Ghostly Narrators?

November 6, 2007 1:16 PM

Ghost-story-spoiler-filter: grateful your examples of ghost stories where the narrator or central protagonist is (or is revealed to be) a ghost.

Some reasonably recent films have used this idea, and I'm wondering if the same twist has been used in fiction. If so, I'd love to find out when the earliest example emerged (if anyone knows).

A cursory google reveals Oscar Wilde's "The Canterville Ghost", but I'm looking for horror rather than comedy.

Of course, I am thinking within European literature, and specifically of short stories or short novels (even more bonus points for ones 19th century examples). However, if you know of some (say) ancient Japanese tales that fit the bill, feel free to de-ignorance me. Films, however, are right out.

I thank you for your time, and will now disapparate in a foul-smelling miasma.

posted by the quidnunc kid to Writing & Language (27 answers total)

I could have sworn that Poe had done this, but I was thinking of "The Masque of the Red Death," and am not sure if that really fulfills your requirements.
posted by jquinby at 1:24 PM on November 6, 2007

There's a recurring theme in urban folklore about people, typically travelers, who reveal some tale of warning to some strangers; the twist is that he/she is a ghost.
posted by mkultra at 1:29 PM on November 6, 2007

Off the top of my head (and not necessarily old), but will think/find more:

Vonnegut - Galápagos
Richard - Fishboy
Tan - Saving Fish from Drowning
Davies - Murther and Walking Spirits
Minack - Campaigning With Grant
Torres - Dona Ines vs. Oblivion
posted by iconomy at 1:29 PM on November 6, 2007

Actually, on further research, a case can be made for Poe's story. The narrator speaks in the first person, but reveals at the end that the plague has killed everyone in the house. There's no big "TA-DA!" moment, but it's pretty close.
posted by jquinby at 1:32 PM on November 6, 2007

In these, it is a supernatural creature, but not a "formal" ghost:

HP Lovecraft - The Outsider
HP Lovecraft - The Shadow Over Innsmouth
posted by ignignokt at 1:32 PM on November 6, 2007

If you're looking for current examples: A Certain Slant of Light by Laura Whitcomb. Creepy!
posted by runtina at 1:34 PM on November 6, 2007 [1 favorite]

Lost Boys by Orson Scott Card (not the narrator but a central character)
posted by jbickers at 1:47 PM on November 6, 2007

Kelly Link's Carnation, Lily, Lily, Rose is narrated by a dead man in (apparently) some kind of purgatory place. Does it count?

In any case, it's fucking creepy. I love it.
posted by Iosephus at 2:06 PM on November 6, 2007

- Peace, Gene Wolfe
- The Lovely Bones, Alice Sebold
- if narrator-in-Pergatory counts, then add The Third Policeman, by Flann O'Brien

... and I wonder if there should have been SPOILER warnings at the top of the thread, since the fact of a narrator being dead is often the big plot twist?
posted by aught at 2:08 PM on November 6, 2007

Does a song count? "Leslie Ann Levine" by Decemberists features a dead narrator that haunts people, but there's no big reveal, you know from the start she's dead.

But it sounds like you're trying to to trace origins of the device, so...
posted by stupidsexyFlanders at 2:12 PM on November 6, 2007

and I wonder if there should have been SPOILER warnings at the top of the thread, since the fact of a narrator being dead is often the big plot twist?

Unless an admin changed it, the OP used the word SPOILER on the front page.
posted by peep at 2:13 PM on November 6, 2007

What about songs? "Long Black Veil" (written by Lefty Frizell in the 1950s) is narrated by a ghost, as is Sinead O'Connor's "Jackie." I can't think of anything older than that, but I could be forgetting something.
posted by craichead at 2:16 PM on November 6, 2007

The initial narrator of Euripides' Hecuba is Polydorus - a ghost.
posted by vacapinta at 2:16 PM on November 6, 2007 [1 favorite]

Unless an admin changed it, the OP used the word SPOILER on the front page.

True, but it is in the middle of one of those "blah blah blah-filter: And here's my actual question" things that people can skim over, rather than "Here's my question; spoiler warning!".
posted by EndsOfInvention at 2:47 PM on November 6, 2007

The Others.
posted by pluckysparrow at 3:11 PM on November 6, 2007

Umm...Virgil in The Inferno?
posted by LionIndex at 3:13 PM on November 6, 2007

Death of an Ordinary Man
posted by middleclasstool at 3:34 PM on November 6, 2007

Death of the Author by Gilbert Adair (1992) begins as a conventional first-person-narrator novel, and then two-thirds of the way through the narrator is murdered but continues to narrate the story. As the title suggests the whole book is built around this idea, and the idea isn't really strong enough to support a full-length story. Still, worth a look. Adair is the man who translated Georges Perec's La Disparation into English, so as you might expect the novel is somewhat OuLiPo-esque.
posted by Hogshead at 3:55 PM on November 6, 2007

The Ghost of Opalina by Peggy Bacon (now sadly out of print) was a great book for young adults.

The narrator is a ghostly cat recounting her nine lives -- from the 1700s to the 1900s -- and, indirectly, the lives of the people in the different generations she witnessed.
posted by tentacle at 5:20 PM on November 6, 2007

Also The Lovely Bones is narrated by a murder victim.
posted by stupidsexyFlanders at 5:24 PM on November 6, 2007

I agree with The Word Famous, and am quite suprised I didn't think of it first.
posted by Large Marge at 5:42 PM on November 6, 2007

The film Sixth Sense of course.
posted by BrotherCaine at 6:21 PM on November 6, 2007

I'll add, quid, that the same author of the book I gave you above also wrote I, Lucifer, which is narrated by the devil, who has taken over a recent suicide's body and life. Not exactly what you're asking for, but if you're interested in reading Duncan's fiction, it's the better of the two, and it's somewhat related to your query. Neither is exactly horror, though, and to my shame, I have no 19th century titles to offer.

(Also he's specifically not asking for films.)
posted by middleclasstool at 7:08 PM on November 6, 2007

I can't believe no one yet has mentioned The Ghost Next Door from R. L. Stine's Goosebumps series.
posted by Zephyrial at 7:30 PM on November 6, 2007

In Ambrose Bierce's An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge, most of the narrative occurs between the time when (spoiler, of course) the protagonist is hung by a noose and he actually dies. He's not technically a ghost, but the events that occur aren't real, and he's revealed to be dead at the end.
posted by ramenopres at 8:21 PM on November 6, 2007

Response by poster: Very nice, you cadre of ghoulish apparitions! I thank you (from the bottom of my grave) for your otherworldly advice.

Let me go and read An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge, which may be my winner from 1891 - unless I've missed another 19th century contender? And honorable mentions to vacapinta for his antiquarian detail, iconomy for speed, and aught for what I aught to have done. More seriously: thanks to all who bothered to reply in any form.

Yet it behoves me to highlight one answer in particular:

Q: Ghost-story-spoiler-filter ... some reasonably recent films have used this idea, and I'm wondering if the same twist has been used in fiction. Films ... are right out.

A: The film Sixth Sense of course.

BrotherCaine, why do you torment the living with your ghastly wailing from the netherworld? Walk into the light, I beg you, and be at peace.
posted by the quidnunc kid at 1:40 AM on November 7, 2007 [2 favorites]

This is such a spoiler that I feel guilty for typing it: William Golding's Pincher Martin kinda fits your bill, in that (only on the last page) it is revealed the whole 'action' has taken place after the protagonist has died. Whether you'd think of him as a 'ghost' or not is another matter.
posted by hatmandu at 5:47 AM on November 7, 2007