Canon Alberic's Scrap-Book

"Canon Alberic's Scrap-Book" is a horror story by British writer M. R. James, which was written in 1892 or 1893 and first published in 1895 in the National Review.[1] It is his earliest known ghost story, and the first (along with "Lost Hearts") to be read aloud to the "Chitchat Society" at Cambridge, where many of his stories made their public debut.[1] It was subsequently included in his first short story collection, Ghost Stories of an Antiquary (1904).

"Canon Alberic's Scrap-book"
Short story by M.R. James
Illustration by James McBryde
CountryEngland
LanguageEnglish
Genre(s)Horror short story
Publication
Publication date1895

Some have considered James' later story "An Episode of Cathedral History" (first published in The Cambridge Review in 1914 and later included in the 1919 collection A Thin Ghost and Others) to be a sequel or companion piece, as it features a similar creature, obliquely suggested to be the mate of the one encountered in "Canon Alberic's Scrap-Book".[2]

Plot summary

The story has a detailed and realistic setting in the tiny decaying cathedral city of Saint-Bertrand-de-Comminges, at the foot of the Pyrenees in southern France. An English tourist spends a day photographing the interior of the eponymous cathedral and is encouraged by the sacristan to buy an unusual manuscript. This, he concludes, had been created long ago by Canon Albéric de Mauléon (an invented character, said to be a collateral descendant of the real 16th-century bishop Jean de Mauléon), who had cut up volumes in the old cathedral library. A disturbing illustration of King Solomon and a demon in the back of the book is a key to the story's suspenseful arc.

Adaptations

The story has inspired a musical composition by Kaikhosru Shapurji Sorabji, St. Bertrand de Comminges: "He was laughing in the tower", first performed in 1985 by Yonty Solomon.[3]

In 2020, the story was adapted into a full-cast audio drama for the second season of Shadows at the Door: The Podcast.

References
  1. Jones, Darryl (2011). "Explanatory Notes". Collected Ghost Stories by M. R. James. Oxford: Oxford University Press. P. 421. ISBN 978-019-956884-0
  2. Jones, Darryl (2011). "Explanatory Notes". Collected Ghost Stories by M. R. James. Oxford: Oxford University Press. p. 452."'Cathedral History's' demon is female (as opposed to its male counterpart in 'Canon Alberic')."ISBN 978-019-956884-0
  3. "Un troisième disque Sorabji par Michael Habermann" (PDF).


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