The Associated Shades This volume contains all the four humorous and witty novels by John Kendrick Bangs about "The Associated Shades" a group of famous dead people who become a sort of corporation or exclusive club in a house-boat on Styx. These stories created a new genre - Bangsian fiction - which is a story set almost or entirely in the afterlife. Members of The Associated Shades include: Confucius, Socrates , Sherlock Holmes, Baron Munchausen, William Shakespeare, Napoleon Bonaparte, Dr Samuel Johnson, Nero, James Boswell , Charles Darwin, George Washington, Walter Raleigh among others.