Master of fallen years

by Vincent O'Sullivan

Genres: Horror

31 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1995

About the author

Vincent O'Sullivan was an American short story writer, poet and critic. Born in New York City to Eugene and Christine O'Sullivan, he began his education in the New York public school system and completed it in Britain. He lived comfortably in London, traveling often to France, until in 1909 he lost his income from the family coffee business when his brother Percy made a spectacularly mistimed futures gamble at the New York Coffee Exchange. The entire family was ruined, and Vincent was destitute for the remaining years of his life.

His works dealt with the morbid and decadent. He was a friend of Oscar Wilde (to whom in his disgrace he was often generous), Leonard Smithers, Aubrey Beardsley and other fin-de-siècle figures. O'Sullivan produced his first collection of supernatural fiction, A Book of Bargains, in 1896. It contains the pact-with the devil story "The Bargain of Rupert Orange", and The Business of Madame Jahn and "My Enemy and Myself", which both feature reanimated corpses. "When I Was Dead" (1905), "Verschoyle's House" (1915) and "The Burned House" (1916) are ghost stories, while "Will" is a tale of psychic vampirism.

Librarian note: There is more than one author in the Goodreads database with this name.

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Reviews

[William · Rating 4 out of 5]

Entertaining listening 🎧
I listened to this as part of the Classic Horror Tales - 500+ stories. I found it to be an enjoyable fantasy, haunting 👀, horror, and ghost 👻 short story. I would highly recommend reading or listening to this novella. 2022