Joseph Henry Shorthouse (9 September 1834 – 4 March 1903) was an English novelist. His first novel, John Inglesant, was particularly admired as a "philosophical romance". It discusses a religious intrigue in the English 17th century.

Biography

Shorthouse was born in Great Charles Street, Birmingham, on 9 September 1834, as the eldest of three sons of Joseph Shorthouse (1797–1880) and his wife, Mary Ann, née Hawker. He grew up in Calthorpe Street, Edgbaston. His father had inherited a family chemical works manufacturing vitriol, and his mother's father had founded the first glasshouse in Birmingham.

The book at once made Shorthouse famous. Though said to be deficient in its structure as a story and unappealing to the general public, it fascinated people by the charm of its style, by a "dim religious light", with which it was suffused, and by occasional striking scenes. More recently it has been described as "one of the best examples of the philosophical romance in English literature". Other admirers of the work included T. H. Huxley, Charlotte Yonge and Edmund Gosse. He was invited to breakfast at 10 Downing Street by the Prime Minister, Gladstone. have some of the same characteristics, but were less successful than the first. Shorthouse also wrote literary essays, including one called "The Platonism of Wordsworth".

The Life, Letters, and Literary Remains of J. H. Shorthouse were edited by the author's wife and published in 1905. A biographical study of Shorthouse appeared in 1995.

Notes

References

  • A Teacher of the Violin and Other Stories (1888)