Rumpole of the Bailey

A Chronological List of the Stories

Rumpole Christmas Stories

Christmas literature has a long history in Britain; Charles Dickens wrote probably the most famous of all Christmas stories in 1843 - A Christmas Carol - which is both a ghost story and Christmas themed. This set the template for what we now recognise as a traditional ghost story for Christmas, if not a northern hemisphere winter or the end of the year. Dickens went on to write many more novels and short stories for Christmas. Earlier than Dickens, Shakespeare wrote a whole play about the end of the Christmas period - Twelfth Night.

John Mortimer was very active in contributing to Christmas literature. Throughout the various Rumpole books are scattered stories which take place or mention the end of year festivities - Christmas and New Year's Eve - with many of these stories being published for Christmas in newspapers. As a consequence some of these stories were not included in the contemporary Rumpole books and did not reach a wide audience until they were collected in the final Rumpole book, Rumpole at Christmas, in 2009, although they are not arranged in the book in chronological order.

The list below is of the Rumpole stories which are Christmas themed, occurring at or near Christmas, or are traditional English Christmas ghost stories. The seven stories in Rumpole at Christmas are denoted with an asterisk.

1979 - Rumpole and the Case of Identity

1981 - Rumpole and the Spirit of Christmas

1986 - Rumpole and the Haunted Courtroom

1988 - Rumpole and the Chambers Party

1990 - Rumpole for the Prosecution

1990 - Making the Connection

1992 - Rumpole and the Soothsayer

          (This is Making the Connection with a new title)

1995 - Rumpole and the Christmas Squeeze

1996 - Rumpole and the Widow Twanky

1997 - Rumpole and the Boy*

1999 - Rumpole and the Absence of Body

1999 - Rumpole and the Millennium Bug*

2000 - Rumpole and Carrots the Clown

2001 - Rumpole and the Old Familiar Faces*

2002 - Rumpole and the New Year's Resolution

2004 - Rumpole and the Christmas Break*

2004 - Rumpole and the Christmas Party*

          (Magazine title: Tale of Rumpole of the Bailey’s Christmas Party)

2005 - Rumpole and Father Christmas*

2006 - Rumpole and the Health Farm Murder*

Note: The two stories Rumpole and the Widow Twanky and Rumpole and the Christmas Squeeze were combined to form Rumpole and the Old Familiar Faces in 2001 for the book Rumpole Rests His Case.