Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-v9fdk Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-19T14:21:59.169Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

M.R. James and the archaeological uncanny

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 January 2015

Gabriel Moshenska
Gabriel Moshenska*
Affiliation:
UCL Institute of Archaeology, 31–34 Gordon Square, London WC1H 0PY, UK (Email: g.moshenska@ucl.ac.uk)
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

Does the curiosity of an archaeologist lead to encounters with forbidden things, inviting retribution? The learned antiquary M.R. James, writer of celebrated ghost stories, certainly thought so. In this vivid analysis, our author unearths the roots of James' impetus and compares it with that of his contemporary, Sigmund Freud. Of course, those days of paranormal terror are long gone, we are all rational now … or are we?

Keywords

history of archaeologyantiquarianismM.R. JamesS. Freuduncanny
Type
Research article
Information
Antiquity , Volume 86 , Issue 334 , December 2012 , pp. 1192 - 1201
Copyright
Copyright © Antiquity Publications Ltd. 2012

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Barker, H.R. 1907. West Suffolk illustrated. Bury St Edmunds: F.G. Pawsey & Co. Google Scholar
Betjeman, J. 1979. Foreword, in Haining, P. (ed.) M.R. James book of the supernatural: 7–8. London: Foulsham.Google Scholar
Briggs, J. 1977. Night visitors: the rise and fall of the English ghost story. London: Faber & Faber.Google Scholar
Cowlishaw, B. 2007. ‘A warning to the curious’: Victorian science and the awful unconscious in M.R. James's ghost stories, in Joshi, S.T. & Pardoe, R. (ed.) Warnings to the curious: a sheaf of criticism on M.R. James: 162-76. New York: Hippocampus.Google Scholar
Cox, M. 1983. M.R. James: an informal portrait. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Davies, D.S. 2007. Introduction, in James, M.R.. Collected ghost stories: v-x. Ware: Wordsworth Editions.Google Scholar
Doig, J. 2005. The antiquarian background of M.R. James's ghost stories. The Ghosts & Scholars M.R. James Newsletter 8. Available at: http://www.users.globalnet.co.uk/pardos/GSNews8.html#anchor99317 (accessed 14 December 2011).Google Scholar
Freud, S. 1995. The uncanny, in Gilman, S.L. (ed.) Sigmund Freud: psychological writings and letters: 120-53. New York: Continuum.Google Scholar
Haining, P. (ed.) 1979. M.R. James book of the supernatural. London: Foulsham.Google Scholar
Hogarth, D.G., James, M.R., Smith, R. Elsey & Gardner, E.A.. 1888. Excavations in Cyprus, 1887-88. Paphos, Leontari, Amargetti. Journal of Hellenic Studies 9: 147–271.Google Scholar
James, M.R. 1895. On the Abbey of S. Edmund at Bury. I. The library. II. The church. Cambridge: Cambridge Antiquarian Society.Google Scholar
James, M.R. 1903. Discoveries at Bury St Edmunds. The Times, 9 January 1903, p. 9.Google Scholar
James, M.R. 1904. Ghost stories of an antiquary. London: Edward Arnold.Google Scholar
James, M.R. 1911. More ghost stories of an antiquary. London: Edward Arnold.Google Scholar
James, M.R. 1926. Eton and King's: recollections, mostly trivial, 1875-1925. London: Williams & Norgate.Google Scholar
James, M.R. 1987 [1930]. Ghost story competition, in Dalby, R. & Pardoe, R. (ed.) Ghosts and scholars: ghost stories in the tradition of M.R. James: 141-47. Wellingborough: Crucible.Google Scholar
James, M.R. 2001 [1929]. Some remarks on ghost stories, in Roden, C. & Roden, B. (ed.) M.R. James: a pleasing terror: the complete supernatural writings: 475-80. Ashcroft: Ash-Tree Press.Google Scholar
James, M.R. 2007. Collected ghost stories. Ware: Wordsworth Editions.Google Scholar
Joshi, S.T. & Pardoe, R. (ed.). 2007. Warnings to the curious: a sheaf of criticism on M.R. James. New York: Hippocampus.Google Scholar
Lloyd, L.J. 2007. The ghost stories of James M.R., in Joshi, S.T. & Pardoe, R. (ed.) Warnings to the curious: a sheaf of criticism on M.R. James: 66–75. New York: Hippocampus.Google Scholar
Lubbock, G. 1939. A memoir of Montague Rhodes James. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Mason, M.A. 1982. On not letting them lie: moral significance in the ghost stories of M.R. James. Studies in Short Fiction 19: 253-60.Google Scholar
Moshenska, G. 2006. The archaeological uncanny. Public Archaeology 5: 91–99.Google Scholar
Pardoe, R. & Nicholls, J.. 2001. The Black Pilgrimage, in Roden, C. & Roden, B. (ed.) M.R. James: a pleasing terror: the complete supernatural writings: 601–608. Ashcroft: Ash-Tree Press.Google Scholar
Pfaff, R.W. 1980. Montague Rhodes James. London: Scolar Press.Google Scholar
Sanders, K. 2009. Bodies in the bog and the archaeological imagination. Chicago (IL): University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Simpson, J. 1997. ‘The rules of folklore’ in the ghost stories of M.R. James. Folklore 108: 9–18.Google Scholar
Taylor, J.A. 2007. ‘If I'm not careful’: innocents and not-so-innocents in the stories of M.R. James, in Joshi, S.T. & Pardoe, R. (ed.) Warnings to the curious: a sheaf of criticism on M.R. James: 197–204. New York: Hippocampus.Google Scholar
Vidler, A. 1992. The architectural uncanny: essays in the modern unhomely. London: MIT Press.Google Scholar