Abraham ‘Bram’ Stoker was an Irish author, best known today for his 1897 Gothic novel Dracula. During his lifetime, he was better known as the personal assistant of actor Sir Henry Irving, and business manager of the Lyceum Theatre in London, which Irving owned.
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.
Amelia Ann Blanford Edwards (7 June 1831 15 April 1892), also known as Amelia B. Edwards, was an English novelist, journalist, traveller and Egyptologist. Her most successful literary works included the ghost story ‘The Phantom Coach’ (1864), the novels Barbara’s History (1864) and Lord Brackenbury (1880), and the Egyptian travelogue A Thousand Miles up the Nile (1877). In 1882, she co-founded the Egypt Exploration Fund. She also edited a poetry anthology published in 1878.
E.F. Benson, in full Edward Frederic Benson , (born July 24, 1867, Wellington College, Berkshire, Eng.died Feb. 29, 1940, London), writer of fiction, reminiscences, and biographies, of which the best remembered are his arch, satirical novels and his urbane autobiographical studies of Edwardian and Georgian society.
Sir Hugh Seymour Walpole was an English novelist. He was the son of an Anglican clergyman, intended for a career in the church but drawn instead to writing. Among those who encouraged him were the authors Henry James and Arnold Bennett. His skill at scene-setting and vivid plots, as well as his high profile as a lecturer, brought him a large readership in the United Kingdom and North America. He was a best-selling author in the 1920s and 1930s.