The Ghost Stories of Wilkie Collins edited by Xavier Aldana Reyes

I hope you all had a relaxing and fun festive season and a very happy New Year! We watched a lot of Christmassy movies, read as many seasonal books as we could, and ate just the right amount of sweets to keep us going. Well, we might have overindulged a touch! We had a lovely white Christmas, then a big melt with a ton of rain, but by New Year’s Eve the temperature dropped and snow fell across the countryside like a dusting of icing sugar. And it has snowed here every day since. Twelve days and counting! What a great excuse to curl up with a hot cup of tea by the fire and dip into some ghost stories. That is, right after you have exerted yourself outside with a brisk walk, of course! 

I had not read anything by Wilkie Collins since reading The Moonstone for a Victorian literature class in uni. I remember it was a favourite of many of my classmates, which surprised me, because I wasn’t blown away by it. However, when you are taking five English courses, all of which have you reading a minimum of one assigned novel per week, plus reading the current research, and writing essays, not to mention going to lectures and seminars, sometimes it can be hard to find joy in what you are reading. I always gravitated towards the novels I read before I started uni, but I’m guessing that had a lot to do with how I read before I started university. There was no rush to get through a book. I read in my leisure, and even when I was reading a weighty tome, it was for leisure.

So, as I said, I had not read any Wilkie Collins in a while, and what a shame that is, because I absolutely loved reading this collection. I grew up reading Charles Dickens, so the language of Collins, a contemporary and friend of Dickens, felt like slipping on a favourite sweater that had got pushed to the back of the drawer and forgotten. What a joy to find the sweater still fits!

“The Last Stage Coachman”

Originally published in 1843, this story was haunting and a bit scary. The narrator comes across an inn, which would have been used in the days of the coach, but has since become derelict. He is bemoaning the loss of the coach in replacement of steam trains, when he spots a coachman. But the coachman is changed of yore. Altered by his fate, the coachman’s clothes hang off him in tatters. His face is lined, and his expression changed. This coachman is not smiling in greeting anymore. 

The story provided me with a perspective of the advent of steam trains that I had not considered. The fact that people might actually mourn the loss of the coach isn’t something that had occurred to me. But I found myself thinking about the changes to rural areas when a highway is put in, diverting traffic away from the smaller communities and their businesses, causing them to have to close up in favour of these big box stores that open just off the highway. The same thing must have happened when the rail lines were put in. This was a great start to the collection. It made me very excited for what was to come.

“Nine O’Clock!”

This is a chilling story about a family prophecy. First published in 1852, but set on June 30, 1793 when a prisoner awaits execution by guillotine. The Girondin party in the first French Revolution are to be taken out to make way for the Robespierre and the Reign of Terror. Many of the prisoners, laugh and joke and make light of their impending doom, even going so far as to place bets on what time they are to die, as a way of dealing with the serious nature of what is to happen in the morning. But one man, Duprat, stands apart. He is serious but calm, and his good friend Marigny asks him why. This was such a compelling story. Sucked me right in!

“Mad Monkton”

First published as “The Monktons of Wincot Abbey” in 1855 in Fraser’s Magazine, this one made an appearance in the collection The Queen of Hearts in 1859, under the title “Brother Griffith’s Story of Mad Monkton”. But whatever you want to call it, at just under 70 pages and divided into four chapters, this one feels more like a novella than a short story. 

Told from the perspective of a neighbour we hear the story of a mysterious family who keeps themselves apart from the rest of the community. It’s rumoured that there is a strain of madness that runs through the family. So when the last surviving son leaves the country to look for the body of his recently deceased uncle, who he was all but a stranger to him and not a particular favourite of anyone, by all accounts, everyone thinks he must have succumb to the madness of the Monktons. The fact that he has recently become engaged to a young woman in the community, only adds to the strangeness of his departure. But he insists he must find his uncle’s body before he can marry. The narrator, this neighbour, ends up helping the man find his uncle‘s body. 

It is terrifically creepy, gothic, disturbing, and I found myself, like the narrator, questioning Monkton’s sanity. I really enjoyed this one. It is a highlight of the collection, as far as I am concerned.  

“The Dream-Woman”

This one was first published in 1855 under the title “The Ostler” in Household Words, then in 1874 it was expanded to appear in The Frozen Deep and Other Stories. A lot of these stories have a frame narrative which, for the most part I don’t think is necessary to the integrity of the story, however, in this one, I think the frame adds to the atmosphere of the story. A doctor is called to a rural area. Once his errand is finished he looks for someone who can give him a ride, as his horse has hurt himself. Calling at an inn, he asks if there’s someone available. The landlord tells him his regular person is out, so they will have to wake up Isaac. 

“Wake up Isaac?” I repeated; “that sounds rather odd. Do your ostlers go to bed in the day-time?”

“This one does,” said the landlord, smiling to himself in rather a strange way.”

“And dreams, too,” added the waiter; “I shan't forget the turn it gave me, the first time I heard him.”

