As one does in Australia, where books are unreasonably expensive due to restrictive wholesaler practices, I sped off to the Book Depository, placed my order for the two, lovely hardback volumes then waited - until today. Keen for the books to arrive I suppressed my impatience by listening to Philip Hensher discuss the work with Claire Armitstead on the Guardian's Books podcast. This much I learned from their conversation: whatever else I read in the anthology I am already in its editor's debt for pointing me in the direction of a 'lost' tale entitled The Forty Litre Monkey. If that prospect doesn't entice you, nothing will.
The first story in the anthology is Daniel Defoe's A True Relation of the Apparition of one Mrs. Veal, the next Day after her Death: to one Mrs. Bargrave at Canterbury. The 8th of September, 1705. Snappy title. Not surprisingly, given the British tradition, it's a ghost story. According to wiki it's thought to be the first modern ghost story and I have no doubt Mr. Hensher sees it that way too. The early date and theme make the story, published anonymously as a pamphlet in 1705, an ideal place to begin.
I've not read much by Daniel Defoe. Any boy from my time and background would, of course, have read Robinson Crusoe. Man Friday lives with us forever. I'm pretty sure I first read the novel in an abridged, children's version presumably stripped of the worst excesses of its 18th Century racism. I read the unabridged text years later but it's the children's version I recall best; not to forget the classic black and white TV series of the 1960s, which I remember mostly for its stirring signature tune. In my defence I can only tell you I was seven years old when it was broadcast in 1964. Many years later, as a student at Sydney University, I read Roxana, or to give this early, surprisingly proto-feminist yarn its full name, The Fortunate Mistress: Or, A History of the Life and Vast Variety of Fortunes of Mademoiselle de Beleau, Afterwards Called the Countess de Wintselsheim, in Germany, Being the Person known by the Name of the Lady Roxana, in the Time of King Charles II. Another snappy title, although, to be fair to Defoe, such was the practice in the early days of the novel.
It's no great surprise then that I'd never read the story of Mrs. Veal's apparition. But it's a good place to start a two-volume set of 90 short stories of British origin spread across nearly 300 years. I'm looking forward to all that follows, not least the stories by writers I've never heard of before. So far - day one - I've read Mr. Hensher's 'General Introduction' and Defoe's ghost story (which predates, to illustrate a point, M Night Shyamalan's movie The Sixth Sense by 296 years). Already it's clear my purchase is money well spent.
