Category: Gothic Literature

Modern writing has changed time and time again throughout the centuries. Arguably, one of the biggest influences for modern writing was gothic literature. Gothic literature was such a dramatic change from many previous works due to its dark, mysterious, melancholy tone. This different approach to writing allowed authors to express themselves in a different way than what was originally seen as “normal” or “the right way”. Gothic literature provided people with a different creative outlet allowing them to express their emotions as well as feelings towards certain things in a way that they could not have originally expressed through traditional writing styles. Gothic literature created a new era for writing blessing us with some of the most interesting and unique stories to ever be created.

One of the most well known authors of gothic literature was Edgar Allen Poe. Poe is one of the many authors during the gothic time period, but he had quite possibly the largest impact on the genre. Poe wrote many different works but among the most famous of these was a poem called “The Raven”. “The Raven” was a story about an unnamed man who lost the love of his life and is thrown into a very distraught and melancholy state causing him to have hallucinations. One of these hallucinations that the story is based around is a raven that flies into his room and speaks to him. It does not say any lengthy phrases, but instead it only replies to the narrator’s questions with the word “nevermore”. This helps add to the ommonus and spooky feel that the poem gives off. It is quite possibly one of the most well known gothic writings to date.

Poe’s story “The Raven” has been one of the most influential poems ever to be written. It not only helped shape the genre of gothic literature, but it has even gone as far to impact the writing of modern day comedic scripts. An example of this is an episode of the modern day comedic television show known as “The Simpsons”. In the episode they do an animated version of “The Raven” with their own little touch. This just goes to show that the influence of gothic literature spreads much further than dark and depressing poems and short stories.

Around the same time gothic literature was in its prime a large deal of people were migrating to the United States. “In large part, Americans’ anxiety about cities resulted from significant and rapid increases in urbanization and immigration in the late antebellum era. The Erie Canal greatly reduced transportation costs to Manhattan from the Great Lakes region, thus making the port city the entrepôt for inland agriculture and America’s ‘premier urban center.’ This commercial growth spurred New York City’s expansion in area and population, as it attracted migrants from both the hinterlands and overseas.” This allowed the genre of writing to diffuse through an incredibly dense and diverse area and then throughout the country. The main port responsible for this diffusion was Ellis Island.

Gothic literature has influenced writing in a very controversial way as well. The topic of sexuallity was a topic breiflly touched on in previous writing, but become a much more common topic during the era of gothic literature. “Multiple authors characterized brothels – again, enticing and immoral – as the Islamic paradise. As Edward Said has noted, European writers in the Orient sought ‘a different type of sexuality, perhaps more libertine and less guilt‐ridden.’ Readers’ familiarity at the time with huriyat – and, for that matter, Hārūn al‐Rashīd – is indicated by authors’ use of the allusions without any gloss. Like many Eastern images, huriyat appeared as the stuff of fantasy. In Hot Corn, Walter saw a huriya, which he had ‘often read of, often dreamed of, never before seen.’ As with allusions to Wall Street and saloons, authors acknowledged the attraction of the scene but criticized a lack of morality. Writers disagreed as to whether prostitutes were alluring or simply shameful.” Now the topic of sexuallity is a lot more common in writing as well as everyday life, and it is not viewed in such a negative way anymore. It is more widely accepted by a majority of modern society.

Another big part of gothic literature that was architecture. Architecture played a huge role in setting the mood of stories and poems as well as the construction of buildings outside of works of writing. Many of the building constructed in the era of gothic literature are still around today and many new ones have been constructed with the same concepts in designs as the original gothic structures. “In the 12th–13th century, feats of engineering permitted increasingly gigantic buildings. The rib vault, flying buttress, and pointed (Gothic) arch were used as solutions to the problem of building a very tall structure while preserving as much natural light as possible. Stained-glass window panels rendered startling sun-dappled interior effects.” Many of these buildings can still be found in places like new york city.

Another big thing to come from gothic literature was an increase in female authors. Many people believe that females played the biggest role in gothic literature, because the genre gave them a creative outlet for them to voice their opinions on society as well as express themselves in a way that they were never able to. The genre allowed them to express feminst ideologies through their stories and poems. “As many scholars have noted, women authors often create Gothic worlds that symbolize patriarchal power in which a virginal heroine attempts to overcome an exaggerated version of the subjugation women face in everyday life. However, a critical mass of women’s Gothic writing exists that addresses very different themes and characters.” “The middle of the century saw the emergence of Female Gothic with Emily Bronte’s Wuthering Heights. Exposing how women are often trapped in a domestic space and dominated by men, the novel was both celebrated and detested. Our next Gothic novel appears in 1871 with Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu’s Carmilla. Although influenced by Coleridge’s unfinished poem Christabel, Carmilla is influential in its own right. The “deviance” of female sexuality is explicit in this novel, especially by Victorian standards, and paves the way for the vampire as a sexual metaphor.” These beliefs are becoming more and more common as the years have progressed.

“The fall of the House of Usher” and” House Taken Over” are two stories we have read so far. These stories have similar stories with the whole house being taken over by a mysterious entity. Although both stories are technically different genres with “The Fall of the House of Usher” being gothic literature and “House Taken Over” is Magical realism the stories have very similar plots. Both stories end with the main characters leaving the house with nothing because it was completely taken over by these strange entities that the people have no idea who or what they are. Both stories are definitely worth the read, if not to expand your knowledge of the subject, to read them for fun.

