‘Terra Incognita’: Tracing Literary Occult Pathways in North London
North London has captured the imagination of gothic writers through the ages, exploring both sides of the region’s possibly: one a promise, one a threat.
A ghost story that caused a riot: the strange case of Maude Carew
In February 1862 a riot broke out in a Suffolk churchyard over a ghost story. Margaretta Greene, the story’s author, originated an enduring legend of the ghost of a nun, Maude Carew, who haunts the ruins of the Abbey of Bury St Edmunds. But the story of Maude Carew, and the riot she inspired, raises intriguing questions about the origins of folklore and beliefs about the supernatural.
A Californian Krampus
Relentlessly sunny and known for a love of trend over tradition, Los Angeles is an unlikely home to a new incarnation of the old Alpine devil. It helps, perhaps, that make-believe is serious business in my town, and that it’s filled with creative people prone to see in an old tradition of folk Catholicism a revolutionary way to shake up the holidays.
Clown Panics and Computers: Chaos Manifests in the Age of the Internet
This article is about clowns. If you have clourophobia you might want to look away now. Not many forms of entertainment have their own phobia, yet there seems to be something about clowns that gets deep into our psyche.
Cars, Coins and Cursed Colours: A Brief Introduction to the Folklore of Vehicles
Cars and motorbikes have been with us for over 130 years. In that time they’ve gathered superstitions and urban legends around them like exhaust fumes.