John Kendrick Bangs

Mrs. Raffles Illustrated John Kendrick Bangs

A. J. Raffles is a British fictional character - a cricketer and gentleman thief - created by E. W. Hornung. Between 1898 and 1909, Hornung wrote a series of 26 short stories, two plays, and a novel about Raffles and his fictional chronicler, Harry "Bunny" Manders. The first story, "The Ides of March", appeared in the June 1898 edition of Cassell's Magazine.[1] The early adventures were collected in The Amateur Cracksman[2] and continued with The Black Mask (1901).[3] The last collection, A Thief in the Night (1904)[4] and the novel Mr. Justice Raffles (1909)[5] tell of adventures previously withheld. The novel was poorly received, and no further stories were published.