In which an examination of M.R. James’ approach to writing ghost stories leads to a distinction between two ways of thinking about the past, the first being a parallel to Edward Said’s Orientalism – a way of treating the past as an exotic and mysterious ‘Other’ – the second, viewing the past as continuous with and persisting into the present, the present as containing palimpsests or time capsules that allow us access to the past.

Music by Sharron Kraus, with Harriet Earis and Guy Whittaker

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