‘House Taken Over’ is a 1946 short story by Julio Cortázar. It recounts to the narrative of a sibling and sister living respectively in their home which is being ‘dominated’ by obscure substances. It begins in a basic way and it gradually presents a scene where the regular laws are twisted. The question that is presented around what those substances are can be viewed in a few different ways, and this additionally causes the theme of the story to differ. Among the parts that are visited in the story, realistic signs are used to reflect restrictions on the main characters. The author put together the house with respect and great detail to immerse the reader into the plot. The Plot is the storyteller and sister, Irene fear a substance they call ‘they’ which is slowly taking over there house(The Short Story Project). This story is categorized as Magical Realism (myPerspectives 33).

“The Fall of the House of Usher” is a short story written by Edger Allen Poe. This story is an example of Gothic Literature which has a dull and dark feel to it, it introduces a ghostly aspect into the story that gives it the spooky feeling. As our anonymous narrator arrives at the House of Usher, a family home owned by his friend Roderick. The narrator spends some time admiring the amazing qualities of the Usher house. Roderick has been very sick and he wrote to the anonymous narrator to stay with him before he passes away. Roderick and his sister are the last of the Usher bloodline, and when they die the house dies with them (GradeSaver).

Magical realism is a style of writing that paints a realistic view of the modern world while also adding magical elements into the story line. It is sometimes called fabulism, in reference to the conventions of fables, myths, and allegory. ‘Magical realism’, perhaps the most common term, often refers to fiction and literature in particular (myPerspectives 33).

Gothic Literature, which is largely known by the subgenre of Gothic horror, is a genre that combines fiction and horror, death, and at times romance. It’s origin is attributed to English author Horace Walpole, with his 1764 novel The Castle of Otranto, subtitled ‘A Gothic Story’. The effect of Gothic fiction feeds on a pleasing sort of terror and fear for the adrenaline junkies (myPerspectives 42).

Edgar Allan Poe is a 19th century American writer, he mostly uses gothic elements in his literary works. One of his literary work which includes gothic elements is “The Cask of Amontillado”. “The Cask of Amontillado” is about a man, Montresor, who wants to take revenge from one of his friends, Fortunato, because Fortunato insults Montresor and at the end of the story, Montresor kills Fortunato due to this insult that is not explained to the reader. The definition of gothic is “of or relating to a style of fiction characterized by the use of desolate or remote settings and macabre, mysterious, or violent incidents” (Merriam-Webster). In the story, Poe uses gothic elements to emphasize the revenge and violence theme which the story includes. In this essay, I will analyse gothic elements from the perspective of setting madness and horror in “The Cask of Amontillado”.

Firstly, Poe emphasizes gothic elements with using setting elements, in the story. In the first place, the situation happens during “the carnival season” (3). Carnivals bring happiness to people, but the protagonist decides to kill someone during “the carnival season” (3). Also, because people go to the carnival, there are not any other people except Fortunato and Montresor in the story. Poe accentuates with this idea that; “the carnival season” (3), is a good time to find streets quiet, because other people go to the carnival and they cannot suspect the protagonist to kill someone. Furthermore, Fortunato is portrayed just like a clown. To emphasize his clothes Poe writes that; “a tight-fitting parti-striped dress, and his head was surmounted by the conical cap and bells.” (3-4). Fortunato is depicted in a clown costume with “a tight-fitting parti-striped dress,” (3). Moreover, the narrator writes, “…, and his head was surmounted by the conical cap and bells.” (4) and “… the bells upon his cap jingled…” (5) to complete Fortunato’s costume which is a costume for a clown. Clown costume implies that, Fortunato insults to Montresor. It is also, a gothic element, because clowns refer to a serial killer in some cases such as; Joker in “The Batman” and “Pennywise the Dancing Clown” from “It” which is one of the Stephen King’s books. Also, the narrator punctuates with; “The gait of my friend was unsteady, and the bells upon his cap jingled as he strode.” (5) to give a clue to the reader that bad things will happen, in the story. Because “…bells the jingle…” (5) is a messenger to bad situations, also it is a warning for Fortunato. In addition, Montresor wears a mask, “a mask of black silk” (5). In the story, Poe points out, “a mask of black silk” (5) hides Montresor’s facial expressions from Fortunato. In the story, when Montresor thinks about to kill Fortunato, he smiles, and Fortunato does not see Montresor’s smile because of this mask and Fortunato does not have a suspicion about Montresor’s plan to kill him.

Poe emphasizes another setting element while he is using gothic elements, in the story. This setting element is description of crypt. In the first place, there are “…white web-work…” (5) and “…catacombs…” (5). Poe symbolises with these items that, a prison for Fortunato, so the narrator gives the reader a clue about how the story will end and how the murderer kills his victim. However, “… white web-work…” (5), refer to dirtiness, too. That means, no one go there a while. Furthermore, the reader can understand, even Montresor does not go the crypt for so long, so he cannot put the “Amontillado” (3) there. That means, he will not show “Amontillado” (3) to Fortunato and it is a trap for him. In addition, ““Nitre,”” (5), emphasizes one of the gothic elements in the story because Montresor finds out Fortunato is sick, and he uses ““Nitre,”” (5) to kill him easily. Also, Poe features “…wine…” (6) as a drink, because it is similar colour with blood. That refers to death theme in the story. Moreover, Montresor mentions; ““We are below the river’s bed.”” (7). River stands for river of death, Styx, in Greek mythology. It also gives a clue for the reader about the end of the story and Fortunato’s future. Finally, “…through walls of piled bones…” (6), in this sentence, “…bones…” (6) refers to death theme in the story, because Montresor takes away Fortunato to his family graveyard, that means it supports the death theme. Also, it supports the idea of Montresor leading the way to Fortunato to his death. Poe emphasizes these setting elements while using gothic elements in the story.

