Introductions

Anon.  "Introduction." The House by the Churchyard.  Stroud: Nonsuch, 2006.

A brief introduction that quotes M. R. James's remarks about  Le Fanu's use of atmosphere.

Anon.  "Introduction."  Madam Crowl's Ghost and Other Tales of Mystery. Ed.  M.R. James. Stroud: Nonsuch, 2006.

A brief introduction that discusses James work as inspired by Le Fanu.

Bourke, Angela.  "Introductory Commentary to an Excerpt from 'Carmilla.'" The Field Day Anthology of Irish Writing.  Cork University Press, 2002.

Brief commentary on the lesbian implications of the two female characters.

Bowen, Elizabeth. "Introduction." Uncle Silas: A Tale of Bartam-Haugh.  The Mill, Brimscombe:  Nonsuch, 2006.

Reprints Elizabeth Bowen's 1946 introduction to the novel.  A very valuable piece.

Casil, Amy Sterling. "Preface:  The Secret Lust of Human Souls."  Uncle Silas.  Doylestown, PA:  Wildside Press, 2002.

Notes the influence of spiritualism on the novel and the doubling of the characters of Austin and Silas Ruthyn.  The first of the great psychological thrillers.

Chapman, Paul M.  "Introduction."  The House by the Churchyard.  Ware, England:  Wordsworth Editions, 2007.

A fairly good introduction to the novel that, unfortunately, reiterates the sensational legend of Le Fanu's death.

Chiu, Frances J.  "Introdiction."  The Rose and the Key.  Kansas City, MO: Valancourt Books, 2007.

A lengthy, perceptive introduction to the novel that discusses the political implications of the novel and Le Fanu's other works, such as "Carmilla" and Uncle Silas.  As is the case with Uncle Silas, The Rose and the Key deals with the political climate of Ireland in the nineteenth century in veiled terms.  It is actually an Irish novel in an English setting.

Cowley, Julian.  "Introduction."  The Wyvern Mystery. Phoenix Mill, England:  Sutton, 2000.

Notes Le Fanu's reclusiveness and his consequent depiction of his anxieties and losses in his fiction and the unfortunate neglect of many of his works.

De Mellow, Jessica. "Introduction." Checkmate.  Phoenix Mill, England: Sutton, 1997.

The introduction does not discuss the novel directly, but only indirectly, discussing instead Le Fanu's most famous works.  Remarks that Le Fanu's later fiction contain "images of self-division, possession, and the rebellion of the conscious mind against the unconscious, the repressed against the repressor."

Faderman, Lillian.  "Introduction to 'Carmilla.'" Chloe plus Olivia:  An Anthology of Lesbian Literature from the Seventeenth Century to the Present.  New York: Viking, 1994.

Introduces an abridged reprinting of Le Fanu's vampire tale as inspired by Coleridge's fragment poem "Christabel."  Notes the parallels and asserts that the story camouflaged the lesbian relationship as a horrifying thing to Victorians.  The vampire becomes an analogue for the sexual love between women.

Girard, Gaid.  "Lecture."  Carmilla.  Trans. into French by Gaid Girard. Paris:  Babel, 2006.

A lengthy essay in French is appended to this translation of "Carmilla."

Hickey, Des. "Le Fanu:  The Invisible Price."  The Hours After Midnight.  London: Leslie Frewin, 1975.

A useful introduction that brings the Irish supernatural tales in perspective.  Hickey notes that "Sheridan Le Fanu never resolved the dilemma of being and Anglo-Irishman."  Helpful is a brief commentary about the story "The Legend of Dunblane," which, according to S.M. Ellis, was "possibly" by Le Fanu.  

Jedrzejewski, Jan.  "Introduction." The Cock and Anchor. Gerrards Cross, England:  Colin Smythe, 2000.

A detailed discussion of the novel that concludes that Le Fanu was better at writing tales of mystery and the Gothic than historical novels.

Kilroy, Thomas.  "Introduction."  The House by the Churchyard.  Belfast:  Appletree Press, 1992.

Touches briefly on the "multi-vocality" and theatricality of Le Fanu's novel.  Comments perceptively on the narrative tone:      "What the voice of Charles de Cresseron does offer . . . is a tone which is crucial to the strange hold that this book exerts upon its reader despite its ramshackle structure, its apparent side-tracking.  The key to this tone is the benevolence which flows through the book and this, in turn,  comes out of a huge appetite  for life in all its shapes--a delight in the sights, sounds and smells of existence in a small village community, what our narrator calls 'the honest prose of everyday life.'"

