The House by the Churchyard (1863). By: Sheridan Le Fanu: Mystery novel

By J. Sheridan Le Fanu, Joseph Thomas Sheridan Le Fanu, Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu

Book Overview

The House by the Churchyard (1863) is a novel by Sheridan Le Fanu that combines elements of the mystery novel and the historical novel. Aside from its own merits, the novel is important as a key source for James Joyce's Finnegans Wake. Plot summary The novel begins with a prologue in the voice of an old man, Charles de Cresseron, that is set in Chapelizod, Ireland, roughly a century after the events of the novel proper. This prologue details how, during an interment at the churchyard of the title, a skull is accidentally unearthed, which bears the marks of two crushing blows to the head and - even more disconcertingly - a small hole from a trepanning. The novel itself is Cresseron's reconstruction of the history related to this grisly item (though by and large his narratorial voice drops out and the novel is told from a conventional omniscient narrator's point of view). The first chapter of the novel proper moves back to 1767, the period of the novel, and begins with another mysterious occurrence in the churchyard: the secretive burial of a coffin, with the occupant simply identified on the brass plaque as "R.D." But after this ominous opening the book turns (in its first half) to the careful and largely light-hearted elaboration of the social life and intrigues among the denizens of Chapelizod, from the powerful Lord Castlemallard to the soldiers in the local barracks under General Chattesworth, to the good Doctor Walsingham and his daughter Lily, to the gluttonous local Catholic priest Father Roach. The opening section of the novel is largely taken up by a farcical duel between two soldiers, Puddock and O'Flaherty, which arises from drunken misunderstanding and eventually is defused without any harm done. Le Fanu introduces hints of unease, though, with the advent of the mysterious Mr Mervyn, who takes up residence in the Tiled House, a building widely rumoured to be haunted. (At this point, Le Fanu interpolates a ghost story, "An Authentic Narrative of the Ghost of a Hand", which has often been separately anthologized.) Mervyn courts the daughter of the General, Gertrude Chattesworth, but has a rival in the scheming Mr Dangerfield, the trusted manager of the English estates of Lord Castlemallard who is visiting Chapelizod and who also has his eye on Gertrude. Dangerfield destroys the romance between Mervyn and Gertrude by setting into circulation vicious rumours about him and his family. Mervyn is in fact the son and heir of the late Lord Dunoran, who was found guilty of murdering a man named Beauclerc to whom he had lost a considerable sum at cards; Dunoran then committed suicide in his prison cell. (It was his coffin that was buried at the beginning of the book - the secrecy required because of the dubiousness of burying a suicide on consecrated ground.)............ Joseph Thomas Sheridan Le Fanu ( 28 August 1814 - 7 February 1873) was an Irish writer of Gothic tales, mystery novels, and horror fiction. He was a 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. Early life: Sheridan Le Fanu was born at 45 Lower Dominick Street, Dublin, into a literary family of Huguenot, Irish and English descent. He had an elder sister, Catherine Frances, and a younger brother, William Richard.His parents were Thomas Philip Le Fanu and Emma Lucretia Dobbin. Both his grandmother Alicia Sheridan Le Fanu and his great-uncle Richard Brinsley Sheridan were playwrights (his niece Rhoda Broughton would become a successful novelist), and his mother was also a writer, producing a biography of Charles Orpen....

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 171735324X
• ISBN13: 9781717353245
• Release Date: April 2018
• Publisher: Createspace Independent Publishing Platform
• Length: 380 Pages
• Weight: 1.66 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.8" x 8.0" x 10.0"

Customer Reviews

House by the Churchyard

Another classic from the foremost Irish author of horror, Sheridan Le Fanu. Good turnaround.

Farce meets gothic trappings in small Irish town

I bought this book expecting it to be full of gothic and mystery elements, having read other LeFanu. I have read LeFanu's ghost stories, and the novels "Uncle Silas," and "Wylder's Hand." "Uncle Silas" is a suspense classic. "Wylder's Hand" is less of a page-turner, but has interesting characters in the mystery. Think of Dicken's "Mystery of Edwin Drood" with Wilkie Collins's dominant female characters. "House by the Churchyard" starts with graves, re-opened crypts, and mystery. LeFanu promptly drops it to pile farce upon farce. Much of the book relates how the residents of this small town wage "war" on each other, similar to "Lucia and Mapp." Set in the 1700s, in a small town near Dublin, featuring officers in the local regiment, the book brings high and low characters together. There is a wealthy spinster whose charities are ill-considered. There is a mysterious stranger who has moved to town, who is surrounded by further shadows. Chapter 11 is frequently taken and printed as a ghost story--in the context of the book, the story is an extended example of how servants chatter. We have lovers, competing small-town doctors, fortune-hunters, nubile and not-so-nubile heiresses, a professional blackmailer, debtors, rapscallions, timid lovers, a priest, an unworldly pastor, an amateur blackmailer, and some nice rabbitty little wives who are under the thumbs of their "lord and master" husbands. There is a hilarious duel-gone-wrong and drowning that never really happens. The introduction suggests that LeFanu wrote "House by the Churchyard" out of nostalgia for the town he lived in as a youth. I think that this book is better characterized as English humor, a la "Three Men in a Boat," than as English horror. It is very readable. I'm about half-way through, and I have found that the humor/horror ratio is about 80/20. I suppose there are still plenty of chapters in which to pack his murder mysteries towards the end. "House by the Churchyard"--It's a wild read, for fans of Dickens, Collins, even "Lucia" novels.

one of the gretest horor story writers ever

hello, as one other great writer M. R. James wrote of joseph sheridan le fanu he stands absolutely in first rank as a writer of ghost storys I share that same verdict after reading many of his storys this book had some very god storys in it I recommend it to those that like ghost storys and like to be scared where when you are home all alone it is late at night and as you read the ghost storys you get cold chills that run through your body as you begin to think what was that bump, or creak that came from don the hall as you shiver continuing to ead the story and wonder if something is comming toward u :) enjoy the book and get more from this author and wilkie collins and edgar allen poe