A PLEASING TERROR: The Complete Supernatural Writings

The ghost stories of M.. R. James need no introduction. They are widely considered the very best classical supernatural tales ever committed to paper, and a testimony to their quality and universal appeal is the fact that James's COLLECTED GHOST STORIES has remained in print since its first publication in 1931. James's ghost stories are a towering achievement, and they continue to dominate the genre more than a century after they first began to appear.. Ash-Tree Press has published collections by many of the writers who followed James and sought to emulate him, and is now proud to be publishing A PLEASING TERROR, which collects all of M. R. James's writings on the supernatural. In addition to the thirty-three stories from the COLLECTED GHOST STORIES, this volume includes a further three stories, seven story drafts left amongst his papers, all of his introductions and prefaces to his various collections, and his article 'Stories I Have Tried to Write'. In addition, there are the texts of the twelve medieval ghost stories discovered and published by James, all of his articles about the ghost story, and his various writings on J. Sheridan Le Fanu.. James's many letters also discussed supernatural matters, and A PLEASING TERROR includes a selection written to his friend Gwendolen McBryde; and those he wrote to the young Sybil Cropper - which touch on many of the ideas he later developed into his fantasy novel for younger readers, THE FIVE JARS. The complete text of this novel is included, together with James's spoof of DOCTOR FAUSTUS, the play AUDITOR AND IMPRESARIO, which is reprinted here for the first time in almost seventy-five years.. Much important Jamesian scholarship has been produced in recent years, and some of the more important articles are reproduced in A PLEASING TERROR. The thirty-three completed ghost stories are fully annotated, and a bibliography provides a starting point for further research. Biographical details are provided by S. G. Lubbock's A MEMOIR OF MONTAGUE RHODES JAMES, and the volume is introduced by Steve Duffy, and has a preface by Christopher and Barbara Roden.