McCormack, W. J.  "The Intellectual Revival, 1830-1850."  The Field Day Anthology of Irish Writing.   Vol. I. Ed. Seamus Deane.  Derry:  Field Day Publications, 1991.

Discusses Le Fanu as editor of and contributor to The Dublin University Magazine.

McCormack, W. J. "Irish Gothic and After, 1820-1945."  The Field Day Anthology of Irish Writing.  Vol. II.  Ed. Seamus Deane.  Derry:  Field Day Publications, 1991.

" . . . it is Charles Robert Maturin (1782-1824), Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu (1814-1873) and Bram Stoker (1847-1912) who are invoked in the name of a more substantial Irish gothic tradition."  Discusses The House by the Churchyard and Le Fanu's wife's dream of her dead father as sexual in a Freudian sense.  Excerpts a chapter from the novel.

McCormack, W. J. "Introduction." In a Glass Darkly. Dover, New Hampshire:  Sutton, 1990.

An excellent introduction to Le Fanu's most famous collection of short stories that explores the sexual, social, and political nature of the displaced, diffused Anglo-Irish order.  Brings into place the displaced nature of the narrational techniques Le Fanu employs.

McCourt, Malachy.  "Introductory Commentary to an Excerpt from Uncle Silas."  Voices of Ireland:  Classic Writings of a Rich and Rare Land.  Philadelphia:  Running Press, 2002.

Brief commentary noting the Swedenborgian influence on the novel.

Robbins, Ruth. "Introduction." The House by the Churchyard. Phoenix Mill, England: Sutton, 1994.

The novel shows "Le Fanu's abiding feeling that in the very midst of ordinary people's lives there might well lurk wickedness beyond explanation--anarchy underlying the apparent calm and warmth of the everyday world.  It also demonstrates his assurance that evil can be combated by the good contained in those same ordinary people."

Rockhill, Jim.  "'A Dream of the Shadow of Smoke':  The Final Years and Supernatural Fiction of Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu, 1870-1873."  Mr. Justice Harbottle and Others. Ashcroft, British Columbia: Ash-Tree Press, 2005.

A superb biographical and critical introduction to this final volume in the Ash-Tree series.  Jim Rockhill, with some thorough, painstaking research, chronicles the last few years of Le Fanu's life and ghost stories.  The most accurate, reasoned, and appropriate commentary about the sensational legend of Le Fanu's death. These three volumes from Ash-Tree are indispensable.

Rockhill, Jim.  "As on a Darkling Plain:  The Life and Supernatural Fiction of Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu from 1814-1861." Schalken the Painter and Others:  Ghost Stories 1838-61.  Ashcroft, British Columbia:  Ash-Tree Press, 2002.

An excellent biographical and critical study of Le Fanu's early days and works.

Rockhill, Jim.  "A Mind Turned In Upon Itself: The Life and Supernatural Fiction of Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu from 1861-1870." The Haunted Baronet and Other Ghost Stories 1861-70.  Ashcroft, British Columbia, Canada: Ash-Tree Press, 2003.

A study of Le Fanu's life and works in his "middle period."  Particularly helpful are his remarks about the influence of Emanual Swedenborg.

Sage, Victor.  "Introduction." Uncle Silas. London:  Penguin Books, 2000.

Comments on the political, fabulous, comic, and mystical aspects of Le Fanu's novel, comparing the novel to the tale of Bluebeard, a comic fable, and a religious tract.  Sage's remarks about the influence of Swedenborg are useful.

Sterling, Robert.  "Introduction:  The Hidden Face."  The Book of Doppelgangers.  Ed. Robert Sterling.  Doylestown, PA:  Betancourt, 2003.

Comments on "Green Tea" as a tale of the doppelgamger.

Stribling, Miles. "Introduction." Spalatro: Two Italian Tales. Mountain Ash, Wales: Sarob Press, 2001.

A detailed introduction to two Le Fanu stories, resurrected by W. J. McCormack, with a history of Le Fanu's association with The Dublin University Magazine.  Also discusses the history of various attributions to Le Fanu made my M. R. James.  A fine introduction which should be consulted by all Le Fanu scholars.

Williams, Anne. "Introduction."  Three Vampire Tales. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2003.

Contains the text of Le Fanu's "Carmilla."

Wolf, Leonard.  "Introduction." Carmilla and 12 Other Classic Tales of Mystery. New York: Signet, 1996.

Le Fanu "creates fictions that shed light, in a surprisingly modern way, on the darker purlieus of the psyche."