I definitely must now read The Beckoning Fair One -- love that title. I have had three encounters with phenomena I could not and cannot explain, one of which was olfactory, one visual, and one involving a cell phone. I heard about the dean's ghost too. I think he was a bit of a bother at Young Harris and wonder if he has moved on into the light.
I THOUGHT it was a dean at Young Harris but I wasn't entirely sure and a bit of googling didn't help, so thank you for confirming that for me! I must ask some of my Young Harris alumni friends if they ever encountered him. I am loving hearing about everyone's unexplained phenomena!
Below is a link to WIDDERSHINS at Project Gutenberg you can download/read online, the collection by Oliver Onions that has "The Beckoning Fair One" as the first story (ignore the book description, which is wrong--WIDDERSHINS isn't a novel and the description is just of "The Beckoning Fair One"). And under that, a reading of it on YouTube. Alternately, I have a copy I can loan you next time I see you.
I believe I remember his last name was Dance (or Danse). I am not sure how close in time his suicide was to that of the poet Byron Herbert Reece, who was also thought to be a ghost at Young Harris. (I bought The Beckoning Fair One from Amazon and have started it. Thanks for the links!)
I remembered his name as Dean Dance as well. It's definitely a question for the newspaper archives, as light googling only offered me things about deans of dance departments and dances at Young Harris (with the unwelcome Google AI informing me that Young Harris didn't hold any dances known as Dean Dances.)
A Christmas Carol of course! 😄. And I've had 2 experiences. One, I saw my much loved deceased pup. I was in the bathroom and saw her out of the corner of my eye. When I looked again, she was gone. I immediately looked around and no dogs were upstairs. It was the day her bestie dog died. I always think she came back for him, and looked in to say hi. If I believed in ghosts, which I'm not sure if I do. But I sure saw her. 🙂
The other. The antique mall I sell in has a ghost, generally accepted to be the ghost of a young girl who was killed in the building when it was a lumber store (that is true). Everyone who saw her, and more than one did, the ghost was described as a child. One day I was in my booth, putting something down, and as I leaned over I felt something brush my hair back. I thought I had gotten too close to something hanging in the booth so stepped back and straightened up. Nothing was anywhere near me. Again. Who knows. But something touched my hair.
Ive always wanted to see a ghost, still do, just to know for sure if they exist. Of course, if they don't, not likely too, am I? 😆
I love how so many of us are in that space of "no I don't think I believe in ghosts but also here's a ghost story!" That antique mall one is creepy. As for animals--I frequently think a cat has jumped on the bed with me, only to realize I've got the door shut and there are no cats in the room with me.
So much to talk about! "The Beckoning Fair One." This is my favorite ghost story as well. When I moved to LA from NYC, I actually pitched it to an executive as a film. His response was, "No one wants to watch movies about writers." Ha ha. Do I believe in ghosts? Depends on the day, I suppose. Sometimes it's a warp in dimensions, sometimes it's wishful thinking. I did, however, grow up in a Victorian farmhouse with a familial graveyard on the property and when I was young, my brother and I took "gifts" to the spirits in a bid to get them not to haunt us. Then there's the night my father died in '98 and my phone rang...yes, one of those stories. Anyway, thanks for lots to continue to ponder.
Argh! And there are SO MANY movies about writers! I'd love to see "The Beckoning Fair One" onscreen. I'm with you on "depends on the day." The phone call--we all have so many stories like this. And yes, for so many of them, we could dig deep and come up with a "rational" explanation. Yet still the what-ifs linger (like ghosts).
I'm making note of the titles you listed because I love a good ghost story. In elementary school my best friend and I took turns checking out from the library The Headless Roommate and Other Tales of Terror. We also attempted a seance once and tried to use a Ouija board, to no success either time much to our dismay. I have a sort of ghost story in which a dead friend appeared to me in a dream. I don't know whether I believe in ghosts or not, but I like to think that he did visit me. It's not very scary but one of my favorite ghost stories is The Canterville Ghost and I only realized recently that it was written by Oscar Wilde.
Ooh, I hope you enjoy some of them! This morning it's occurred to me that The Haunting of Hill House is not a ghost story but a haunted house story--but a great book all the same! I don't believe I've ever actually read the Oscar Wilde story although I've certainly heard of it.
My mom actually threw away our Ouija board after she saw The Exorcist, haha, so maybe she wouldn't have been quite THAT vulnerable in a horror movie after all. But your comment is bringing in a flood of memories of attempted seances, Ouija boards (it moved but I'm sure someone was doing it)... a slumber party at my house where someone brought a copy of The Amityville Horror and we were passing it around and working ourselves into a state of absolute terror. I remember one of us set a Bible on top of it before we went to sleep!
I think it's because in Hill House, it's the house itself that's evil/wrong. Sort of the case with the Overlook Hotel in The Shining as well I guess, although there are lots and lots of ghosts in that one too. I was being very strict with my definitions just for the purposes of this piece although it's not something I bother with most of the time--I think that usually, slicing things into genres and smaller and smaller subgenres is kind of boring and pointless. Hill House FEELS like a ghost story, anyway!
Did you know Liz Hand wrote an authorized (by Jackson's family) sequel to it a couple of years ago--A Haunting on the Hill? Practically an impossible brief, to try to follow the original, but she's a great writer and I enjoyed reading it.
Oh I meant to add... I do wonder whether some dreams might be visitations. I've dreamed about dead people lots before of course but I don't remember any of them seeming like anything more than dreams. I know people who have had very powerful ones, though, that didn't seem like dreams. My mom had one about my brother after she died that she felt very strongly was from him, and I know there were details of it she never shared.
I'm going to write about the dream I had (prompted by this post), but in it my friend Fred, who had died by suicide, came to me and said that he wished he could take it back and how sorry he was for everyone's pain. It was very real and felt like a visit. A few days later I realized that I had had the dream on Yom Kippur, the Jewish day of atonement, and Fred was Jewish. Maybe it was just my brain, but I don't think I knew that it was Yom Kipppur that day.
I definitely must now read The Beckoning Fair One -- love that title. I have had three encounters with phenomena I could not and cannot explain, one of which was olfactory, one visual, and one involving a cell phone. I heard about the dean's ghost too. I think he was a bit of a bother at Young Harris and wonder if he has moved on into the light.
I THOUGHT it was a dean at Young Harris but I wasn't entirely sure and a bit of googling didn't help, so thank you for confirming that for me! I must ask some of my Young Harris alumni friends if they ever encountered him. I am loving hearing about everyone's unexplained phenomena!
Below is a link to WIDDERSHINS at Project Gutenberg you can download/read online, the collection by Oliver Onions that has "The Beckoning Fair One" as the first story (ignore the book description, which is wrong--WIDDERSHINS isn't a novel and the description is just of "The Beckoning Fair One"). And under that, a reading of it on YouTube. Alternately, I have a copy I can loan you next time I see you.
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/14168
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a0Iu0AJ1AIg
I believe I remember his last name was Dance (or Danse). I am not sure how close in time his suicide was to that of the poet Byron Herbert Reece, who was also thought to be a ghost at Young Harris. (I bought The Beckoning Fair One from Amazon and have started it. Thanks for the links!)
I remembered his name as Dean Dance as well. It's definitely a question for the newspaper archives, as light googling only offered me things about deans of dance departments and dances at Young Harris (with the unwelcome Google AI informing me that Young Harris didn't hold any dances known as Dean Dances.)
I really hope you enjoy The Beckoning Fair One!
A Christmas Carol of course! 😄. And I've had 2 experiences. One, I saw my much loved deceased pup. I was in the bathroom and saw her out of the corner of my eye. When I looked again, she was gone. I immediately looked around and no dogs were upstairs. It was the day her bestie dog died. I always think she came back for him, and looked in to say hi. If I believed in ghosts, which I'm not sure if I do. But I sure saw her. 🙂
The other. The antique mall I sell in has a ghost, generally accepted to be the ghost of a young girl who was killed in the building when it was a lumber store (that is true). Everyone who saw her, and more than one did, the ghost was described as a child. One day I was in my booth, putting something down, and as I leaned over I felt something brush my hair back. I thought I had gotten too close to something hanging in the booth so stepped back and straightened up. Nothing was anywhere near me. Again. Who knows. But something touched my hair.
Ive always wanted to see a ghost, still do, just to know for sure if they exist. Of course, if they don't, not likely too, am I? 😆
I love how so many of us are in that space of "no I don't think I believe in ghosts but also here's a ghost story!" That antique mall one is creepy. As for animals--I frequently think a cat has jumped on the bed with me, only to realize I've got the door shut and there are no cats in the room with me.
