"A School Story" is a
ghost story
A ghost story is any piece of fiction, or drama, that includes a ghost, or simply takes as a premise the possibility of ghosts or characters' belief in them."Ghost Stories" in Margaret Drabble (ed.), ''Oxford Companion to English Literature'' ...
by British writer
M. R. James
Montague Rhodes James (1 August 1862 – 12 June 1936) was an English author, Medieval studies, medievalist scholar and provost (education), provost of King's College, Cambridge (1905–1918), and of Eton College (1918–1936). He was List of ...
, included in his collection ''
More Ghost Stories of an Antiquary
''More Ghost Stories'' is a horror short story collection by British writer M. R. James, published in 1911. Some later editions under the title ''Ghost Stories of an Antiquary'' contain it and the earlier ''Ghost Stories of an Antiquary'' in one ...
''.
Plot summary
Two men are discussing the folklore of the private schools they attended. One tells of a Latin teacher named Mr. Sampson who kept a Byzantine coin that he would show his students. The narrator's friend gives the teacher a strange message in Latin which translates to "remember the well among the four yews", though he doesn't know why he wrote it. Later another paper shows up translating to "If you don't come to me, I'll come to you",
and it visibly worries Sampson. Later at night the narrator's friend sees a man sitting on Sampson's window-sill, but when he returns with the narrator he's gone. Sampson is missing the next day. Years later a body is found - with Sampson's coin - in a well that sits between four trees.
References
External links
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Full text of "A School Story"A Podcast to the Curious
Episode 9 - A School Story
Cast of Wonders
Episode 172 - A School Story
1911 short stories
Short stories by M. R. James
Horror short stories
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