The Lost Ghost

by Mary Eleanor Wilkins Freeman

This book is ideal for people who are looking for new solutions to further their study of foreign languages, and is an excellent addition to grammar, phrase and vocabulary books. It is designed in a form of parallel text, where the reader will find the text in two languages placed next to one another for easy reference.
This particular story is part of a book containing the whole collection of seven short stories titled " Learn Spanish, Parallel text", which is also available for purchase. Each of the seven stories is dedicated to aid in learning a foreign language in a new and exciting way, and through reading parallel texts.
How best to use this book to gain the most benefit?
For beginners, I would suggest they read the story in their primary language first, then begin reading single sentences in the foreign language. Advanced level students can begin by reading in the foreign language, and only reference the text in their primary language when they encounter a problem with comprehension.
With motivation, practice and perseverance, and a good ‘ghost story’, anyone, absolutely anyone is capable of learning a new language.
The series of ghost stories contain the following THE LOST GHOST, THE JUDGE’S HOUSE, KERFOL, THE LONG GALLERY, MEN IN THE MARBLE, THE TOLL-HOUSE, THE WHISTLE.

Genres: Horror, Short Stories, Fiction, Classics, Gothic, Weird Fiction, Supernatural

40 pages, ebook

First published April 1, 2001

About the author

Mary Eleanor Wilkins Freeman was born in Randolph, Massachusetts, and attended Mount Holyoke College (then, Mount Holyoke Female Seminary) in South Hadley, Massachusetts, for one year, from 1870–71. Freeman's parents were orthodox Congregationalists, causing her to have a very strict childhood.

Religious constraints play a key role in some of her works. She later finished her education at West Brattleboro Seminary. She passed the greater part of her life in Massachusetts and Vermont.

Freeman began writing stories and verse for children while still a teenager to help support her family and was quickly successful. Her best known work was written in the 1880s and 1890s while she lived in Randolph. She produced more than two dozen volumes of published short stories and novels. She is best known for two collections of stories, A Humble Romance and Other Stories (1887) and A New England Nun and Other Stories (1891). Her stories deal mostly with New England life and are among the best of their kind. Freeman is also remembered for her novel Pembroke (1894), and she contributed a notable chapter to the collaborative novel The Whole Family (1908). In 1902 she married Doctor Charles M. Freeman of Metuchen, New Jersey.

In April 1926, Freeman became the first recipient of the William Dean Howells Medal for Distinction in Fiction from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. She died in Metuchen and was interred in Hillside Cemetery in Scotch Plains, New Jersey.

Reviews

[Natalie · Rating 5 out of 5]

English review below ⬇️
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German review:

Kurz zum Inhalt: In Mary E. Wilkins Freemans ‚The Lost Ghost‘ geht es um die Erzählung unheimlicher Begebenheiten in einem Spukhaus, wobei hier neben der unheimlichen Atmosphäre zugleich eine rührend-tragische Atmosphäre entfaltet wird. 🏚️👻 💔 Dabei entwickelt sich die Geschichte langsam aus einer anfänglichen lockeren Gesprächssituation über die News in der Wohngegend zwischen Mrs. Meserve und Mrs. Emerson und wechselt dann über in eine Erzählung zu aus der Vergangenheit von Mrs. Meserve, die sich bis zum Schluss steigert. 🫣🖤

Mir hat die Geschichte sehr gut gefallen 😍, vor allem wie sie mit einer scheinbar harmlosen Rahmenhandlung beginnt und sich dann vollständig in eine Spukgeschichte aus der Vergangenheit mündet. Der Aufbau ist geschickt, da erst nach und nach Gruselemelemente eingebaut werden und erst am Ende das eigentliche Gespenstisch-Gefährliche zum Tragen kommt, das sowohl unheimlich als auch bewegend ist. Es hat etwas Überraschendes an sich und einige sich wiederholende Beschreibung (z.B. zum Charakter von Figuren) erscheint dann in einem neuen Licht bzw. runden die Erzählung in einer rührenden Weise stimmig ab, wodurch die Wirkung der gesamten Geschichte als Ghost story verstärkt wird. Trotzdem finde ich die reale Geschichte, wie der Geist zum Geist wurde eigentlich das moralisch Erschreckendste, d.h. die menschlichen Abgründe wiegen hier schwerer als das Unheimlich-Übernatürliche.