Secondly, Poe emphasizes gothic elements with using madness factor, in the story. The first madness factor is suspense. The reader cannot know whether the event happens or not because the protagonist is unstable. To support that idea; Belino writes, “… the cask of amontillado that titles the short story never actually existed; it was a mere illusion built up in order to convince Fortunato to go to the Palazzo.” (Belino, 233). The reader can easily mention that at the end of the story. While Montresor builds a wall to capture Fortunato, Fortunato tells him; ““Let us be gone”” (10) and ““…Will not they be awaiting us at the palazzo, the Lady Fortunato and the rest? …”” (10). Fortunato calls Montresor and him as one and when Montresor captures him, he behaves like both are captured by Montresor himself. The second madness element in the story is Montresor’s obsession. In the story, Montresor is too obsessed to take revenge on Fortunato and he decides to kill him. Also, the story begins to describe how Montresor hates Fortunato and he plans to kill him. However, he does not mention what exactly Fortunato insults him about. If that insult is too much important to Montresor, he will mention it. That means, it is not too much important to kill someone or one of your old friends. Poe maintains with these, the obsession of Montresor which takes place in the story.

The final gothic element which is used in the story is horror. Firstly, Montresor plans to kill Fortunato. In the beginning of the story, Poe claims that Montresor wants to take revenge on Fortunato, and he decides that the best way to take his revenge is; killing one of his friends because his friend Fortunato just insults him. While Montresor is planning the murder, he thinks about every detail such as; Fortunato’s illness, Fortunato’s weaknesses, the time of the murder, to send his servants to the carnival to not have a witness, and the place of the murder. He decides everything and acts like he worries about Fortunato because of his illness, and he behaves like they meet on the street as a coincidence. In that case, Fortunato does not have any suspicions about Montresor’s plan which is about killing Fortunato. Furthermore, Montresor acts like he thinks about his illness and he worries about him and says to Fortunato that he should go his home because the crypt is damp, and that dampness is bad for Fortunato’s health. However, Fortunato is too excited because he will taste “Amontillado” (3), and he refuses his offerings to leave the place. Also, Montresor wears “mask of black silk” (5) to cover his face, so Fortunato does not recognize Montresor’s facial expressions, such as smiling when Montresor thinks about killing Fortunato or how well Montresor’s plan is going. Also, Montresor behaves like he has experienced to kill someone, in his past. In the story, Montresor plans everything such as a calmness of a serial killer, but Poe does not mention Montresor has killed anyone in his past. Montresor is too calm to a person who will kill someone after a while. Secondly, the way Montresor kills Fortunato is a horror element in the story. Montresor tricks Fortunato there is an “Amontillado” (3) at the depth of the crypt. He gives Fortunato wine because he wants to get Fortunato drunk, but instead of saying this he acts like he suggests drinking this wine because he thinks Fortunato’s health. Montresor makes Fortunato believes that “…wine…” (6) is good for his coughing and his health. When they come to the depth of the crypt, Montresor chains up Fortunato and starts to build a wall to capture him. That murder plan shows the reader that the vindictiveness of Montresor. He is angry to Fortunato because Fortunato insults him. Moreover, Montresor decides to kill his friend gingerly. He is calm and vindictive person. In addition, Montresor does not stab Fortunato because he decides that this murder is not enough to calm him for Fortunato’s behaviours in the past. Also, Montresor wants to watch his victim, Fortunato, while his victim is dying. Finally, while Montresor is putting on a wall to kill Fortunato to capture him, Fortunato laughs and says that ““Ha! ha! ha! – he! he! – a very good joke indeed-an excellent jest. We will have many a rich laugh about it at the palazzo-he! he! he! – over our wine- he! he! he!”” (10). That is a horror element in the story because Fortunato is laughing while he is dying. People do not laugh while they are dying; they will cry to not die, beg to the murderer to release them. However, Fortunato says only ““Let us be gone.”” (10) and he does not beg as a normal person.

In conclusion, Poe uses gothic elements in this short story to show the reader violence and death theme in the story. In this essay, I analysed, these gothic elements one by one. I think that, gothic elements complete the gaps in the story. The reader can understand how much Montresor hates Fortunato and how much he wants to get revenge on him.

Resources

1. Belino, Miles Juliana. «The Influence of Gothic Literature In Edgar Allan Poe’s ‘The Cask of Amontillado’.» Cosmic Fear (2017): 233.
2. Merriam-Webster

Throughout Poe’s life, many challenges have been thrown at him, causing him to fall into a deep depression. He was born in 1809, and his mother sadly passed away 2 years later in 1811. Poe was adopted by the Allen family after her death, but his siblings stayed with different families. While he lived with the Allens, he went to good schools and lived in a welcoming community. Edgar was a good student, but when he entered college he started heavily drinking, and this led to him going into debt. He dropped out of school quickly. Poe married his wife at the extremely young age of thirteen. She passed away at 24 years old.

