SHORT STORY WEDNESDAY (HALLOWEEN EDITION): GREAT GHOST STORIES: 101 TERRIFYING TALES

 Great Ghost Stories:  101 Terrifyng Tales, edited by Stefan Dziemianowicz  (2016)

Stefan Dzienmianowicz (b. 1957) is a prolific editor of horror, fantasy, science fiction, and mystery anthologies, editor of single author collections, and author of a number of critical works in those fields.  Many of his anthologies were large collections for the instant remainder market and he has worked with such luminaries as Martin H. Greenberg, Robert Weinberg, Ed Gorman, and S.T. Joshi.  His anthologies are often deep dives into lesser known tales from the pulp magazines and collections from the specialty small presses.  As we approach Halloween, I thought it appropriate to discuss onew of his doorstop anthologies.  Great Ghost Stories was one that Geroge Kelley sent me a few months ago.

Depite the book's subtitle, ghost stories do not have to be terrifying.  They can be humorous, sad, sentimental, vengeful, unsettling, or reaffirming; they can be cliched or innovative.  The variety can be seemingly unending.  Here, Dziemianowicz has assembled a bit of everything, from old chestnuts to forgotten rarities.  

Lovecraft is here, as are Bierce, Saki, Washinton Irving. M. R. James, de Maupassant, and Sheridan Le Fanu, as well as some unexpected authors such as Stephen Leacock, Ford Madox Ford, and Somerset Maugham (with an earlier version of his classic story "A Man from Glascow").  A great anthology for sampling.

The stories:

• Across the Moors by Willaim Fryer Harvey (from Midnight House and Other Tales, 1910; Harvey may be best known for his story "The Beast with Five Fingers")
• The Adventure of the German Student by Washington Irving (also known as "The Lady with the Velvet Collar;" from Tales of a Traveller by "Geoffrey Crayon, Gent.," 1824; by "The Headless Horseman" and "Rip van Winkle" guy)
• All Souls' Day by D. K. Broster (from Macmillan's Magazine, September 1907; reprinted in A Fire of Driftwood, 1932; Dorothy Broster wrote the classic "Couching at the Door"_
• At Ravensholme Junction by Mary E. Penn (from The Argosy [UK], December 1876; who the author was is a mysery, although there is some circumstantial evidence that it might have been Ellen Wood, the popular author who wrote East Lynne (1861); Peen's eight ghost stories were finally collected by Richard Dalby in the second volume of his "Mistresses of the Macabre" series for Sarob Press, In the Dark and Other Ghost Stories, 1999)
• At the Dip in the Road by Mrs. Molesworth (from Uncanny Tales, 1896; Mary Louisa Moleworth wrote over 100 books of many types, but is best known for her "charming stories of children," as well as for her chilling excursions into the supernatural)
• At the Gate by Myla Jo Closser (from Century Magazine, March 1917; included in Dorothy Scarborough's seminal anthology Famous Modern Ghost Stories, 1921)
• Bone to His Bone by E. G. Swain (from The Stoneground Ghost Tales:  Compiled from the Recollections of the Reverend Roland Batchel, Vicar of the Parish, 1912; Swain was a chaplain at King's College, Cambridge, and a colleague of M. R. James; he was a member of th select group to whom James read his famous annual Christmas Eve ghost stories)
• The Botathen Ghost by R. S. Hawker (from All the Year Round, May 1867, edited by Chalres Dickens)
• Buggam Grange:  A Good Old Ghost Story by Stephen Leacock (from Winsome Winnie and Other New Nonsense Novels, 1920)
• The Burned House by Vincent O'Sullivan (from The Century Magazine, October 1916; reprinted in The Haunted Wherry and Other Rare Ghost Stories, edited by Jessica Amanda Salmoson, 1985)
• Cara by Georgia Wood Pangborn (from Harper's Magazine, January 1914; reprinted in The Wind at Midnight, 1999; Pangborn was the mother of SF writer Edgar Pangborn)
• The Clock by William Fryer Harvey (from The Beast with Five Fingers and Other Tales, 1928)
• The Closed Window by A. C. Benson (from The Hill of Trouble and Other Stories, by Arthur Christopher Benson, 1903)
• The Cold Embrace by Mary Elizabeth Bradden (from The Welcome Guest, September 22, 1860; reprinted in Ralph the Bailiff and Other Tales "by the author of 'Lady Audley's Secret,' 'Aurora Floyd,' Etc. Etc. Etc.," 1862)
• Colonel Halifax's Ghost Story by Sabine Baring-Gould (from The English Illustrated Magazine, December 1897, as by "S. Baring-Gould"; reprinted in A Book of Ghosts by S. Baring-Gould, 1904; interesting fact:  Baring-Gould wrote the Christian hymn "Onward Christian Soldiers")
• The Conquering Will by Harriet Prescott Spofford (from The Smart Set, June 1901;reprinted in The Moonstone Mass and Others, 2000)
• The Damned Spot by Violet M. Methley (from Truth, June 21, 1921; reprinted in The Ash-Tree Press Annual Macabre 2004:  The Last "Queer Stories from Truth," edited by Jack Adrian, 2004)
• Dark Dignum by Bernard Capes (from Pearson's Magazine, June 1897; reprinted in At a Winter's Fire, 1899)
• The Delusion of Ralph Penwyn by Julian Hawthorne (from Cosmopolitan, February 1909; reprinted in The Rose of Death and Other Mysterious Delusions, 1997)
• The Demon Spell by Hume Nisbet (from The Haunted Station and Other Stories, 1894)
• The Diary of Mr. Poyntner by M. R. James (from A Thin Ghost and Others by Montague Rhodes James, 1919)
• The Door by Henry S. Whitehead (from Weird Tales, November 1924; reprinted in Passing of a God and Other Stories, 2007)
• Dr. Trifulgas by Jules Verne (variant title of Frritt-Flacc, from Le Figaro illustre, December 5, 1884; first published in English ias "Frritt-Flacc" in The Trinity Tablet, October 3, 1885, and as "Dr. Trifulgas" in The Strand Magazine, July-December 1892; reprinted in Yesterday and Tomorrow, 1965)
• The Dream Giver by Chris Sewell (from Truth, December 6, 1922; reprinted in The Ash-Tree Press Annual Macabre 2004:  The Last "Queer Stories from Truth," edited by Jack Adrian, 2004)
• The Eleventh of March by Amelia B. Edwards (from Miss Carew, 1865; reprinted in The Phantom Coach:  Collected Ghost Stories, 1999)
• Eveline's Visitant by Mary Elizabeth Braddon (from Belgravia, January 1867; reprinted in Ralph the Bailiff and Other Stories by "the author of 'Lady Audley's Secret,' 'Aurora Floyd,'  Etc. Etc. Etc.," 1862)
• A Far-Away Melody by Mary E. Wilkins Freeman (from Westminster Magazine, August 1890; reprinted in Collected Ghost Stories by Mary E. Wilkins-Freeman, 1974)
• Father Macclesfield's Tale by R. H. Benson (from A Mirror of Shallot:  Being a Collection of Tales Told at an Unprofessional Symposium by Rev. Robert Hugh Benson, 1907)
• The Fifteenth Man by Richard Marsh (from The Seen and the Unseen, 1900, as "The Fifteenth Man:  The Story of a Rugby Match";  fun fact:  Marsh published his horror novel The Beetle the same year Bram Stoker published Dracula, Marsh's book outsold Stoker's)
• Fingers of a Hand by H. D. Everett (from The Death Mask and Other Ghosts by Mrs. h. D. Everett, 1920)
• The Footsteps in the Dust by Alice Perrin (from Crampton's Magazine, December 1901; reprinted in The Sistrum and Other Ghost Stories, 2001)
• The Former Passengers by B. M. Croker (from "To Let," 1893; reprinted in "Number Ninety" and Other Ghost Stories, the third volume in Richard Dalby's "Mistresses of the Macabre" series, 2000)
