Introduction
Starting with Elizabeth Gaskell’s “The Old Nurse’s Story” (1852)—a staple of many Victorian Ghost Story Anthologies—and ending with Ambrose Bierce’s “The Moonlit Road” (1907), this collection includes twenty-one ghost stories spanning six decades. As our classes were moved online for the 2020-21 academic year, this Scalar project functioned as a collaborative space with each student responsible for one ghost story (writing a short introduction and creating explanatory notes) and then finding links between those texts (and texts outside the course) to create a critical apparatus that helps guide readers through the anthology.
This is the first edition and attempt at creating a project of this kind for this course and I hope it offers a foundation for future projects for EN 4573 (Victorian Ghosts) at York University. I cannot praise the students enough for their effort and enthusiasm during our time together when faced with learning a new software and completing unfamiliar assignments—not to mention, doing this all while navigating a (new to many of them) completely remote learning environment.
If you have any questions or comments about the project, I can be reached at mdunlea@yorku.ca.
Matthew Dunleavy
Course Director, Victorian Ghosts
York University
January 2021