Charlotte Elizabeth MacManus

Life
1894-1941 [known as “Lil”; var. “Lottie”; published as “L. MacManus”; err. Charlotte MacManus in DIW;] b. Castlebar, Co. Mayo; ed. at home and in Torquay; became ardent nationalist, later on the anti-Treaty side; Gaelic League worker in Kiltimagh, Co. Mayo, where the second League branch was founded contrib. Folklore Journal; she wrote numerous popular patriotic novels including Lally of the Brigade (1899), Nessa (1904), In Sarsfield’s Days (1907), et al.;

her penny pamphlets published in Educ. Co. of Ireland series incl. In the High King’s Camp; A Battle Champion; Felim the Harper; The Prince of Breffny’s Son; How Enda Went to the Iceland; The Leathern Cloaks; also two serials in Sinn Féin - ׏The Professor in Erin”; and “One Generation Passeth”, the former a glimpse into the future, also issued in book form; she also contrib. chapters to Seumas MacManus [no relation], The Story of the Irish Race (1921); Dermot MacManus [q.v.] was a nephew. DIW DIL IF2

[ top ]

Works
Novels
  • The Red Star (NY: G. P. Putnam's Sons 1895), Do. (London: T. Fisher Unwin 1896).
  • Silk of the Kine (London: T. Fisher Unwin 1896), rep. as Silk (NY: Harper 1896).
  • Lally of the Brigade (London: T. Fisher Unwin; Boston: L. C. Page 1899), Do. (Dublin: Sealy, Bryers & Walder [1902]).
  • Nessa (Dublin: Sealy, Bryers Walker [1902]).
  • The Wager (NY: F. M. Buckles [1902]).
  • In Sarsfield’s Days: A Tale of the Siege of Limerick (Dublin: M. H. Gill 1906).
  • Nuala: The Story of a Perilous Quest (Dublin: Browne & Nolan 1908).
  • The Professor in Erin (Dublin: M. H. Gill 1918).
Stories
  • Within the Four Seas of Fola (Dublin: M. H. Gill 1922).
Autobiography
  • White Light and Flame: Memories of the Irish Literary Revival and the Anglo-Irish War (Dublin; Cork: Talbot [1929]).

[ top ]

References
Stephen Brown, Ireland in Fiction [Pt. I] (Dublin: Maunsel 1919) comments that she ‘holds the distinction of being one of the few writers of historical fiction who write from a thoroughly national standpoint’; lists works, The Silk of the Kine (London: T Fisher Unwin 1896); Lally of the Brigade (Dublin: Duffy 1899); Nessa (Dublin: Sealy, Bryers 1904); In Sarsfield’s Days (Dublin: Gill 1907); Nuala (Dublin: Browne & Nolan 1908). IF2 adds biog. [as above]; cites White Light and Flame (1929), an informal autobiog. 1894-1922; and lists The Professor in Erin (1918) [‘a fantasy of might-have-been in which Ireland wins the Battle of Kinsale’, acc. Clarke]. Also Within the Four Seas of Fola (1922), twelve sketches with psychic overtones.

 

Notes
Translation: Her novel Nuala (1908) has been trans. into Irish by Gearoid Mac Spealáin (c.1950).

[ top ]