“Whenever five or six English-speaking people meet round a fire on Christmas Eve, they start telling each other ghost stories,” wrote British humorist Jerome K. Jerome as part of his introduction to an anthology of Christmas ghost stories titled “Told After Supper“ in 1891. “Nothing satisfies us on Christmas Eve but to hear each other tell authentic anecdotes about specters.”

From ancient times, ghost stories were also called “Winter’s Tales.”  In his play The Jew of Malta (1589), the 16th century English playwright Christopher Marlowe has a character Barnabus saying:

Now I remember those old women’s words,

Who in my youth would tell me winter’s tales,

And speak of spirits and ghosts that glide by night

William Shakespeare titled his strange play about magic and transformations A Winter’s Tale (1623).  He has the character of Prince Mamilius proposing to tell the court a story:

A sad tale’s best for winter:…