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Published by Penguin and Oxford University Press, 1931, 361 pages.

“I was conscious of a most horrible smell of mould and of a cold kind of face pressed against my own…”
The Treasure of Abbot Thomas

M.R. James is one of the best—if not the best—ghost story writer in the English language. Born in 1862, he went on to become a medieval scholar at Cambridge University (his academic work is still highly respected). But he is best known for his ghost stories, which he used to write and read aloud to friends.

James took the ghost story—which at the time, tended towards the Gothic—and made it contemporary. His protagonists are often scholars, antiquarians like himself, who stumble across a medieval document or artefact that opens the gates to another world, letting in a creature that shouldn’t be there.

My personal favourite is “Oh, Whistle, and I’ll Come to You, My Lad” in which Professor Parkins goes to Burnstow, a seaside town, for a holiday. Walking on the beach, he picks up an old whistle, probably dating back from the time of the Templars. As he walks h

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Montague Rhodes James, better known as M. R. James, (August 1, 1862 - June 12, 1936) was a British scholar, story teller and writer. He is best known for his ghost stories and for developing some of the elements that are still used in that genre. His writings influenced H.P. Lovecraft, Clark Ashton Smith, Stephen King, Ramsey Campbell and John Betjeman. James also influenced radio, film, television and music works.

Most of his ghost stories were originally written to be read aloud to friends.

Works[]

Ghost story anthologies

Other short stories

Travel guidebooks

Abbeys (1926)
Suffolk and Norfolk (1930)

Children's books

M.R. James also wrote entries for the 1912 second supplement of the multi-volume reference work The Dictionary of National Biography. He wrote and edited numerous scholarly works on Bible studies and medieval English history, which were intended for specialists rather than for the general reader.

As well as writing his own ghost stories, M.R. James also championed the works of the Irish author Sheridan Le Fanu (1844-1873). Jam

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M.R. James

Collected Ghost Stories

4.13 avg rating — 7,587 ratings — published 1931 — 58 editions

Ghost Stories of an Antiquary

4.06 avg rating — 5,510 ratings — published 1904 — 1207 editions

Count Magnus and Other Ghost Stories
by

4.21 avg rating — 2,662 ratings — published 2005 — 26 editions

The Conception of Terror: Tales Inspired by M.R. James, Volume 1
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3.40 avg rating — 3,198 ratings — published 2019

Oh, Whistle, and I'll Come to You, My Lad

3.66 avg rating — 2,017 ratings — published 1904 — 21 editions