A forgotten short story from the author of “Dracula” found in Dublin

(Keystone-ATS) It was forgotten in the archives of the National Library in Dublin: a short story by Bram Stoker, the author of “Dracula”, was found by a long-time admirer of the writer more than 130 years after its publication.

Entitled “Gibbet Hill”, this story had been published in a Christmas supplement of the Dublin edition of The Daily Mail newspaper in 1890, but had never been cited in any work or biography on Bram Stoker.

Brian Cleary, a 44-year-old amateur writer and historian, got his hands on this treasure in October 2023, while he is taking advantage of a period of convalescence after an operation to satisfy his interest in the Dublin author of “Dracula”. like him.

“Elements of ‘Dracula’”

“I sat in the library, flabbergasted by the fact that I was potentially holding a forgotten ghost story by Stoker,” Brian Cleary told AFP in the grounds of the Marino Casino, a famous neoclassical building in Dublin where the text is exhibited for the first time.

He is particularly amazed to note that the novella dates “around the time when Bram Stoker was writing ‘Dracula'” and that it contains “elements of ‘Dracula,'” an epistolary novel published in 1897. .

“I sat down to look at the screen and asked myself, ‘Am I the only person on Earth who read this?’ Then: ‘What am I going to do with it?’ “, he remembers. Brian Cleary then carried out in-depth research to verify his extraordinary find and interviewed Paul Murray, biographer and expert on Bram Stoker, who confirmed that the news had remained unknown until now.

Macabre tale

“’Gibbet Hill’ is very important for understanding Stoker’s development as a writer. In 1890 he was a young writer and had taken his first notes for ‘Dracula,’” says Paul Murray.

“It’s a typical Stoker story, the struggle between good and evil, evil emerging in surprising and unexplained ways, and it’s a step on his journey that culminated in the publication of ‘Dracula,’” he added. he.

This macabre tale tells the story of a sailor murdered by three criminals whose bodies are hung from a gallows or gallows on a hill, as a ghostly warning to passing travelers. To celebrate its discovery, “Gibbet Hill” was published in a book illustrated by Irish artist Paul McKinley.