Classic Ghost Stories Podcast

A most wonderful Christmas Ghost story. I know I tend to overenthuse, but Green Holly by Elizabeth Bowen is, for me, one of the best ghost stories in English from the mid 20th Century. Bowen removes ghosts from their history of clanking and scaring and contrasts them with the ordinary world or ordinary importance (the war effort in 1944) and suggests that our aspirations for romance and glamour ar...

A Fall of Snow A Fall of Snow by James Turner is a beautifully written and poignant story about a childhood visit to his uncle and a mysterious happening that stayed with him for the rest of his life. The story is set in a large house at Christmas, which is situated in the English County of Suffolk. It is a tale about family, loss, love, and friendship, and it is told in Turner's trademark lyrical...

Classic Ghost Stories Podcast is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. The Magic Shop by H G Wells was published in 1903. "The Magic Shop" is a fantasy short story about a little English boy named Gip who wanted his father to take him into a magic shop they found while walking. They don't know that what they're about...

The Dead is is the last story, and the longest from James Joyce's 1914 short stories collection: Dubliners. It is longer than the rest, being more like a novella. It is considered one of the classics of Irish literature, and possibly the best literary short fiction in the English language. Dubliners is a rich and generous story and though Joyce was considered a pioneer of modernist literature, wit...

Happy Halloween! A disturbing and scary tale that will be performed live in Whitehaven this Halloween as part of our Eerie Cumbria programme. I hope you will be suitably disturbed by it, even it you don't live in Whitehaven. You can listen to my version of Dracula free on Bandcamp (you get to play each chapter 3 x before you have to pay a cent) if you need more Halloween vibes. Classic Ghost Stori...

The Company of Wolves by Angela Carter is a short story from her collection The Bloody Chamber published in 1979 that was made into the 1984 film called, surprisingly The Company of Wolves, by Neil Jordan and starring, amongst others, Angela Lansbury. Classic Ghost Stories Podcast is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscrib...

Ray Bradbury wrote "The Witch Door" in 1995. The main characters live in a dilapidated New England farmhouse. They've come to escape from the totalitarian government and collapsing cities.  One night, one night, they hear a hammering on the Witch Door in their house. The witch door dates back to 1680, when people used it to hide witches from the Salem Witch Trials. The noises grow louder and a wom...

Sardonicus by Ray Russell is possibly the best Gothic horror story written in the 20th century.  Ray Russell's mastery of language elevates this piece of genre fiction into literature.  Russell's reading of character and masterful portrayal of dark nuances are evident. It is such quality even though the author wrote it for Playboy magazine. This tale is perfect for Halloween, but it's captivating...

Basil Netherby is a masterpiece of brooding supernatural fiction. This unabridged audio book style story narrates a ghost story or a story of possession. Basil Netherby has many of the elements of gothic literature. It was written by Arthur or A.C. Benson, the brother of E. F. Benson. It has elements of M. R. James, who was a personal friend of A C Benson and is even reminiscent of H. P. Lovecraft...

Brickett Bottom by Amyas Northcote is about a mysterious house deep in the woods that no one but lonely young girls can see. There is a dark secret to this house in the forest, as you will discover. Amyas Northcote was the son of an English aristocratic family. This story was published in his one collection of ghost stories: "Ghostly Company". Though it was published in 1921, I think there is some...

In this short chapter, Kay eavesdrops on Wicked Hill and hears the plans of the Pouncer 7 and also something about the Harker Treasure. He leads Nibs back home and has a run in at breakfast with his governess. A charming children's story by John Masefield. The Midnight Folk by John Masefield [The Midnight Folk: Masefield, John, Blake, Quentin + Free Delivery](https://amzn.to/3SpRsRu) Get All Episo...

The Birds by Daphne du Maurier was adapted into the 1963 horror thriller movie The Birds by Alfred Hitchcock. Daphne du Maurier wrote horror and mystery and crime stories and the birds can be considered science fiction. She was a master of storytelling and character building in English literature. The Birds concerns a bird attack in a horror story version of the near future when nature has been tw...

The Outcast by E F Benson First we are introduced to Mrs Bertha Acres through the eyes of Tony and his wife Madge. The initial incident is her husband shooting himself due to detesting her. That is the first sign we have that this lady is to be the subject of the story and it is enough to make us prick up our ears and raise questions about her. (If You Appreciate The Work I’ve Put In Here - You co...

