Author:Peter Washington
Tales about ghosts are as old as human culture itself but the ghost story as a distinguished literary form reached its apogee in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. As traditional religions declined in the West during those years, people looked for new ways of describing the spiritual realities explained by religion. The ghost story is a literary expression of this need, its rise corresponding to the growing popularity of Spiritualism. Ghost stories balance the increasingly powerful scientific materialism of the age with intimations that there are other orders of experience which we cannot define and only glimpse.
The Everyman selection of ghost stories includes examples from this period by major writers such as Robert Louis Stevenson, Guy de Maupassant, Henry James and Edith Wharton. M. R. James is featured as a specialist in the genre. Later writers include Elizabeth Bowen, Penelope Lively and Ray Bradbury.
One feature of this collection is to show that there is more to the ghost story than the thrill of horror, important though that is. These stories include comedy and tragedy, pathos, drama and even poetry. Each is a masterpiece in its own right, irrespective of whether or not we believe in the realm of spectres.
Deeply moving and entertaining
—— New York TimesThe readability of a novel like A Word Child is almost appallingly powerful
—— IndependentIt would be difficult to speak too highly of the extraordinary skill and confidence here displayed
—— Frank KermodeFrom the beginning of her career, Iris Murdoch seemed to enlarge the possibilities in front of the English novel. She was a writer of wonderful, and sometimes rather alarming idiosyncrasy... Hers was a liberating and a generous imagination
—— IndependentThe incomparable and timeless genius - perfect for readers of all ages, shapes and sizes!
—— Kate MosseP.G. Wodehouse remains the greatest chronicler of a certain kind of Englishness, that no one else has ever captured quite so sharply, or with quite as much wit and affection
—— Julian FellowesA genius ... Elusive, delicate but lasting
—— Alan AyckbournP.G. Wodehouse is the gold standard of English wit
—— Christopher HitchensTo dive into a Wodehouse novel is to swim in some of the most elegantly turned phrases in the English language
—— Ben SchottWodehouse is so utterly, properly, simply funny
—— Adele ParksI've recorded all the Jeeves books, and I can tell you this: it's like singing Mozart. The perfection of the phrasing is a physical pleasure. I doubt if any writer in the English language has more perfect music
—— Simon CallowWodehouse was quite simply the Bee's Knees. And then some
—— Joseph ConnollyI constantly find myself drooling with admiration at the sublime way Wodehouse plays with the English language
—— Simon BrettQuite simply, the master of comic writing at work
—— Jane MooreTo pick up a Wodehouse novel is to find oneself in the presence of genius - no writer has ever given me so much pure enjoyment
—— John Julius NorwichCompulsory reading for anyone who has a pig, an aunt - or a sense of humour!
—— Lindsey DavisP.G. Wodehouse should be prescribed to treat depression. Cheaper, more effective than valium and far, far more addictive
—— Olivia WilliamsMy only problem with Wodehouse is deciding which of his enchanting books to take to my desert island
—— Ruth Dudley EdwardsThe Wodehouse wit should be registered at Police HQ as a chemical weapon
—— Kathy LetteWitty and effortlessly fluid. His books are laugh-out-loud funny
—— Arabella WeirThe funniest writer ever to put words to paper
—— Hugh LaurieThe greatest comic writer ever
—— Douglas AdamsP.G. Wodehouse wrote the best English comic novels of the century
—— Sebastian FaulksSublime comic genius
—— Ben EltonYou don't analyse such sunlit perfection, you just bask in its warmth and splendour
—— Stephen Fry
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