The Christmas Ghost Story Tradition with Dr Kate Cherrell

The Christmas Ghost Story Tradition with Dr Kate Cherrell

Author: Icy Sedgwick December 22, 2025 Duration: 58:02

Dr Kate Cherrell is a writer and broadcaster specialising in the long 19th century and paranormal history. Her academic interests include 19th-century Spiritualism, mourning traditions, the gothic, the monstrous feminine, and death history. She is the author of Begotten (2025), Memorials to the Dead (2026), and writes commercially on paranormal history for various magazines and publishers. She is co-founder of Not of this Wold festival, director of The Bats’ Ball annual cemetery gathering and sits on the director’s board of Lincoln Book Festival. As a historian, she has co-hosted Haunted Homecoming, Unexplained: Caught on Camera and has provided historical expertise on The Yorkshire Exorcist, Paranormal, and Weird Britain.

In this chat, we talk about the fashion for Christmas ghost stories, where it came from, why television plays such a big role in our fascination with MR James at Christmas, and where the genre might go next!

Find Kate online: https://burialsandbeyond.com/

Order Begotten: https://uk.bookshop.org/a/12992/9781803418049

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Each week, Fabulous Folklore with Icy offers a compact, fifteen-minute dive into the strange and storied shadows of our world’s traditions. Host Icy Sedgwick, a writer steeped in fantasy and Gothic horror, brings a storyteller’s eye to the material, weaving together tales of local legends, deep-rooted superstitions, and ancient myths. The podcast moves beyond simple retellings to consider the cultural soil from which these stories grew-why people believed what they did, how these narratives functioned in society, and the peculiar, often unsettling details that make them endure. You’ll hear about the oddities and occult practices that textbooks often overlook, all delivered with a blend of curiosity and a slight chill. It’s a consistently engaging exploration for anyone fascinated by the weird corners of history and human belief, a weekly reminder that our world is far more mysterious than it seems. Sedgwick’s background ensures the tales are told with both authority and a palpable sense of wonder, making each short episode a perfect gateway into a larger, fabulously folkloric universe. This isn’t just a catalog of curiosities; it’s an invitation to look at the familiar landscapes around us and imagine the layers of story hidden just beneath the surface, all packed into a brief, compelling listen that easily fits into a daily routine.
Author: Language: English Episodes: 100

Fabulous Folklore with Icy
Podcast Episodes
Newgate Prison: Novels, Escapees, and Dreadful Conditions [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 21:10
If you've ever read any Charles Dickens novels, especially Great Expectations, then you'll have run into Newgate Prison. The hulking, notorious jail loomed large in London's history, before its demolition in 1902. While…
How did popular culture add to Bedlam's fearsome reputation? [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 24:57
Bedlam, or Bethlem Royal Hospital to give it its full name, is actually the world's oldest psychiatric institution. It began life in 1247 in the Priory of St Mary of Bethlehem, which stood where we now find Liverpool Str…
Foxes in Folk Tales: From Aesop to Reynard [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 18:14
Foxes appear in literature and legend across the world. Look at Brer Fox in the American South. In Rebel Folklore, I discussed the Jiuwei Hu of China, or nine-tailed fox, who drains men of their life force. Korea's kumih…
Monsters and Strange Creatures with Natalie Lawrence [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 49:43
Natalie Lawrence is an author and illustrator who explores our relationship with the natural world, looking through multiple lenses - from the biological to the mythic and psychoanalytic. She completed a MSc and Ph.D. in…
Hedgehogs in Folklore: Witches, Familiars, and Milk Thieves [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 20:37
Hedgehogs are one of the stranger mammals you might encounter. They're nocturnal, they hibernate, they're prone to rolling into a ball when frightened, and they're extremely vulnerable to habitat loss. While some of you…
Moles in Folklore: Folk Remedies and Weather Omens [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 20:20
Moles are fascinating creatures. They're phenomenal diggers and while they weigh around 120g, they can shift 540 times their body weight of earth. Given they live entirely underground, they're a rarely seen mammal, and w…
Otters in Folklore: Brave Helpers or Fearsome Monsters [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 15:27
Otters are some of the most charming mammals you might encounter. Sometimes nicknamed the "water sausage" by the internet, otters are playful, intelligent, and capable of using tools. They also appear in popular culture,…
Creepy Listener Stories of Space and Place [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 21:21
When we think about folklore, we often think about the characters involved: King Arthur, Queen Mab, Lady Godiva, and more. Yet folklore has an intrinsic link with place, too. Even the most throwaway comment about a place…
The Screaming Skulls: Guardian Spirits or Poltergeists-in-Waiting? [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 26:59
English folklore is full of peculiarities. The legends of the so-called screaming skulls are definitely among them. These are skulls kept in mansions and farmhouses, sometimes considered to be guardians of the property.…
Storytelling and Making Folklore Accessible with Three Ravens [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:32:35
I'm talking to Eleanor Conlon and Martin Vaux from the Three Ravens podcast about the difficulties in defining 'folklore', the importance of storytelling, which of England's 39 historic counties has the best folk tales,…