Ich mag auch die Frauenfiguren, bei deren Beschreibung auf den Hysterie-Diskurs der Zeit referiert wird (z.B. ‚Studien über Hysterie‘ als 1895 erschienenes Buch von Sigmund Freud/Josef Breuer; Wilkins Freemans Text erschien 1903), aber als starke Frauen präsentiert werden, die auch mit einem Spukhaus umgehen können. Sehr feministische Darstellung!

Insgesamt eine atmosphärisch dichte Spukgeschichte, die gerade durch ihren behutsamen Aufbau so eindrucksvoll bleibt. 🥹🖤
4,5 🌟🌟🌟
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English review:

Brief summary: Mary E. Wilkins Freeman's ‚The Lost Ghost‘ tells the story of eerie events in an haunted house, creating an atmosphere that is both spooky and touchingly tragic. 🏚️👻 💔 The story slowly develops from an initial casual conversation between Mrs. Meserve and Mrs. Emerson about the news in the neighborhood, then transitions into a narrative about Mrs. Meserve's past, which intensifies until the end. 🫣🖤

I really liked the story 😍, especially how it begins with a seemingly harmless plot and then completely turns into a ghost story from the past. The structure is clever, as elements of horror are only gradually incorporated and it is only at the end that the actual ghostly danger comes into play, which is both eerie and moving. There is something surprising about it, and some repetitive descriptions (e.g., of the characters) then appear in a new light or harmoniously conclude the narrative in a touching way, reinforcing the effect of the entire story as a ghost story. Nevertheless, I find the real story of how the ghost became a ghost to be the most morally frightening, i.e., the depths of human depravity weigh more heavily here than the eerie supernatural.

I also like the female characters, whose descriptions refer to the discourse on hysteria at the time (e.g. ‚Studies on Hysteria‘: a book by Sigmund Freud and Josef Breuer published in 1895; Wilkins Freeman's text appeared in 1903), but who are presented as strong women who can also deal with a haunted house. A very feminist portrayal!

Overall, it is an atmospherically dense ghost story that remains so impressive precisely because of its careful structure. 🥹🖤
4.5 🌟🌟🌟

[Teal Veyre · Rating 5 out of 5]

Such a horrifying story of extreme child abuse. It's terrible to think that anyone could allow a child to starve to death, but unfortunately, that sort of evil happens all the time. And like any abused young child, this little lost ghost still loves her mother. In death she repeats, "I can't find my mother." It was a sad story, but it has a happy ending. This little lost ghost didn't find her mother, but that's a good thing. Her mother was a monster. She has Mrs. Bird instead. The image of the two of them walking out over the lawn, approaching the afterlife together was so sweet.
Amazing short story.

[Felicidad Martínez · Rating 3 out of 5]

No le pongo más puntuación porque, aunque me ha gustado mucho el final, sospecho que lo habría disfrutado más de haberlo leído en la época en la que se escribió. Te deja ese regusto a clásico, que mola, pero con lo racional que soy, me cuesta imaginarme esa angustia cuando se descubre al fantasma. Algo que me pasa bastante a menudo, incluso cuando lo veo en películas de hoy en día.

[JoAnne Keltner · Rating 5 out of 5]

I found this story, by Mary E. Wilkins Freeman, intriguing and eerie. It was also conversational, as I felt that the narrator was specifically telling me the story. All of this made this work the perfect book to translate into Polish for the Polish language learner.

[Latasha · Rating 3 out of 5]

a very sad tale. I liked it.

[David_e · Rating 4 out of 5]

Un buen relato con regustillo a clásico.
¡Gracias a Carbaes por la traducción!

[Caroline · Rating 4 out of 5]

A sweet ghost story!

