Vernon Lee

Violet Paget spoke four languages, began her career as a journalist at the age of 13, suffered from maladies that were probably psychosomatic, and may have secretly been a lesbian. She was, in other words, the perfect Victorian lady writer of gothic horror, a mystery and a scandal in her own right. Though not well remembered today, Paget's work-often likened to the works of Henry J...

This story is included in Hauntings: Fantastic Stories. Vernon Lee (Violet Paget). London: Heinemann, 1890.

Here are three stories from the pen of Vernon Lee (Violet Paget, 1865-1935): "Lady Tal," "A Worldly Woman," and "The Legend of Madame Krasinska." "Round these sketches of frivolous women, there have gathered some of the least frivolous thoughts, heaven knows, that have ever come into my head; or rather, such thoughts have condensed and taken body in these stories. Indeed, how can one l...