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Reminiscences of a Bachelor
"I know there is a God — a dreadful God — and that retribution follows guilt." — "The Watcher"
For the first time in over 150 years, “The Watcher”, Le Fanu’s classic tale of supernatural menace, is reissued from the pages of the Dublin University Magazine along with its original companion piece “The Fatal Bride”, a brooding gothic novella not reprinted since its first publication in 1848. Like matched duelling pistols, Reminiscences of a Bachelor offers the most exquisite balance of craftsmanship, beauty, and peril. In these tales of Old Dublin, honour is ever at stake, the fate of lovers lies mired in the past, and something even worse than deceit stalks the streets, something just as deadly to the soul as it is to the flesh.
Contents
"Introduction"
Matthew Holness
"Prologue"
"The Watcher"
"The Fatal Bride"
"From an Ancient Leathern Armchair:
Some Comments on the Bachelor"
Jim Rockhill & Brian J. Showers
"A Note on 'The Watcher' "
Jim Rockhill & Brian J. Showers
"Acknowledgements"
Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu was born in Dublin on 28 August 1814. Though he worked as a journalist and owned several newspapers, he is now best remembered for his pioneering tales of the psychological and supernatural such as “Schalken the Painter”, “Green Tea”, and “Carmilla”. His notable novels include The House by the Church-yard (1863) and Uncle Silas (1864). Le Fanu’s seminal short story collection In a Glass Darkly was published in 1872, less than a year before his death on 7 February 1873.
Matthew Holness is a film and television director. He co-created the Channel 4 series Garth Marenghi’s Darkplace, and has recently written and directed A Gun For George (Film4) and The Snipist (Sky Arts Playhouse). www.matthewholness.com
For the first time in over 150 years, “The Watcher”, Le Fanu’s classic tale of supernatural menace, is reissued from the pages of the Dublin University Magazine along with its original companion piece “The Fatal Bride”, a brooding gothic novella not reprinted since its first publication in 1848. Like matched duelling pistols, Reminiscences of a Bachelor offers the most exquisite balance of craftsmanship, beauty, and peril. In these tales of Old Dublin, honour is ever at stake, the fate of lovers lies mired in the past, and something even worse than deceit stalks the streets, something just as deadly to the soul as it is to the flesh.
Contents
"Introduction"
Matthew Holness
"Prologue"
"The Watcher"
"The Fatal Bride"
"From an Ancient Leathern Armchair:
Some Comments on the Bachelor"
Jim Rockhill & Brian J. Showers
"A Note on 'The Watcher' "
Jim Rockhill & Brian J. Showers
"Acknowledgements"
Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu was born in Dublin on 28 August 1814. Though he worked as a journalist and owned several newspapers, he is now best remembered for his pioneering tales of the psychological and supernatural such as “Schalken the Painter”, “Green Tea”, and “Carmilla”. His notable novels include The House by the Church-yard (1863) and Uncle Silas (1864). Le Fanu’s seminal short story collection In a Glass Darkly was published in 1872, less than a year before his death on 7 February 1873.
Matthew Holness is a film and television director. He co-created the Channel 4 series Garth Marenghi’s Darkplace, and has recently written and directed A Gun For George (Film4) and The Snipist (Sky Arts Playhouse). www.matthewholness.com
- GenresFiction
132 pages, Hardcover
First published December 1, 2014
About the author
J. Sheridan Le Fanu
1,264 books1,477 followersJoseph Thomas Sheridan Le Fanu was an Irish writer of Gothic tales and mystery novels. He was the leading ghost-story writer of the nineteenth century and was central to the development of the genre in the Victorian era. M.R. James described Le Fanu as "absolutely in the first rank as a writer of ghost stories". Three of his best-known works are Uncle Silas, Carmilla and The House by the Churchyard.
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
December 22, 2014
"Reminiscences of a Bachelor" published by The Swan River Press in Ireland is a finely crafted book that presents to us two fine connected stories by J. S. Le Fanu. The Bachelor in the title is also the narrator of both stories. He is never named and we are told he is quite an honorable gentleman.
In the first story "The Watcher",which is the better know story of the two in this volume saw it's first publication in 1847 in a magazine called the Dublin University Magazine and was published the same month fellow Dubliner Bram Stoker was born. The story is a frighting ghost story and concerns spectral revenge.
