Ancestral Shadows: An Anthology of Ghostly Tales

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Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing, 2004 - 406 Seiten
Widely regarded as the founder of the modern conservative movement, Russell Kirk was a noted man of letters whose prodigious literary output included a syndicated newspaper column, a regular page in "National Review," and many books. This volume demonstrates another compelling side of Kirk -- the imaginative author who could communicate his powerful vision through the dramatic genre of the ghost story.

"Ancestral Shadows" collects nineteen of Kirkbs best ghostly tales from periodicals and anthologies published throughout his life. In the tradition of Defoe, Stevenson, Hawthorne, Coleridge, Poe, and other master writers, these frightful stories conjure the creaks and shadows of the very places where they came to life through Kirkbs pen: haunted St. Andrews, the Isle of Eigg, Kellie Castle, Balcarres House, Durie House (bwhich has the most persistent of all country-house spectresb), and Kirkbs own ancestral spooky house in Mecosta, Michigan.

Full of fantastic gothic tales masterfully told, the volume ends with bA Cautionary Note on the Ghostly Tale, b an incisive piece in which Kirk reflects on why he writes such stories: bexperiments in the moral imaginationb are what he is really after. Ghost stories are not merely entertaining but possess a particular ability to capture the essential features of human nature, of good and evil. bAll important literature has some ethical end, b Kirk says, band the tale of the preternatural -- as written by George Macdonald, C. S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and other masters -- can be an instrument for the recovery of moral order.b

Including an illuminative introduction by Vigen Guroian, "Ancestral Shadows" will enthrall and delight all lovers ofghost stories.

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Inhalt

Introduction
vii
Ex Tenebris
3
Behind the Stumps
18
Uncle Isaiah
33
The Surly Sullen Bell
50
Balgrummos Hell
68
Lex Talionis
85
What Shadows We Pursue
106
Sorworth Place
178
Saviourgate
195
The Last Gods Dream
211
The Peculiar Demesne of Archvincar Gerontion
250
Theres a Long Long Trail AWinding
276
Watchers at the Strait Gate
308
The ReflexMan in Whinnymuir Close
326
The Invasion of the Church of the Holy Ghost
353

The Cellar of Little Egypt
122
Fates Purse
137
The Princess of All Lands
156
An Encounter by Mortstone Pond
395
Urheberrecht

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