What Makes London Such a Ghostly City

What is it that makes London such a ghostly city? I’ve been living here most of my life and the place still gives me the willies sometimes. In December, the sun seems to rise and set in the time it takes to make a cup of tea, while fog and damp insinuate their way into every dark, slimy corner. The city’s many steam age buildings, silent streets and still back gardens feel almost ludicrously spooky. Even the view from my kitchen window looks like the cover of an airport horror novel, with ravens pecking at a dying cedar in the half-light.

Perhaps as a response to this creeping darkness, Christmas Eve (not Halloween) is the traditional time for telling ghost stories in Britain, the thought of unspeakable things lurking outside the window supposedly making indoors feel cozier. And in London, you never have to travel far beyond your doorstep to find some allegedly haunted spot. Indeed, in the neighborhood where I grew up, they cropped up on every other corner.