‘Oh Whistle and I’ll Come to You’ by M.R. James

An old ghost/horror story, by one of the masters of the uncanny, with layers of atmosphere, wit and humour. Again, I first read this as a teenager. Despite its age it wears well, with a chatty narrator who is clearly enjoying himself, and who is not completely neutral. This technique is relatively rare these days, but on re-reading the story I still enjoy the narrative bias, and all the many asides. The story begins: “‘I suppose you will be getting away pretty soon, now Full term is over, Professor,’ said a person not in the story…”

The premise is truly nightmarish. Professor Parkins invites a malign ghostly presence into his life simply by blowing a whistle which he has dug up from an ancient ruin. He blows the whistle in all innocence and is slowly terrified almost out of his wits, as was I the first time I read it. The mysterious inscription on the whistle isn’t completely explained, but perhaps part of it means O thief, you will blow [it], you will weep…

There are plenty more stories to read at the link – four books’ worth of stories, according to the introduction by M.R. James himself. There is also a short chapter by the author at the end: “Stories I have tried to write” – how wonderfully honest of him! And generous too, as he offers these ideas to anyone who can make something of them.

First published in Ghost Stories of an Antiquary, Edward Arnold, 1904. You can find this story in the Canadian Gutenberg collection of M.R. James’s collected ghost stories here

‘Lost Hearts’ by M. R. James

We think of James as a teller of unsettling stories of ghosts and apparitions taking place in pleasant English landscapes, but Lost Hearts might more correctly belong to the horror genre – its subject matter is so shocking that I can hardly bear to describe it – suffice to say it can be thought of as a variation of the vampire myth with added cannibalism and the destruction of innocence. It is, like all his stories, a masterfully constructed narrative creating a completely convincing and believable world where the unbelievable happens. From the opening with its attention to the architectural detail of the stately home, to the charming little friendship between Stephen, the young protagonist and Mrs Bunch the housekeeper, and the butler’s brief appearance – a whole community of the house is evoked in a few pages. The moments of supernatural horror are grounded with convincing esoteric knowledge, and there is the typical James trope of the signs of supernatural intrusion being mistaken for something trivial – rats or wild animals in this case. A real masterpiece of a short story.

First published in Ghost Stories of an Antiquary, 1904, and now available in Collected Ghost Stories of M. R. James, Oxford World Classics 2013. It can be read online here

‘Oh, Whistle and I’ll Come To You, My Lad’ by M. R. James

Lots of you will already know this one… in my opinion, it’s one of the finest ghost stories ever written. I also recommend the absolutely wonderful 2013 BBC adaptation starring John Hurt and Gemma Jones, which still keeps me up at night when I think about it!

Originally published in Ghost Stories of an Antiquary, Edward Arnold, 1910

‘Canon Alberic’s Scrap-Book’ by M. R. James

Selected by Richard V. Hirst

This was the first known ghost story M.R. James wrote for his Christmas Eve gatherings and, for me, it remains the most affecting. Here we find Dennistoun, an English antiquarian on holiday with friends in southern France who, during a solo day trip to an obscure and decaying cathedral city falls in with some mysterious locals. Via them, Dennistoun encounters an obscure manuscript he discovers is in fact a collection of pages cut from illuminated medieval manuscripts.

All the James elements are there: the stately, slightly fussy erudition, the rare but cursed medieval artefact, the tourist whose curiosity gets the better of him, the shadowy ambivalence about the nature of the ‘ghost’, the “slight haze of distance” (the story is presented as a tale heard second- or perhaps third-hand).

First published in the National Review, 1895; collected in Ghost Stories of an Antiquary, Edward Arnold, 1904 and subsequently in Collected Ghost Stories, Edward Arnold, 1931. Read it online at Project Gutenberg here

‘The Mezzotint’ by M.R. James

‘The Mezzotint’ was read to me on Friday November 21st 1980 when it was screened on BBC1 as part of a series called Spine Chillers; the performer was the actor Michael Bryant and the series was produced by the same team that made Jackanory. The literary and the uncanny were both well represented on TV in the 1970s and early 1980s, occasionally overlapping in strands like this one, the BBC Ghost Story for Christmas adaptations of ‘A Warning to the Curious’, ‘The Signalman’ and so on, and portmanteau series such as Dead of Night and Tales of the Unexpected.

It was years before I read ‘The Mezzotint’ for myself because I had no idea who had written it or who M.R. James was; it remains my favourite of his stories.

First published in Ghost Stories of an Antiquary, Edward Arnold, 1904; Collected in Collected Ghost Stories, Edward Arnold, 1931 and widely available, including in Ghost Stories by M.R. James, Penguin English Library, 2018, and online here