ABSTRACT
In the introduction to the first chapter of a book entitled There are Ghosts Everywhere in Singapore, volume two, the author – whose pen name is John Ong – of “Six Selected War-Time Ghost Stories” appears to have given himself the mandate of educating readers about the trials of his fellow Singaporeans and of the British during the years of the Japanese Occupation. Four of the horror tales that constitute the chapter are presented as his own “true” experiences with “ghosts and demons,” and two as being told to him by “others” he met in slave labor camps when he was a teenager. What particularly drew my attention to these tales is the fact that, for each one, the ghostly encounter itself is the segment that triggers the least feeling of horror. The writing is, in fact, poignant to the extent that when it comes to identifying the dreadfulness of private experiences under conditions of war, the boundaries between the living and spiritual worlds prove to be totally irrelevant.
