Halloween Folklore and Ghost Stories
Halloween. The night when the veil between the living and the dead is at its thinnest. When ghosts walk and corpses writhe, and innocent souls had best beware.
Let award winning storyteller Brice Stratford take you on a wild and witchy ride, fascinating and unnerving in equal measure, through the twists and turns of Allhallowstide, and the forgotten history of Halloween and the wider Hallowmas season. With ghost stories, ancestor worship, bone fires, otherworld pixies, Pagan belief and archaic, Christian mythology along the way, Stratford shares for the first time the deeper tales and stranger lore that lurk beneath the tricks and treats we know so well, and the ancient flame that keeps the Jack O’Lantern lit. Light the candles, lock the doors, and prepare to be unsettled. Are you sitting comfortably? Then let’s begin.
Bio
Brice Stratford is an actor, storyteller, theatre director, folklorist, historian and former stuntman. Born and raised in the New Forest, he’s a regular fixture at folk, fringe and fright events across the country with his award-winning theatre company, the Owle Schreame. He currently sits on the board of the New Forest National Park Authority, and writes regularly on culture, heritage, architecture and the arts for a range of periodicals. In 2024 he launched the Finding Folklore podcast, an expansive storytelling and research project designed to unearth the hidden lore beneath the humdrum veneer of modern England. This talk accompanies the release of Brice’s third book on mythology and folklore, Halloween Folklore and Ghost Stories.
Curated & Hosted by
Marguerite Johnson is a cultural historian of the ancient Mediterranean, specialising in sexuality and gender, particularly in the poetry of Sappho, Catullus, and Ovid, as well as magical traditions in Greece, Rome, and the Near East. She also researches Classical Reception Studies, with a regular focus on Australia. In addition to ancient world studies, Marguerite is interested in sexual histories in modernity as well as magic in the west more broadly, especially the practices and art of Australian witch, Rosaleen Norton. She is Honorary Professor of Classics and Ancient History at The University of Queensland, and a Fellow of the Australian Academy of the Humanities.
don’t worry if you miss it – we will send you a recording valid for two weeks the next day
