Joseph Sheridan LeFanu

Born: 28 August 1814; Dublin

Father a clergyman, church of Ireland

Family moves to Abington in Limerick - 1826

Trinity College, Dublin - 1833-38

Called to the bar - 1839

Abandons law for journalism

Marries Susan Bennett - 1844

Editor, Dublin University Magazine - 1856-1869

Susan dies - 1858

Recluse

Dies: 7 February 1873

 

 

The Purcell Papers - while at Trinity College (pub.1880) Ghost Stories and Tales of Mystery - 1851 The House by the Churchyard - 1863 Wylder's Hand - 1864 Uncle Silas - 1864 Chronicles of Golden Friars - 1871 In a Glass Darkly - 1872

 

Of all the Victorian authors who wrote ghost stories, only Le Fanu seems to have recognized that there must be an aesthetic of supernatural terror. He obviously thought deeply about the nature of fictional supernaturalism and was aware of the implications that it would have for the other dynamics of the story. To him alone it occurred that the personality of the beholder could be just as important and perhaps just as supernatural as the manifestation itself.

- E. F. Bleiler

 

Certain vague and strange sensations visited me in my sleep. The prevailing one was of that pleasant, peculiar cold thrill which we feel in bathing, when we move against the current of a river. This was soon accompanied by dreams that seemed interminable, and were so vague that I could never recollect their scenery and persons, or any one connected portion of their action. But they left an awful impression, and a sense of exhaustion, as if I had passed through a long period of great mental exertion and danger. After all these dreams there remained on waking a rememberance of having been in a place very nearly dark, and of having spoken to people whom I could not see; and especially of one clear voice, of a female's, very deep, that spoke as if at a distance, slowly, and producing always the same sensation of indescribable solemnity and fear.

Carmilla