Ghost Stories by M.R. James

Wednesday, October 29, 2025

I've read a few ghost stories by M.R. James this month. The first, Oh, Whistle, and I'll Come to You, My Lad is actually one I've read before. In it, a professor on holiday finds a whistle on the beach and blows on it resulting in the unfolding of a series of mysterious (and creepy) events. One of my favorites. 

The next, The Residence at Whitminster, was new to me. The story is about two different periods of time separated by about a century which are connected by a haunting. 

The third story, An Episode of Cathedral History, The story involves a cathedral's renovation, during which workers uncover a hidden altar-tomb that has been sealed for centuries. Of course, creepiness ensues. 

Common elements in M.R. James's stories include a scholarly or antiquarian protagonist, settings in ancient English or European locations like villages, universities, or abbeys, and a plot where the mundane is disturbed by a supernatural entity after the protagonist interferes with something from the past. 

I love his stories because they build slowly with an increasing sense of growing dread before a chilling, often malevolent, manifestation appears. They also have many of the characteristics of a good mystery.