The Norton Book of Ghost Stories - Hardcover

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0393035646 ISBN 13: 9780393035643

Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company, 1994

Synopsis

"I've occasionally been asked, by someone who has heard that I was assembling this anthology, whether I myself believe in ghosts―to which I've replied, less facetiously than might first appear, "Everybody does." I can't believe that any of us, if we dig deep enough in our psyches, is utterly free of the suspicion that the dead continually attend the living. ―Brad Leithauser, from the Introduction

This assemblage of twenty-nine of the eeriest stories in English features such talents as Henry James, Shirley Jackson, Elizabeth Bowen, A. S. Byatt, and Elizabeth Taylor, accompanied by an introduction that reevaluates the genre.

About this title

From the Back Cover:

This spellbinding book will delight as it terrifies. Brad Leithauser, the noted poet and novelist, had excellence as his only criterion in assembling this collection of twenty-eight of the eeriest short stories in the English language. Included are the most intriguing works by the writers who have defined the genre over the years - Henry James, Oliver Onions, and M. R. James - as well as stories by other authors whose forays into the supernatural are less well known: V. S. Pritchett, Muriel Spark, John Cheever, A. S. Byatt, Elizabeth Taylor, and Philip Graham among others. This surprising gathering of writers makes this collection a must-have for confirmed ghost-story fans as well as for those who simply love good writing. Brad Leithauser's introduction redefines the genre, finding its origins in our fascination with the world beyond our senses. Whatever the stories' similarities, however, each creates its own unique atmosphere of uncanniness that is as hard to analyze as it is to resist. After all, it is "in their restless unease, their dissatisfaction with the provable", as Leithauser writes, that the ghost stories' bewitching power lies.

About the Author:

Brad E. Leithauser(b. February 27, 1953) is an American poet, novelist, essayist, and teacher.

About this edition

• Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
• Publication date: 1994
• ISBN 10: 0393035646
• ISBN 13: 9780393035643
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 432
• Editor: Leithauser Brad E.