• The Furnished Room by O. Henry (from New York Sunday World Magzine, August 14, 1904; reprinted in The Four Million, 1919)
• The Ghost and the Bone-Setter by Sheridan Le Fanu (from Dublin University Magazine, January 1938 [uncredited]; reprinted in The Purcell Papers by Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu, 1880)
• A Ghost from the Sea by J. E. Muddock (from Stories, Weird and Wonderful, 1889)
• The Ghost in the Chair by Lettice Galbraith (from New Ghost Stories, 1893; Galbraith, the pseudonym of Lettice Susan Gibson, published a handful of highly respected ghost stories in the 1890s and then stopped, although she lived until 1932)
• A Grammatical Ghost by Elia W. Peattie (from The Shape of Fear and Other Ghastly Tales, 1898)
• The Halfway House by Mary Heaton Vorse (from Harper's Magazine, October 1921; reprinted in Sinister Romance, 2002)
• The Haunted Burglar by W. C. Morrow (from Lippincott's, July 1897; reprinted in The Monster Maker and Other Stories, 2000)
• The Haunted Mill; or, The Ruined Home -- by Jerome K. Jerome (from Told After Supper, 1891; Jerome is best known for his novel Three Men in a Boat (To Say Nothing About the Dog) and for his short story "The Passing of Third Floor Back")
• The Haunted Orchard by Richard Le Gallienne (from Harper's Magazine, January 1912; reprinted in Famous Modern Ghost Stories, edited by Dorothy Scarborough, 1921)
• He? by Guy de Maupassant (variant title of Lui?, first published in Gil Blas, Julu 3, 1883, as by "Maufrigneuse"; first English appearance in an edition of the works of de Mapaussant published by M. Walter Dunne, 1903)
• The House of the Nightmare by Edward Lucas White (from Smith's Magazine, September 1906; reprinted in Lukundoo and Other Stories, 1927)
• How He Left the Hotel by Louisa Baldwin (from The Argosy [UK], October 1894 [uncredited]; reprinted in The Shadow on the Blind and Other Ghost Stories by Mrs. Alfred Baldwon, 1895)
• "If You See Her Face" by B. M. Coker (from "To Let", 1893; reprinted in  "Number Ninety" and Other Ghost Stories, the third volume in Richard Dalby's "Mistresses of the Macabre" series, 2000)
• In Kropfsberg Keep by Ralph Adams Cram (from Black Spirits & White:  A Book of Ghost Stories, 1895)
• In the Dark by Mary E. Penn (from The Argosy [UK], June 1885; reprinted in In the Dark and Othr Ghost Stories, 1999)
• The Interval by Vincent O'Sullivan (from The Best Ghost Stories, edited anonymously, most likely by Joseph Lewis French [sometime erroneously attributed to Arthur B. Reeve, who wrote the introduction], 1919; reprinted in Master of Fallen Years:  The Complete Supernatural Stories of Voncent O'Sullivan, 1995)
• John Charrington's Wedding by E. Nesbit (from Temple Bar, September 1891, as by Edith Nesbit; reprinted in Grim Tales, 1893)
• Joseph:  A Story by Katherine Rickford (from Land and Water, September 18, 1919; reprinted in The Best Psychic Stories. edited by Joseph Lewis French, 1920)
• The Journal of Edward Hargood by "'D.N.J." (from The Cambridge Review, January 26, 1911; reprinted in The Moon-Gazer and One Other, 1988)
• The Kirk Spook by E. G. Swain (from The Stoneground Ghost Tales:  Compiled from the Recollections of the Reverent Roland Batchel, Vicar of the Parish, 1912)
• The Lady and the Ghost by Rose Cecil O'Neill (from The Cosmopolitan, November 1902; reprinted in Humorous Ghost Stories, edited by Dorothy Scarborough, 1921; primarily known as a cartoonist, O'Neill was the creator of the Kewpies)
• The Last Squire of Ennismore by Mrs. J. H. Riddell (from Idle Tales, 1888; Charlotte Riddell was one of the leading Victorian woman writers of supernatural fiction)
