JOSEPH

See also:

• HENRY
• HENRY (1129-1195)
• HENRY (Fr. Henri; Span. Enrique; Ger. Heinrich; Mid. H. Ger. Heinrich and Heimrich; O.H.G. Haimi- or Heimirih, i.e. " prince, or chief of the house," from O.H.G. heim, the Eng. home, and rih, Goth. reiks; compare Lat. rex " king "—" rich," therefore " mig
• HENRY (c. 1108-1139)
• HENRY (c. 1174–1216)
• HENRY, EDWARD LAMSON (1841– )
• HENRY, JAMES (1798-1876)
• HENRY, JOSEPH (1797-1878)
• HENRY, MATTHEW (1662-1714)
• HENRY, PATRICK (1736–1799)
• HENRY, PRINCE OF BATTENBERG (1858-1896)
• HENRY, ROBERT (1718-1790)
• HENRY, VICTOR (1850– )
• HENRY, WILLIAM (1795-1836)

HENRY

See also:

• JOSEPH HENRY SHORTHOUSE (1834-1903)

SHORTHOUSE (1834-1903)  , English novelist, was born in Great Charles Street, Birmingham, on the 9th of September 1834 . He was the eldest son of Joseph Short-house, chemical manufacturer, and Mary Ann, daughter of John Hawker, of the same town . He was educated at Grove House, Tottenham, where he proved a promising and industrious pupil, and upon leaving school entered his father's business, in which he was all his life actively engaged . He married, in 1857, Sarah, daughter of John Scott, of Birmingham . His literary interest was fostered by a local essay club, to which he contributed many papers . It was not until he was nearly fifty years old that Shorthouse made his public appearance as an author, and even then his remarkable !story, John Inglesant, had undergone vicissitudes . It was kept for over three years in MS., and the author eventually printed one hundred copies for private circulation . One of these found its way intolthe hands of Mrs Humphry Ward, who recommended it to Messrs Macmillan . Its first appearance was a quiet one; but Gladstone was at once struck by its quality, and made its reputation by his praise . It became the most discussed book of the day, and its author was suddenly famous . Besides John Inglesant (1881), Shorthouse published The Little Schoolmaster Mark (1883), Sir Percival (1886), The Countess Eve and A Teacher of the Violin (1888), and Blanche, Lady Falaise (1891); but none of these has been so popular as his first novel . He will always remain known to fame as " the author of John Inglesant." Shorthouse was originally a Quaker, but the appeal of the Anglican Church was insistent with him, and he was baptized into its body before the appearance of his story .

Something of his own stress of religious transition appears in the

character of his hero, who is pictured as living in the time of the Civil War, a pupil of the Jesuits, a philosopher and a Platonist, who is yet true to the National Church . The story, which is deeply mystical and imaginative, has for its central idea the dangers of bigotry and superstition, and the necessity of intuitive religion to progress and culture . It is a work.full of opulent colour and crowded life, no less than of philosophy and spiritual beauty . Shorthouse's work was always marked by high earnestness of purpose, a luxuriant style and a genuinely spiritual quality . He lacked dramatic faculty and the work-manlike conduct of narrative, but he had almost every other quality of the born novelist . He died at Edgbaston on the 4th of March 1903 . See The Life, Letters and Literary Remains of J . Henry Shorthouse, edited by his wife (2 vols., 1905) .