[Rick West · Rating 4 out of 5]

Mary Wilkins was a master at story telling. This ghost short story is a little creepy with a little girl that is obviously a ghost showing up at times repeating over and over, " I can't find my mother". A lot of the classics lack the creepy feel but Ms. Wilkins hits it right on the coffin nails head.

[Lidia Pelayo Alonso · Rating 4 out of 5]

Me ha encantado este relato. La verdad es que no había escuchado apenas nada de Mary E. Wilkins Freeman y ha sido todo un placer leer «El fantasma perdido». ¡Gracias por traducirlo para nosotros, Carla!

[Laura Maquilón · Rating 3 out of 5]

No recomiendo leerlo a altas horas de la noche. Me ha encantado la naturalidad de los diálogos. El final ha llegado demasiado pronto :(

[Concertina · Rating 3 out of 5]

Siento que estoy leyendo a una Shirley Jackson romántica.

[The Mines of Moriah · Rating 4 out of 5]

How can a story be chilling and heartwarming at the same time?

[Mariè · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5, quick, easy and fun. Nothing too special but it holds up as a creepy little bedtime story for bats

[K. Anna Kraft · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have arranged my takeaway thoughts on this sad-yet-sweet story into a haiku:

"In raising a child,
They say it takes a village
But one soul's enough."

[Bionic Jean · Rating 2 out of 5]

The lost ghost is a short story by an American author new to me, Mary Eleanor Wilkins Freeman. A New England writer, she is said to have written disquieting tales exploring a world of domestic spaces turned uncanny. Such is this one, included in “The Oxford Book of English Ghost Stories”. The Lost Ghost is a ghostly tale within a domestic frame story, and probably written during her most productive period of the 1880s and 1890s.

Mrs. Rhoda Meserve has stopped in at Mrs. John Emerson’s house, and as the two sit comfortably together with their needlework she tells her friend the latest gossip, namely that a large house in the area is now being rented by a couple from another town:

“He does business in Boston and it’s just as easy to get to Boston from here as from South Dayton, and so they’re coming here. You know the old Sargent house is a splendid place.”

The sharing of this news surprises Mrs. Emerson, as everyone knows the house is reputed to be haunted. But Mrs. Meserve says the newcomers do not seem bothered when folk say there is something wrong with it, and laugh at the warnings. But she declares:

“Nothing in creation would hire me to go into a house that I’d ever heard a word against of that kind … I wouldn’t go into that house if they would give me the rent. I’ve seen enough of haunted houses to last me as long as I live.”

And of course, after a lot of prevaricating, Mrs. Meserve reluctantly tells of her own experience. When she was a young teacher in East Wilmington, North Carolina, she rented a room from two sisters Mrs. Amelia Dennison and Mrs. Abby Bird. She stresses that she was in great need at the time:

“Anyhow, they took me to board, and I thought I was pretty lucky to get in there. I had a nice room, big and sunny and furnished pretty, the paper and paint all new, and everything as neat as wax. Mrs. Dennison was one of the best cooks I ever saw, and I had a little stove in my room, and there was always a nice fire there when I got home from school. I thought I hadn’t been in such a nice place since I lost my own home, until I had been there about three weeks.”

One particular night during her stay, the young woman heard a knock on her door, “but a very little scared one”. She called to come in, and then opened the door herself. Nobody was there, but there was a draught of cold air, with a strange close smell like a cellar that had been shut up for years. Then she saw a little pitiful white face with scared, longing eyes, holding the teacher’s coat, which she had brought upstairs for her.

Greatly agitated, Mrs. Meserve shared this baffling experience with the sisters, who then felt they had to explain. The small ghost was the manifestation of a young girl who had been severely neglected, forced from a young age to work as a skivvy, eventually incarcerated and left to died in a locked room in the house a few years earlier.

The young teacher Mrs. Meserve was so grateful for the sisters’ kindness, and their frank confession that they had concealed these events, that she felt obliged to stay and try to become accustomed to the presence of the ghost. It seemed harmless enough after all, but one of the sisters started to become increasingly cold, and fretful at the child’s repeated cries of“I can’t find my mother”.

