WCP3157

[1]

The Cottage,

Raheny

Feb. 11th [circa 1895].¹

Dear Dr Wallace,

I am very glad to hear that you have found 'Kerrigan's Quality'² at all interesting. To tell you the truth, ever since I finished writing it, I have tried to forget its existence, because it seemed to me such a failure. It was written under a combination of difficulties — one of them my own fault: I foolishly undertook to have it ready by a certain date, which I found to have a paralysing effect on my faculties — and I could [2] not make it what I wished. So I was altogether dissatisfied with it. But I have just now been looking through it again, and it strikes me as not being quite so bad as I feared. There is some absurdity in the plot, and most of the characters are not very real, but Kerrigan is rather a human sort of person I think. I wish I could write such a sequel to it as you suggest. What I am afraid of is my incompetence; for an ignorant or feeble book would, of course, be worse than useless, though I do think a good one might have some effect. I must think it over a great deal.

I have not read the work of Mr Craik³ which you mention. In fact my reading on the subject has been [3] very limited, and I should feel extremely grateful for any information about books that would be useful.

I fear I should find it heard to believe in quite such a happy end to the story as you say. It seems to me that there would always be some people with sufficient cause for grumbling — if we call it so. Still, it will be easier to judge of this when all preventible [sic] miseries have been removed — and how far we are from that in Ireland, where at the present moment whole parishes are starving.

yours very sincerely | Jane Barlow⁴ [signature]