Some say that ever ‘gainst that season comes
Wherein our Savior’s birth is celebrated,
The bird of dawning singeth all night long:
And then, they say, no spirit dares stir abroad;
The nights are wholesome; then no planets strike,
No fairy takes, nor witch hath power to charm,
So hallow’d and so gracious is the time.
Marcellus, Hamlet Act I, Sc I
(Happy Halloween)
Théodore Chassériau, “The Ghost of Banquo”
If he wanted a grand horror tale, that was probably too graphic for England, he could have written about mass murderer-cannibal Sawney Bean and his clan.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sawney_Bean
Dorothy L. Sayers did a great write up about Sawney & family, in her anthology Great Short Stories of Detection, Mystery and Horror (1928).
Thanks for this post. Our family loves a bit of literary nerd stuff, and there wasn’t even any Shakespeare in the park in our locale this summer. So this was welcome.