In order to cope with his troubles, Poe turned to writing short stories and poetry. His work went around quickly, but not all of it was praised. Newspapers quickly rejected his stories. It took years for him to get a job, but in 1835 he finally scored a spot as an editor for a newspaper because of his story, The Manuscript Found In A Bottle. 5 years later he started working for Graham ́s Magazine. Because of his stories included in the magazine, it became much more popular. He made the stories interactive with the readers. For example, he challenged readers to send in cryptograms after reading his mystery story, The Murders in the Rue Morgue. He chose to solve each and every one of them. In 1842, Poe left the company because he wanted to start his own. However, this was a major mistake. His magazine The Stylus failed terribly. Because of this, Poe was, yet again, jobless. He published booklets with his stories and poems, but they weren’t sold enough. His story The Gold Bug got him $100 in prize money. He sold 300,000 copies, but it still was not enough for him to make a living. In 1845 he became an editor for The Broadway Journal, but it went bankrupt a year after he was hired. In 1847, his wife ́s health was quickly fading. She passed 10 days after Poe’s birthday. This caused Poe to become severely stressed, and he could barely function.

His last year was 1849. He was rushed to the hospital after being found at Gunner’s Hall, and he died 4 days after making it there on October 7th. However, no one knows exactly how he died, and it is still a mystery to this day. Many say he died from alcohol, but other conspiracies are that he had rabies or he was attacked. However, Poe brought us many amazing stories deep from his brain. Some popular stories or poems he wrote are The Raven, The Fall of the House of Usher, The Tell-Tale Heart, The Bells, Annabel Lee, and The Black Cat.

The Raven tells about a raven visiting a grieving man, and talking to him until he descends into complete madness. This work was written after the death of his wife. The raven is meant to represent ‘mournful and never-ending remembrance,’ according to Poe. The main conflict in the text is really in the narrator’s mind, after seeming to argue with the raven when in reality he is fighting with himself. Poe most likely wrote this text in order to cope with his pain and suffering after losing his loved one.

The Fall of the House of Usher is a twisted story about a man whose fear leads him to destroying everything. He fears that his sister’s seizures will quickly lead to her death, so he took things into his own hands and buried her alive. His family and his entire house fell apart. The theory of Poe’s reasoning to write this story is that it was based off of events he heard passing around through his town. This supposedly happened in the 1800s, before Poe was born. The story is basically about two lovers that died in their own home, locked in an embrace. Their skeletons were found and the house soon turned to dust. This is very similar to Poe’s story, and the darkness of the original tale could be what led him to write The Fall of the House of Usher.

The Tell-Tale Heart is yet another dark story by the famous Poe. It follows the narrator, claiming to be a sane man, as he murders an old man with a ‘vulture eye.’ Since his murder was calculated, he hid his body under floorboards to hide him from the police. However, once the police were onto him his lips became loose, and he confessed his wrongdoings. Poe may have wrote this text to let readers explore the darker side of the human mind, since he already knew what it was like.

Annabel Lee is a poem about the death of a beautiful woman which the narrator was in love with from a young age. Like some of his other texts, it connects to his own experiences with the death of his wife. In the poem, the narrator is so madly in love with Annabel that “angels are envious.” This was the last complete poem written by Poe. Annabel Lee is killed by a sea wind that gives her a deadly chill. The sea symbolizes loneliness and emptiness. She is placed in a tomb, which represents death. Poe was clearly traumatized by his loved one’s death, which is why so many of his works are about the death of a treasured woman.

Finally, The Black Cat is a story about a crazy alcoholic drawn mad by his addiction. This causes him to kill his cats, and eventually his wife. The black cats can symbolize the narrator’s soul, which is dark and decaying. The story also involves the death of a cherished woman, which obviously relates to the death of Poe’s own wife. Poe also struggled with alcohol. He also took opiums, which can cause users to suffer from delusions. The narrator in this story suffered from this, since peaceful cats drove him to insanity.

In conclusion, Poe wrote these dark, gothic texts in order to cope with the struggles in his life. Not many things went right in his life, so he turned to writing in order to let all of his pain and grief out, and in the end it led to his success. Edgar Allan Poe is looked at as one of the world’s greatest authors, and he is still praised as such today. Not many dared to go down the path Poe did, since back in his day not many writers found success. Poe’s notebook was his safe place, and we cherish him for not giving up on his twisted tales.

The Tell-Tale Heart is a short story written by Edgar Allan Poe in 1843. The piece talks about the life of an unnamed narrator who is suffering from psychosis and his continued attempt to prove his sanity. Operating from the first person point of view, Poe enables readers inside the head of the protagonist and his current battle with nervousness. The story moves forward as the narrator becomes fixated with the old man’s ‘vulture-like’ eye and plots to remove this evil from his body. It is in this process that he kills the old man, dismembers the body, and hides it under the floorboards. He would have escaped the investigation of the police if he did not confess his crimes due to the ringing that the narrator associated with the heartbeat of the old man.

One of the evident themes highlighted in the story corresponds to man’s battle with psychological conditions. Looking closely, the unnamed persona in the story tries to justify that he is not ill but rather his state of extreme nervousness is caused by the heightening of his senses, particularly that of his hearing (Poe 1). Though this might seem to be the case, the inability of the protagonist to recognize his condition prompts him to fixate on other things such as the eyes of the old man he takes care of, resulting in him murdering the person. In addition, the direct and vivid language used by the author in the story further adds to the appreciation of the psychosis experienced by the narrator.

Another important theme that can be used to analyze Poe’s piece is the contradictions evident in the narrator’s profile to commit murder. Other than he is psychologically imbalanced, he does not possess the motive to do the act against the old man. For instance, the story does not show his specific interest in the wealth of the person or demonstrate his hate against the old man (Mikansek 1). Seeing this, the initiative came from the fixation and obsession of the narrator with the old man’s ‘evil eye’. He plans the murder as a way to free the man from his burden. However, the narrator also fails to realize that doing this act would be murder and the vulture-like eyes he contends to be evil remains to be evil is a valuable part that continues to define the identity of the old man he cares for.

