Mr. Mortimer's Diary | A Ghost Story by Amyas Northcote | A Bitesized Audio Production

The strange behaviour of Mr. Roger Mortimer in the days before his death puzzled his friends and neighbours at the time, but the man himself and the peculiar circumstances of his demise have long been forgotten. When, after 25 years, his long-lost diary is discovered, the bizarre mystery may finally be explained...

A new, original recording of a classic public domain text, read and performed by Simon Stanhope for Bitesized Audio.

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Amyas Northcote (1864–1923) was the seventh and youngest son of a senior Conservative politician of the Victorian era: Sir Stafford Northcote (later the Earl of Iddesleigh), who served as Chancellor of the Exchequer and Foreign Secretary in the governments of Disraeli and Salisbury, as well as Leader of the Opposition when Gladstone was prime minister. (A historical footnote for trivia buffs: while Foreign Secretary under Salisbury, Iddesleigh was also First Lord of the Treasury and so lived at 10 Downing Street, even though he was not prime minister. He died suddenly in No.10, while still in office, in January 1887.)

Amyas appears not to have followed his father into politics, although he presumably had very good connections: his London neighbours during his adolescence apparently included Lord Randolph Churchill and his young son Winston. However, precise details of Amyas's life and career are rather obscure. He was born at the Stafford family seat, Pynes House near Exeter, and was educated at Eton, a year or two below M. R. James (who was slightly his senior, having been born in August 1862), but there is no evidence to show whether or not the two were acquainted at school. Very little is known about Amyas Northcote's adult life and work: as an author he is only known to have published one book, in his late 50s: a collection of 13 short ghost stories entitled 'In Ghostly Company', published by Bodley Head in November 1921. His death barely eighteen months later in 1923 at the age of 58 or 59 meant that 'In Ghostly Company' fell quite quickly into obscurity, his only contribution to supernatural fiction (or fiction of any kind for that matter). It was not republished for many decades. Northcote may have been forgotten entirely had it not been for Montague Summers choosing one of his stories - 'Brickett Bottom' - for inclusion in his 1930s volume 'The Supernatural Omnibus'. Northcote's ghost stories have been compared to those of his old school-fellow M. R. James; certainly the antiquarian character of Mr. Roger Mortimer has Jamesian echoes.

'Mr. Mortimer's Diary' was first published in the volume 'In Ghostly Company' in November 1921.

Recording © Bitesized Audio 2021.