Edward Maturin

Edward's father, Reverend Charles Robert Maturin, was curate of St. Peter's church, Dublin, and well known as a preacher, as well as a poet and Gothic novelist.

Having studied law under Charles O'Conor, he was called to the bar but later became professor of Greek in the College of South Carolina and applied for American naturalisation in 1837.

They concern incidents during the reigns of the Roman emperors from Tiberius to Nero; self-consciously literary, the dialogue is written in an imitation of Shakespearean English.

The long series of "Spanish Ballads" that originally appeared in the United States Democratic Revue during 1845 were eventually collected with his other poems in Lyrics of Spain and Erin (1850).

His later Bianca, a tale of Erin and Italy (1852) was set in more modern times but equally condemned as "an outlandish story, full of murders, characters - mostly illegitimate - with terrible secrets, a duel between brothers, banshees, mysterious lady-prophetesses, fee-faw-fum".