Lastly, Poe’s piece also uses different literary devices to convey ideas to readers. One way of doing this is through the use of symbolism. In the story, the beating heart represents the individual’s conscience as it tells him the mistake he committed in murdering the old man (Seneca 1). Equally, the use of vivid imagery and sound through words is also evident in Poe’s work. For example, the depiction of the murder scene was written dramatically and based on what the persona is thinking and feeling at the same time. All of these add depth to the story and enable readers to uncover the character’s exploits despite being written from the perspective of an insane man.

Overall, ‘The Tell Tale-Heart’ is a dark tale by Edgar Allan Poe that examines the extremity of actions that an insane man can do. By writing from the perspective of the narrator, readers can uncover his transformation and how the manifestations of his extreme nervousness paved the way for his fixation on the old man’s physical deformity. It is his recognition of his obligation to remove the ‘evil eye’ from the old man that motivates his quest for murder, validates his insanity, and consequently continues to show his humanity through the symbolism brought forward by the beating heart he hears by himself.

The 19th century was a marking era in literature with many movements and genres gaining popularity. After examining the romantic and gothic genre, it is clear that Frankenstein written by Mary Shelley respects the ideals of romanticism and the gothic genre. It is thus because of the setting’s frightening and sublime elements, it t is a work of the romantic and gothic genre. This is present in the sense of mystery they evoke, the value they attribute to nature and the fact that they are eerie environments that build suspense.

Gothic settings often serve as a backdrop for frightening circumstances, and the novel exemplifies this through dreary settings. The first instance the readers see of this is when Victor’s obsession with chemistry and anatomy as a student builds his desire to further develop his God complex explaining, “To examine the causes of life, we must first have recourse to death” (Shelley 58). The readers observe how this leads him to wander the cemetery at night, illegally digging up and gathering body parts, “Now, I was led to examine the cause and progress of this decay and forced to spend days and nights in vaults and charnel-houses […] I beheld the corruption of death succeed to the blooming cheek of life; I saw how the worm inherited the wonders of the eye and brain” (58). This assembly of corpse fragments at the cemetery fits into the gothic genre due to the fact that it evokes a sense of uneasiness in the reader and emphasizes the fear factor as a result of the frequent presence of paranormal activity at cemeteries. Shelley also makes use of dark, stormy settings at key moments. These are gothic settings for their purpose is to add to the mystery of the novel and foreshadow future events such as on the night of monster’s awakening“ It was on a dreary night in November that I beheld the accomplishment of my toils […] It was already one in the morning; the rain pattered dismally against the panes, and my candle was nearly burnt out” (66). This pathetic fallacy sets the tone for the monster’s birth and foreshadows the trouble he will cause further in the novel. Subsequently, the night Frankenstein and Elizabeth arrive at the inn for their honeymoon, there are violent winds and Victor observes that “Suddenly a storm of rain descended” (263). This also is a pathetic fallacy that foreshadows Elizabeth’s approaching death. It is evident due to these arguments that foreshadowing through the use of these sinister environments is a gothic convention that aids to build suspense and keep the readers interested. Subsequently, suspense is also developed in obscure settings.

Furthermore, gothic settings entail obscure places such as the Arctic regions and Orkney islands that are uncommon travel destinations that remain unexplored to the majority of readers. For instance, the remote setting of the North Pole creates an isolated and mysterious mood, “we were nearly surrounded by ice, which closed in on the ship on all sides […] compassed round by a very thick fog” (18). This setting is, additionally another example of pathetic fallacy as it correlates to the characters’ feelings of isolation. The monster is a lonely creature after a life of abandonment by his creator and rejection by mankind similarly to Walton, who has distanced himself from family and friends in the pursuit of knowledge and has little interaction with his crew. These two characters demonstrate the seclusion and essentially the dreary nature of the Arctic. Similarly, the Orkney Islands, a scarcely populated place with hardly even enough livestock to keep the animals and few inhabitants fed provides a total sense of isolation for the character. These are gothic settings because they are serving to unsettle the readers and create a sense of impending doom. They stimulate mystery to frighten the readers who can only imagine the unknown location where another destructive creature will be created. These isolated settings also often demonstrate the sublime, a characteristic of romanticism.

Finally, romantic settings often reflect a deepened appreciation of the beauties of nature. Mary Shelley demonstrates this in Frankenstein as the novel is set in Switzerland, well known for its scenic essence. Victor speaks of it highly “Dear mountains! my own beautiful lake! […]Your summits are clear; the sky and lake are blue and placid” (92). We also see later in the novel how the sublime natural world, serves as a source of consolation for the characters. After William’s death for which Victor feels that he is at fault, he heads to the mountains filled with anguish and remorse to restore his spirits

I remained two days at Lausanne, in this painful state of mind. I contemplated the lake: the waters were placid; all around was calm; and the snowy mountains, `the palaces of nature,’ were not changed. By degrees the calm and heavenly scene restored me, and I continued my journey towards Geneva (91).

Likewise, after a long, winter, the monster who had felt isolated and horrified with his appearance feels hopeful and joyful when spring arrives. Delighted at the surrounding beauty he says “My spirits were elevated by the enchanting appearance of nature […] (150). Mary Shelley uses the the romantic settings mentioned to demonstrate the admiration and healing powers of nature prevalent in the Romantic era.

