R[ichard] B[rinsley] Sheridan Knowles

Life
1820-1882; journalist, son of James Sheridan Knowles; Middle Temple, 1843; The Maiden Aunt, com. (Haymarket, 1845); converted to Catholicism [1849]; ed. Catholic Standard, afterwards Weekly Register; ed. Illustrated London Magazine, 1853-55; staff of Standard, 1857-60; ed. Chronicles of John of Exenedes in Rolls Series (1859); Royal Commission on historical MSS, 1871; Life of James Sheridan Knowles (private) [see supra]. ODNB IF RAF OCIL

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References
Stephen Brown, Ireland in Fiction (Dublin: Maunsel 1919), lists Glencoonage [first ser. in The Month; US ed.; Blackwood 1891], love-story of English girl and ‘splendid’ Irish peasant. Romantic South-West Ireland setting like Glengarriff. Biog. note; grandson [sic] J. S. Knowles; ed. Rosminian Fathers, Ratcliffe; Glencoonoge (1891) appeared in The Month. Lived at Hammersmith. Clencoonoge, 3 vols. (1891; 1 vol., US), 3 romance threads interwoven, English girl of gentle birth meets splendid Irish peasant nr. Glengarriff, ‘description of Irish Sunday one of the most beautiful in fiction’; portraits of both clergies, both gentries [Catholic and Protestant], and the peasants.

Patrick Rafroidi, Irish Literature in English, The Romantic Period, 1789-1850 (Gerrards Cross: Colin Smythe 1980), Vol. I, give details: b. Glasgow, lawyer and journalist; converted to Catholicism the same year his father published The Rock of Rome (1849); wrote biog. of J. S. Knowles, and also The Maiden Aunt, 5 act verse com. Haymarket, Nov. 1845).

Peter Kavanagh, The Irish Theatre (1946), gives bio-details: Richard Brinsley Knowles 1820-1882; son of the James Sheridan Knowles; wrote The Maiden Aunt, 5 act verse com. (Hay 19 Nov. 1845) 1845.

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