Prospero’s Ghost

Decades after his death, renowned Shakespearean scholar Dr. Marshall Emerson returns from the grave to seek vengeance on those who dared disturb his fitful sleep.

Emerson, whose specialty was the bard’s The Tempest and was nicknamed “Professor Prospero” could never be spotted walking the grounds of McMaster University without the precious 1861 folio edition of Shakespeare’s works clutched in his hands.

When McMaster University library and bookstore staff begin producing replica versions of his original text on a newly acquired Espresso Book Machine, Emerson’s ghost returns, intent to put a stop to this “desecration” of his precious text.

This short story of approximately 6000 words originally appeared in the book CAMPUS CHILLS (2009) and was written by McMaster Graduate Kimberly Foottit and Mark Leslie, whose alter ego ran the Espresso Book Machine at the McMaster bookstore from 2008 until 2011.