• The Lonely Road by H. D. Everett (from The Death Mask and Other Ghosts by Mrs. H. D. Everett, 1920)
• Lost Hearts by M. R. James (from The Pall Mall Magazine, December 1895; reprinted in Ghost Stories of an Antiquary by Montague Rhodes James, Litt.D., 1904)
• The Man with No Face by G. M. Robins (from The Lady's Realm, February 1902; reprinted in The Relations and What They Related and Other Weird Tales by Mrs. Baille Reynolds, 1902; reprinted as The Relations and What They Related & Other Weird Tales by G. M. Robins as Volume 6 in Richard Dalby's "Mistresses of the Macabre" series, 2003)
• The Mass of Shadows by Anatole France (published in French as La messe des onmbres in E'tui de nacre, 1892; first published in English as The Mass of the Shades in Tales from a Mother-of-Pearl Casket, 1896)
• The Medium's End by Ford Madox Ford (from The Bystander, March 1912; reprinted in The Ash-Tree Press Annual Macabre 1998, edited by Jack Adrian, 1998)
• Monsieur de Guise by Perley Poore Sheehan (from The Scrap Book, January 1911; reprinted in Fantastic Novels, July 1940)
• Mrs. Morrel's Last Seance by Edgar Jepson (from The London Magazine, February 1912; reprinted in The Ash-Tree Press Annual Macabre 2005:  Haven't I Read This Before?, dited by Jack Adrian, 2005)
• The Murderer's Violin by Erckmann-Chatrian ("Erckmann-Chatrian was thejoint pseudonym of Emile Erckmann and Alexandre Chatrian; the original Frech appearance of this story was as Le violon du perdu in Contes de la montagne, 1860; English version in The Wild Huntsman, 1877)
• My Friend's Story by Catherine Crowe (from Ghosts and Family Legends:  A Volume for Christmas by Mrs. Crowe, 1859)
• The Mystery of the Semi-Detached by Edith Nesbit (from Grim Tales by E. Nesbit, 1893)
• The Occupant of the Room by Algernon Blackwood (from Nash's Magazine, december 1909; reprinted in Day and Night Stories, 1917)
• Old Ayah by Alice Perrin (from The Story-Teller, June 1916; reprinted in The Sistrum and Other Ghost Stories, 2001)
• On the Brighton Road by Richard Middleton (from The Ghost Ship & Other Stories, 1912)
• The Open Window by Saki (from The Westminster Gazatte, November 18, 1911; repronted in Beasts and Super-Beasts by H. H. Munro, 1914)
• The Other Occupant by Ultich Daubeny (from The Elemental:  Tales of the Supernormal and the Inexplicable, 1919)
• Outside the Door by E. F. Benson (from The London Magazine, January 1910; reprinted in The Room in the Tower and Other Stories, 1912)
• Over an Absinthe /Bottle by W. C. Morrow (from The Argonaut, January 2, 1893, as The Pale Dice-Thrower; reprinted in The Ape, the Idiot & Other People, 1897)
• The Pageant of Ghosts by R. Murray Gilchrist (from The National Observer, August 19, 1892; reprinted inThe Stone Dragon and Other Tragic Romances by Murray Gilchrist 1894)
• The Queer Picture by Bernard Capes (from The Fabulists, 1015)
• The Readjustment by Mary Austin (from Harper's Monthly Magazine, April 1908; reprinted in What Did Miss Darrington See?  an Anthology of Feminist Supernatural Fiction, edited by Jessica Amanda Salmonson, 1989)
• Reconstruction by Michael Kent (from The Blue Magazine, July 1920; reprinted in The Ash-Tree Press Annual Macabre 2005:  Haven't I Read This Before?, edited by Jack Adrian, 2005)
• The Recrudescence of Imray by Rudyard Kipling (from My Own People, aka Life's Handicap:  Being Stories of My Own People, 1891; often reprinted as The Return of Imray)
• The Return by R. Murray Gilchrist (from The National Observer, July 2, 1892; reprinted in The Stone DRagon and Other Tragic Romances by Murray Gilchrist  1894)
• Rose Rose by Barry Pain (from The London Magazine, May 1910; reprinted in Stories in Grey, 1912)
