Hugh Conway

Called Back Hugh Conway

Called Back is an 1883 mystery/romance novel written by Englishman Frederick John Fargus under the pseudonym Hugh Conway and published in Bristol by J. W. Arrowsmith. Over 350,000 copies were sold within four years and a stage version was produced in London in 1884. The book was popular during the 1880s in Amherst, Massachusetts, a fact that has been correlated with the use of the phrase "called back" by American poet Emily Dickinson in her late life. She was impressed by the book, which a friend sent her. She used the title in a later letter. In what was evidently the last letter she wrote shortly before she died in May 1886, she simply wrote, "Little Cousins, Called back. Emily."