This post is brought to you by Strange Detectives, a collection of ghostbreaker mysteries by G. W. Thomas. Meet Dr. Drayk who solves a weird mystery from Canada. Here are Richard Delamare and his Watson, Bainbridge in four occult tales filled with terror and laughter. We also get The Athenodorians, a secret organization of sleuths led by Baron von Klanstein, who lives in Wellman House in New England. His daughter Orestia is not so housebound, flying around the United States in a bi-plane to wield her sword in the interests of the human race. They solve “The Case of Phantom Legion” as well as “The Case of the Blue Man”. This collection is guaranteed to thrill Horror and Mystery fans alike. Check out the companion volume, Strange Adventures.
Television has created a cadre of ghostbreakers including a short-lived show called Ghostbreaker, Carl Kolchak, the Winchesters, Agent Muller & Scully, a coven of sister witches in San Francisco, not to mention such cartoon characters as Scooby-Doo (many iterations but Thirteen Ghosts of Scooby-Doo is my fav) , The Ghostbusters (not the movie ones) and The Real Ghostbusters (Yes, those ones) and even an episode of I Dream of Jeanie and Fantasy Island. But this post isn’t about any of those. I wanted to hunt down the classic ghostbreakers of literature that were adapted for TV.
C. August Dupin
Poe’s little Frenchman C. Auguste Dupin was the great-grand-daddy of them all. He appeared twice on TV played by George C. Scott and Edward Woodward. (Scott got Val Kilmer for a sidekick.) Dupin solves the case and proves no ghosts need apply. The first Mystery story and one of the first ghostbreaker stories. Later Poe would step into Dupin’s shoes.
“The Murder in the Rue Morgue”
Sherlock Holmes
There have been many Sherlock Holmes shows, on the Radio, in the movies and on TV. My go-to is always Jeremy Brett. He could do no wrong until I saw the adaptation of “The Sussex Vampire” which went full Dracula. Strangely, this should have made me happy but it was dull. Sherlock was never a ghostbreaker by choice, being far too rational for that. Fortunately, his creator loved a good spook.
Dracula
Abraham van Helsing was a vampire-hunter, a kind of occult detective. As with all the early ones, he was a Doctor. (Later The Doctor would fulfill this same role, especially when played by John Pertwee.) Plenty of Dracula material on TV but most shows update the setting to modern times and throw some descendant of Van Helsing at the Count. Mark Gatiss and Steve Moffett turns the van Helsing strain into a nun, Sister Agatha van Helsing.
Father Brown
Father Brown is back as Mark Williams but the new show lacks the backbone of the 1974 show with Kenneth More. This series adapted the original G. K. Chesterton stories, which have philosophical or religious questions in them. (This where Mark Williams is just too soft for my palate.) Like Simenon’s Inspector Maigret, I keep hoping for a new series that is excellent and faithful to the original. I keep hoping…
“The Curse of the Golden Cross”
Thomas Carnacki
Thomas Carnacki had his own collection of stories back in 1913, but only one of these made it onto the TV in The Rivals of Sherlock Holmes, based on the Hugh Greene collection. Bramah’s Max Carrados was another in this series but they didn’t do his supernatural-appearing story. For more supernatural-appearing fare, go here.
Hercules Poirot
As with Jeremy Brett as Holmes, David Suchet will always be “the Poirot”. Like Sherlock Holmes, the early adventures of the Belgian detective occasionally had a Horror feel, not Dracula so much as The Moonstone. Christie wrote some actual Horror tales in her early days.
“The Adventure of the Western Star”
“The Tragedy at Marsden Manor”
“The Adventure of the Egyptian Tomb”
Miss Marple
Miss Marple, unfortunately, has yet to have her “Brett/Suchet moment”. (I am too young to have seen Margaret Rutherford in the role. She was Miss Marple for several generations of film-goers, just as Basil Rathbone was Holmes.) I like Joan Hickson and Geraldine McKewn and other actors who have played her but none is “the Marple”. She didn’t do many supernatural-seeming tales either.
Cribb
Peter Lovesy’s Cribb borrows wonderfully from Victorian times with several supernatural appearing stories. Of course, Jack the Ripper comes in at this time. Alan Dobie does a good job with Cribb.
Conclusion
I suppose you have noticed that most of these are Mystery tales first that have the appearance of the supernatural. Sherlock Holmes, Father Brown, Hercule Poirot, these are the classic detectives of straight Mystery. Of course, they all had their spooky stories. Not often, but they are often some of their best. “The Speckled Band” or The Hound of the Baskervilles can hold their own against Algernon Blackwood or E.F. Benson any day.
The one exception is Thomas Carnacki who appeared as one of The Rivals of Sherlock Holmes. “The Horse of the Invisible” is not his spookiest tale (or even his best) but it does offer a cake-and-eat-it-too plot that might placate straight Mystery fans. I would have preferred “The Hog” with its no-holds-bar Horror. (sigh.) That was part of Carnacki’s charm (borrowing from Flaxman Low). You never knew if the ghosts were real until the end. It could go either way. “The Horse of the Invisible” tried to do both.
Some other ghostbreakers I’d like to see from Mystery fiction include John Dickson Carr’s Dr. Gideon Fell and Sir Henry Merrivale. From the Horror stories, I’d like to see Jules de Grandin and Dr. Trowbridge, Manly Wade Wellman’s John Thunstone and Silver John. (John did get a movie back in the 1970s but it is too awful to mention.)
Mythos Horror & Ghostbreakers at RAGE m a c h i n e
A friendly correction: ‘The Rivals of Sherlock Holmes’ wasn’t collected by Graham Greene, but by his brothe, former, BBC Director-General Hugh Carlton Greene.
You are right, of course.