alt.books.ghost-fiction

Randy Money  (April 16, 1998)

Well, I'm pretty sure I can't make that subject line too much more cryptic.

Anyway, I've tried to find a message on list that hinted at an idea I've been chewing on, but haven't been able to.  The question, though, won't go away, so I think I'll try formulating it without that other message as a crutch.

It seems to me that most of the classic Western ghost stories we discuss seem to spring from a Christian perspective, the ghosts subject to rules imposed by Christianity.  Is it just my odd reading, or is the movement over the 20th century away from [Christianity], toward a secular explanation of ghosts?  And if so, might that be why ghost stories by more mainstream writers sometimes feel older than they are -- because they stem more directly from the Henry James, Edith Wharton breed of stories, the mainstream writers unaware of the movement of genre fiction?

Just a thought I can't get rid of and wondered if anyone else would like to consider it.

Randy Money
(then again, if that's the sort of thought fermenting in my skull, maybe I should go get a life)

oOo

 
 

Otzchiim  (April 17, 1998)

Most Western ghost stories stem from a Christian perspective because they are Western ghost stories.  The Japanese ghost stories (at least those filtered through Lafcadio Hearn) and Chinese tales do not have ghosts that act much differently, I think.
     Did you know there is a Chinese anthology available in English called "Stories about Not Being Afraid of Ghosts?"
    Western ghost stories must be Judeo-Christian of necessity.  Atheistic ghost stories would be scarce.
                                          Mark Owings

oOo

 
 

rbadac  (April 17, 1998)

Or at least they usually react to a Judeo-Christian universe, anyway, in that they raise dead souls that would normally go to Heaven or Hell (unless a 'Limbo' figures in there somewhere), not to mention the whole idea of a ghost implies a soul or spirit of some kind, which atheism appears to disavow.

Curiously, the analogy usually stops there, in most (dare I say, the 'better'?) ghost stories, with intervention by whatever God may be implied being rather rare, though the implied Devil is usually more available.

Well, they ARE supposed to SCARE you...

rbadac

oOo

 
 

Randy Money  (April 17, 1998)

Otzchiim wrote:
>      Did you know there is a Chinese anthology available in English called
> "Stories about Not Being Afraid of Ghosts?"

No, I didn't.  Thanks.  I'll look for it.

>     Western ghost stories must be Judeo-Christian of necessity.  Atheistic
> ghost stories would be scarce.

And thanks again.  I remember now the earlier conversation my line of thought stemmed from.  We had discussed Fritz Leiber's "Smoke Ghost" and someone mentioned T.E.D. Klein's "Nadelman's God".  I went off and read it, and both deal with ghosts, of a sort, that have secular rather than religious origins; further, both are genre stories that mainstream literary writers might not be aware of -- or might dismiss, if they are aware of them.  Therefore, it seemed to me that, at least among genre writers, one strain of ghost story was trying to pull away from a connection to Christianity, maybe even trying to find something more secular to latch onto as reason for being.  (Then, of course, comes the question, can we properly call such things "ghosts", and do we do so now for any reason other than Leiber's using the word in his title.)

Randy Money

oOo

 
 

Robert Suggs  (April 18, 1998)

While western ghost stories have been around as long as western civilization, I think there is no one simple explanation or source of them, sacred or secular.  I do believe they really flourished with the onset of the Age of Reason and industrialism.  A number of the Victorian stories are concerned with pointing out the folly of the skeptic and the scientist, such as Oliphant's "The Open Door."  But this isn't the agenda of most of the stories.  It's more of an unconscious thing, I think--a suspicion we can't shake, that there's indeed a "ghost in the machine."  Still, Christian writers like M. R. James don't seem to me to have any religious agenda--others would disagree with that statement. Yes, he uses the ecclesiastical backgrounds he knows, but he wrote these for reading aloud and for fun.  He seems to have never completely made up his mind whether he really believed in ghosts or not.  Based on his own words, the constraints of faith didn't predetermine his answer--he was willing to consider the evidence on its own face.  As has been said earlier, I think the western ghost story arises quite logically from western culture, a bit of which is influenced by Christianity.  There are some connections to western religion, but it's more of an acquaintance than a marriage.  By the same token, the 20th century crowd doesn't totally desert the Christian elements--that's simply the foundation they build on.

Rob

ooOoo