I really cannot recommend these two ghostly treats for Christmas highly enough. Created while the BBC were on topof their game when it came to period drama and these stories definitely feel as though they are off a very different era. Despite the poverty and hardship, the yolk of class and a genuine belief in an immaterial world. I do not believe that MR James , for all his learning and erudation, could have concieved that within two generations God himself might die. They are two beautifully crafted meditations on hubris and greed, seen through a prism of cranky scholarlship.
Do your imagination a favour this Christmas and set aside a couple of evenings to enjoy these visions of a lost England, or at least an England that sleeps, its slumber restless and touched by gossamer threads.
