J. Sheridan Le Fanu (1814-1873)

Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu (1814-73)

[ Note: A miniature portrait of J. S. Le Fanu by an unknown hand is cited in Anne Crookshank, Irish Portraits Exhibition, [Catalogue] Ulster Museum 1965. ]

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Bibliographical details

[ To view num. portraits, title-pages, and illustrations of J. S. Le Fanu can be viewed on Google, search J. S. Le Fanu > images - online. ]

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Commentary
See separate file [infra].

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Quotations
See separate file [infra].

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References
Justin McCarthy, gen. ed., Irish Literature (Washington: Catholic Univ. of America 1904), gives extracts and selections of “The Quare Gander”; “A Wandering Minstrel” (from House by the Churchyard); also “Shamus O’Brien”, with a note referring to the account in W. R. Le Fanu’s Seventy Years: ‘[It] was written in a very few days in the year 1840 […].The scraps of paper on which it was written were lost, and years after, when my brother wished for a copy, I had to write it out from memory for him’ [… &c., as infra]; “Phaudrig Crohoore” [conceived as an ‘Irish Lochinvar’, it appeared in Dublin University Magazine, with a preface stating it to be composed by an illiterate minstrel Michael Finley; attended by an anecdote from W. R. Le Fanu relating to the disclosure of its author’s real identity by him at the Viceregal Lodge in the days of Lord and Lady Spencer]; “Abhrain an Bhuideil” [addressed to a whiskey bottle and ending, ‘Then, beautiful witch, / I’ll be found - in a ditch / With your kiss on my cold lips, and never rise more’]. The Editor writes: ‘Mr Le Fanu, who had retired from social life several years previously, died in his house in Merrion Sq., Feb. 7 1873. / Mr Alfred Perceval Graves edited his poems in a collected edition of 1896, and in his preface he says, those who possessed the rare privilege of Le Fanu’s friendship, and only they, can form any idea of the true character of the man; for after the death of his wife, to whom he was most deeply devoted, he quite forsook general society, in which his fine features, distinguished bearing, and charm of conversation marked him out as the beau-ideal of an Irish wit and a scholar of the old school. / From this society he vanished so entirely that Dublin, always ready with a nickname, dubbed him the Invisible Prince; and, indeed, he was for long almost invisible, except to his family and familiar freinds, unless at odd hours of the evening, when he might occasionally be seems stealing, like the ghost of his former self, between his newspaper office and his home in Merrion Square. sometimes too he was to be encountered in an old, out-of-the-way bookshop, poring over some rare black-letter Astrology or Demonology’ [End].

Brian McKenna, Irish Literature, 1800-1875: A Guide to Information Sources (Detroit: Gale Research Co. 1978), lists The Cock and Anchor, being a Chronicle of Old Dublin City (Dublin: Curry 1845), rpt. with changes as Morley Court being &c. (London 1873); Uncle Silas, A Tale of Bartram Haugh (Bentley 1864). Bibl., W. J. McCormack, ‘Uncle Silas’, in Long Room, no. 4. (1971), and ‘Swedenbourgianism as ‘Structure in... Uncle Silas’, in Long Room, no. 6 (1972). Also Willing to Die (1873); The Watcher and Other Wierd Stories (London: Downey & Co. 1894)[?]; Madam Crowl’s Ghost... (London: Bell 1923); The Prelude, Being a Contribution Towards the History of the Election for the University, by John Figwood, pseud. (Dublin 1865); and The Beautiful Poem of Shamus O’Brien (Manchester 1867). Stewart M. Ellis, in Wilkie Collins, Le Fanu and Others (NY 1931), contains a bibliography extended from the list in Irish Book Lover 8 (1916), 30-33.[ top ]

Stephen Brown, Ireland in Fiction [Pt. I] (Dublin: Maunsel 1919), lists The Cock and Anchor (Duffy 1845; Downey & Co. 1909); The Fortunes of Col. Turlogh O’Brien (anon., 1847, Downey & Co. 1895) [recte McGlashan 1847]; The House by the Churchyard (Duffy [1863]); The Purcell Papers; A Chronicle of Golden Friars and Other Stories (London: Downey & Co. 1896). The plot of Turlogh, efforts of an officer in Jacobite army to regain estates in Tipperary held by Sir Hugh Willoughby whose daughter [Grace] he loves; descriptions of Jacobite parliament in Dublin and Battle of Aughrim. ‘Among the 3 or 4 best Irish historical novels’ [Cleeve’s ‘some critics’]. Bibl, The Cock and Anchor, rep. Garland, 1979.

