M. R. James inspired music

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The latest edition of Ghosts & Scholars – the M. R. James newsletter mentioned a new album which might well be of interest to fans of James’ work.

THE FUTURE KINGS OF ENGLAND – WHO IS THIS WHO IS COMING?

www.thefuturekingsofengland.com

The Future Kings of England 4th album is based on the fantastically creepy short story ‘Oh, Whistle and I’ll Come to You my Lad’ by M R James.

One could say this album forms the final part of a trilogy starting with our second album ‘The Fate of Old Mother Orvis’ and our third ‘The Viewing Point’ concerning Suffolk both in it’s wonderful landscape and folklore.

The album is available via Backwater Records

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Reading of the album reminded me of another Jamsian record of a few years past.

THE TRIPLE TREE – GHOSTS

www.myspace.com/thetripletree

The Triple Tree consists of Tony Wakeford (Sol Invictus) and Andrew King aided and abetted by M, Autumn Grieve, Kris Force, Guy Harries, Renee Rosen and John Murphy, and is an extended homage to the supernatural fiction of M. R. James (with a certain nod to his notable studies in the New Testament Apocrypha) the greatest ghost story writer in the English language, and the finest medievalist of his generation. Join Dr Wakeford and the Rev. King as they search for the Three Crowns, attempt to Cast the Runes, purchase The Mezzotint, follow Mr Abney’s “remarkable enlightenment” in Lost Hearts, and join Count Magnus on the “Black Crusade”! Winter evenings will never be the same again…

The album is available via Cold Spring Records

M. R. James on Royal Mail First Class stamps

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On February 23rd 2012 the Royal Mail released a stamp featuring James as part its Britons of Distinction series

Britons of Distinction

Issue Date – 23rd February 2012

Britons of Distinction celebrates another selection of distinguished individuals from the realms of science and technology, architecture, politics and the arts, who are all celebrating anniversaries in 2012.

These Britons were born with very different gifts, but they shared a determination to follow them. Rubbing shoulders with the architects and musicians are the social reformer, the ironmonger from a small Devon town who changed the history of engineering, the craftswoman, the brilliant mathematician, the secret agent and the Cambridge don who created some of the most terrifying ghost stories ever written.

The last time Royal Mail brought together ten different individuals and their achievements was with Eminent Britons in 2009. This was one of the most popular issues of that stamp year and came about when Royal Mail discovered a number of important, but unrelated, anniversaries.

Initial research for 2012 soon demonstrated that, once again, there were many significant anniversaries allowing Royal Mail to assemble a distinguished list of those celebrating birthdays and anniversaries of specific achievements in 2012.

Clark Ashton Smith on M. R. James

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“The peculiar genius of M. R. James, and his greatest power, lies in the convincing evocation of weird, malignant and preternatural phenomena such as I have instanced. It is safe to say that few writers, dead or living, have equaled him in this formidable necromancy and perhaps no one has excelled him.”

(Clark Ashton Smith – The Weird Works of M. R. James, 1934)

H. P. Lovecraft on M. R. James

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“M.R. James joins the brisk, the light, & the commonplace to the weird about as well as anyone could do it — but if another tried the same method, the chances would be ten to one against him. The most valuable element in him — as a model — is his way of weaving a horror into the every-day fabric of life & history — having it grow naturally out of the myriad conditions of an ordinary environment…”

(H. P. Lovecraft to Emil Petaja, 6 March 1935)

Montague Rhodes James, OM, MA, (1 August 1862 – 12 June 1936)

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M. R. James, was an English mediaeval scholar and provost of King’s College,  Cambridge (1905–1918), and of Eton College (1918–1936). He is best remembered for his ghost stories, which are regarded as among the best in the genre. James redefined the ghost story for the new century by abandoning many of the formal Gothic clichés of his predecessors and using more realistic contemporary settings. However, James’s protagonists and plots tend to reflect his own antiquarian interests. Accordingly, he is known as the originator of the “antiquarian ghost story”.

[from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mr_james]

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The goal of this site is to provide an easily accessible online resource for anyone with an interest in James and his works.

mrjames.org has no official connection to the estate of M. R. James or to any current copyright holder of his works.