• The Shell of Sense by Olivia Howard Dunbar (from Harper's Magazine, December 1908; reprinted in The Shell of Sense:  Collected Ghost Stories of Olivia Howard Dunbar, 1997)
• The Soul of Laploshka by Saki (from The Westminster Gazette, May 8, 1909; reprinted in Reginald in Russia and Other Sketches, 1910)
• The Specter by Guy de Maupassant (first appeared in French as Apparition in Le Gaulois, April 4, 1883; first pubished in English in an edition og the works of de Maupassant pubished by M. Walter Dunne, 1903)
• A Spectral Collie by Elia W. Peattie (from The Shape of Fear, and Other Ghostly Tales, 1898)
• The Spectre Bride by William Harrison Ainsworth (from Arliss's Pocket Magazine, 1882, as The Baron's Bride; reprinted in Great British Tales of Terror:  Gothic Stories of Horror and Romance 1765-1840, edited by Pater Haining, 1972; this is not  by Ainsworth:  editor Haining confused this with a simlar-named Scottish story; this is supposed from the German and the original author and title is unknown)
• The Spectre of Rislip Abbey by Dick Donovan (from Tales of Terror, 1899; Donovan was a pseudonym of J. E. P. Muddock)
• The Spectre Spiders by William L. Wintle (from Ghost Gleams:  Tales of the Uncanny by W. J. Wintle, 1921)
• The Steps by Amyas Northcote (from In Ghostly Company, 1922)
• The Stone Coffin by "B." (from The Magdalene College Magazine, December 1913; reprinted in When the Door Is Shut and Other Ghost Stories, 1986; the author is suspected by A. C. Benson)
• The Story of the Spaniards, Mammersmith -- by E. and H. Heron (from Pearson's Magazine, January 1898; reprinted in Ghosts:  Being the Experiences of Flaxman Low by Hesketh Prichard and K. Prichard, 1899; Hesketh  Hesketh-Prichard and Kate Prichard were mother and son)
• A Strange Goldfield by Guy Boothby (from The Lady of the Island, 1904)
• A Strange Messenger by Mrs. Molesworth (from The Wrong Envelope and Other Stories, 1906)
• The Stranger by Ambrose Bierce (from Cosmopolitan Magazine, February 1909, as A Stranger; reprinted in Can Such Things Be?, 1910)
• Terror by Night by E. F. Benson (from The Room in the Tower and Other Stories, 1912)
• The Three Sisters by W. W. Jacobs (from Night Watches, 1914; Jacobs is best-known for his story The Monkey's Paw)
• Told in the Inn of Algeciras by W. Somerset Maugham (from The Woman at Home, February 1905; reprinted in The Ash-Tree Press Annual Macabre 1998. edited by Jack Adrian, 1998; this is a much earlier verson of Maugham's 1947 story A Man from Glacow)
• The Tomb by H. P. Lovecraft (from The Vagrant, March 1922, as by Howard Phillips Lovecraft; reprinted in The Outsider and Others, 1939)
• The Transferred Ghost by Frank R. Stockton (from Century Magazine, May 1882; reprinted in The Lady or the Tiger? and Other Stories, 1884)
• The Water Ghost of Harrowby Hall by John Kendrick Bangs (from Harper's Weekly, June 27, 1891; reprinted in The Water Ghost and Others, 1894)
• The Will of Luke Carlowe by Clive Pemberton (from Sketchy Bits, February 19, 1906; reprinted in The Weird O' It, 1906)
• A Wireless Message by Ambrose Bierce (from Cosmopolitan Magazine, October 1905; reprinted in Can Such Things Be?, 1910)
• "With What Measure Ye Mete..." by Ethel Lina White (from Black and White, December 29, 1905; reprinted in The Ash-Tree Press Annual Macabre 2000, edited by Jack Adrian, 2000; the author's novel The Wheel Spins was filmed as The Lady Vanishes by alfed Hitchcock)
• The Woman's Ghost Stroy by Algernon Blackwood (from The Listener and Other Ghost Stories, 1907)

That's a lot of stories to choose from for your Halloween reading!