From the Library
The Journal
Notes from the Library: winter folklore, old customs and odd history, the writers who made the ghost story, and now and then a classic tale shared in full.
Folklore & HistoryThe Hellfire Club: Mock Monks and Rumor Beneath West Wycombe
The Hellfire Club of Sir Francis Dashwood: mock monks at Medmenham Abbey, candlelit chalk caves at West Wycombe, and why the rumors outran the evidence.
Story ShelfThe Wendigo by Algernon Blackwood
Algernon Blackwood's 1910 story of a hunting party, an uneasy guide, and a call from above the winter trees.
Folklore & HistoryJoanna Southcott's Box: A Prophecy Still Waiting for Its Bishops
Joanna Southcott's box, sealed until twenty-four bishops gather: the Devon prophetess, her seals, the Shiloh pregnancy, and the Panacea Society's long wait.
Folklore & HistoryThe Victorian Séance: How the Dead Became a Parlor Game
Victorian séance history: how two sisters' rapping knuckles launched spiritualism, filled respectable parlors with mediums, and changed horror forever.
Folklore & HistorySpirit Photography: How the Victorians Photographed Ghosts
Spirit photography history: William Mumler's ghostly portraits, the Mary Todd Lincoln photograph, the fraud trials, and why the pictures still unsettle.
Story ShelfThe Judge's House by Bram Stoker
Bram Stoker's 1891 haunted house classic of a student, a bargain lease, and an unusually bold rat.
- Folklore & History
The Ghost Story as Christmas Gift: A Tradition Revived
For the Victorians, a ghost story was a Christmas gift: seasonal books, fireside readings, a shiver shared. How to revive the tradition this year.
Folklore & HistoryLiminal Places in Folklore: Why Thresholds Frighten Us
Liminal space folklore explained: why doorways, crossroads, bridges, and midnight have frightened every culture, and what the old beliefs knew.
Folklore & HistoryThe Voynich Manuscript: The Book Nobody Can Read
The Voynich Manuscript: a fifteenth-century book of unknown plants, star charts and bathing women, in a script that has beaten every codebreaker who tried it.
Folklore & HistoryThe Krampus Legend: Saint Nicholas and His Christmas Devil
The Krampus legend: the horned Alpine devil who walks with Saint Nicholas on December 5, from carved masks and banned dances to numbered devils in Salzburg.
Folklore & HistoryWhy the Victorians Told Ghost Stories at Christmas
The Victorians spent Christmas Eve telling ghost stories by firelight. Here is where that eerie tradition came from, and how to revive it this winter.
Folklore & HistoryThe Icelandic Yule Cat, Grýla and the Thirteen Yule Lads
The Icelandic Yule Cat and its family: Grýla the child-cooking ogress, her ragged husband, and thirteen troll sons who raid the farms before Christmas Eve.
WritersCharles Dickens, Ghost-Story Editor: The Man Who Ran Christmas
Dickens did more than write A Christmas Carol: as editor he built the Christmas ghost story into an institution. The impresario of the Victorian shiver.
Folklore & HistoryThe Mari Lwyd: The Horse Skull That Sings at Your Door
The Mari Lwyd, a ribboned horse skull on a pole, went door to door in south Wales between Christmas and Twelfth Night and had to win a rhyming duel to get in.
Story ShelfThe Signal-Man by Charles Dickens
Dickens's 1866 railway ghost classic of a lonely signal box, a spectral warning, and a scheduled disaster.
Folklore & HistoryThe Black Dogs of England: Folklore's Favorite Omen
Black dog folklore: Black Shuck, the Barghest, and the phantom hounds of the English lanes, from the Bungay church door to the Baskerville moor.
Reading ListsA Ghost Story for Every Night of Advent: 24 Winter Tales
An advent calendar of ghost stories: 24 classic winter tales, one for each December night, from The Signal-Man to Oh Whistle on Christmas Eve.
Folklore & HistoryReal Cryptids the Victorians Believed In
Victorian cryptids were front-page news: sea serpents logged by naval officers, ape-men, and beasts that turned out to be real. The strange true history.
WritersM.R. James: A Beginner's Guide to the Ghost Story Master
New to M.R. James? Here is who he was, what makes his ghost stories so frightening, and the five tales to read first. A guide for the curious.
Folklore & HistoryCorpse Roads and Crossroads: Folklore of In-Between Places
Corpse road folklore: the paths the dead were carried along, the crossroads burials, and why Britain's old ways are still walked carefully after dark.
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