What do you think?
Rate this book
Ghost Stories
Véra by Villiers de l'Isle-Adam
Don Giovanni by E. T. A. Hoffmann
Him? by Guy de Maupassant
William Wilson by Edgar Allan Poe
The Black Monk by Anton Chekhov
Selecting a Ghost by Arthur Conan Doyle
The Signalman by Charles Dickens
Dr. Cinderella's Plants by Gustav Meyrink
The Haunted House by Edward Bulwer-Lytton
Don Giovanni by E. T. A. Hoffmann
Him? by Guy de Maupassant
William Wilson by Edgar Allan Poe
The Black Monk by Anton Chekhov
Selecting a Ghost by Arthur Conan Doyle
The Signalman by Charles Dickens
Dr. Cinderella's Plants by Gustav Meyrink
The Haunted House by Edward Bulwer-Lytton
- GenresHorrorFictionAnthologies
208 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1986
5 people want to read
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
December 8, 2022
The usual fare you'll find in hundreds of other inexpensive ghost story anthologies. It's worth it just for 'Dr. Cinderella's Plants' by Gustav Meyrink, which was so deliciously weird and grotesque that I'll remember it for a long time.
August 12, 2016
From Casual Debris, including reviews of the individual stories.
Among the numerous twentieth century anthologies of nineteenth century anthologies, the lazily titled Ghost Stories mixes some overly-anthologized stories with a couple of lesser known works. As the stories themselves go, they are all worth reading, but the anthology itself is, despite its physical attractiveness, at times confusing due to its packaging.
The anthology lumps a bunch of supernatural and psychological tales together and claim they are about ghosts. Though the idea of ghosts can be broadened to include more than just the spirits of the dead, the collection is really about apparitions, including hallucinations and projections along with specters. Since of the nine stories included only four actually feature ghosts, the anthology should have been just as lazily titled Apparition Stories.
The other confusing packaging element is the art. Each story is complemented by one or two full-page colour illustrations and a handful of small black and white works. Artist Jan Dungel did read each story since the illustrations sometimes borrow from minor details, though his interpretations are sometimes outside the scope of the tale, particularly with the Maupassant story, where a hallucination is drawn with the head of a leopard-like humanoid that is an invention of the artist himself.
Regardless, though the anthology does not add to the numerous books of its kind, it was good to revisit each of these stories and I do generally like to see such works illustrated. The inclusion of the all-too-common (though excellent) Dickens and Poe stories, is balanced well with the introduction to a strong piece by Villiers de l'Isle-Adam and an amusing one by Doyle, both of which I first read here.
The translators here are not credited, and I can assume they are from the earliest translators of these stories as each should be in the public domain in order to publish something inexpensively.
Among the numerous twentieth century anthologies of nineteenth century anthologies, the lazily titled Ghost Stories mixes some overly-anthologized stories with a couple of lesser known works. As the stories themselves go, they are all worth reading, but the anthology itself is, despite its physical attractiveness, at times confusing due to its packaging.
The anthology lumps a bunch of supernatural and psychological tales together and claim they are about ghosts. Though the idea of ghosts can be broadened to include more than just the spirits of the dead, the collection is really about apparitions, including hallucinations and projections along with specters. Since of the nine stories included only four actually feature ghosts, the anthology should have been just as lazily titled Apparition Stories.
The other confusing packaging element is the art. Each story is complemented by one or two full-page colour illustrations and a handful of small black and white works. Artist Jan Dungel did read each story since the illustrations sometimes borrow from minor details, though his interpretations are sometimes outside the scope of the tale, particularly with the Maupassant story, where a hallucination is drawn with the head of a leopard-like humanoid that is an invention of the artist himself.
Regardless, though the anthology does not add to the numerous books of its kind, it was good to revisit each of these stories and I do generally like to see such works illustrated. The inclusion of the all-too-common (though excellent) Dickens and Poe stories, is balanced well with the introduction to a strong piece by Villiers de l'Isle-Adam and an amusing one by Doyle, both of which I first read here.
The translators here are not credited, and I can assume they are from the earliest translators of these stories as each should be in the public domain in order to publish something inexpensively.
October 28, 2022
Old stories. And written like that of course. Sometimes they were a little hard to keep on reading, to not lose interest. Because, lets be real, this old writing style is a bit boring.
But it was about the stories themselves too. Some were boring, some were actually really nice.
I particularly liked the one by A.C. Doyle and the first story called "Vera".
But it was about the stories themselves too. Some were boring, some were actually really nice.
I particularly liked the one by A.C. Doyle and the first story called "Vera".
January 4, 2020
Two things led me to pick up this book. 1) the death's head moths on the cover; pre-Silence of the Lambs, aren't they? 2) the inclusion of an Edgar Allan Poe story. But I have to say, the stories featured in this collection were rather boring. Yes, I know these are OLDER stories, but I found myself skimming through most of the pages instead of reading them.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews