WHAT IS "GOTHIC"? (PART 2)

Today we take a deeper dive into the nuts and thunderbolts of gothic fiction and how supernatural, romance and other devices influence the genre. These cannot be any more evident than in the piles of modern-day gothic romance novels where entire sections are reserved for them in any bookstore.

Elements of the Gothic Novel

By Robert Harris | April 22, 2019

Source: https://www.virtualsalt.com/gothic.htm

The gothic novel was invented almost single-handedly by Horace Walpole, whose The Castle of Otranto (1764) contains essentially all the elements that constitute the genre. Walpole's novel was imitated not only in the eighteenth century and not only in the novel form, but it has influenced the novel, the short story, poetry, and even film making up to the present day.

Gothic elements include the following:

1. Setting in a castle. The action takes place in and around an old castle, sometimes seemingly abandoned, sometimes occupied. The castle often contains secret passages, trap doors, secret rooms, dark or hidden staircases, and possibly ruined sections. The castle may be near or connected to caves, which lend their own haunting flavor with their branchings, claustrophobia, and mystery. (Translated into modern filmmaking, the setting might be in an old house or mansion--or even a new house--where unusual camera angles, sustained close ups during movement, and darkness or shadows create the same sense of claustrophobia and entrapment.)

2. An atmosphere of mystery and suspense. The work is pervaded by a threatening feeling, a fear enhanced by the unknown. Often the plot itself is built around a mystery, such as unknown parentage, a disappearance, or some other inexplicable event. Elements 3, 4, and 5 below contribute to this atmosphere. (Again, in modern filmmaking, the inexplicable events are often murders.)

3. An ancient prophecy is connected with the castle or its inhabitants (either former or present). The prophecy is usually obscure, partial, or confusing. "What could it mean?" In more watered down modern examples, this may amount to merely a legend: "It's said that the ghost of old man Krebs still wanders these halls."

4. Omens, portents, visions. A character may have a disturbing dream vision, or some phenomenon may be seen as a portent of coming events. For example, if the statue of the lord of the manor falls over, it may portend his death. In modern fiction, a character might see something (a shadowy figure stabbing another shadowy figure) and think that it was a dream. This might be thought of as an "imitation vision."

5. Supernatural or otherwise inexplicable events. Dramatic, amazing events occur, such as ghosts or giants walking, or inanimate objects (such as a suit of armor or painting) coming to life. In some works, the events are ultimately given a natural explanation, while in others the events are truly supernatural.

6. High, even overwrought emotion. The narration may be highly sentimental, and the characters are often overcome by anger, sorrow, surprise, and especially, terror. Characters suffer from raw nerves and a feeling of impending doom. Crying and emotional speeches are frequent. Breathlessness and panic are common. In the filmed gothic, screaming is common.

7. Women in distress. As an appeal to the pathos and sympathy of the reader, the female characters often face events that leave them fainting, terrified, screaming, and/or sobbing. A lonely, pensive, and oppressed heroine is often the central figure of the novel, so her sufferings are even more pronounced and the focus of attention. The women suffer all the more because they are often abandoned, left alone (either on purpose or by accident), and have no protector at times.

8. Women threatened by a powerful, impulsive, tyrannical male. One or more male characters has the power, as king, lord of the manor, father, or guardian, to demand that one or more of the female characters do something intolerable. The woman may be commanded to marry someone she does not love (it may even be the powerful male himself), or commit a crime.

9. The metonymy of gloom and horror. Metonymy is a subtype of metaphor, in which something (like rain) is used to stand for something else (like sorrow). For example, the film industry likes to use metonymy as a quick shorthand, so we often notice that it is raining in funeral scenes. Note that the following metonymies for "doom and gloom" all suggest some element of mystery, danger, or the supernatural.

• wind, especially howling
• rain, especially blowing
• doors grating on rusty hinges
• sighs, moans, howls, eerie sounds
• footsteps approaching
• clanking chains
• lights in abandoned rooms
• gusts of wind blowing out lights
• characters trapped in a room
• doors suddenly slamming shut
• ruins of buildings
• baying of distant dogs (or wolves?)
• thunder and lightning
• crazed laughter

10. The vocabulary of the gothic. The constant use of the appropriate vocabulary set creates the atmosphere of the gothic. Using the right words maintains the dark-and-stimulated feel that defines the gothic. Here as an example are some of the words (in several categories) that help make up the vocabulary of the gothic in The Castle of Otranto:

• Mystery: diabolical, enchantment, ghost, goblins, haunted, infernal, magic, magician, miracle, necromancer, omens, ominous, portent, preternatural, prodigy, prophecy, secret, sorcerer, spectre, spirits, strangeness, talisman, vision
• Fear, Terror, or Sorrow: afflicted, affliction, agony, anguish, apprehensions, apprehensive, commiseration, concern, despair, dismal, dismay, dread, dreaded, dreading, fearing, frantic, fright, frightened, grief, hopeless, horrid, horror, lamentable, melancholy, miserable, mournfully, panic, sadly, scared, shrieks, sorrow, sympathy, tears, terrible, terrified, terror, unhappy, wretched
• Surprise: alarm, amazement, astonished, astonishment, shocking, staring, surprise, surprised, thunderstruck, wonder
• Haste: anxious, breathless, flight, frantic, hastened, hastily, impatience, impatient, impatiently, impetuosity, precipitately, running, sudden, suddenly
• Anger: anger, angrily, choler, enraged, furious, fury, incense, incensed, provoked, rage, raving, resentment, temper, wrath, wrathful, wrathfully
• Largeness: enormous, gigantic, giant, large, tremendous, vast
• Darkness: dark, darkness, dismal, shaded, black, night

11. Hyperbolic Phrases. In the advertising business, it is sometimes said, "The lie is in the adjective." Adjectives control how we think of the nouns they modify: "mild curiosity" presents an attitude of relaxed interest, whereas "insatiable curiosity" presents the attitude of a hungry mind. In the Gothic, adjectives are used to amplify nouns in order to (1) create phrases that increase the feeling of dread, horror, anxiety, or suspense, or (2) produce a substantially increased emphasis or sense of importance. Here are some examples from Mary Shelley's Frankenstein:

Increased Dread 

• deep grief 
• gigantic creature 
• bitterly feel 
• strange sight 
• dark gloom 
• unparalleled misfortunes 
• intoxicating draught 

Increased Emphasis

• intense distaste
• inestimable benefit
• ardent curiosity
• unparalleled eloquence
• astonishing degree
• burning ardor
• strongly excited

Walpole himself lays on most of these elements pretty thick (although he's a lot lighter on darkness than many modern gothic works), so it might be said that another element of the classic gothic is its intensity created by profuse employment of the vocabulary of the gothic. Consider this from Chapter 1 of The Castle of Otranto: The servant "came running back breathless, in a frantic manner, his eyes staring, and foaming at the mouth. He said nothing but pointed to the court. The company were struck with terror and amazement." Gets your interest up on page two, doesn't he? Then, "In the meantime, some of the company had run into the court, from whence was heard a confused noise of shrieks, horror, and surprise."

An Example

The 1943 Sherlock Holmes film, Sherlock Holmes Faces Death (one of the classic Basil Rathbone and Nigel Bruce films), contains all the elements of the gothic. Here is a brief rundown of the items above:

1. Setting. It's not quite a castle, but it is a huge mansion with several levels, including a basement and a hidden sub-basement. Dark and drafty. Ominous.

2. Atmosphere of Mystery. It's a multiple murder mystery, with cryptic notes, hidden passageways, wind, lightning, and everyone a suspect.

3. Ancient Prophecy. There is the Musgrave Ritual. Obscure, compelling, ancient.

4. Omens and portents. The crow at the tavern, the intrusive lightning strike, the taunting notes from the butler.

5. Supernatural or inexplicable events. How the victims died. The lightning seems to strike at just the right time.

6. Overwrought emotion. The female lead screams and panics a bit.

7. Women in distress and 8. Women threatened by a male. Toned down here, but the murderer had designs on the heroine.

9. The wind blows, signs bang into the wall, lightning, a few characters are trapped in various ways.

ROMANTICISM

The Romantics broke away from the restrained ideas and styles of the eighteenth century. This movement marked a liberation of the artist’s imagination and style.

Faust by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe = earliest most essential Romantic work. Faust sells soul to the devil for knowledge – pursuing idea that all knowledge is significant.

Essential Romantic Musician / Composer = Beethoven – “turned the highly structured classical sonata into an expansive form for the expression of powerful internal struggles.” (5th Symphony)

Romanticism refers to a movement in art, literature, and music during the 19th century.

Romanticism is characterized by the 5 “I”s

Imagination

• Imagination emphasized over “reason”
• Backlash against the rationalism characterized by the Neoclassical period or “Age of Reason”
• Imagination considered necessary for creating all art
• British writer Samuel Taylor Coleridge called imagination “intellectual intuition.”

Intuition

• Romantics placed value on “intuition,” or feeling and instincts, over reason.
• Emotions were important in Romantic art.
• British Romantic William Wordsworth described poetry as “the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings.”

Idealism

• Idealism refers to any theory that emphasizes the spirit, the mind, or language over matter – thought has a crucial role in making the world the way it is.
• Immanuel Kant, a German philosopher, held that the mind forces the world we perceive to take the shape of space-and-time.

Inspiration

• The Romantic artist, musician, or writer, is an “inspired creator” rather than a “technical master.”
• Romanticism emphasized going with the moment, or being spontaneous, rather than being precise, controlled, or realistic.

Individuality

• Romantics celebrated the individual.
• During this time period, Women’s Rights and Abolitionism were taking root as major movements.
• Walt Whitman, a later Romantic writer, would write a poem entitled “Song of Myself.” It begins, “I celebrate myself.”

CHARACTERISTICS OF ROMANTICISM

• Interest in emotions and imagination
• Awareness of mystery and ecstasy
• Fondness for picturesque, exotic settings
• Belief in the goodness of simple, unspoiled humanity
• Humanitarian sympathy for the common man; poets wrote in the language of the common man and idealized those close to nature – farmers/shepherds
• Enthusiasm for external nature – the wilder, more primitive the better
• Fascination with remote times and places, legends and superstitions
• Not much regard for truth to life
• Emotion over reason – “Poetry is the spontaneous overflow of powerful feeling.” – William Wordsworth
• Individual or free expression valued over the social and artistic conformist
• Personal experience valued over set rules and traditions
• Romantic spirit sees real world as a reflection of an ideal world and life as constant striving toward that ideal

WHAT IS "GOTHIC"? (PART 1)

The most enduring of all genre fiction is what is known today as the gothic novel. We've heard of the early classics such "The Castle of Otranto" (1764/1765) and "The Mysteries of Udolpho" (1794), as well as later gothic romances by authors such as Charlotte Brontë,  Daphne du Maurier, Phyllis A. Whitney, Joan Aiken and even Anne Rice. The "Dark Shadows" paperback books by Marilyn Ross (aka William Edward Daniel Ross) are considered gothic novels. Besides the authors of the classic era, other men such as Patrick McGrath and Michael McDowell, who wrote in the southern gothic sub-genre, have also contributed to the tradition.

Edgar Allan Poe can be generally considered the father of the gothic horror story (as well as the detective story), but many authors have before and since dipped their quill pens in the black ink of that dark sub-genre.

But what is it exactly that constitutes a gothic novel? This weekend we'll delve into that which is a kind of mystery in itself with several essays on the matter, from the historical predecessors to the modern-day gothic romance.

THE FEAR AND FASCINATION OF GOTHIC FICTION

'[W]hat makes a story “gothic”, and why are we still fascinated by it hundreds of years after its inception?'

By Joe Hart | September 9, 2025 | CrimeReads.com

There was this book my mom brought home when I was maybe eleven or twelve. No idea where she got it. A rummage sale or bargain bin at a thrift store? Doesn’t matter. It was a little book, that’s the first thing I noticed. Smaller almost by half than a typical paperback. The title was Edgar Allan Poe: Tales of Mystery and Terror. The cover was illustrated as was the interior as I soon found out, but that cover—

Wowsa.

Picture a stone mansion, stately but decaying, tall windows, a soaring chimney, ornate ironwork decorating its rooflines. But amidst all this your attention is drawn to a massive fracture running from peak to foundation. A blood red sun is setting behind the building and it’s seeping through that split in the house like a mortal wound.

The image was so striking I can still see it some thirty years later.

What my young eyes feasted on inside was formative in a way I didn’t understand at the time. I devoured The Tell-Tale Heart and The Fall of House Usher (which I believe was the inspiration for the cover), along with The Gold Bug, and “FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, MONTRESOR!”—The Cask of Amontillado. The book dripped with gothic imagery, disturbing themes, and a creeping sense of dread which never really left me.

Historically the genre has been around since the late 18th century. Common elements run the gambit from psychological illness to crumbling architecture to the supernatural and encompass names we all know like Shelley, Wilde, Poe, Jackson, and King.

But what makes a story “gothic”, and why are we still fascinated by it hundreds of years after its inception?

Firstly, I’d argue it has a lot to do with it being one of the oldest forms of horror outside of folklore and religion. The expression and examination of what makes us afraid can be found in the isolation of the rotting house upon the hill—the one that’s supposedly haunted. Or in the distrust of the strange old man who lives alone at the edge of the village and seems to know much, much more than he should. Or in our very own vengeful hearts as our familial enemy is sealed into a dungeon alcove alive, brick by inevitable brick.  The gothic provides a playground for authors to explore all structure and facet of what fear is made of—the power the past has over the present and future, what might exist just outside the bounds of our senses, and what terrors we might be capable of given the right or wrong circumstances.

Personally, I can’t help but think there’s a socioeconomic factor contributing to the genre as well, either purposeful or on the subconscious level. So many times, the focus of gothic fiction involves a wealthy house or family falling to ruin while harboring a horrible secret within their legacy. Enter a desperate character who the wealthy then use as a means to their ends. For me this definitely reads as social commentary regarding exploitation of labor and the examination of class systems. The distrust of the upper class and their inherent corruption tends to permeate many of the works, which like any good fiction highlights disparities within society.

And let’s not forget the indulgence of spectacle—gothic lit as well as film brims with it by way of immense buildings, untold wealth, or larger than life characters.  There’s a scene in Guillermo del Toro’s Crimson Peak, a modern gothic masterpiece in my opinion, when Tom Hiddleston and Mia Wasikowska’s characters arrive at Allerdale Hall (Hiddleston’s ancestral mansion). When they step inside, the grandeur of the space is only slightly overshadowed by the decay it’s befallen—the roof, several stories overhead, has rotted away and leaves and snow drift elegantly through the hole, cluttering the grand entrance. This image carries plenty of weight by highlighting not only the former splendor of the hall but also foreshadows the decay within the character’s morality as well. Spectacle is also enchanting in its own right. Even though a character may know there is danger within the lavish setting and eccentric people they meet, they are intoxicated by them as well.

But for me, the most prominent feature that comes to mind when thinking of gothic lit is the unknown. Mystery is the allure that draws the wary character toward the crumbling mansion just as it draws us in as well. Within the mystery lies possibility, both good and very, very bad. For Mira Caine, the main character in my novel Wyndclyffe, the offer of a better life for her and her intellectually disabled younger brother is what brings her to the isolated Wyndclyffe estate situated on an island in the St. Lawrence River. But the mystery of the tragedies that have taken place there is what drives the story. What is the strange circle of stones out in the woods and what is it used for? What do the unsettling entries in the ancient journal Mira stumbles onto mean? Why do the mansion and its grounds feel eerily familiar to her? And what is the unspeakable secret at the heart of Wyndclyffe? Mystery triggers our need to know and keeps us running full-tilt into the dark even when we know we should slow down, and good gothic literature tends to have all the hallmarks of the unknown which keeps the pages turning.

I think to answer the question; the genre’s fascination lies in its multifaceted nature. Gothic fiction is horrific. It is beautiful. It evokes awe and revulsion alike. For centuries it’s been steeped in isolation, fading grandeur, social commentary, desperation, terrifying secrets, mental illness, ghosts, echoes of the past, as well as mystery—all of it coursing through the genre like an eerie red sunset shining through the fracture of a decaying mansion.

***

Joe Hart was born and raised in northern Minnesota. Having dedicated himself to writing horror and thriller fiction since the age of nine, he is now the author of eleven novels that include The River Is Dark, Lineage, and The Last Girl. When not writing, he enjoys reading, exercising, exploring the great outdoors, and watching movies with his family.

http://www.joehartbooks.com

Unsettling Dark Pleasures: A short history of Gothic fiction

by David Stuart Davies

Part One: The Sparks Burst into Life

The Gothic novel, which became the vogue in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, contains a rich mixture of tragedy and romance, tinged with horror enacted in or around some form of a medieval or ‘Gothick’ architecture – a ruined castle, a deserted abbey and similar crumbling edifices. The novels feature murky tales of revenge, torture, ancient villainies punished and young sensitive love rewarded usually by supernatural or supposed supernatural means. These tales took the reader into the land of dark dreams and racy scenarios presenting possibilities that the standard novel failed to capture, providing delicious and tantalising forbidden delights. The Gothic novel was not about real life. Its rich, sensual hallucinatory qualities gave the reader an illicit thrill which still remains as potent and rewarding today.

The creators of these tales wanted to reshape the standard notion of literature from the smooth classical structure of the formal novel into a darker, older and more artificial style and as such Gothic literature is intimately associated with the revival of interest in Gothic architecture during the same era. Similar to the gothic revivalists’ rejection of the clarity and rationalism of buildings in the neoclassical style – all smooth clinical lines and regulated forms –  the literary Gothic embodies an appreciation of the joys of extreme emotion, the thrills of fear, dark unpredictability, awe inherent in the recherché and a quest for atmosphere. The ruins of gothic buildings gave rise to multiple linked emotions by representing the inevitable decay and collapse of human creations.  It was a fascination with this form of architecture that inspired the first wave of gothic novelists.

However, like the majority of so-called movements, whether in art or literature, there was no conscious decision by a group of writers to form themselves into a collective with a clear manifesto or to create fiction in a particular style. The genre was defined retrospectively and it developed through a kind of artistic osmosis.

The Castle of Otranto (1764) by Horace Walpole (1717 – 97) is often regarded as the first true Gothic romance. Walpole was obsessed with medieval Gothic architecture and built his own house in that fashion. Externally his property at Strawberry Hill in Richmond near London seemed to be a blend of two predominant styles: a style based on castles with turrets and battlements, and a style based on Gothic cathedrals with arched windows and stained glass. It was Walpole’s intention to create ‘a little Gothic castle.’

In Otranto, Walpole’s declared aim was to combine elements of the medieval romance, which he deemed too fanciful, and the modern novel, which he considered to be too confined to strict realism. The basic plot created other elements which became gothic staples, including a threatening mystery and an ancestral curse, as well as countless trappings such as hidden passages and oft-fainting heroines. Sir Walter Scott called it the ‘happy combination of supernatural agency with human interest.’

William Beckford’s (1759 – 1786) Vathek (1786), a strange concoction subtitled ‘An Arabian Tale’, tapped into the dark weirdness of Otranto and included sorcery, the sacrifice of children, a man who sells his soul to the devil, subterranean ruins and eternal damnation.

The Mysteries of Udolpho (1794) by Ann Radcliffe (1764 – 1823) is a powerful tale with the key elements of the Gothic: a heroine in peril, a sinister count and a creepy castle.

The Monk by Matthew Lewis (1771 – 1818), published two years after Udolpho, continued to develop the dark themes of the emerging gothic oeuvre but the novel was condemned as being lewd with elements of the pornographic and the satanic. Even today, the depiction of the gradual corruption of a monk, the rape of a virgin by a representative of religion, who later discovers he has committed incest, matricide and made a bargain with the Devil, can seem rather sordid. However, this darkness was embraced by the growing audience for the gothic.

The Monk influenced Ann Radcliffe in her last novel, The Italian (1797). In this book, the hapless protagonists are ensnared in a web of deceit by a malignant monk called Schedoni and eventually dragged before the tribunals of the Inquisition in Rome, leading one contemporary to remark that if Radcliffe wished to transcend the horror of these scenes, she would have to visit hell itself.

With the arrival of the 19th century, the gothic genre was well established. Even the fledgling author Jane Austen tried her hand at penning such a dark romance with Northanger Abbey (published in 1817 but written 1798/99).

Further contributions to the Gothic genre were provided in the work of the Romantic poets. Prominent examples include Coleridge’s The Rime of the Ancient Mariner and Christabel as well as  ‘La Belle Dame sans Merci’ (1819) and ‘Isabella, or the Pot of Basil’ (1820) which feature mysteriously fey ladies. In the latter poem, the names of the characters, the dream visions and the macabre physical details are influenced by the novels of Ann Radcliffe. Percy Bysshe Shelley’s first published work was the Gothic novel Zastrozzi (1810), about an outlaw obsessed with revenge against his father and half-brother. Shelley published a second Gothic novel in 1811, St. Irvyne; or, The Rosicrucian, about an alchemist who seeks to impart the secret of immortality.

The poetry, romantic adventures, and character of Lord Byron – characterised by his spurned lover Lady Caroline Lamb as ‘mad, bad and dangerous to know’ – were another inspiration for the Gothic, providing the archetype of the Byronic hero. Byron features, under the pseudonym of ‘Lord Ruthven, in Lady Caroline’s own Gothic novel: Glenarvon (1816). Byron was also the host of the celebrated ghost-story competition involving himself, Percy Bysshe Shelley, Mary Shelley, and John William Polidori at the Villa Diodati on the banks of Lake Geneva in the summer of 1816. This occasion was productive for both Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein (1818) and Polidori’s The Vampyre (1819), both influenced by the Gothic tradition. The Vampyre has been accounted by cultural critic Christopher Frayling as one of the most influential works of fiction ever written and spawned a craze for vampire fiction.

Part Two: The Victorian Era & Beyond

During the Victorian era, the Gothic influence was at its most pervasive. In many ways, it was now entering its most creative phase in the sense that it grew more fanciful and horrific.  One of the great interpreters of the genre was Edgar Allan Poe (1809 -1849) who took the basic elements of the form and fashioned them in his own style. Poe focused less on the traditional ingredients of gothic stories and more on the psychology of his characters, who often descended into madness. There were still old decaying houses and barren landscapes, but it was the tortured souls who inhabited these environments that interested Poe. He believed that terror was a legitimate literary subject. His story The Fall of the House of Usher (1839) explores these ‘terrors of the soul’ while revisiting classic Gothic tropes of aristocratic decay, death, and madness. The legendary villainy of the Spanish Inquisition which was explored in The Pit and the Pendulum (1842) was based on a true account of a survivor. The influence of Ann Radcliffe can be detected in Poe’s ‘The Oval Portrait’ (1842), which also includes an honorary mention of her name in the text of the story.

The influence of Byronic Romanticism evident in Poe is also apparent in the work of the Brontë sisters. Emily Brontë’s Wuthering Heights (1847) transports the Gothic to the bleak and alien Yorkshire Moors and features ghostly apparitions and a dark, cruel Byronic hero in the person of the demonic Heathcliff. The Brontës’ fiction is seen by some feminist critics as a prime example of Female Gothic, exploring woman’s entrapment within the domestic space along with the subjection to patriarchal authority and the desperate and dangerous attempts to escape from such restrictions. Emily’s Cathy and Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre are both examples of female protagonists in such a role.

