This collection of ghost stories is the first to present the full range of classic English ghost fiction, including some of the very best and most frightening ghost stories ever written. The important contribution of women writers to the genre is shown with stories by Amelia Edwards, Edith Wharton, and Elizabeth Bowen amongst others, alongside M. R. Jame's 'Oh Whistle, and I'll Come to You, My Lad', W. W. Jacobs's 'The Monkey's Paw', and H. G. Wells's 'The Red Room'. This selection of 42 stories written between 1829 and 1968 is the first to present the full range and vitality of the English tradition of literary ghost fiction by demonstrating its historical development as well as its major themes and characteristics. The fictional ghost story is demonstrated by English authors, from J. S. Le Fanu and M. R. James to Walter de la Mare and Robert Aickman, and by American authors such as Edith Wharton, writing in the English tradition. Though its heyday coincided with the golden age of Empire in the nineteenth century, the ghost story enjoyed a second flowering between the two World Wars and even now still attracts dedicated practitioners and readers.