“Never you mind about that,” retorted the proprietor; “you go and rouse Isaac up. The gentleman’s waiting for his gig.” (104)

The narrator’s interest is peaked, as he thinks this ostler, Isaac, could be an interesting medical case. And so we find out the story of how Isaac came to be at this working at this inn and why he sleeps during the day. Let me tell you, he has good reason to be afraid of sleeping at night! 

This one was unsettling and creepy, in the best way. Like “Mad Monkton” and some of the other stories in this collection, the story has a sort of inevitability to it. I read a lot of mystery novels and short stories, which tend discredit the possibility of the supernatural being to blame in favour of a human cause, so it is a rare treat to read something like this that entertains and even encourages those what-ifs.

“The Dead Hand”

The darkness forced his mind back upon itself, and set his memory at work, reviving, with a painfully vivid distinctness the momentary impression it had received from his first sight of the corpse. Before long the face seemed to be hovering out in the middle of the darkness, confronting him through the window, with the paleness whiter, with the dreadful dull line of light between the imperfectly closed eyelids broader than he had seen it—with the parted lips slowly dropping farther and farther away from each other—with the features growing larger and moving closer, till they seemed to fill the window and to silence the rain and to shut out the night. (141-142)

I don’t want to share too much about this one because I think the story spins out very nicely and is especially effective when you know very little about what is going to happen. Here’s the premise… A man arrives in a town in the middle of race week and there are no rooms available to rent for the night. He is desperate and is on the brink of thinking he will have to sleep outside, when he finds an inn far off the beaten with a bed available. Immediately agreeing to the price the landlord stipulates, he finds out too late that he will be sharing the room with a dead man. First published in Household Words in 1857 as “The Double-Bedded Room”, this one was thrilling, really well executed, and nothing like what I was expecting. 

“Blow Up with the Brig!”

I have an alarming confession to make. I am haunted by a ghost.

If you were to guess for a hundred years, you would never guess what my ghost is. I shall make you laugh to begin with—and afterwards I shall make your flesh creep. My Ghost is the ghost of a Bedroom Candlestick. (155) 

So begins “Blow Up with the Brig!”. It has a humorous beginning, but by the end, you see the man has good reason for being haunted by a candlestick. As with all of these stories the tale l is spun out in such a way by the teller that there’s an inevitability to the conclusion. But this makes it no less creepy, terrifying, and exciting to read. It was first published in 1859 as “The Ghost in the Cupboard Room” in All the Year Round. 

“Miss Jéromette and the Clergyman”

“The Clergyman’s Confession” is the title this one was first appeared as when it was published in Canadian Monthly in 1875. It opens with our narrator reading a collection of famous trials that has been recently published, when his brother, a clergyman, recognises the case he is reading. 

“You don’t mean to say you know anything about the Trial?”

“I know this,” he said. “The prisoner was guilty.”

“Guilty?” I repeated. “Why, the man was acquitted by the jury, with the full approval of the judge! What can you possibly mean?”

“There are circumstances connected with that Trial,” my brother answered, “which were never communicated to the judge or the jury—which were never so much as hinted or whispered in court. I know them—of my own knowledge, by my own personal experience. They are very sad, very strange, very terrible. I have mentioned them to no mortal creature. I have done my best to forget them. You—quite innocently—have brought them back to my mind.” (171-172)

Part murder mystery, part ghost story, this story is creepy and again has a sort of inevitability to the ending. I really enjoyed it, though it was quite sad.

“Mrs. Zant and the Ghost”

This one dates to 1885 when it was published in Harper’s Weekly, under the title “The Ghost’s Touch”. What a strong story to end on! Unlike many of the stories in this collection, which have a rural setting, this one is set in London with the inciting incident occurring in the middle of the day in Kensington Gardens. But it is no less unsettling for it! Mrs. Zant is haunted by the ghost of her dead husband. He seems to be trying to warn her about someone, but Mrs. Zant is hesitant to believe the ghost. This one was a favourite of mine and the perfect one to end on. And it is probably one of the safer stories in this collection to read before bed!

Many of these stories are set in the autumn months. Although, “Mrs. Zant and the Ghost” is different in this regard, too, as it is set in April. Ghost stories can be enjoyable any time of year, but I think the cooler months are when I favour them the most. Curling up with this one during the long winter nights with the wind whistling outside, I found to be particularly atmospheric.

All of the publishing dates and original story titles can be found in Xavier Aldana Reyes’ insightful introduction. I thought it might be helpful to include that information in my review for anyone who is trying to figure out if any of these stories can be found in other collections.

It is hard to believe that six months ago, I did not gravitate towards short story collections and now I get so excited when I get my hands on one. In the past year I have read nine collections, eight of which happen to be published by the British Library, and all of which I thoroughly enjoyed. I have read a lot and consistently my whole life, so I thought my reading taste was fairly unchangeable. Apparently, not!

I had such a great time reading Wilkie Collins’ ghost stories that it has me eyeing my old copy of The Moonstone. It might be time to give it a second chance.

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Thank you to British Library Publishing for kindly sending me a copy of The Ghost Stories of Wilkie Collins* for review. As always, all opinions on the book are my own.

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