The end of the story provides the first real chill. Mrs. Denison and her young lodger are worried about Mrs. Bird, who is upstairs in bed, finding it impossible to keep warm. Then they see her outside in the bitter cold, walking across the front lawn away from the house, holding hands with the ghost of the little girl. Rushing upstairs they see that she has died in her sleep, no longer fretting about the ghost child but with a smile on her face. It must have been her spirit that they had seen.

The story ends abruptly (but none too soon) with only a brief reference to the frame story: just two short sentences to explain the obvious.

Overall the story feels flat with no atmosphere. Most of it is told in a matter of fact way, alien to a gothic or weird tale such as this. Here is a small sample of the long preliminary passage, presumably intended to set a scene of cosy domesticity:

“Mrs. Meserve settled herself in the parlour rocking-chair, while Mrs. Emerson carried her shawl and hat into the little adjoining bedroom. When she returned Mrs. Meserve was rocking peacefully and was already at work hooking blue wool in and out.
“That’s real pretty,” said Mrs. Emerson.
“Yes, I think it’s pretty,” replied Mrs. Meserve.
“I suppose it’s for the church fair?”
“Yes. I don’t suppose it’ll bring enough to pay for the worsted, let alone the work, but I suppose I’ve got to make something.”
“How much did that one you made for the fair last year bring?”
“Twenty-five cents.”

and so on and so forth. The conversation is pedestrian and deadly dull.

When we come to the story proper it is told mostly through the voice of Mrs. Meserve. As an aside, they call each other Mrs. Meserve and Mrs. Emerson throughout, as befits their time, culture and class. Their situation is a precise replica of Edwardian England; the staid and unimaginative writing adds to the stultifying atmosphere.

Evidently the message of the story is to reveal that horrors are more often found in the living, rather than in any spirits or phantom appearances that we might see and believe to be appearances of the dead. We are far more moved by the details of the little girl’s life and eventual death than we are by her appearance as a ghost. We imagine her pain and longing, the heartbreak of those who knew her and then became aware of the atrocities that are were inflicted upon this unwanted child. Her fate was far more unnerving than the ghost’s appearance. An additional point of interest might be the ambiguity of the title. We are not entirely sure who The Lost Ghost is. The child? The mother? Mrs. Bird, latterly? Birds had often been an indicator of something supernatural in Victorian fiction.

There are other stories from the period and culture with this feel: supernatural stories which teeter on the edge of reality. Edith Wharton and Henry James’s ghost stories both have this sense, and are both rather stolid, although Mary Eleanor Wilkins Freeman writes far more dialogue than either of those. A little earlier, the English author Elizabeth Gaskell (calling herself Mrs. Gaskell) had written a similar themed short story titled “The Old Nurse’s Story”.

Ghosts in stories usually cause unrest, or outright fear. But in The Lost Ghost it is the knowledge of how the ghost came to be that truly haunts us. As mentioned, the writing is lifeless, and only the ending - predictable as it is - saved this from being a one star story. But I will make that a solid two stars (i.e. by Goodreads’s scale “it was OK”) because of details of the author's life that I have just learned.

Mary Eleanor Wilkins Freeman was brought up very strictly by Congregationalists. She began writing stories and verse for children before the age of 20, to help support her family and achieved success quickly.

“As an adolescent, Freeman was increasingly caught between the need for her mother’s love and her instinct to avoid becoming her mother and subsiding into her mother’s form of passivity. Despite continuous pressure from her mother to participate in domestic chores, no amount of discipline could pull Mary away from her reading to the reality of hated kitchen work. According to Edward Foster’s biography of Freeman, “Disliking her household duties, she avoided them, nor could she be moved by disciplinary tactics.” It is clear that a growing tension between Mary and her mother centered on her resistance to undertaking the tasks expected of a “good girl.”

Increasingly Mary Eleanor Wilkins Freeman escaped into her own writing. This is probably why her stories are centred on the monotonous routine of domesticity, which is then transformed by strange and inexplicable events.

