."

Posts: 9779 | From: Manchester | Registered: Sep 2003  |  IP: Logged
AdamPater
Sacristan of the LavaLamp
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This is the volume I have. Haven't blinked for hours! (I know it's face isn't covered, but it's eyes are closed.... they're clever like that.)

I girded my loins and, fortified with a nice hot cup of tea, read through There was a Man Dwelt by a Churchyard and Rats, selected for length.

(Who can die of fright in only six pages, after all) (Especially with PaterMinor scoffing in the background.)

Filled with confidence, I shall start reading from the beginning.

But I'm not following up Kelly's link. No ways, PJs. [Disappointed]

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Put not your trust in princes.

Posts: 4894 | From: On the left of the big pink bit. | Registered: Apr 2003  |  IP: Logged
Firenze

Ordinary decent pagan
# 619

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quote:
Originally posted by AdamPater:
This is the volume I have.

Not the optimal image IMO. One of the most sinister stories takes place on a bright, hot, summer's day...
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Adeodatus
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quote:
Originally posted by Kelly Alves:
Don't look it up. I mean it. Palahniuk makes Steve King look like Beatrix Potter.

I looked it up.

I may now have to find a way of tearing my memory out and burning it.

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"What is broken, repair with gold."

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Jane R
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OK, I am NOT going to look it up. I would probably also leave the 'Do Not Open' box closed and run screaming from the haunted house at the first sign of ectoplasm.

If you've read 'The Mezzotint' you already know the plot of 'The Haunted Doll's House', more or less... personally I find both stories gruesome but not frightening in the same way as 'Mr Poynter's Diary' is.

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Amos

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# 44

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As I read the second lesson in the Morning Office today (from Rev. 16) I realized where M.R. James had got his horrible demonic things that resemble frogs.

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At the end of the day we face our Maker alongside Jesus--ken

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Firenze

Ordinary decent pagan
# 619

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quote:
Originally posted by Amos:
As I read the second lesson in the Morning Office today (from Rev. 16) I realized where M.R. James had got his horrible demonic things that resemble frogs.

Were you in a James story, you would have noticed, as you closed the lectern bible, that the leather had a soft, cold, reptilian feel to it....
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Adeodatus
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quote:
Originally posted by Firenze:
quote:
Originally posted by Amos:
As I read the second lesson in the Morning Office today (from Rev. 16) I realized where M.R. James had got his horrible demonic things that resemble frogs.

Were you in a James story, you would have noticed, as you closed the lectern bible, that the leather had a soft, cold, reptilian feel to it....
And when you get home and open your front door, a particularly large frog jumps out, brushing stickily against your ankle as it vanishes into the shrubbery....

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"What is broken, repair with gold."

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Firenze

Ordinary decent pagan
# 619

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And that night, and every night thereafter, you cannot sleep for the persistent sound of croaking, until...
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Adeodatus
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... you're woken one night by a tapping, or a knocking, or rather a slapping noise against the window of your room, and become aware of things moving within the room itself, at floor level. And fear clutches at your throat as you feel something fall, or land, on the blankets near your feet....

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"What is broken, repair with gold."

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AdamPater
Sacristan of the LavaLamp
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Maybe Kelly's thing isn't so bad to look up after all...

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Put not your trust in princes.

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Pine Marten
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# 11068

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quote:
Originally posted by Adeodatus:
... you're woken one night by a tapping, or a knocking, or rather a slapping noise against the window of your room, and become aware of things moving within the room itself, at floor level. And fear clutches at your throat as you feel something fall, or land, on the blankets near your feet....

... this is usually one of the cats buggering about...

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Keep love in your heart. A life without it is like a sunless garden when the flowers are dead. - Oscar Wilde

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Firenze

Ordinary decent pagan
# 619

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But not this time.

That evening in Hall, you start back in horror as the servitor places dessert in front of you.

'What's the matter?' exclaims the Regius Professor of Ancient Greek. 'Don't you like tapioca pudding?'

[ 29. November 2012, 15:03: Message edited by: Firenze ]

Posts: 17302 | From: Edinburgh | Registered: Jun 2001  |  IP: Logged
Adeodatus
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quote:
Originally posted by Firenze:
But not this time.

That evening in Hall, you start back in horror as the servitor places dessert in front of you.

'What's the matter?' exclaims the Regius Professor of Ancient Greek. 'Don't you like tapioca pudding?'

[Killing me] Fantastic! But isn't that more like Hammer horror than James? Surely in James you'd just be found dead the next morning by your maid, your mouth and lungs mysteriously full of pond-water.

(And for Pine Marten's sake, let's not mention the story that features the cat....)

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"What is broken, repair with gold."

Posts: 9779 | From: Manchester | Registered: Sep 2003  |  IP: Logged



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