Our house was a new build when we moved in. I always think, if there are ghosts, it's our pets who have passed. And I'm always ok with that. ❤️
The Shepherd by Frederick Forsyth is a favourite of mine and it IS set at Christmas. https://youtu.be/FBDJV2H4UTs?si=bMRndAyXhRGrchzr
Oh, thank you for this! I'm not familiar with it all. I only know Frederick Forsyth as a writer of espionage thrillers.
So much to talk about! "The Beckoning Fair One." This is my favorite ghost story as well. When I moved to LA from NYC, I actually pitched it to an executive as a film. His response was, "No one wants to watch movies about writers." Ha ha. Do I believe in ghosts? Depends on the day, I suppose. Sometimes it's a warp in dimensions, sometimes it's wishful thinking. I did, however, grow up in a Victorian farmhouse with a familial graveyard on the property and when I was young, my brother and I took "gifts" to the spirits in a bid to get them not to haunt us. Then there's the night my father died in '98 and my phone rang...yes, one of those stories. Anyway, thanks for lots to continue to ponder.
Argh! And there are SO MANY movies about writers! I'd love to see "The Beckoning Fair One" onscreen. I'm with you on "depends on the day." The phone call--we all have so many stories like this. And yes, for so many of them, we could dig deep and come up with a "rational" explanation. Yet still the what-ifs linger (like ghosts).
I'm making note of the titles you listed because I love a good ghost story. In elementary school my best friend and I took turns checking out from the library The Headless Roommate and Other Tales of Terror. We also attempted a seance once and tried to use a Ouija board, to no success either time much to our dismay. I have a sort of ghost story in which a dead friend appeared to me in a dream. I don't know whether I believe in ghosts or not, but I like to think that he did visit me. It's not very scary but one of my favorite ghost stories is The Canterville Ghost and I only realized recently that it was written by Oscar Wilde.
Ooh, I hope you enjoy some of them! This morning it's occurred to me that The Haunting of Hill House is not a ghost story but a haunted house story--but a great book all the same! I don't believe I've ever actually read the Oscar Wilde story although I've certainly heard of it.
My mom actually threw away our Ouija board after she saw The Exorcist, haha, so maybe she wouldn't have been quite THAT vulnerable in a horror movie after all. But your comment is bringing in a flood of memories of attempted seances, Ouija boards (it moved but I'm sure someone was doing it)... a slumber party at my house where someone brought a copy of The Amityville Horror and we were passing it around and working ourselves into a state of absolute terror. I remember one of us set a Bible on top of it before we went to sleep!
Love the Haunting of Hill House. I always think of it as a ghost story. Not sure the distinction between a haunted house and a ghost story.
I'll have to look for that.
I think it's because in Hill House, it's the house itself that's evil/wrong. Sort of the case with the Overlook Hotel in The Shining as well I guess, although there are lots and lots of ghosts in that one too. I was being very strict with my definitions just for the purposes of this piece although it's not something I bother with most of the time--I think that usually, slicing things into genres and smaller and smaller subgenres is kind of boring and pointless. Hill House FEELS like a ghost story, anyway!
Did you know Liz Hand wrote an authorized (by Jackson's family) sequel to it a couple of years ago--A Haunting on the Hill? Practically an impossible brief, to try to follow the original, but she's a great writer and I enjoyed reading it.
Oh I meant to add... I do wonder whether some dreams might be visitations. I've dreamed about dead people lots before of course but I don't remember any of them seeming like anything more than dreams. I know people who have had very powerful ones, though, that didn't seem like dreams. My mom had one about my brother after she died that she felt very strongly was from him, and I know there were details of it she never shared.
I'm going to write about the dream I had (prompted by this post), but in it my friend Fred, who had died by suicide, came to me and said that he wished he could take it back and how sorry he was for everyone's pain. It was very real and felt like a visit. A few days later I realized that I had had the dream on Yom Kippur, the Jewish day of atonement, and Fred was Jewish. Maybe it was just my brain, but I don't think I knew that it was Yom Kipppur that day.
Oh, wow. I look forward to reading your piece on it!
—What is a ghost? Stephen said with tingling energy. One who has faded into impalpability through death, through absence, through change of manners.
James Joyce, ULYSSES
♥️ Love this. I've always thought The Dead feels like a ghost story, especially that final stunning sentence.