The Most Wonderful Time of the Year. It’s a highly familiar song that immediately conjures up images of stores decked in garland, red bows, towering Christmas trees as bundled shoppers scurrying to and fro. With rousing joviality, Andy Williams sings:
"There’ll be parties for hosting Marshmallows for toasting And caroling out in the snow There’ll be scary ghost stories And tales of the glories of Christmases long, long ago."
“There’ll be scary ghost stories.”
It had never occurred to me that there was anything strange about this line. It’s possible I didn’t think anything of it because I had heard the song so many times and it was one of those things you just accept. Maybe it was because I linked the ghost stories and the following line about Christmases from long ago. Those both had the same vibe. Or maybe it was because we always had a bonfire for our cousin Christmas party and every once in a while, when it was only the stragglers left, we might try to scare each other with a scary story around the dying embers.
Whatever it was, the line always felt right to me. Ghost stories at Christmas just made sense. As it turns out, Edward Pola was referencing a Victorian tradition when he wrote the song.
I first learned of the tradition from an episode on the subject from the podcast Risking Enchantment. Rachel Sherlock and her frequent guest on the show, Phoebe Watson, do a delightful job delving into this Victorian tradition and even expanding on what it can mean for us as Catholics. I highly recommend listening to it. It's fun and informative, and only takes an hour.
While we in America associate spooky things with October and Halloween, that is the Irish and Celtic influence on our imagination. For the English in the 19th century, it was a tradition to gather around on Christmas Eve and tell ghost stories. It may be the most wonderful time of the year, but it’s also the darkest, the time when the black closes in quicker, and keeps its hold longer. Especially in damp, foggy England, telling tales of the creepy and unnerving would have fit the season.
In the introduction for Told After Supper, a collection of Christmas ghost
stories, Jerome K. Jerome writes, “Whenever five or six English-speaking people meet round a fire on Christmas Eve, they start telling each other ghost stories. Nothing satisfies us on Christmas Eve but to hear each other tell authentic anecdotes about spectres. It is a genial, festive season, and we love to muse upon graves, and dead bodies, and murders, and blood.”
He speaks of it so mater-of-fact, that even though I now know it was a tradition, it’s still surprising to hear how ingrained it was to the culture.
The most recognizable example to us in the present day is Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol. Another piece of holiday media that we are so familiar with we probably don’t even think about how seemingly out of season it is for Scrooge to be haunted by spirits. While it may be easy to accept the cheerful ghost of Christmas present, Marley in chains and the ghost of Christmas future as well as the visit to a graveyard are more often associated with the horror genre, not that of cheer and good will to all. But this is evidence that has come to us through time, to show us the tradition that Dickens was writing out of.
It’s a brilliant combination, the hope and festivities of Christmas against the dark gloom of a spooky, spine chilling tale. It’s like riding in the bed of a truck to go see Christmas lights, tucked in blankets and hats bundled on. It’s only with the cold brushing our cheeks rosy do we get to experience the full embrace of the blanket’s warmth. It’s only in the dark that we are dazzled by the array of twinkling lights. It’s at this darkest time of year that we as Christians celebrate the light of the incarnation breaking into our world of darkness and sin.
So why are we talking about Christmas in July?
Well, why not? The incarnation is always relevant to us as Christians. Do we not bow at the mention of Christ becoming man when we recite the creed? Do we not genuflect at its mention in the Angelus? Is this not the turning point in history?
Also, it’s very very hot this summer. Maybe if we collectively have a Christmas spirit, the weather will chill out a few degrees??? One can only hope.
But really, it’s because we want you to write stories.
Inkwells & Anvils is officially hosting our first short story contest.
A ghost story contest. Specifically Christmas ghost stories.
We hope you’ll don a red hat, turn down the lights, turn up the fire, and let your imaginations soar, like the flying sled-pulling cervine. Harken back to the past and join in that tradition: tell us a spine chilling tale, one encrusted with frozen holly and steeped in the past, one we would be proud to tell around the fire on a cold December 24th night. For as Jerome says,
“It always is Christmas Eve, in a ghost story.”
Read below for contest overview & join our server at the link below if you want full details & to participate. There'll also be a cover-art contest, details shared on social media & in the Discord.
Inkwells & Anvils “There’ll Be Scary Ghost Stories” Contest Overview
One entry per-person
3000-5000 words
Original works only
Must contain Christmas & Spooky elements
Must meet I&A Standards of upholding Catholic faith & pursuing perfection of our craft
Must be a member of I&A Community
This is a brief overview. For complete submission guidelines, rules, and instructions join our Discord Server!
For further reading and listening:
Told After Supper by Jerome K. Jerome
Ghosts of Christmas Past Edited by Tim Martin
Christmas Ghosts Edited by Kathryn Cramer and David G. Hartwell
Join our Server to participate! https://www.inkwellsandanvils.com/general-8
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