Spectral Tales

From the dawn of storytelling we have been mesmerized, entertained, and fascinated by stories of otherworldly visitations. Our earliest folklore and oral tales suggest that even before recorded time, on every continent and in every language, we created narratives to animate our fear of the unknown. The classic stories in this anthology have been selected for their literary style, psychological complexity, and enduring power to electrify both the imagination and the senses. As varied, rooted in, and intriguingly expressive of their time and place as these stories are, they all give expression to a universal hunch that we live among ghosts—whether of the past or in the form of portending presences. From Edgar Allan Poe’s timeless “The Tell-Tale Heart” to M. R. James’s “Count Magnus” to Edith Wharton’s subtly unnerving “The Eyes” these tales rise to—and in many ways define—the high water mark of the genre.Includes the full text of H. P. Lovecraft’s superb essay, Supernatural Horror in Literature, an illuminating history and exploration of the art of the weird story—along with brief author biographies.

M. R. James (1862-1936) was an English author, medievalist scholar, and educator. James redefined the ghost story for the twentieth century, shedding many formal Gothic conventions of the genre. Although the settings for his stories were contemporary, his subject and plots reflect his own preoccupation with ancient artifacts, archaeological sites, archives or historical manuscripts. He developed a distinct storytelling style in which the plot hinges on the discovery of an old book or artifact. Hence he is known as the originator of the "antiquarian ghost story." His stories are regarded as some of their kind and his are held in high regard by critics and other writers, including Ramsey Clarke and Stephen King. H. P. Lovecraft called "Count Magnus" (1904) a "veritable Golconda of suspense and suggestion."

Edgar Allan Poe (1809-1849) was one of the most influential American writers of the nineteenth century. He was a poet, a master of the macabre, a pioneer of science fiction, and the inventor of the detective story. "The Tell-Tale Heart" (1843) is a classic work of Gothic fiction and one of Poe's best-known short stories. It was republished on several occasions in his lifetime and has remained a staple of the genre for more than one hundred and fifty years. Since the silent film era, there have been more than thirty film, radio, and stage adaptations.

Ambrose Bierce (1842-1914) was an American short story writer, journalist, and Civil War veteran. The tenth of thirteen children, he left home at the age of fifteen to become a printer's devil at a small abolitionist Ohio newspaper. At the outset of the Civil War he enlisted in the Union Army and was eventually commissioned a first lieutenant. In 1866, a military expedition took him to San Francisco where he contributed to or edited a variety of local newspapers. After a stint living and writing in England he returned to San Francisco and became a regular columnist at The San Francisco Examiner and one of the most influential journalists on the West Coast. He wrote piercingly about the ghastly things he had seen in the war and is considered a pioneer of the psychological horror story. At the age of seventy-one Bierce disappeared while accompanying Pancho Villa's army in Mexico and, in spite of an official investigation, his ultimate fate remains a mystery. For his horror writing, Washington Post critic Michael Dirda ranks Bierce alongside Edgar Allan Poe and H. P. Lovecraft. "The Death of Halpin Frayser" (1891) is among Bierce's finest short stories.