The Literary Ghost: Great Contemporary Ghost Stories

"It takes a certain amount of daring for a literary writer to employ a device as powerful and obvious as a ghost, and a great deal of talent and self-assurance to pull it off. The fact that these stories are so different from one another and that no two ghosts in them are alike is a testament to the power of the individual imagination to appropriate established myths without assuming the associated clichés." So writes Larry Dark in the introduction to this anthology of expertly crafted ghost stories by such luminaries as Donald Barthelme, Paul Bowles, A. S. Byatt, Robertson Davies, M. F. K. Fisher, John Gardner, Nadine Gordimer, Graham Greene, Patrick McGrath, R. K. Narayan, Tim O'Brien, V. S. Pritchett, Anne Sexton, Isaac Bashevis Singer, and Fay Weldon.

"The Lost, Strayed, Stolen," M.F.K. Fisher
"The Portobello Road," Muriel Spark
"The Ghost Who Vanished by Degrees," Robertson Davies
"The Others," Joyce Carol Oates
"A Story of Don Juan," V.S. Pritchett
"Up North," Mavis Gallant
"The Warden," John Gardner
"The Death of Edward Lear," Donald Barthelme
"The Circular Valley," Paul Bowles
"The Third Voice," William Ferguson
"Marmilion," Patrick McGrath
"Spirit Seizures," Melissa Pritchard
"Revenant as Typewriter," Penelope Lively
"Ghostly Populations," Jack Matthews
"The Ghost Soldiers," Tim O'Brien
"Family," Lance Olsen
"Letter from a Dogfioghter's Aunt, Deceased," Padgett Powell
"The Ghost," Anne Sexton
"Angel, All Innocence," Fay Weldon
"Jack's Girl," Cynthia Kadohata
"The Next Room," A.S. Byatt
"Grass," Barry Yourgrau
"Eisenheim the Illusionist," Steven Millhauser
"Ghost and Flesh, Water and Dirt," William Goyen
"Letter from His Father," Nadine Gordimer
"Old Man of the Temple," R.K. Narayan
"A Little Place Off the Edgware Road," Graham Greene
"A Crown of Feathers," Isaac Bashevis Singer