![]() Otis, leases the rural manor, Canterville Chase, and moves his loud, rambunctious family into the grim hall – all in spite of the locals’ grave warnings that it has been haunted for centuries. Towards the turn of the 20th century, the American ambassador to London, Hirim B. Was there still justice? Did morals still matter? Had we outgrown social accountability? Ghost stories answered these questions and soothed the aching growing pains of Victorian society as the next hundred years saw humanity graduate from candles, lancets, and buggies to electricity, penicillin, and automobiles. The clash between the not-so-distant past and the steam-powered future lead to a tremendous fashion of ghosts, providing a convenient and navigable space for modern Britons to ponder the rapidly developing times that they lived in. These tales generally decided that steam-engines, Darwinian biology, and mass-market publishing may have prettied mankind up a bit, but we were still subject to the same crimes, temptations, and terrors of our agrarian forefathers. Edwards, and Wilkie Collins, English readers were encouraged to question how far we truly had evolved. In ghost stories by Charles Dickens, Rhoda Broughton, Mrs. ![]()
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