The gloomy villain, forbidding mansion, and persecuted heroine of Sheridan Le Fanu’s Uncle Silas (1864) shows the direct influence of both Walpole’s Otranto and Radcliffe’s Udolpho. Although it is not a supernatural tale it cleverly engages the trappings of such to weave a cunning narrative which features an early example of the locked room mystery. Le Fanu’s short story collection In a Glass Darkly (1872) includes the influential vampire tale Carmilla, which provided fresh blood for that particular strand of the Gothic and influenced Bram Stoker’s vampire tale Dracula (1897) which in turn was the progenitor of a rich sub-genre of vampiric fiction.  Stoker set up the rules, as it were, for the vampire genre which have been followed and sometimes dramatically broken by many writers since.

Stoker’s novel was also part of a new chapter in the Gothic story which placed emphasis on the supernatural and the unexplained.  Classic works in this late Victorian period included Robert Louis Stevenson’s Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde (1886) Oscar Wilde’s The Picture of Dorian Gray (1891), George du Maurier’s Trilby (1894), Richard Marsh’s The Beetle: A Mystery (1897),  The Turn of the Screw (1898), and the stories of Arthur Machen. In America, at the end of the 19th century, two notable writers in the Gothic tradition emerged. These were, were Ambrose Bierce and Robert W. Chambers. Bierce’s short stories were in the horrific and pessimistic tradition of Poe, while Chambers trod the same decadent path as Wilde and Machen, to the extent of his inclusion of a character named ‘Wilde’ in his most famous and influential novel The King in Yellow (1895).

In the Twentieth Century, new writers came along altering the Gothic form somewhat in order to focus more on horror and the supernatural. Vengeful ghosts, vampires, werewolves and their unholy associates were the new Gothic stars. Important English twentieth-century writers in this Gothic tradition include Algernon Blackwood, William Hope Hodgson, M. R. James, and Marjorie Bowen.

The cinema also involved itself in the genre creating such silent movie classics as Nosferatu (the first cinematic version of Dracula), The Cabinet of Dr Caligari, The Cat and the Canary and other silent film fright fests in the 1920s.

In the 1930s Universal Studios carried on the tradition with superb Gothic talking picture versions of Dracula and Frankenstein (and their sequels), embellishing the originals with spooky visuals and added plot twists.  Dracula’s castle and the tower where Frankenstein experiments on creating life are wonderful pictorial realisations of the original spirit of the Gothic. Universal also brought some original material to the screen such as Edgar G. Ulmers’ The Black Cat (1934) which, with the use of shadows and implied horror, achieves a magnificent sense of Gothic menace in an ultra-modern setting.

Similarly in the 1950s & 60s, Hammer Studios in Britain brought colour to old texts in their various versions of the Gothic classics, Dracula, and Frankenstein as well as other offerings such as The Phantom of the Opera, The Gorgon and The Reptile.

Meanwhile, in the post-war period, Gothic literature took a back seat in favour of those stories which not so much chilled the blood as turned the stomach. In the 1970s visceral thrills and gore were in fashion and novels such as William Peter Blatty’s The Exorcist, James Herbert’s The Rats and Stephen King’s Carrie became best sellers. The explicit descriptions of horror in these novels created an appetite for more of the same. Then in the 1980s, Susan Hill wrote a ghost story, The Woman in Black, which in a sense was a Gothic pastiche but it worked brilliantly. The novel was a great success and was turned into a play and later a movie, proving that there is still an audience for such dark thrills. Slowly other writers tried their hand at the dark and subtle. Now, the subtle Gothic chiller, such as those created by such authors as Jonathan Aycliffe, Neil Gaiman, John Harwood and Sarah Pinborough, sit on the bookshelf alongside the more gory, unrestrained works of modern horror fiction.

[SOURCE: Wordsworth-editions.com]

IS THERE A "GOTHIC" NEW WAVE?

A post HERE a couple of weeks ago posed the question: "Is Gothic Horror making a comeback?" Judging from the buzz around literary and book news feeds, it appears that there is indeed a resurgence of interest in the subject. The article below makes the case for equivalency in today's world.

Following is the first issue of Charlton Comics' HAUNTED LOVE (April, 1973), with a cover by Tom Sutton, a script by Nicola Cuti and interior art by Joe Staton and Tom Sutton.

TERROR AND POWER: IS GOTHIC HORROR POISED FOR 21ST CENTURY REVIVAL?

Gothic fiction isn't outdated—on the contrary, it's the best method of capturing our present day anxieties.

By Jasper DeWitt | July 7, 2020 | crimereads.com

In Bram Stoker’s iconic vampire novel Dracula, the eponymous count warns his pursuers, “My revenge is just begun! I spread it over centuries, and time is on my side.”

Those who have read the novel or watched one of its countless adaptations will know that the count’s threat was empty. His revenge, and the count himself, were literally cut short. But while Dracula the character was killed, Dracula the book remains immortal, with horror readers and authors of all eras since genuflecting to its example. Ironically, Dracula was far from the first novel to place a vampire in a modern setting, nor even to depict him as a suave, darkly fascinating aristocrat: John Polidori’s The Vampyre predated Stoker’s novel by almost a century.

However, when authors search for a model for their vampires of today, it is not Polidori’s Lord Ruthven that they turn to first. Instead, every modern vampire, from Kurt Barlow of Stephen King’s Salem’s Lot, to Lestat in Anne Rice’s Vampire Chronicles, to even Stephanie Meyer’s Edward Cullen in Twilight, make some nod or other to Count Dracula. Indeed, Dracula’s legacy has been spread over more than a century, and time remains on its side.

