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Ramsey Campbell (Ramsey)
Username: Ramsey

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 92.8.22.143
Posted on Sunday, August 26, 2012 - 10:13 am:   

...and you'll be telling me what to read:

http://www.fantasycon2012.org/ghoststory.php

As you see, the vote is open to all.
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Gary Fry (Gary_fry)
Username: Gary_fry

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 86.31.88.121
Posted on Sunday, August 26, 2012 - 11:30 am:   

I already did. I voted for Just Behind You!
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Gary Fry (Gary_fry)
Username: Gary_fry

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 86.31.88.121
Posted on Sunday, August 26, 2012 - 11:49 am:   

(Only slightly biased :-))

(But I do think it will be good to get a leftfield winner rather than Oh Whistle'.)
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Mick Curtis (Mick)
Username: Mick

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 86.180.123.78
Posted on Sunday, August 26, 2012 - 11:52 am:   

Which it has a good chance of being, I guess. I voted for a tale of Ramsey's too, one which I heard him read at my first ever FCon back in '84 or so. Stuck in my mind all these years so it must be a good'un!
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Gary Fry (Gary_fry)
Username: Gary_fry

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 86.31.88.121
Posted on Sunday, August 26, 2012 - 12:33 pm:   

What if Turn of the Screw wins. You'll be there all bleeding night!
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Huw (Huw)
Username: Huw

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 1.171.251.235
Posted on Sunday, August 26, 2012 - 12:45 pm:   

I was just going to say, what if it's 'The Great God Pan' or something equally lengthy?!
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Mick Curtis (Mick)
Username: Mick

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 86.180.123.78
Posted on Sunday, August 26, 2012 - 12:48 pm:   

They ask for no novels or novellas - let's hope Varney the Vampire doesn't win; we'll be there for a fortnight, and at the end of that Ramsey probably will need a microphone!
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Huw (Huw)
Username: Huw

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 1.171.251.235
Posted on Sunday, August 26, 2012 - 01:04 pm:   

Ah, I see. It's difficult to nominate just one. Who to choose - Aickman, Leiber, Le Fanu, Machen, Blackwood, Ramsey, or perhaps M.R. James? A tough decision!
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Joel (Joel)
Username: Joel

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 2.27.143.40
Posted on Sunday, August 26, 2012 - 06:58 pm:   

Huw – de la Mare is in the running too.
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Joel (Joel)
Username: Joel

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 2.24.39.129
Posted on Sunday, August 26, 2012 - 09:08 pm:   

But Machen's not really a ghost story writer, or not a very good one. Awful good at other kinds of weird tale, of course. Glad to see Leiber in your shortlist.
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Weber (Weber_gregston)
Username: Weber_gregston

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 82.145.208.161
Posted on Sunday, August 26, 2012 - 09:27 pm:   

Well i just voted for a charles grant story
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Joel (Joel)
Username: Joel

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 2.24.10.110
Posted on Monday, August 27, 2012 - 02:36 am:   

Another good choice, Weber.

When it comes to actual ghost stories August Derleth wrote a few classics as well.
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Craig (Craig)
Username: Craig

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 99.126.164.88
Posted on Monday, August 27, 2012 - 06:37 am:   

Since it must be short (rules out oh so many), and must be among "the best"... I'm going with the one by Elizabeth Bowen that—though now more than a few years since first encountering it—still haunts me....
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Joel (Joel)
Username: Joel

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 2.24.37.213
Posted on Monday, August 27, 2012 - 12:55 pm:   

If that's 'The Demon Lover', Craig, not a bad choice. It's interesting to compare it with Shirley Jackson's later story with the same title.

How literal should we be about what is or is not a ghost? Is any spectral being a ghost, or does it have to be a human revenant (i.e. the ghost of a person)? The latter cuts out a lot of classic stuff, of course, and it's probably better to keep the definition more open. But a vampire or werewolf story is not quite a ghost story.

So, basing our criteria on precedent rather than theory, we could say something like: A ghost story is a kind of supernatural story in which the supernatural entity is an apparition or spectre rather than a fully tangible or living creature, 'haunts' a particular place or person, and has some association with the afterlife.

Trying to categorise supernatural entities never works, however, for the basic reason that they don't exist except as symbolic figures in the imagination. That doesn't mean they don't affect us. A dream can change your life by making you understand things in a different way, and a ghost is closer to a dream than to anything else.
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Stevie Walsh (Stephenw)
Username: Stephenw

Registered: 03-2009
Posted From: 212.183.128.10
Posted on Monday, August 27, 2012 - 01:47 pm:   

Just cast my vote for the finest ghost story I ever read: 'The Beckoning Fair One' (1911) by Oliver Onions. It is the most perfectly constructed haunted house story I am aware of as well as the most frightening and psychologically penetrating.

And after that has to come 'The Turn Of The Screw'.
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Weber (Weber_gregston)
Username: Weber_gregston

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 80.239.242.192
Posted on Monday, August 27, 2012 - 02:31 pm:   

My choice was 'if damon comes'. The ghost never actually appears directly but it's still one of the most nerve-wrangling stories Grant ever wrote.
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Ramsey Campbell (Ramsey)
Username: Ramsey

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 92.8.20.213
Posted on Monday, August 27, 2012 - 02:48 pm:   

Stevie, I think the Onions is a novella.
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Huw (Huw)
Username: Huw

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 1.169.132.191
Posted on Monday, August 27, 2012 - 03:57 pm:   

Weber, that particular Grant story got to me, too - I think I first came across it in one of the The Dark Descent volumes.

