“A paranormal event without a story is tenuous, fragile. What makes it “real,” at least in a sense, is the story, the tale that grounds the event. That sense of the uncanny, of something not-quite-right, of things ever-so-slightly off, cries out for an explanation, and often we turn to ghosts for that explanation. Just as an oyster turns a speck of dirt into a pearl, the ghost story doesn’t make the feeling disappear, but can transform it into something more stable, less unsettling.”
— Colin Dickey, Ghostland: An American History of Haunted Places
Franz Sedlacek / ‘Ghost Over The Trees’ / circa 1931 / image source