Unfortunately, despite the ubiquity of references to early works of Gothic horror like Dracula and the earlier, but no less influential Frankenstein, the genre both books populated has curiously ended up with a stake through its heart. Today, Gothic Horror writ large is either forgotten, treated as an artifact whose best literary features have been absorbed by other forms of genre fiction, or dismissed as an antiquated and socially regressive fictional universe full of parodical and cliché tropes. The caricature of Gothic horror as being one long string of books whose covers depict nubile women fleeing in sheer nightgowns from dark castles, often set in the gaslight era and with a readership as allergic to sunlight as its various ghoulies and ghosties, has become the dominant accepted image of the genre. Progressive cultural critics, meanwhile, accuse the genre of sins such as denying agency to its female characters, turning them into mere damsels in distress to be rescued by presumptively white, handsome, traditionally masculine men, often from the clutches of racially/ethnically othered villains whose only sin is encouraging unlicensed expressions of sexuality. There are exceptions to this latter point, but mostly, the genre’s detractors believe it to be hokey, Puritanical, sexist, bigoted, and totally impossible to relate to in our modern era. Even Jane Austen’s scathing satirical novel Northanger Abbey was not so dismissive.

I dissent, not merely as the author of a book which has been compared to works of Gothic or neo-Gothic fiction like Dracula and The Exorcist, but also as a lifelong reader of horror whose favorite works and most prominent literary influences spring primarily from the heyday of late-19th and early-20th century Gothic horror fiction that gave rise to so much of what we now think of as modern day horror. While I understand where the idea of Gothic horror as a nightgown-clad vehicle for racial and sexual moral panic comes from, I cannot agree with its interpretation of the genre’s corpus. Nor can I agree that Gothic horror is anachronistic or impossible to relate to in our present moment. Quite the opposite: I think that there is no genre of horror fiction that so easily and intuitively speaks to our present day anxieties as the gaslit fantasies of our distant ancestors.

"I THINK THAT THERE IS NO GENRE OF HORROR FICTION THAT SO EASILY AND INTUITIVELY SPEAKS TO OUR PRESENT DAY ANXIETIES AS THE GASLIT FANTASIES OF OUR DISTANT ANCESTORS."

This naturally raises a question of just what I mean when I use the phrase “Gothic horror.” What is the genre all about? The name, “Gothic,” provides some clues here, as it originates from the type of architecture favored by the founder of the genre, Horace Walpole, who conspicuously not only set his novel The Castle of Otranto in a Gothic castle, but also set it in the Gothic era of the middle ages and deliberately based it stylistically on the work of William Shakespeare. Over time, this idea of setting a story of supernatural horror in a crumbling old castle or similarly “Gothic” structure gave the genre its name. True, not every Gothic story takes place in a literal castle: the architecture required has democratized since Walpole, with crumbling manor houses (H.P. Lovecraft’s Exham Priory, Henry James’ Bly Manor and Shirley Jackson’s Hill House), churches (M.R. James’ The Treasure of Abbot Thomas), hotels (Stephen King’s The Shining), and even creepy old apartment buildings (Ira Levin’s Rosemary’s Baby) being accepted now. But the central idea of Gothic horror as being horror that takes place in old, isolated buildings in various states of disrepair, with a long and bloody history to them, surely matters to understanding the genre. In other words, in Gothic horror, the sins of the past are embodied in the very locations where it takes place, and the atomizing, agonizing after-effects of that past are felt as much on the narrative itself as they are on the buildings that are crumbling under the weight of age. In an era where we are never more conscious of the pain inflicted even by distant history, can we really say horror that takes place in settings that emphasize the “sins of the father” are out of place?

So the creepy buildings on the covers of Gothic novels are representative, at least. What about the nightgown clad women? Well, while the actual number of women in nightgowns in Gothic horror is vanishingly small, the idea of the damsel in distress seems at first glance to be a fairly common feature. However, subtleties introduce themselves when you actually look at the women in question. Mina Murray in Dracula, for example, is pretty much the person who makes the difference in the protagonists’ ability to take out the count at all, while the more (for the time) conventionally feminine Lucy Westenra ends up a villainous child-murdering vampire midway through. The unnamed second Mrs. DeWinter in Daphne du Maurier’s Rebecca learns to assert herself against her tyrannical housekeeper and cold husband over the course of the novel. Even Emily St. Aubert and her aunt in The Mysteries of Udolpho  heroically and tenaciously refuse to give into the depredations of their male persecutors, and Emily escapes not with the aid of her lover Valancourt, but rather thanks to her own resourcefulness and help from the servants, and ends up a property owner at the end of the book while her lover is penniless. And that’s not even touching on the meta fact that many of the early writers of Gothic fiction were themselves women, such as Ann Radcliffe, Eliza Parsons, Eleanor Sleath, and of course, Mary Shelley. The caricature of the helpless screaming girl in the nightgown, it seems, is more “sex sells” marketing than reality. In fact, the heroines of Gothic horror may begin as damsels in distress, but they often end up as masters of their own destiny even moreso than they were when they came in.

However, it is in looking at the villains of Gothic horror where the real resonance of the genre takes hold. Whether it’s Walpole’s castle-owning Manfred, Radcliffe’s faux-Italian nobleman Montoni, Shelley’s wealthy Victor Frankenstein, Polidori’s Lord Ruthven, Stoker’s Count Dracula, Lovecraft’s displaced English nobleman Delapore, M.R. James’ Count Magnus De la Gardie, Nathaniel Hawthorne’s Colonel Pyncheon, J.S. Le Fanu’s Countess Carmilla Karnstein, Stephen King’s wealthy antiques dealer Kurt Barlow, Wilkie Collins’s Sir Percival Glyde, Anya Seaton’s Patroon Nicholas van Ruyn, or Oscar Wilde’s Dorian Gray, a consistent pattern emerges: Gothic villains are almost always powerful. Indeed, even shunned characters like Frankenstein’s monster or the Phantom of the Opera make up for their lack of social/financial power with great intellectual or physical might. Seen in this way, the overriding concern of Gothic horror becomes achingly current for the modern day. This is a genre where the horror comes from the immiserating effects of the abuse of power. Including, and this can’t be overstated, its immiserating effects on those who wield power, no less than those who lack it.

