Ghosts
by Ellen Galford and Time-LIFE editors, 1984 (144 pages)
ISBN 0809452162, 0809452170 (US Editions)
This volume is divided into four chapters dealing with death, the dead, and those who remain behind.
Chapter One: Guises of the Reaper
Ghosts are the reminders that life has an end, but we really don't know what that end is going to be like. So tales of ghosts, and tales of the Grim Reaper, abound. It always seems to come back to England and the British Isles for these tales. No surprise since these are the tales we are most familiar with. Here we learn of the Black Dog or Old Shuck, the Ankou, the Bean-Nighe, and banshees. Even innocent-looking animals like the raven and owl could be harbingers of death.
We see similar manifestations in Germany where the Fetch becomes the Doppelgänger, and in the Middle East where the raven is called Abu Zájir or "The Father of Omens."
It should also be no surprise that quite a few of our myths and legends about ghosts and the dead come from the times of plague in Europe, where death was often given anthropomorphic form.
Song of the Sorrowing Harp
A Scottish tale of jealousy of two sisters and the ghost that told of her murder.
Chapter Two: Invasions by the Angry Dead
Death may take the souls of the dead, but they don't always stay quiet. Much like vampires (where the distinction is often blurred) the dead can come back. Here we encounter the utburd and the navky, two types of child ghosts that have haunted my own books and this blog for ages.
We encounter poltergeists, the noisy ghosts, who might also be demonic.
Demonic ghosts seem par for the course in Japan if "The Wife's Revenge" is any indication.
A Meeting on the Road Home
A tale from Lancaster, but when re-told in modern times in America, it became the ghost girl that drivers would pick up. This one has a twist of the ghost keeping her head in a basket.
Chapter Three: Shadow Plays of Grief and Pain
Ghosts are often doomed to repeat their deeds from their life in the afterlife. A forgotten battlefield in Scotland plays out it's bloody battle in ghostly form. Same with battlefields in Assyria, Troy, Wales, and the US Civil War.
But ghosts are not just attracted to battlefields, places of power where human sacrifice occurred were also popular among the dead. And of course haunted houses.
The Hooded Congregation
A Swedish woman rushes one cold morning to attend Christmas services, only to discover she share the service with a congregation of the dead.
Chapter Four: Hands Across the Void
The living and the dead can interact, and often the consequences are dire. Here the dread art of necromancy is used and often the living soon join the dead. Others take great care to make sure the dead can't be rising or spoken too in their own sorts of necromantic arts. From Caesar to Vikings to Medieval Christians to 17th Century Cornwall, consulting the dead was a dread business.
Glam's Tale
In this tale, the line between ghost and zombie is blurred as the dead return.
This one is still a fun read so many years later. I am surprised by how much of this wormed its way into my subconscious and took up a permanent haunt, as it were.