Joel, I agree with you about keeping the definition fairly flexible in a ghost story (it would probably be easier to refer to them as supernatural or 'weird' tales, as that keeps it more open). It's true Machen didn't really write ghost stories - the only one I can think of now that has actual ghosts is 'The Happy Children'. I also agree with you about de la Mare - he's up there with Aickman as one of the best writers of 'strange' stories, in my opinion. I would also suggest L.P. Hartley.
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Craig (Craig)
Username: Craig

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 99.126.164.88
Posted on Monday, August 27, 2012 - 04:09 pm:   

Indeed, Joel, it was that one.

And your classification of what is or is not a ghost story, is something I was thinking myself; and made me pass over, say, Ambrose Bierce's "The Damned Thing."

But, your classification structure would surely help include "The Tell-Tale Heart."
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Gary Fry (Gary_fry)
Username: Gary_fry

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 86.31.88.121
Posted on Tuesday, August 28, 2012 - 11:10 am:   

What's that Grant story in which parents stage-manage every aspect on their teenage kids' lives? That was insidious.
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Stevie Walsh (Stephenw)
Username: Stephenw

Registered: 03-2009
Posted From: 212.183.128.7
Posted on Tuesday, August 28, 2012 - 01:00 pm:   

If 'The Beckoning Fair One' & 'The Turn Of The Screw' are ruled out for being novellas then the short story I'd have to go for is "The Inner Room" (1968) by Robert Aickman - no ghost story has so haunted my mind and demanded as many obsessive re-readings since first encountering it as that one. He really nailed something extraordinary in that tale.
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Huw (Huw)
Username: Huw

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 111.243.154.19
Posted on Tuesday, August 28, 2012 - 05:27 pm:   

I very nearly chose 'The Inner Room', Stevie. I went with Leiber instead.
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Carolinec (Carolinec)
Username: Carolinec

Registered: 06-2009
Posted From: 92.232.244.38
Posted on Tuesday, August 28, 2012 - 06:24 pm:   

Would W.W. Jacobs' "The Monkey's Paw" count as a ghost story, do you think? I was going to vote for that, and then thought it wasn't really a ghost story. I then forgot to go back to the site and vote!
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Gary Fry (Gary_fry)
Username: Gary_fry

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 86.31.88.121
Posted on Tuesday, August 28, 2012 - 07:28 pm:   

It definitely is, Caroline.
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Gary Fry (Gary_fry)
Username: Gary_fry

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 86.31.88.121
Posted on Tuesday, August 28, 2012 - 07:29 pm:   

I also think Peep is a contender.
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Ramsey Campbell (Ramsey)
Username: Ramsey

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 92.8.30.101
Posted on Tuesday, August 28, 2012 - 10:59 pm:   

The Jacobs certainly is, Caroline.
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Carolinec (Carolinec)
Username: Carolinec

Registered: 06-2009
Posted From: 92.232.244.38
Posted on Wednesday, August 29, 2012 - 12:32 am:   

"The Monkey's Paw" it is for me then - I've been and voted. Pity I won't be at FCon to hear your reading of what ever story wins though, Ramsey.
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Seanmcd (Seanmcd)
Username: Seanmcd

Registered: 03-2009
Posted From: 86.179.77.78
Posted on Wednesday, August 29, 2012 - 12:55 am:   

Very hard to choose. I suspect all the old favourite's will dominate the list. So, based on the amount of hairs raised on my neck, i've picked Napier Court.
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Joel (Joel)
Username: Joel

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 217.37.199.45
Posted on Thursday, August 30, 2012 - 02:06 pm:   

The BFS invites us to make two decisions – which is your favourite ghost story, and which is the best ghost story of all time – that may not coincide. For example, I love every grimy, sardonic word of August Derleth's 'Mrs Manifold' – but I can't make a critical case for it as the best ghost story ever. Best old-school fireside tale with a weird outcome, sure. Best use of wordplay in a ghost story, even. Oh sod it, there's my vote.
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Hubert (Hubert)
Username: Hubert

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 178.116.57.117
Posted on Thursday, August 30, 2012 - 03:13 pm:   

So much to choose from . . . For me it's "All Hallows" by Walter de la Mare. I'm inordinately fond of his "A Recluse" too, but suspect not too many connoisseurs know the tale. Second would be "Martin's Close" by good old M.R. James.
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Hubert (Hubert)
Username: Hubert

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 178.116.57.117
Posted on Friday, August 31, 2012 - 08:19 pm:   

Actually, I've just reread "All Hallows", "A Recluse", "Crewe", "Mr Kempe", "Miss Miller", "Miss Duveen", and "What Dreams May Come" and am mesmerised, as ever, by de la Mare's language. Curiously, "Seaton's Aunt" has always left me cold.

Does anyone here know whether All Hallows, the old cathedral in the cove, is based on an existing structure somewhere on the east coast? Des, maybe?

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