Pallinghurst Barrow by Grant Allen A horror story about spirits who linger in old places in the English countryisde. Published 1892. Suggested by Susan Tudor-Coulson  If You Appreciate The Work I’ve Put In Here - You could buy me a coffee at https://ko-fi.com/tonywalker or join as a Patron for exclusive content here: https://www.patreon.com/barcud Grant Allen Charles Grant Blairfindie Allen was bo...

The Doll by Daphne du Maurier Dame Daphne du Maurier, Lady Browning was born in 1907 in London in 1931 and died in 1989 in Cornwall. She is a famous novelist with such best-sellers as Rebecca, Frenchman’s Creek, The Birds and the novella Don’t Look Now. This story is taken from a collection of short stories written before her famous novels. She was clearly fond of the name Rebecca for the dark-spi...

A Pair of Muddy Shoes by Lennox Robinson Lennox Robinson was an Irish author, poet, dramatist and theatre produce who was born in Westgrove, County Cork, Ireland in 1886 the son of a Protestant clergyman, who had previously been a stockbroker. Lennox (fully Esme Stuart Lennox Robinson) was often ill as a child and educated by private tutor and at a Church of Ireland (that is the Protestant Anglica...

The Milk-White Child of Ravenglass by Tony Walker, is one of mine. As I explain in the notes, this is one of my More Cumbrian Ghost Stories book. You can purchase the full book or audiobook (just saying, if you were so inclined, and you liked this one, well maybe you'd like the rest?) Check out the Ko-Fi link. I think it's there. I'm giving you this because I'm off on my hols soon so I will schedu...

The Entrance by Gerald Durrell Gerald Durrell was born in Jamshedpur which was then part of British India, in 1925 and died in St Hellier, Jersey in 1995, aged 70.  This story, The Entrance was published in his collection The Picnic and Suchlike Pandemonium in 1979. This title was renamed The Picnic and Other Inimitable Stories though I suspect that someone who didn’t understand the word pandemoni...

Clark Ashton Smith Clark Ashton Smith was an American writer born in Long Valley, California in 1893 who died in Pacific Grove, California in 1961, aged 68.  They are actually four hundred and twenty eight miles apart which is longer than the whole of England.  For comparison I have only made two hundred yards from the place I was born to the place I now live. He lived most of his life in the smal...

The Masque of the Red Death by Edgar Allan Poe The Masque of the Red Death was published in 1842 by Edgar Allan Poe in Graham’s Magazine.  He was paid $12 for it. There is an app on the internet to tell you the value of money today and that calculates $12 in 1842 is worth $482 today.  That is £353 Sterling, or £4,236 Scots.  Good money in anyone’s book for a 16 minute story. It was made into a fil...

A Night On The Borders of The Black Forest Episode A Night On The Borders of The Black Forest.mp3 Amelia B Edwards Born in 1831 in London and died in 1892 aged 60 in Weston Supermare at the seaside near Bristol. She was a novelist, traveller and enthusiastic amateur Egyptologist. Her mother was Irish and her father had been an officer in the British Army and then became a banker. She was married,...

The Catacomb by Peter Shilston was recommended by one of my Patreons but it was hard to get hold of. It was published in the early 1980s in a fanzine for lovers of M R James's stories who wrote stories in a similar vein. This home-produced magazine was called More Ghosts and Scholars and is very hard to get hold of. Then it was reprinted in Best of Ghosts and Scholars and Best Horror Volume 9 edit...

The Secret of the Vault by J Wesley Rosenquest or Rosenquist was published in the May 1938 edition of *Weird Tales*. Not much is known about him. I am not doing many notes as I have spoken my piece at the end of the podcast. But every narrator needs a hand and podcasting doesn’t come free to the podcaster, so if you don’t / haven’t already then consider the following! If You Appreciate The Work I’...

Anthony Boucher Anthony Boucher known as was the pen name of William Anthony Parker White and he was known at Tony. He was born in 1911 in Oakland California and died aged only 56 in Oakland of lung cancer. I guess he liked it there. He graduated from Pasadena High in 1928 and went to the University of Southern California and did his masters at University of California, Berkely. Boucher is to rhym...

E F Benson Edward Frederic Benson was born in 1867 at Wellington College, where his father was headmaster,  in Berkshire just outside London and died at University College London at the age of 72. His father went on to be Bishop of Truro, and Cornwall features in both his and his brothers’ stories, and then Archbishop of Canterbury, the highest ranking of the Anglican Church. He was the fifth chil...