Due to the setting characteristics, Frankenstein respects the criteria for the gothic and romantic. Undoubtedly, it is clear that Mary Shelley respects the traits of two closely connected genres through the physical location and atmosphere of the environments. Many of Mary Shelley’s other literary works fit the romantic or gothic genre which leads the reader to question what aspects of the two genres she made use of in those novels.

High and Popular Gothic were classed as poisonous novels which were read in secret. Beattie criticises the reading of sensationalist gothic novels as a dangerous past time because “Romances are a dangerous recreation… and tend to corrupt the heart and simulate the passions” (Beattie, J, (1970), pp. 309-327). In this assignment, I will argue that the relationship between the two genres is shifting alignments of popular and literary fictions with cultural theories, consumption and representations of science. This argument will explore the ways in which these genres were aligned with the historical process of modernity – with the Gothic representing the negative aspects of vice and barbarism that accompanied the changing parameters of civilisation, while Romance clung on to traditional values, manners and feelings.

The hypothesis for my argument is to argue that popular culture does not make romance Gothic a rubbish genre. Most people like the genre because it can alert us as to how the past was lived, by people living periods before us. Haggerty argues what leaves the audience often lusting over the gothic characters while Brooks points out that a clever historian is all it takes to remould an event for the present reader rather than keeping a mundane theme dated back centuries ago. Although I agree with both Brooks because of the media applications we have today making events from centuries ago seem more appealing to a present-day audience and Haggerty, I find myself agreeing more with Haggerty because Gothic leaves nothing out. There is nothing left unexplored throughout because the motif of Gothic is darkness. Therefore, the reader will expect to read about dark things that are decayed and neglected because these are antonyms of Gothic Hume also states that there are certain fixed properties within a Gothic narrative, such as a dark atmosphere and supernatural occurrences. We will never read a gothic novel which is colourful and where the sun is shining because this does not fit the structure of a gothic novel. Another criticism widely broadcasted is that Gothic fiction is now mass produced. Surely this can just be a good thing because it makes it more accessible and allows working class to read it. Gothic is therefore no longer an activity which just the upper classes of society can enjoy. I agree with Reeve that Gothic was an opposite of romantic and medieval, but within this now exists a subgenre of Romantic Gothic. Romantic novels are concerned with love and passion, Gothic on the other hand, is concerned with decayed emotion. An inconsistency in Gothic is that ‘Gothic novelists did not know how to release their own feelings of frustration and rebelliousness. Their fiction is both exploratory and fearful’ as Kilgour tells us. It usually results in the death of a villain. Miles has a valid point about how you cannot constrain Gothic to a particular type of text, preferring to class Gothic literature as a taste or preference. Overall, I will show that the reception of gothic writing-its institutional and commercial recognition as a kind of literature- played a fundamental role in shaping many of the ideological assumptions about high culture that we now associate with the term Romanticism.

The Gothic novel was first invented almost single-handedly by Walpole as The Castle of Otranto fits most of the classifications we see in Gothic today. ‘The Gothic, like any genre, depends on a system of classification, and because genres, as Derrida argues, are never pure, and systems of classification, according to Foucault, cannot be verified, one is pressed to investigate and contest the validity of the definitions and conceptions typically attributed to the term “Gothic”, a kind of writing that is evidently heterogeneous and impure’ (Alshatti, A. (2008).). Walpole’s novel was imitated in the eighteenth century, but it was enjoyed widespread influence in the nineteenth century partly because of the era’s understanding in dark and fascinating themes. He could be said to have been influenced by Shakespearean dramas because in The Castle Of Otranto he plays around with mental disturbances, where Manfred seeks to marry the soon to be wife of his dead son Conrad to keep his genes alive throughout generations. Lady Macbeth evidently suffers from a psychotic disorder with the misfortune of hallucinations which can be induced by extreme guilt. She has the sense of heavy guilt because her and her husband killed King Duncan in cold blood. Gothic, it can be argued, was instrumental in the decisive shift towards popular fiction in its modern form, aimed at a brood readership, commercially streamlined, formulaic, with the profit motive uppermost. The characterisation can change at times because it used to be the case where you would see the monster. Nowadays, it tends to be the case where the monster is hidden, so this shows a transformation in the way the novel is illustrated. The scene and characters are unchanging though as there is always a brutal atmosphere with the weather and as for characters there is always a villain and a hero. “The Gothic is an allusion to or characteristic of the Middle Ages, or, more obliquely, the medieval or romantic, both of which are positioned as opposite classics” (Reeve, 2012, p. 233). ‘Though God cannot alter the past’, the Victorian essayist Samuel Butler noted, ‘historians can’ (Brooks, 1999, p. 2). So, historians have the power to change segments of the history so it can mirror something closer to our lives we live now, instead of mirroring something which we would class as tasteless that happened many centuries ago. During the publication of Gothic texts there was a movement of clear distinction between praised Gothic novels and criticised Gothic novels.

