About this episode

A young woman becomes enchanted by a mysterious Egyptologist in Cairo, exploring themes of knowledge and the supernatural.

Cairo, in the winter season, when the wealthy of Europe come for the warmth and the ruins. A young woman falls under the spell of a scholar unlike any other — a man treated with strange deference by those who know him best, a man whose knowledge of the dead seems to run deeper than any book could teach. She will walk beside him through moonlit halls where the pharaohs sleep in glass cases, "A Professor of Egyptology" first appeared in The Graphic on 10 December 1904, and was collected that same year in Guy Boothby's volume The Lady of the Island. Boothby was an Australian-born novelist best known for his Dr Nikola thrillers, a writer of ferocious productivity who dictated up to six thousand words a day. He died suddenly in 1905, only months after this story appeared, at the age of thirty-seven. Search the archive here www.classicghost.com

People in this episode

Host: Tony Walker

Topics covered

• Egyptology
• ghost stories
• historical fiction
• mystery
• thriller

Keywords

• Egyptology
• Cairo
• Guy Boothby
• ghost stories
• pharaohs
• historical fiction
• mystery

Mentioned in this episode

Books & works: The Lady of the Island

Places: Cairo

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