Showing results for "Casting the Runes" in Anthologies & Short Stories

The four stories in this compilation, not by James, are meant to serve as prime illustrations of the best work of a few of his contemporaries and immediate antecedents.

An association rejects a paper entitled 'The Truth of Alchemy'. The author of the paper, Mr Karswell, does not take the rejection well. After his appeals fail, he begins to make inquiries about the expert behind the decision. The expert, Edward Dunning, soon begins to experience strange and disturbing events. He eventually becomes convinced that Karswell has placed a curse on him.

Montague Rhodes James was born on 1st August 1862 and, as M.R. James, is best known to the general public as a writer of remarkable ghost stories. He was also a medievalist scholar and provost of King's College, Cambridge and later of Eton College. James dismantled and did away with many of the existing concepts of ghost stories. Instead his stories were placed in a more realistic and contemporary setting.

M. R. James (1862-1936) was provost of King's College, Cambridge, and Eton College. He was a highly regarded scholar and academic in his time but today is remembered for his ghost stories, which are considered among the finest in the genre. Here is one of them: "Casting the Runes".