The second story "The Fatal Bride", to my mind, the better of the two, is told by the same narrator as we had in The Watcher. It was also published in the Dublin University Magazine, this time in January of 1848 issue. "The Fatal Bride" is not a ghost story but more of a mystery. and has never been reprinted since it's first publication over one hundred and fifty years ago.
The stories naturally fit together like a matching pair of socks, and its a wonder why no one has previously put them together. It was Le Fanu's intention to have the stories read together. This is signified by the fact that "The Watcher" was subtitled "From the Reminiscence of a Bachelor", and "The Fatal Bride" was published with the subtitled "Being a Second Contribution from the Reminiscences of a Bachelor"
Both stories are written with a sense of brooding Gothic suspense that immerses the reader into another time and place. Oh how the Times are different and have changed.
Recommended !
From an edition of 300 copies, this is copy 25 of 100 numbered copies alos containing a numbered post card.
In the first story "The Watcher",which is the better know story of the two in this volume saw it's first publication in 1847 in a magazine called the Dublin University Magazine and was published the same month fellow Dubliner Bram Stoker was born. The story is a frighting ghost story and concerns spectral revenge.
The second story "The Fatal Bride", to my mind, the better of the two, is told by the same narrator as we had in The Watcher. It was also published in the Dublin University Magazine, this time in January of 1848 issue. "The Fatal Bride" is not a ghost story but more of a mystery. and has never been reprinted since it's first publication over one hundred and fifty years ago.
The stories naturally fit together like a matching pair of socks, and its a wonder why no one has previously put them together. It was Le Fanu's intention to have the stories read together. This is signified by the fact that "The Watcher" was subtitled "From the Reminiscence of a Bachelor", and "The Fatal Bride" was published with the subtitled "Being a Second Contribution from the Reminiscences of a Bachelor"
Both stories are written with a sense of brooding Gothic suspense that immerses the reader into another time and place. Oh how the Times are different and have changed.
Recommended !
From an edition of 300 copies, this is copy 25 of 100 numbered copies alos containing a numbered post card.
March 5, 2022
This short volume contains two stories (or one and a novella?), with a shared narrator, by J.S. Le Fanu: the original magazine version of the much-anthologized "The Watcher," and "The Fatal Bride," reprinted for the first time in 150-ish years! Needless to say, I snatched this up as soon as I happened upon it. Given that they're fairly early stories in Le Fanu's career, and are from the POV of an elderly bachelor looking back on his life, there's a little stiffness, especially in the first story, where I had to stop and untangle a few sentences to find the subject and the object. But I found them very enjoyable! (I read the paperback edition, which doesn't seem to be listed here yet).
June 29, 2024
https://fromtheheartofeurope.eu/reminiscences-of-a-bachelor-by-sheridan-le-fanu/
Le Fanu is one of those overlooked nineteenth-century Irish writers of the Weird, and this slim volume presents two of his stories told by a narrator identified only as “a Bachelor”. There are good forewords and afterwords by Matthew Holness, Jim Rockhill and Brian J. Showers, and the two stories themselves are prefaced by an introduction which is actually lifted from the original publication of the second story, “The Fatal Bride”.
The first story, “The Watcher”, is much weirder and to be honest much more interesting; “The Fatal Bride” resolved in a rather prudish nineteenth-century way, and the dark hints of what is going on in “The Watcher” are better executed. However, both of them give a very strong impression of eighteenth-century Dublin – even though Le Fanu was born i 1814 so would not have known it personally.
A nice little gem.
Le Fanu is one of those overlooked nineteenth-century Irish writers of the Weird, and this slim volume presents two of his stories told by a narrator identified only as “a Bachelor”. There are good forewords and afterwords by Matthew Holness, Jim Rockhill and Brian J. Showers, and the two stories themselves are prefaced by an introduction which is actually lifted from the original publication of the second story, “The Fatal Bride”.
The first story, “The Watcher”, is much weirder and to be honest much more interesting; “The Fatal Bride” resolved in a rather prudish nineteenth-century way, and the dark hints of what is going on in “The Watcher” are better executed. However, both of them give a very strong impression of eighteenth-century Dublin – even though Le Fanu was born i 1814 so would not have known it personally.
A nice little gem.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews