The Green Book 25
Bealtaine 2025
Brian J. Showers (ed.)
Availability: In Print
If you’ve already browsed the contents of this issue, you’ll have noticed that we devoted the entire number to Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu (1814-1873). The last time we gave so much space to Le Fanu was for the bicentenary of his birth in 2014 (see Issue 3 and Issue 4). There is no special occasion to herald this issue, save that we’ve since accumulated a handful of interesting items that I feel deserve broader attention.
Reprinted here for the first time since its initial publication in 1910 is a recently rediscovered monograph of Le Fanu written by his publisher Edmund Downey (1856-1937). While this memoir leans heavily on earlier portraits of the author, notably A. P. Graves’s lengthy introduction to the Poems of J. S. Le Fanu (1896) and anecdotes related by Le Fanu’s son Brinsley (1854-1929), there are some new sketches and scenes that further illuminate the Gothic novelist’s sense of humour and warmth of character. While Dublin’s “Invisible Prince” may sometimes seem an inscrutable presence, even to his close friends, he was clearly remembered with fondness by those who knew him.
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Paperback edition limited to 250 copies.
Cover art: “The Dream” by Brinsley Le Fanu (1894)
Editor’s Note by Brian J. Showers
ISSN: 2009-6089 (pbk)
Editor’s Note #25
If you’ve already browsed the contents of this issue, you’ll have noticed that we devoted the entire number to Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu (1814-1873). The last time we gave so much space to Le Fanu was for the bicentenary of his birth in 2014 (see Issue 3 and Issue 4). There is no special occasion to herald this issue, save that we’ve since accumulated a handful of interesting items that I feel deserve broader attention.
Reprinted here for the first time since its initial publication in 1910 is a recently rediscovered monograph of Le Fanu written by his publisher Edmund Downey (1856-1937). While this memoir leans heavily on earlier portraits of the author, notably A. P. Graves’s lengthy introduction to the Poems of J. S. Le Fanu (1896) and anecdotes related by Le Fanu’s son Brinsley (1854-1929), there are some new sketches and scenes that further illuminate the Gothic novelist’s sense of humour and warmth of character. While Dublin’s “Invisible Prince” may sometimes seem an inscrutable presence, even to his close friends, he was clearly remembered with fondness by those who knew him.
It’s not often that new writing can be attributed to Le Fanu, an expansion of the known bibliography, but that seems to be the case with “Song of the True Blue”, a trio of poems anonymously published over three issues of the Dublin University Magazine in 1838. This attribution was made through the papers of Edmund Downey at the National Library of Ireland, and Fergal O’Reilly’s “Preliminary Note” explains how we came to identify the poem’s author as Le Fanu—and touches upon the apparent incongruities of the politics in his verse.
Albert Power weighs in on another Le Fanu curiosity: “Some Gossip About Chapelizod”. This portrait of a Dublin neighbourhood, published in the DUM in April 1851, followed on from and serves as a sort of coda to Le Fanu’s triptych of tales “Ghost Stories of Chapelizod”. This hitherto overlooked text was first reprinted in Swan River Press’s now out-of-print booklet The Complete Ghost Stories of Chapelizod (2011); I’m pleased to present the text here again.
Jim Rockhill’s article “The Faux and the Spurious” takes on the issue of attribution—and misattribution—in Le Fanu’s work. In particular, he addresses that perennial bugbear of Le Fanu scholarship, A Stable for Nightmares (1868/1896), anonymously published stories that careless and overzealous editors still mistakenly assign to the Invisible Prince. And Martin Voracek considers a 1942 German translation of “Green Tea” by O. C. Recht. Oddly, Recht had his own ideas regarding Le Fanu’s ending to this classic tale of psychological terror, and so decided to pen his own sequel . . .
Finally, I would like to dedicate this issue to the late poet and Le Fanu scholar Gavin Selerie (1947-2023). I first met Gavin in Dublin in 2005 when he was here conducting research for Le Fanu’s Ghost (2007), a peculiar and excellent volume, equal parts insightful verse and poetic scholarship. Gavin worked with Swan River Press on a few occasions, including writing profiles on Edmund Downey (Issue 11) and Brinsley Le Fanu (Issue 12). In fact, it was Gavin who initially drew my attention to Downey’s monograph of Le Fanu. This one’s for you, Gavin.
Brian J. Showers
Æon House, Dublin
17 March 2025
Brian J. Showers
Brian J. Showers is originally from Madison, Wisconsin. He has written short stories, articles, and reviews for magazines such as Rue Morgue, Ghosts & Scholars, and Supernatural Tales. His short story collection, The Bleeding Horse, won the Children of the Night Award in 2008. He is also the author of Literary Walking Tours of Gothic Dublin (2006), the co-editor of Reflections in a Glass Darkly: Essays on J. Sheridan Le Fanu (2011), and the editor of The Green Book. Showers also edited four volumes of Uncertainties anthology series, and co-edited with Jim Rockhill, the Ghost Story Award-winning anthology Dreams of Shadow and Smoke. He lives in Dublin, Ireland.
Read moreThe Green Book 25 (Bealtaine 2025) edited by Brian J. Showers. Cover art: “The Dream” by Brinsley Le Fanu (1894); cover design by Meggan Kehrli; editor’s note by Brian J. Showers; edited by Brian J. Showers; copyedited by Jim Rockhill; typeset by Steve J. Shaw; published by Swan River Press at Æon House.
Paperback: Published on 11 April 2025; limited to 250 copies; 108 pages; digitally printed on 80 gsm paper; ISSN: 2009-6089.
About The Green Book
Aimed at a general readership and published twice-yearly, The Green Book is Swan River Press’s house journal that features commentaries, articles, and reviews on Irish Gothic, Supernatural and Fantastic literature.
Certainly favourites such as Bram Stoker and John Connolly will come to mind, but hopefully The Green Book also will serve as a pathway to Ireland’s other notable fantasists: like Fitz-James O’Brien, Charlotte Riddell, Lafcadio Hearn, William Allingham, J. Sheridan Le Fanu, Cheiro, Harry Clarke, Dorothy Macardle, Lord Dunsany, Elizabeth Bowen, C. S. Lewis, Mervyn Wall, Conor McPherson . . . and this list is by no means exhaustive.
It should be noted that the word “Irish” in the journal’s title should be understood as inclusive rather than exclusive. The Green Book will also feature essays on Irish themes—even if by non-Irish authors. We hope that you will find something of interest here, for there is much to explore.
The Green Book is open for submissions.
Praise for The Green Book
“A welcome addition to the realm of accessible nonfiction about supernatural horror.” – Ellen Datlow
“Serious aficionados of the weird should also consider subscribing to The Green Book.” – Michael Dirda
“An exceptionally well-produced periodical.” – S. T. Joshi
“[A] wonderful exploration of a weird little corner of literature, and a great example of how careful editing can make even the most obscure subject fascinating and entertaining beyond all expectations.” – The Agony Column
“Eminently readable . . . [an] engaging little journal that treads the path between accessibility and academic depth with real panache.” – Black Static
“The overall feel here is not of fusty excavation in a small corner of the literary world, but of exploration on a broad front that continues to unearth intriguing finds.” – Supernatural Tales