Patrick Rafroidi, Irish Literature in English (Gerrards Cross: Colin Smythe 1980), Vol. 1: Le Fanu constantly recycled, rewrote, and retitled his stories for various magazines and collections. ‘Some Account of the Latter Days of the Hon. Richard Marston of Dunoran’ first appeared in Dublin University Magazine (April-June 1848), but was reissued as ‘The Evil Guest’ in Ghost Stories (1851), and finally distributed in three volumes of A Lost Name (Bentley 1863); numerous Dublin University Magazine-published stories appeared in other Le Fanu collections published by Bentley, such as Chronicle of Golden Friars (1871) and In A Glass Darkly (1872), and in and in The Purcell Papers (1880, rep. Wisconsin 1975). His Dublin University Magazine works include ‘Shamus O’Brien,’ a ballad (July 1850), reprinted as The Poem of Shamus O’Brien (Manchester 1867), and famous in the US where Samuel Lover recited it, and also rendered as an opera by Charles Villiers Stanford.

Patrick Rafroidi, Irish Literature in English, The Romantic Period (Gerrards Cross 1980), Vol. 2, lists Dublin University Magazine contributions, each rep. in Purcell Papers (1880), “The Ghost and the Bone-Setter” (Jan 1838; XI, 61, p.50),; “The Fortunes of Sir Robert Ardogh” (March 1838; XI, 63, p.313), later “The Haunted Baronet”, in Belgravia 1870, and in Chronicles of Golden Friars, London: Bentley 1871, vols. 1-2 of 3 vols.; “The Last Heir of Castle Connor” (June 1838; XI, 66, p.713); “The Drunkard”s Dream” (Aug. 1838; XII, 68, p.151); “Passage in the Secret History of an Irish Countess” (Nov. 1838; XII, 71, p.502), rev. rep. as “The Murdered Cousin” in Ghost Stories [&c.] (1851), further enlarged as “Maud Ruthyn”, in Dublin University Magazine, 1864, then as Uncle Silas (1864); “The Bridal of Carriguarah” (April 1839; XIII, 76, p.405); “Schalken the Painter” (May 1839; XIII, 74, p.579), rep. in Ghost Stories (1851); “Scraps of Hibernian Ballads” (June 1839; XIII, 78, p.752); “Jim Sullivan’s Adventures in the Great Snow” (July 1839; XIV, 79, p.103); “A Chapter in the History of a Tyrone Family” (Oct. 1839; XIV, 82, p.398) [later enl. as The Wyvern Mystery]; “An Adventure of Hardress Fitzgerald, a Royalist Captain” (Feb. 1840; XV, 86, p.147); “The Quare Gander” (Oct. 1840; XVI, 94, p.390); “Miscellanea Mystica” (Jan., Feb., & June 1846; XXVII, 157, [n.p.]; 158, p.155; 162, p.691) [attribution made by M. Sadleir]; “The Watcher”, from Reminiscences of a Bachelor (Nov. 1847; XXX, 179, p.526), rep. in Ghost Stories (1851); “Fireside Horrors for Christmas” (Dec. 1847; XXX, 180, p.631) [attribution made by Rafroidi]; “The Fatal Bride”, from Two Contributions from Reminiscences of a Bachelor (Jan. 1848; XXXI, 181, p.15); “Evenings with the Witchfinders” (passim 1848, a series; attrib. Rafroidi); “Some Account of the Latter Days of the Hon. Richard Marston of Dunoran” (April, June 1848 [no issue details]), later as “The Evil Guest” in Ghost Stories (1851), then as A Lost Name (1868); “The State Prosecutions” [ editorial] (June 1848; XXXI, 186, p.785); “The Irish League” [editorial] (July 1848; XXXIII, 187, p.115); “The Mysterious Lodger” (Jan. & Feb 1850) [no issue details]; (“Billy Malowney”s Taste of Love and Glory” (June 1850; XXXV, 210, p.692); “Shamus O’Brien, A Ballad” (July 1850; XXXVI, 211, p.109). [Contemporary printings as in Works, supra.]

Brian Cleeve & Ann Brady, A Dictionary of Irish Writers [rev. 1 vol. edn.] (Dublin: Lilliput Press 1985), incls. an incomplete and ill-informed article citing Turlogh O’Brien (1847) as ‘one of the best of Irish historical novels’ according to ‘some critics’; 16 subsequent novels incl. The House by the Churchyard (1863); Uncle Silas (1864); In a Glass Darkly [recte stories]; Le Fanu contrib. The Purcell Papers to Dublin University Magazine while still a student, and later issued them in volume form (1880); also notices Peter Le Fanu, Smock Alley Secrets (1778).

Seamus Deane, gen. ed., The Field Day Anthology of Irish Writing (Derry: Field Day 1991), Vol. 1 selects Strange Event in the Life of Schalken the Painter, 1231; see also remarks at 1078, 1107, 1136, 1176, &c. Bibl. Jean Lozes, ed., ‘Fragment d’un journal intimes de J. S. Le Fanu... 18 Mai 1858’, [in] Caliban [new ser.], 10, 1 (1974), pp.153-64; William Le Fanu, Seventy Years of Irish Life (London: Arnold 1893); T. P. Le Fanu, Memoir of the Le Fanu Family (Manchester, priv. 1924); Elizabeth Bowen, ‘Uncle Silas’ (1946), rep. in Collected Impressions (London: Longman 1950); Nelson Brown[e], Sheridan Le Fanu: A Short Survey of His Life and Works (London 1951); Ken Scott, ‘Le Fanu’s “The Room in the Dragon Volant”‘ in Lock Haven Review, No. 10 (1968), pp.25-32; Kevin Sullivan, ‘The House by the Churchyard, James Joyce and Sheridan Le Fanu’, in Modern Irish Literature, ed. R. J. Porter & J. D. Brophy (Syracuse UP 1972), pp.315-34; Kevin Sullivan, ‘Sheridan Le Fanu, The Purcell Papers 1838-40’, in Irish UniversityReview, 2, 1 (1972), pp.5-19; W. J. McCormack, Sheridan Le Fanu and Victorian Ireland (Oxford 1980) [1298-99].

Seamus Deane, gen. ed., The Field Day Anthology of Irish Writing (Derry: Field Day 1991), Vol. 2 selects The House by the Church-yard [883-89], with remarks at 832-54 [W. J. McCormack, ed.]; 930, 939, 990. See also FDA3, 384, 562, 655n. Note that William Richard Le Fanu (1816-1894), Seventy years of Irish Life is selected in FDA3 [387-91], with BIOG at 557; the family experienced hardships during Tithe War; ed. TCD, engineer; moved to Rathporeen House, Co. Cork, 1859, and met Anthony Trollope.

William Trevor, ed., Oxford Book of Irish Short Stories (1989; rep. 2010), incls. Le Fanu’s story “Green Tea”.

John Sutherland, The Longman Companion to Victorian Fiction (Longmans 1988; rep. 1989), lists Carmilla and remarks: ‘generally considered the finest vampire story of the century’; set in Styria; the vampire is Mircilla, Countess Karnstein, dead a century and a half. Exorcised by stake, by baron Vordenburg; psychological tale with explicit lesbian overtones; published with Green Tea, The Familiar, and Mr Justice Harbottle, ghost stories. In Green Tea, an epistolary tale of Dr. Hesselius, the ‘metaphysical investigator,’ a hyper-sensitive, Rev. Jennings, is afflicted with visions of an obscene monkey by drinking the tea. Passed his last years in virtually complete isolation, dying in Dublin at a relatively young age from bronchitis. [J. S. le Fanu - BL 21 titles].

Charles Baldrick, ed., The Oxford Book of Gothic Tales (OUP 1992), incls. ‘A Chapter in the History of a Tyrone Family’ [1839], pp.102-32.

The Continuum Encyclopedia of British Literature, ed. Steven Serafin & Valerie Grosvenor Myers (NY & London: Continuum 2003), article on “Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu” by M. Bernstein.

Belfast Central Public Library hods All in the Dark (n.d.); A Chronicle of Golden Friars (1896); The Evil Guest (n.d.); Fortunes of Torlogh O’Brien (n.d.); In A Glass Darkly (1923); Poems (1896); The Rose and the Key (n.d.); The Purcell Papers (3v. 1880); The Tenants of Mallory (n.d.); Uncle Silas (1899); Willing to Die (n.d.); Wylder’s Hand (1876), and Do. (rep. 1963). Also A. P. Graves, Memoir (1880).