The genre of gothic presupposes that it is a historically enclosed genre, which I believe to be a false claim because historians can play with time, making it similar to what happened, but perhaps not in the same way, as we would view this as being quite bland. “This narrow view of the history of the Gothic that separates the gothic novel from its non-novelistic counterparts and gothic novels from other gothic works by the same writer may partly be attributed to the ambivalence of the term “Gothic” itself, and partly to the Romantic ideology that dominated the Romantic canon for a considerable part of the twentieth century” (Alshatti, A (2008), p.10). “The decade of the French Revolution was also the period when the Gothic novel was at its most popular” (Botting, 1996, p. 6). This is why the gothic setting is a classic and never changes, the story is always set with a dark, stormy night. These Gothic trappings include haunted castles, supernatural occurrences (sometimes with natural explanations), secret panels and stairways, time-yellowed manuscripts, and poorly lighted midnight scenes” (Hume, 1969, p. 282). These features are commonly used to create the correct atmosphere for the piece. The Gothic motifs that are common are torture, imprisonment and terror. Researchers of novel history have submitted their general direction to Walpole and appropriated the expression ‘gothic’ for the popular books that overwhelmed the 1790s, and on the grounds that this move has concentrated basically on the novel, it has brought about the disregard of a substantial amount of gothic writing that showed up in sorts other than the novel. The affiliation of the Gothic with ladies’ journalists has heightened this disregard since it was for quite a while the propensity in twentieth-century investigations of Romanticism to concentrate essentially on the poetical yield of six male artists: Blake, Wordsworth, Coleridge, Byron, Shelley and Keats. Miles adds to the argument that Gothic fiction is not historically closed because “It as a literary historical solecism to equate the Gothic only with fiction. During it’s initial phase (1750-1820) Gothic writing also encompassed drama and poetry, and before it was any of these Gothic was a taste, an aesthetic” (Alshatti, A, (2008), p.26). I agree with Ellis who argues that gothic fiction adopts and recycles gothic fiction in an attempt to posit a theory of history by presenting a fictive narrative as a kind of history in The History of Gothic Fiction. The combination of history and fiction, along with the Romanticism creates a hybrid of the gothic narrative and as seen with The Castle of Otranto, Gothic eludes strict categorisation and defies generic formulations. For these reasons I believe that Gothic Literature cannot be delimited by genre or confined by discipline.

Gothic is also interesting because of how gender was viewed at the time some of the classics were written. “In no other century was woman such a dominating figure, the very essence of rococo being a female delicacy” (Alshatti, A, (2008), p.21). Gothic is also an interesting genre as it shares elements with various other genres. The weak and defenceless woman who is stick until a knight hurries to her rescue shares the motif with a tragedy and a fairy-tale. This leads to the woman dominating and being in control when the knight saves her. This mix of intertextuality enriches Gothics stock elements. In evident Gothic style, limits are trespassed, explicitly love crossing the limit among life and demise and Heathcliff’s transgressing social class and family ties. Brontë pursues Walpole and Radcliffe in depicting the oppressive regimes of the dad and the savageries of the male centric family and in reconstituting the family on non-male centric lines, despite the fact that no counterbalancing matron or matriarchal family is displayed. The climate pounded Wuthering Heights is the conventional mansion, and Catherine takes after Ann Radcliffe’s courageous women in her valuation for nature. Like the traditional Gothic legend reprobate, Heathcliff is a puzzling figure who demolishes the lovely lady he seeks after and who usurps legacies, and with run of the mill Gothic overabundance he hitters his head against a tree. Heathcliff is below the standard of what Cathy is expected to marry into so she goes for Edgar. By the time Catherine undergoes the trials and tribulations of family life she is dead. Heathcliff tries to see her but is simply too late. Although, when Heathcliff is told by Lockwood, half in jest that Wuthering Heights is haunted, it seems to encompass the audience that the building is preyed upon by spirits. Considering the house is centred on in the play, it lets the audience find out that in order to enter the house you have to also enter the stories of those who had lived there before he entered. Ellen Moers feminist theory is “Women’s proper sphere of activity is elsewhere [than writing]. Are there no husbands, lovers, brothers, friends to coddle and console? Are there no stockings to darn, no purses to make, no braces to embroider? My idea of a perfect woman is one who can write but won’t” (-, (2016)). Moers criticises that women were not meant to write, they were not in a creative business industry, however the perfect woman in her eyes could write if the boundaries were shifted.

It is argued that some gothic writing was written for the working classes. It identifies and explores the consistent framing of sensation fiction as a pathological ‘style of writing’ by middle-class critics in the periodical press, revealing how such responses were moulded by new and emerging medical research into the nervous system, the cellular structure of the body, and the role played by germs in the transmission of diseases. “Where the classical was well ordered, the Gothic was chaotic, where the classical was simple and pure, Gothic was ornate and convoluted; where the classics offered a world of clear rules and limits, Gothic represented excess and exaggeration, the product of the wild and the uncivilised, a world that constantly tended to overflow cultural boundaries” (Punter, 2004, p. 7). If Hume is correct then Gothic romanticism could not have been written for working classes because if Gothic was a poor art, then it would require people of higher intellect to read it and to understand it properly. Gothic was often thought as a genre written for women, though it was said to make their brains rot, which is why they read it in secret. As Robert Miles recently put it, “Gender, one may say, is the law of the Gothic genre”. The Gothic offers commentators the chance to examine the effect of female readership on the flavours of the distributing market, the development of an unmistakable ladylike talk in the open circle, and most critically, the complex connections which exist among Gothic and sexual orientation. In any case, at the core of the gothic plot is the jeopardized courageous woman, assailed by the oppression of a man centric figure; in scholarly history the gothic novel has been related with ladies’ essayists and female readership; yet incomprehensibly as an outcome of the strength of a Romantic belief system the non-novelistic assortments of Gothic delivered by authors other than the six male artists have been side-lined. Howard has also suggested that “Given the more or less fixed nature of many received views-about the rise of the novel and realism as its dominant form, about the marginal role and status of women writers, about the nature of genre itself and the Gothic as a ‘popular’ form with predictable textual properties- situating Gothic texts with greater precision against the dominant literary canon and other cultural texts seem an important task” (Howard, 1994, p. 2).