And what, in our era of crumbling trust in unaccountable institutions, could be more current than that? True, Manfred in Otranto never bragged of grabbing anyone “by the pussy,” but he did seek to marry his own daughter-in-law for political advantage. No, the Phantom of the Opera might not have had top flight defense attorneys, but his body count made Phil Spector look like a piker. No, Dracula might not have used the casting couch, but his ability to make young women complicit in his sexualized reign of terror was easily a match for Harvey Weinstein. Yes, Dorian Grey covered up his inner ugliness with a hidden portrait rather than an anonymous Twitter account, but his ability to destroy himself with his appetites was no less potent. Indeed, the all-too-human and all-too-corrupted-by-power nature of the Gothic villain makes them the perfect monster for our era, just as the crumbling, tragic Gothic structure is the perfect symbol for the helpless feeling among so many people that the sins of our past are grinding what was once beautiful into an alienated ruin. And who but the empowered, modern, young heroes and heroines of Gothic horror are we looking for as our models for how to escape those crumbling old structures and the wounded old tyrants who cling to them? What is more, in our era of extremism, perhaps the tragedy ubiquitous to so much of Gothic horror can offer a sobering tonic, and a reminder that even the greatest of heroes, like Dracula himself, can be corrupted into monstrous husks of themselves by the lust to abuse power. That they who fight monsters stand only a knife’s edge away from nesting in their own monstrous lairs.

In short, in rediscovering the resonance of Gothic horror for an era where tragedy dominates and yet heroism is still possible with the greatest of effort, perhaps we can remind ourselves that, contra Count Dracula, the revenges of the past can be ended before they begin, and for our imagination’s greatest monsters, time is not on their side: in fact, it is running out.

IS GOTHIC HORROR MAKING A COMEBACK?

Making a bit of a buzz around the pop culture news feeds lately has been the resurgence of interest regarding gothic horror and romance (or a combination of the two). When this type of thing happens, there is usually a look back into the history of the topic. This article from Book Riot explains some of the reasons why gothic literature is becoming popular again, as well as how it is influencing new work on this rich historical subject.

Following the article is the first issue of DC's DARK MANSION OF FORBIDDEN LOVE (Sept./Oct. 1971) with a cover by George Ziel (who painted a number of paperback gothic romance novels), a script by Dorothy Woolfolk and Ethan C. Mordden and art by Tony de Zuniga. Also included is the text story, "The Love That Was Stronger Than Death", by none other than Wes Craven!

ARE WE IN THE MIDST OF A GOTHIC HORROR BOOM?

By Isabelle Popp | Oct 29, 2021 | bookriot.com

As the title of this article asks, are we in the midst of a gothic horror boom? The short answer is yes. With popular gothic horror-inflected titles like Mexican Gothic, The Broken Girls, and The Only Good Indians coming out in recent years, fans of ominous houses laden with festering secrets can rejoice. So the deeper question to ask is why are we in the midst of this gothic boom?

GOTHIC BOOKS COME IN WAVES

To understand the genre’s popularity, first we look back. The first big wave of gothic novels came during the late 1700s. The Mysteries of Udolpho by Ann Radcliffe was a hit from 1794, for example, following Emily St. Aubert’s misadventures in a gloomy castle. Gothic romance and horror remained popular for a couple of decades. That wave crested, though it produced some of the works of gothic horror that remain essential today. Namely, Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein and Jane Austen’s gothic send-up Northanger Abbey.

There was a lull throughout the mid-1800s, although Edgar Allan Poe is an enduring gothic horror writer from that time period. Again at the end of the 19th century, gothic appetites ramped up. Some well known classics like Dracula, The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, The Turn of the Screw, The Picture of Dorian Gray, and The Phantom of the Opera come from this era.

Again there was a lull. Rebecca marked an extremely popular blip that led to the gothic romance craze of the mid to late 20th century. Some people attributed the lulls to times that real life was scary enough, like entire era of the First and Second World Wars, when society didn’t crave scary books. Others think this cycle is related to fin de siècle syndrome. Among other symptoms, the “syndrome” creates waves of pessimism that permeate culture near the ends of centuries. Did we see it at the end of the 20th century? Sure enough. Stephen King, Anne Rice, and Toni Morrison were key writers employing gothic modes during that time. Even Jurassic Park is a retelling of Frankenstein. Dr. Roxanne Douglas expanded on that idea in her fascinating lecture about the gothic dinosaur horror franchise.

SO WHAT ABOUT NOW?

We should have cleared any fin de siècle malaise we had by now, right? And needless to say, real life is plenty scary. Yet people are still hungry for thrilling stories of ghosts, monsters, and other unspeakable evils. So I’ve looked at some of the common themes in gothic horror, and it’s quite simple. Authors are continuing to make gothic themes relevant to contemporary readers by using them in new and fascinating ways. I’ve explored a handful of the themes below. So pick your poison and discover how the world we live in is really just one big haunted house.

THE PAST HAUNTING THE PRESENT

Ghosts are a manifestation of the past intruding on the present, a persistent theme in gothic horror. At our current stage of late capitalism, society is witnessing a reckoning. Past atrocities committed for economic gains are very much still with us, not as malevolent ghosts but as pernicious systems. Gothic books has sometimes sidelined these ugly truths; we visit a manor like Manderley in Rebecca but the exploited labor that funded its construction is hard to see. Recent books like Mexican Gothic and When No One is Watching make these connections between past and present viscerally clear. 

The spectacular middle grade ghost story The Forgotten Girl has a similar theme. Iris discovers a neglected segregated cemetery and researches it for a school project. But she has to contend with the best kind of antagonist: a righteous character demanding justice. In this case, it’s the ghost of a girl interred at the cemetery.

