The Children's Literature Podcast

Just because you’re dead doesn’t mean you have to stop having a good time, as W.D. Westervelt discovered back in 1915 when he collected this story in Hawaii and translated it into English.

“A Visit to the King of the Ghosts” was the title of Chapter 13 of his book Legends of Gods and Ghosts. It depicts an afterlife where people still eat, sleep, are married, go surfing, dance, and party — at least, as well as you can when you aren’t alive any more. Ka-ilio-hae gets a tour of the afterlife, thanks to his bossy si...

For hundreds of years, sailors have seen the Flying Dutchman – a ghost ship that is doomed to sail forever in troubled waters after its foolish and greedy captain took it through a storm. The Dutchman sank, taking its entire crew to the bottom with it.

Here I present the two earliest written accounts of the Dutchman, and we see that not everyone who hears the tale is a believer. John MacDonald first wrote about the Flying Dutchman in 1790 with a brief passage in his book Travels in Various Parts of Europe, Asia, and Africa.

...

This is the True(?) Story of the Black Dog that has been terrorizing the East of England since 1577. The Black Dog, also called Black Shuck, is a famous apparition that has terrorized East Anglia for centuries. He first appeared at the village church in Bongay (pronouned BUN-gee), where the marks of his claws can still be seen in the church door. To this day, folk tell tales of their own encounters with the Black Dog.

But was this vision real? The interesting part about this story is that it happened at a time when medieval...

These are the 13 nights of Halloween, during which I will spook you silly with awful anecdotes. Tonight’s terrible tale is “The Honest Witch,” a story about a real Korean courtier who, four hundred years ago, discovered that not all witches need to be burned.

This story was first recorded by Im Bang in the 17th century, and the event allegedly happened within the author’s own lifetime to a real government bureaucrat named Song Sang-in. It was first translated into English by James Gale and included in his book “Imps, Ghosts, and Fairies, Translated from the K...

They say that in the depths of Windsor Forest, the ghost of a vengeful huntsman rides on a steed with hooves of flame, taking out his wrath on the wicked — or in some accounts, innocent livestock.

Shakespeare wrote about Herne in his play The Merry Wives of Windsor, and the legends are still told today about the mysterious rider with the stag’s horns on his head.

If you’d like the commentary-free version of this tale, you can find that at my storytelling channel:

Welcome to my 13 Nights of Halloween, during which I will heebie your jeebies with freaky folktales. Tonight’s terrifying tale is “The Finger,” is a Jewish folktale which was recorded nearly 400 years ago.

This story is as funny as it is creepy, and it was what inspired Tim Burton to make his film Corpse Bride. Reuven is ready to marry his beloved, but a drunken joke at his bachelor party leaves him with a dead bride laying claim to him. Can a thoughtful rabbi settle the dispute?

If you’d like the commentary-free version...

Welcome to my 13 Nights of Halloween, during which I will torment you with terrible tales Tonight’s freakish bit of folklore is “Kuchisake-onna” or “The Woman With the Slit Mouth,” a ghost legend from Japan that goes back many hundreds of years but which became a frightening urban phenomenon in the 20th Century in Japan.

This malevolent spirit is the ghost of a vain woman who asks you an unanswerable question, then punishes you however you answer. The real question is, is there any way to escape her?

There is a commentary-free version of the sto...

Welcome to my 13 Nights of Halloween, where I will share frightening folktales guaranteed to scare the bejeebers out of you. Tonight’s story is “The Baba Yaga” which comes from William Ralston’s 1873 collection of Russian Folk-Tales.

Baba Yaga is a delightfully nasty witch who never apologizes and likes to eat up little girls and boys who are too stupid to escape from her. She rides around in a mortar and pestle, presumably because she likes to grind herbs while on road trips.

PREPARE YOURSELVES! And please enjoy “The Baba Yaga.”

If you would...

This is the second of my 13 Nights of Halloween, and tonight you will hear “The Ghost Sailor,” a folktale that comes from the Mashpee people of Cape Cod.

This is my own retelling, and the story teaches us that you can’t put a price on the safety of your children.

PREPARE YOURSELVES! And please enjoy “The Ghost Sailor”

If you would like a commentary-free version of this story, here it is:

Welcome to my 13 Nights of Halloween, where I will share frightening folktales guaranteed to scare the bejeebers out of you. These are stories so scary that most grownups won’t share them with children any more. But I think we’ve gone soft! Bring back the screams, the peril, the ghastly, the ghoulish. Kids from the past loved feeling their hair stand on end, and so do kids today.

Tonight’s story is “The Blue Beard,” which was originally published as “Barbe Bleue” in Charles Perrault’s 1697 collection, Histoires ou contes du temps passé. Perrault didn’t just write...

This evening’s Fireside Fairy Tale is “Cap O’ Rushes,” a tale printed in English Fairy Tales, which was a collection made by Joseph Jacobs in 1890. He gave the author as “Anonymous,” which isn’t totally correct. The authors are the common people of England.

Cap O’ Rushes is interesting because it combines elements of King Lear with the structure of a classic Cinderella story. This tale has ties to Leicestershire, where I live, so I am pleased to present a story from a place I am happy to call home.

If you would like the c...