Montague Rhodes James is considered one of the greatest writers of ghost stories of all time. Born in Kent, England in 1862, James was a well-known and respected scholar in his time for his exacting and informative research in medieval studies. He went on to become a Provost at King’s College, Cambridge, and later Eton, in addition to publishing four popular and influential collections of ghost stories between 1904 and 1925. His story-telling modernized the traditional gothic conception of a supernatural tale to the more realistic contemporary settings and characters of the early 20th century. James incorporated his vast knowledge of antiquities to make the details of his ghost stories all the more genuine and frightening and reveled in contrasting quiet bucolic settings with strange and unexplained events. James’s style was widely influential and inspired famous horror writers, such as H. P. Lovecraft and Stephen King. “Count Magnus and Other Ghost Stories” contains a collection of some of James’ most famous ghost stories.