Almost always when we think of Ghost Stories, we first think of those written by the Victorians.When you consider the depth of literary talent available over the extraordinary length of Queen Victoria’s reign, allied to the fascination with their all things spiritual on ‘the other side’, then perhaps it’s simply right place, right time.Whatever the reasons given or proffered the reality and known facts are that if you want a really good ghost story to bring that edge of chi...

John Donne was born on the 22nd January 1572 in London, into a Roman Catholic family when Catholicism was illegal in England, and there was turbulence and unrest with both state and church throughout much of Europe.His father, also named John, died when he was four, and his mother, Elizabeth Haywood, married a wealthy widower, ensuring the family were looked after. He received a good education at both Oxford and Cambridge but was unable to obtain a degree without taking the oath of...

Leslie Harrison Lambert was born on 11th November 1883 in Nottingham.After attending Rugby School he trained to be a surveyor. One of his passions was magic and such was his prowess that he joined The Magic Circle, and performed at society events.By the beginning of World War I he was an amateur radio ham and volunteered to work at a coastguard station in Norfolk to intercept German radio transmissions. By November 1914 he was with the Admiralty at Naval Intelligence Room 4...

Edward Alexander Crowley was born on 12th October 1875 to wealthy parents in Royal Leamington Spa in Warwickshire.He was educated at Malvern College, Tonbridge School, Eastbourne College and finally Trinity College, Cambridge where he focused on his passions of mountaineering and poetry and published several volumes.Life for Crowley was to abandon his parents’ Christian faith and instead to inject himself into Western esotericism. In 1898, he joined the esoteric Hermetic Or...

Alexander Kuprin was born in Narovchat, Penza in Russia on 7th September 1870.At 3 his Father died and he and mother moved to Moscow. By 10 he was enrolled at the Second Moscow Military High School and there his interest in literature began. The Alexander Military Academy followed and two years later he was a sub-lieutenant and posted to an Infantry Regiment for a further four years.Despite his duties he was a now a keen writer and published his first short story at this ti...

Herbert George Wells was born on September 21st, 1866 at Atlas House, 46 High Street, Bromley, Kent. He was the youngest of four siblings and his family affectionately knew him as ‘Bertie’.The first few years of his childhood were spent fairly quietly

Gustav Meyrink was born in Vienna on the 19th January, 1868.As a young man he co-founded a bank in Prague, but a personal crisis and a suicide attempt turned his life away from commerce to a study of the occult and a career in literature.His early short stories, supernatural, occult and weird, are full of promise, menace and the unusual.In 1915 he published his landmark novel ‘Der Golem’ and followed these with others which, whilst noted, failed to achieve the extra...

Short stories have always been a sort of instant access into an author’s brain, their soul and heart. A few pages can lift our lives into locations, people and experiences with a sweep of landscape, narration, feelings and emotions that is difficult to achieve elsewhere.In this series we try to offer up tried and trusted ‘Top Tens’ across many different themes and authors. But any anthology will immediately throw up the questions – Why that story? Why that author?The theme ...

René Karl Wilhelm Johann Josef Maria Rilke was born into a troubled marriage on the 4th December 1875 in Prague, then part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. His mother, having previously lost a baby girl, would dress the young boy up in girl’s clothing.Later his father dispatched him to a military academy at age 10 but after a miserable 5 years the young Rilke left due to illness and instead entered first Prague and then Munich and finally Berlin university to study art history, phil...

Throughout the long centuries of human history is the want, and the need, to share information, to exchange ideas and for that knowledge and experience, for curiosity and learning, to be the basis of a civil society.In literature the ambition is much narrower. In order to be known, to be popular, you had to be published. And for that people had to know you existed and your ideas worth reading. Obviously for most of humanity’s time people couldn’t read and texts couldn’t be publishe...

The bookshelves of European literature are incredible collections that have gathered together centuries of very talented authors. From this continent their fame spread and whilst among their number many are now forgotten or neglected their talents endure. Among them is Affonso Botelho.

Gustav Meyrink was born in Vienna on the 19th January, 1868.As a young man he co-founded a bank in Prague, but a personal crisis and a suicide attempt turned his life away from commerce to a study of the occult and a career in literature.His early short stories, supernatural, occult and weird, are full of promise, menace and the unusual.In 1915 he published his landmark novel ‘Der Golem’ and followed these with others which, whilst noted, failed to achieve the extra...