Edgar Allan Poe is a writer whose life and personality have attracted almost as much attention as his writing, which is a pity considering that there are few, whether in the field of supernatural or mainstream fiction, who can be called his equal. A New Englander, like his great admirer H P Lovecraft, Poe was born in in Boston, Massachusetts in 1809 and was the son of itinerant actors. Orphaned as a child by the death of his mother and mysterious disappearance of his father, Poe was taken into the home of a Richmond merchant, John Allan, from whom he later took his middle name. Despite this, Poe’s relationship with his ‘foster-father’ (he was never legally adopted) was never good and was strained especially when he was forced to withdraw from the University of Virginia because Allan refused to finance him. Although in 1830 Poe attended the Military Academy at West Point at Allan’s behest, in an act of defiance he neglected his duties there intentionally, which led to his dishonourable discharge in 1831. Thus began an itinerant, tormented life which nevertheless resulted in the publication of some of the most visionary, powerful and searing poetry and prose ever committed to print.
Top Posts & Pages
Liddell’s Ghost
Click image to read my short story, 'Liddell’s Ghost' in Cygnus, the Journal of Speculative Fiction.
Changed
Click image to read my short story 'Changed' in The Cynic Online Magazine.
First Date
Click image to read my short story 'First Date' in Aphelion, the Webzine of sci-fi and fantasy.
Ghost Walk
Click image to read my short story 'Ghost Walk' in Aphelion, the Webzine of sci-fi and fantasy.
M R James
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Ghosts of Christmas Past
‘There must be something ghostly in the air of Christmas,’ wrote Jerome K. Jerome in the introduction to his darkly comic collection Told After Supper (1891), ‘something about the close, muggy atmosphere that draws up the ghosts, like the dampness of the summer rains brings out the frogs and snails’. Dickens would no doubt agree, […]
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M R James’s Suffolk
The macabre beneath the landscape is not dispelled by nearness to the sea. What Henry James knew, and described in English Hours (1905) – the strangeness present on a flattened seashore – M R James (no blood relation, although the two were acquainted) expressed in two of his best-known ghost stories: Oh, Whistle, and I’ll […]
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A Warning to the Curious
Here’s a real festive treat. In 2000 the BBC produced a series called Ghost Stories for Christmas, with Christopher Lee in which Lee played M R James reading four of his own stories. Lee, who actually once met James, obviously enjoyed making this series and A Warning to the Curious is a real highlight – enjoy!
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Lost Hearts
I have been haunted by the writings of M R James since childhood but when asked what is my favourite of all his ghostly tales I’ve never fully been able to answer. Lost Hearts, an early tale which apparently James didn’t much care for, and which only appeared in Ghost Stories of an Antiquary to […]
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A Ghost Story for Christmas: The Tractate Middoth
Here’s a real treat to conclude the series of Christmas ghost stories that I’ve been posting for the last few weeks – the BBC adaptation of The Tractate Middoth from just a couple of years ago. Fingers crossed they do another one this year!
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Ghost Cities 