The Canterville Ghost by Oscar Wilde | A Classic Tale for Halloween
The Three Ravens PodcastPlay episode
Show notes
To wish everyone a very happy Halloween, we warmly present a reading of Oscar Wilde's classic ghost story, The Canterville Ghost.
After a month of celebrating more sincere ghost stories and quite dense, spooky topics, we thought it might be time for a little levity - and this story is an important one: written in 1887, it called time on the Victorian ghost story, masterfully blending satire, social commentary, and supernatural themes, subverting the traditions of the form to explore profound ideas about culture, redemption, and the human condition.
It's a tale which has its cake and eats it, packed with familiar gothic tropes while also being both a parody and social satire; it serves as a sharp critique of both the English aristocracy and the American nouveau riche, with Wilde using the clash between ancient, tradition-bound British culture and modern, materialistic, and practical American culture to highlight the absurdities and shortcomings of both societies.
Exploring eternally-relevant themes such as redemption and forgiveness, life and death, and the tensions between materialism and spirituality, it also showcases Wilde's characteristic wit, irony, and use of paradox.
Rightfully acknowledged as a masterpiece of comic gothic fiction that continues to be enjoyed for its literary craftsmanship and timeless relevance, we hope you enjoy Martin's reading, that it makes you smile during our current quite dark and dismal times, and offers both a lighthearted, entertaining parody and a poignant, meaningful exploration of human nature and social values.
About Three Ravens 🔮
Three Ravens is a completely independent English myth and folklore podcast where we share stories, celebrate folk culture, and fall backwards through the hedgerows of history.
Hosted by real-life couple Eleanor Conlon and Martin Vaux, and mostly recorded at our home in rural Sussex in southern England, Three Ravens is rated 4.8/5 from over 500 reviews and has grown by word of mouth care of our lovely listener community ‘The Conspiracy of Ravens.’
We release three episodes a week, on Mondays, Thursday and Saturdays, through which we explore folktales, folkways, fairy stories, folk songs, mythology, local heritage, seasonal customs and traditional beliefs.
Our research inspires our retellings of stories from across history and culture, with episodes standing alone but connected together across over 500 chatty, mostly light-hearted, swear-free installments driven by passion, kindness and curiosity.
Now ranked as an all-time Top 5 podcast across several categories by Goodpods, charting in the Spotify, Apple and Rephonic UK Fiction Top 10 across 2024, 2025 and 2026, if you’re interested in ghosts, monsters, regional beliefs, and the things that unite us all, then join us round the campfire and listen in…
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