Madam Crowl's Ghost & Other Stories by J. Sheridan Le Fanu

This anthology is slightly inferior to In a Glass Darkly, the collection of later stories Le Fanu published during his lifetime, but the entire book is nevertheless enjoyable and contains two stories ('Madame Crowl's Ghost' and 'Squire Toby's Will') that are masterpieces of the form. They were selected primarily from Le Fanu's early 'Dublin Magazine' period, when his stories-like those of many of the authors published there by editor Le Fanu-were characterized by a leisurely, folkloric narrative style and the often humorous exploitation of Irish stereotypes.

James.This is a good posthumous anthology of ghost stories, chosen by no less an authority than M.R. His work influenced other prominent horror fiction authors, including M. Le Fanu's particular brand of literary horror tends toward the refined, subtle fright rather than the graphic sensationalism of Matthew Gregory Lewis.

His lengthy Gothic novels, such as Uncle Silas (1864), though less highly regarded than his shorter fiction, are nonetheless wonderfully atmospheric. Writing most effectively in the short story form, Le Fanu's tales such as 'Carmilla' (a vampire story that is thought possibly to have influenced Bram Stoker's Dracula) and the problematic 'Green Tea' are considered by many literary scholars to be classics of the supernatural genre. Probably he began writing ghost fiction in 1838 his earliest supernatural story is often cited as being either 'The Ghost and the Bone-Setter' or the 'Fortunes of Sir Robert Ardagh,' both of which were later collected in the anthology entitled The Purcell Papers (1880). After his wife died in 1858, until his own death, Le Fanu was known as a recluse, creating his ghost fiction late at night in bed. He graduated from Trinity College and married in 1844. Le Fanu came from a middle-class background his family was of Huguenot descent.

Le Fanu was born in Dublin and, as with so many other English popular fiction authors of his time, entered the genre of fiction by way of journalism, working on such publications as the Evening Mail and the Dublin University Magazine.

The greatest author of supernatural fiction during the nineteenth century was undoubtedly J.

Madam Crowl's Ghost & Other Stories by J. Sheridan Le Fanu