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3 Swedenborg’s ghost

Abstract

The Swedenborgian-cum-Yeatsian notion of 'dreaming-back' one's earthly experiences after one's death is not simply a dramatic device existing in isolation from any larger body of belief. Swedenborgian correspondence provided a means whereby a central doctrine is extended to account for every detail of the visible world: The whole natural world corresponds to the spiritual world, not only the natural world in general but also in every particular. Uncle Silas, being the best known of Le Fanu's novels, can stand as typical, and it has the additional merit of explicitly citing Swedenborgian texts. Le Fanu's fiction deals with a number of themes which occur prominently in Honore de Balzac. These include Swedenborgian doctrines concerning not only ultimate spiritual truth but matters as immediate as marriage and sexuality.

Abstract

The Swedenborgian-cum-Yeatsian notion of 'dreaming-back' one's earthly experiences after one's death is not simply a dramatic device existing in isolation from any larger body of belief. Swedenborgian correspondence provided a means whereby a central doctrine is extended to account for every detail of the visible world: The whole natural world corresponds to the spiritual world, not only the natural world in general but also in every particular. Uncle Silas, being the best known of Le Fanu's novels, can stand as typical, and it has the additional merit of explicitly citing Swedenborgian texts. Le Fanu's fiction deals with a number of themes which occur prominently in Honore de Balzac. These include Swedenborgian doctrines concerning not only ultimate spiritual truth but matters as immediate as marriage and sexuality.

Chapters in this book

  1. Front matter i
  2. Contents v
  3. Foreword vii
  4. Part I On literary history
  5. 1 Cashiering the gothic tradition 2
  6. 2 Between Balzac and Yeats 12
  7. 3 Swedenborg’s ghost 21
  8. 4 Mediating the Past 34
  9. 5 The parochial and exotic 45
  10. 6 Beginning the English novels 60
  11. 7 Characters beheaded with mottoes 76
  12. 8 Towards a theory of public opinion 95
  13. 9 ‘Freezing brightness’ 107
  14. 10 Gottfried Schalcken in history and fiction 121
  15. 11 In a Glass Darkly 140
  16. 12 Serialising 160
  17. 13 Gladstone and Ascendancy 181
  18. 14 Yeats and gothic politics 193
  19. 15 Is the novel properly entitled ... ? 208
  20. 16 Indefinite articles 218
  21. 17 ‘The neutral island in the heart of man’ 232
  22. Epilogue 241
  23. Index 253
Dissolute Characters
This chapter is in the book Dissolute Characters
https://doi.org/10.7765/9781526125538.00007

Chapters in this book

  1. Front matter i
  2. Contents v
  3. Foreword vii
  4. Part I On literary history
  5. 1 Cashiering the gothic tradition 2
  6. 2 Between Balzac and Yeats 12
  7. 3 Swedenborg’s ghost 21
  8. 4 Mediating the Past 34
  9. 5 The parochial and exotic 45
  10. 6 Beginning the English novels 60
  11. 7 Characters beheaded with mottoes 76
  12. 8 Towards a theory of public opinion 95
  13. 9 ‘Freezing brightness’ 107
  14. 10 Gottfried Schalcken in history and fiction 121
  15. 11 In a Glass Darkly 140
  16. 12 Serialising 160
  17. 13 Gladstone and Ascendancy 181
  18. 14 Yeats and gothic politics 193
  19. 15 Is the novel properly entitled ... ? 208
  20. 16 Indefinite articles 218
  21. 17 ‘The neutral island in the heart of man’ 232
  22. Epilogue 241
  23. Index 253
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