Echoing Ghost Stories: Literary Reflections of Oral Tradition

For centuries, ghost stories were part of an oral tradition, often involving a storyteller reciting the spooky tale before a fire on a chilly winter night. During the 1800s, as magazine production and literacy became more widespread, reading ghost stories rose in popularity. However, many authors attempted to preserve on paper the experience of listening to an account of the supernatural. Harriet Beecher Stowe, Mary E. Wilkins, E. Nesbit, Ambrose Bierce, Edith Wharton, M.R. James, and many others put their creative stamps on this distinctive tradition. Echoing Ghost Stories: Literary Reflections of Oral Tradition showcases such tales, establishing their fascinating place within the wider genre of the Victorian ghost story.