The Penguin Book of Ghost Stories: From Elizabeth Gaskell to Ambrose Bierce

This definitive and wide-ranging collection brings together some of the best ghost stories ever written. From Elizabeth Gaskell's "The Old Nurse's Story" to Edith Wharton's "Afterword," The Penguin Book of Ghost Stories features the finest writings from the mid-nineteenth to early twentieth century, by masters including M. R. James, Sheridan Le Fanu, and Ambrose Bierce, among others. With stories from America, Ireland, and England, this volume includes all of the works that define the genre, from its beginning to its apex.

Weaving in details about individual authors and their most famous tales, Michael Newton's absorbing introduction explores the ghost story's history and influences, as well as its changing nature and the reasons for its ongoing popularity.

Introduction • essay by Michael Newton
The Old Nurse's Story • (1852) • novelette by Mrs. Gaskell [as by Elizabeth Gaskell ]
What Was It? • (1859) • shortstory by Fitz-James O'Brien
The Haunted and the Haunters; or, The House and the Brain • (1859) • novelette by Edward Bulwer-Lytton [as by Edward Bulwer Lytton ]
The Cold Embrace • (1860) • shortstory by Mary Elizabeth Braddon
The North Mail • (1865) • shortstory by Amelia B. Edwards (variant of The Phantom Coach 1864)
No. 1 Branch Line: The Signalman • (1866) • shortstory by Charles Dickens (variant of The Signalman)
Green Tea • [Martin Hesselius] • (1974) • novelette by Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu [as by Sheridan Le Fanu ]
The Ghost in the Cap'n Brown House • (1870) • shortstory by Harriet Beecher Stowe
Thrawn Janet • (1881) • shortstory by Robert Louis Stevenson
The Open Door • (1882) • novelette by Margaret Oliphant
At the End of the Passage • (1890) • shortstory by Rudyard Kipling
Nightmare-Touch • (1900) • essay by Lafcadio Hearn
The Monkey's Paw • (1902) • shortstory by W. W. Jacobs
The Wind in the Rose-Bush • (1902) • novelette by Mary E. Wilkins Freeman [as by Mary Wilkins Freeman ]
"Oh, Whistle, and I'll Come to You, My Lad" • (1904) • novelette by M. R. James
The Moonlit Road • (1907) • shortstory by Ambrose Bierce
The Jolly Corner • (1908) • novelette by Henry James
The Readjustment • (1908) • shortstory by Mary Hunter Austin [as by Mary Austin ]
Afterward • (1910) • novelette by Edith Wharton