Eric Stevens Books (1992 Cat.) lists The Poems of Jos. Sheridan Le Fanu, ed. Alfred Percival Graves (Downey & Co. 1896) [1st ed.], scarce , Eric Stevens Cat. 166 £95; also J Sheridan LeFanu, Willing to Die, a Novel (Chapman & Hall 1878; first ed. 3 vols. 1873) [1st 1 vol. ed.?], 412pp. [£25].

Hyland Books (Cat. 220; Jan. 1996) lists M. R. James, ed., Madam Crowl’s Ghost and Other Tales of Mystery (1925).

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Notes
Variations: On editorship of the Dublin University Magazine, the following variations are found: 1861-69 [OCIL]; 1869-72 [ODNB]; ‘joined staff’ 1837, ed. 1861-69 or 1872 [RAF]; 1869-1871 [DIB], and 1869-72 [DIH].

W. R. Le Fanu’s Seventy Years of Irish Life (London: Arnold 1894), gives several of his pieces for Dublin University Magazine in full, including “Shamus O’Brien” and “Phaudrig Crohoore”, together with explanations of their origins, the former being based on a song sung by Paddy O’Neill, a fiddle and violin-playing musician who entertained the fares on the Limerick-Kilrush ferry [named] Garry Owen with his witty and sentimental tooralees. “Shamus O’Brien”, a veteran of 1798, is captured and sentenced to hanging after a patriotic dock-speech; but, on the gallows, his bonds are cut by the Catholic priest and he escapes to the Glen of Aherlow. The piece, in rhyming couplets, was printed with an elaborate pseudonymic disclaimer, attributing it to an illiterate Irishman. Samuel Lover received a copy of it from W. R. Le Fanu and included it in his successful American Irish Evenings, and thenceforth it was often attributed to him. Lover’s letter is reproduced in Le Fanu’s book. Note: Roy Foster (Paddy and Mr Punch, 1993, p.68), writes that W. R. Le Fanu he sees the Golden Age of Ireland peasant-landlord relations as falling the ‘before the Tithe War’ - i.e.,. before 1831.

Lord Edward Fitzgerald: Le Fanu wrote verses on the death of Lord Edward in Hiberno-English, published as “Scraps of Hibernian Ballads” in Dublin University Magazine, XIII, 78 (June 1839), p.754. (See Patrick Rafroidi, Irish Literature in English, The Romantic Period, Vol 1, 1980; also under Fitzgerald, supra.)

James Joyce (1): There are extensive allusions to Le Fanu’s House by the Churchyard in James Joyce’s Finnegans Wake, entailing mention of Sturk, the occupant of the house in Chapelizod who is attacked at Butcherswood in the Phoenix Park and resurrected by Black Dillon. Other characters from the novel mentioned in the Wake include Devereux, Irons, et al. (See Adaline Glasheen, Third Census to Finnegans Wake, 1977.)

James Joyce (1): Harry Levin remarks, in James Joyce: A Critical Introduction [1944] (London: Faber 1968), that Chapelizod is ‘also the setting for Le Fanu’s faded novel, The House by the Churchyard, which gains recogniton from Joyce on these grounds.’ [vide FW245.]

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Films
Uncle Silas (1947) - a film directed by Charles Frank with Jean Simmons [Caroline Ruthyn - sic], Katina Paxinou [Mme de Rouggiere -sic], Derrick De Marney [Uncle Silas]. There is an interesting review of this film online at EOFFTV which rates the film very highly, speaking of it as the first study in the genre of the breakdown of family, and quoting several academic studies of Gothic and gothic film in support of that interpretation and appraisal. A show-stealing performance by Paxinou as the mad governess is particularly praised [online]. Note: the film is not to be confused with My Uncle Silas being five stories by H. E. Bates about a roguish English countryman, dir. by Tom Clegg (released II in 2003).

Screen vampires: Danish director Carl Theodor Dreyer filmed Le Fanu’s version of the vampire myth as Vampyr in 1931-32, resulting in an acknowledged masterpiece; Hammer films produced The Vampire Lovers, based on Le Fanu’s Carmilla, with Ingrid Pitt embroiled in fairly explicit scenes of lesbian seduction which attracted large Dublin audiences.

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