HAUNTED HOUSES

Haunted houses are a perpetual theme of the gothic. They are essentially a subset of the above category. Nowadays writers are imbuing haunted houses with rich commentary on contemporary concerns. White Smoke, a YA thriller pitched as The Haunting of Hill House meets Get Out, follows Marigold and her blended family. They are moving into a beautiful renovated home in the midwestern town of Cedarville. But the house, the street, even the town itself, has secrets. They’re manifesting as creepy voices and bad smells in Marigold’s house. She’s been running from ghosts forever, but now she has to face them down. This story makes tangible the horrors stemming from gentrification and mass incarceration.

Plain Bad Heroines takes the haunted house theme, and instead of a house, haunts a school for girls. The novel uses stories within stories, a device that also pops up in classic gothic novels from Wuthering Heights to The Turn of the Screw. When a modern cast of actors are working on a film adaptation of a tragic story from the school’s past, the past and present become intertwined. In some ways the ghosts in Plain Bad Heroines are welcome, as they represent queer women whose stories are often erased from the historical record.

EVIL CLERGY

Gothic novels of yore were rife with malevolent nuns and monks within crumbling abbeys and monasteries. Much of that writing was rooted in anti-Catholic sentiments from the time, made tangible via decrepit religious architecture. The pitfalls of religion are still on display in our current gothic craze. They reflect real life stories of how the imbalanced power dynamics between religious authorities and people in their flock can lead to corruption. 

Recent gothic novels that take on these ideas include The Year of The Witching. This menacing novel digs into the truth of a patriarchal cult and the opposing forces of witchcraft the main character Immanuelle Moore gravitates toward. It’s a bloody exploration of race, gender, family, and faith.

Another book that plays with some of these ideas is Yes, Daddy, pitched as a gay modern gothic. It highlights how religious trauma inflicted on young LGBTQIA+ people can leave them vulnerable for further abuse as adults. In this novel Jonah Keller, a young gay man from an evangelical background, moves to New York and falls under the thrall of Richard, and older and successful playwright. Pay attention to content warnings if this one intrigues you; it’s a brutal one.

GOTHIC ROMANCE SIDEBAR: SEXUAL DESIRES AND THE SUBLIME

Ever since I read the tweet reducing romance to “fan fiction about men,” I haven’t been able to stop thinking about it. Granted, there’s plenty of queer romance with no male characters. But I have been thinking about this tweet in conjunction with the craze for monster romances. There are certainly insidious elements to the trend. Namely, some readers enthusiasm for reading about sex with nonhuman creatures sits alongside their complaints of not being able to “relate” to romances with diverse representations of race, gender, sexuality, religion, or ability.

Still, gothic horror celebrates heightened emotions and the experience of the sublime. When cis men aren’t cutting it as objects of romantic fantasy, some readers are going beyond and turning to monsters. Monsters are a staple of gothic horror. They can represent a manifestation of science gone too far, as in Jurassic Park. Vampires can represent parasitism, as seen in the reclaimed lesbian vampire classic Camilla. Whatever is feared or misunderstood can become a monster in the gothic.

To me, the monsters in the monster romance are turning the monsters of gothic horror on their head. They acknowledge that in many classic monster stories, we’ve been wrong about who the monster is. Cue my favorite joke: Knowledge is knowing Frankenstein isn’t the monster. Wisdom is knowing Frankenstein is the monster.

This same idea bears out in Jurassic Park. Who’s really the monster? The dinosaurs doing what comes naturally to them, or the western scientists and developers who wreaked havoc on a Central American island and then peaced out?

A JOURNEY INTO MONSTER ROMANCE

With this flipped script, monster romances can be stories of misfits finding love. And so here I am letting you all know that I read Morning Glory Milking Farm, a minotaur romance. In it, Violet is a debt-ridden millennial who is willing to tackle a very unusual job involving minotaur, um, fluids, for a steady paycheck. And then one of her monstrous clients isn’t so monstrous after all. It’s both bananas and delightful.

That Time I Got Drunk and Saved a Demon is another book I’ve read in my curiosity about the monster romance craze. It’s a lighthearted fantasy adventure in which a woman and a demon team up to defeat a baddie. This demon isn’t particularly monstrous either, but like our minotaur friend above, he’s got horns. Horns are clearly on trend. If that sounds appealing, monster romances may be for you.

BACK ON TOPIC: SELF REFERENCE IN THE GOTHIC

Gothic novels love nothing more than to reference their own genre. I wrote about this more with Northanger Abbey in particular. But in our current culture and its seemingly bottomless appetite for retellings, adaptations, and remakes, the gothic is right at home.

Gothic classic Jane Eyre has seen a few recent retellings. One rendered sapphic is The Wife in the Attic, while The Wife Upstairs goes in a southern gothic direction. Brightly Burning is a YA spin on the classic tale of a headstrong woman and a mysteriously brooding man, but set in space.

One of my recent favorite gothic horror retellings, The Initial Insult, is a YA adaptation of Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Cask of Amontillado.” I adored the memes that made the internet rounds a few years ago, as rounded up in a Vox article. Those memes showed we were primed for a remake, and Mandy McGinnis delivered with the visceral tale of Tress Montor bricking Felicity Turnado into a wall for revenge. In this version, it happens at a Halloween party while the Poe references rain on astute readers. It’s a gripping gothic tale of how class gets in the way of friendships.

IN CONCLUSION: PUSHING TRADITIONS

Many scholars point out the conservative nature of gothic horror. By this, they mean that the resolutions of these stories of the supernatural, real or imagined, often return to a status quo in which tradition is upheld. Heterosexual marriages vanquish ghosts. Characters deemed the monstrous other are pushed into obscurity.

Today’s gothic novels, which continue to upend what the gothic stands for, have the option of nodding to tradition while taking the narratives in different directions. It can make the novels a little less pleasingly predictable than their forebears, but the distinct pleasures they bring are more than worth it. After all, we are living in a time when we have to face down all the ghosts of our own making. This new gothic horror boom can help us see the path forward.