The Lost Ghost made me think of a frightening TV episode of Dr. Who involving gasmasks, called “The Empty Child” where one sentence must surely be the author Steven Moffat revisiting The Lost Ghost, but much more effectively. Also a far better short modern novel on this theme is Susan Hill’s “The Small Hand”.

Perhaps I will try another story by Mary Eleanor Wilkins Freeman if it comes up in an anthology, but I will not seek her out, despite her many works: more than two dozen volumes of published short stories and novels. Perhaps the deadpan verisimilitude of the accounts of small, humdrum lives is supposed to lull me into a sense of security, but it makes me feel more like the adolescent Mary, and want to escape by running a mile.

[summer · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5

next year i'll try to read wilkins' whole ghost story collection because she is a brilliant writer.

the story told us through mrs. meserve, who is narrating her encounter with the ghost to her friend, mrs. emerson. this way, the story becomes even more powerful because i think oral narrative is an inseperable part of ghost stories. in this case, the story was sad and depressing more than scary. it was about an abused child who was looking for her mother even though her mother starved her to death. the fact that she didn't ask or tell anything other than "i can't find my mother" broke my heart because her mother didn't even want her, to the point of leaving her and keeping her away from any possible help. she probably didn't want her in the afterlife, too, and that was the reason the girl was looking for her desperately... it was a beautiful way to show children's unconditional love towards their mothers and fathers.

in the end, she found herself a mother who gave her the love she deserved, though. so it was a bitter-sweet story about child abuse and motherhood. and i loved the way wilkins named mrs. bird because she, like a bird, flew out of the window to be the mom of the little girl at the end of the story :")

i don't know if i can include this story in my thesis but i liked it anyways 🥲

[Izzati · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was very intriguing from start to finish. It gave me imageries of Asian ghosts (which I find to be darker and scarier than Westen ghosts) but as the story unfolded, it was not as terrifying as I thought it would be. It gave me that similar familiar feelings I got from reading Frankenstein - begging the question of parenting. Definitely one of the best short stories I have ever read in my life. I would nondoubt seek out for more works by Mary E. Wilkins Freeman.

[Srutirupa Acharya · Rating 5 out of 5]

The story was tragic with a haunting vibe. The story was creepy with a chilling atmosphere. The story was heartwarming with a sweet climax, if we can say so. This one touched me to the core. Easily one of the best short stories I have ever read.

[Aurora · Rating 3 out of 5]

It was predictable and suspenseless. But perfect, if one wants to analyse it and find all the gothic elemts.

[Kath · Rating 4 out of 5]

Well this one surprised me so much. It actually made me cry at the end. What a perfectly wrapped up sad little tale.

[Forked Radish · Rating 5 out of 5]

A ghost and momster story.

[Mim Plech · Rating 5 out of 5]

What a beautiful and chilly scary story...It's haunting and heartwarming at the same time, really, incredible.

[Aleksandra]

DNF 40%

[H. F. Greenwood · Rating 4 out of 5]

Just “The Lost Ghost” 4.25 stars

[Ik · Rating 3 out of 5]

3,5 stars. I liked the atmosphere and the way it was written, a lively little ghost story.

[denudatio_pulpae · Rating 3 out of 5]

"Zagubione duchy" to zbiór opowiadań o... duchach :) Sięgając po tę książkę spodziewałam się dokładnie tego, co w niej znalazłam, więc można powiedzieć, że jestem w pełni usatysfakcjonowana. Autorka przedstawia nam opowieści z bardzo subtelnym dreszczykiem, nie ma tu żadnych elementów, które mogą wzbudzić śmiertelne przerażenie, ale za to opowiadania mają swój klimat. Jest to bardzo subtelne "straszenie" i pewnie część czytelników będzie się nudzić, bo takie historie trzeba po prostu lubić.

Mnie urzekło już pierwsze opowiadanie "Wiatr w krzewie róży", a najbardziej spodobało mi się chyba to pt. "Dzieweczka w progu". Przy pozostałych również się nie nudziłam, zawsze chętnie sięgam po tego typu historie.
7/10

[Bee · Rating 3 out of 5]

Read:

Luella Miller - 3/5