Many have acclaimed that “While gothic’s contentious reception constituted it as a conspicuously “low” form against which romantic writers could oppose themselves, its immense popularity, economic promise, and sensational subject matter made this opposition a complex and ultimately conflicted and duplicitous endeavour” (Gamer, M, (2000), p.7). Gamer is suggesting that even though there is a great deal of overlap, they are not the same category. Yes, something can be gothic and also romantic, but this is not always the case. “The gothic perpetually haunts, as an aesthetic to be rejected, romanticism’s construction of high literary culture” (Gamer, M (2000), p.7). Until 1970 women often hid the fact that they were reading excerpts from gothic novels or gothic novels themselves because at best they were considered a “novel slideshow of romanticism, and at worst an embarrassing and pervasive disease destructive to national culture and social fabric” (Gamer, M, (2000), p.8). Gamer argues here that people, especially women hid the fact that they read Gothic as ideas conjured up on it were classed as unfeminine and this had the power to break British culture. Miles states that “Gothic is a discursive site, a “carnivalesque” mode for representations of the fragmented subject. Both the generic multiplicity of the Gothic and what one might call its discursive primacy, effectively detach the Gothic from the tidy simplicity of thinking of it as so many predictable, fictional conventions”. Again, romance fits in with Gothic and can tie in really well making Gothic Romantic novels and in turn these end up being very popular. Gothic novels are so popular because they evoke the emotion of fear about the supernatural rather than being about the supernatural itself. Another thing we like are character doubles. In Frankenstein, Viktor and the creature are doubles of each other. Both protagonists are heavily isolated which I can see at various stages in the book, firstly when Viktor states “I am now alone” in chapter three and later in the novel when the creature reflects Viktor’s isolation “am I not alone, miserably alone?”. I would argue that Frankenstein is not a Romantic work and is Gothic, because Viktor ends up killing Elizabeth. Veeder states that Viktor, has females as correspondents as opposed to companions. He cannot love Elizabeth as he does not unite with her, instead he ‘substitutes her. He projects his male element outward in the monster, allows the female to become dominant in himself, and spends the rest of the novel seeking to make love to his self” (Ketterer, D, (1973), p.269). So, if Frankenstein can be classed as a Romantic novel, it is Romantic between Viktor and the creature, not Viktor and Elizabeth.

In comparison to Shelley’s Frankenstein, is Stevenson’s The Strange Case Of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde in terms of popular culture in Gothic Romanticism. Both novels have monsters, but the difference is that the monster in Stevenson’s novel is not artificially created from stitched-together body parts but fully emerges from the dark side of the human personality. The Gothic component of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde is spoken to by means of the subject of multiplying. This is uncovered to the peruser by the stunning change of Dr Henry Jekyll into the atavistic killer Edward Hyde. The change is produced by the dread of relapse, as the two men are uncovered to be a similar individual. Stevenson’s portrayal of the decent man of honour Dr Jekyll as fit for the horrible conduct shown by Mr Hyde, is proof of his control of Victorian nerves and social feelings of trepidation. It broke the facade of class-adapted decency that secured and controlled the lives of good individuals from the populace. As the content illustrates, it isn’t just the devastated, common laborers living in the ghetto territories of the city that are fit for perpetrating violations; offenders are additionally found in instructed, well off, and apparently decent echelons of society. Gothic fiction has seen many versions of doubles or sinister alter egos on various occasions but Stevenson’s unique idea with Jekyll and Hyde was not only to portray dual natures of a singular man but to portray two sides of society in general, as a whole. Honesty is also shown portrayed against duplicity and abandonment against restraint. The topic of multiplying is symbolized all through the content. The city of London is part in two. The one side where Dr Jekyll, Mr Utterson and their counterparts live and work is spoken to as shrewd, well off and instructed zone, distinguished all things considered in Utterson’s referral to Cavendish square – the home of Dr Lanyon – as ‘that fortification of medication.’ conversely, the opposite side of London is spoken to by the region of Soho, a ghetto region of the city that symbolizes an atavistic play area, where corrupt conduct is normal and in this way substantially less observable. The novel is now associated with the mental condition of a ‘split personality’, where two personalities of differing character reside in one person. As Darwin holds the sentiment that people advance from increasingly less difficult living beings after some time Mr. Hyde can be viewed as an increasingly basic living being of his mind who has a creature like appearance and depicted as the ‘child of hell’ in the novel. However, the text was written before the science of psychology was firmly established, and the novella itself appears to be influenced by a variety of scientific theories predominant in the late-Victorian era.

Overall, my judgement is that Romantic Gothic does create popularity. Popular characteristics of Gothic fiction are mystery, the supernatural, haunted houses, castles, darkness, death and decay, romance madness, monsters. Frankenstein is a popular novel therefore because it was published in the first half of the nineteenth century where a monster is created from Viktor and out of this a romance builds while he shifts his affections from Elizabeth to the create; ends up killing Elizabeth. Walpole’s Castle Of Otranto could be said to have been influenced by Shakespearean dramas because in The Castle Of Otranto he plays around with mental disturbances, where Manfred seeks to marry the soon to be wife of his dead son Conrad to keep his genes alive throughout generations. Most mental disturbances seen throughout literature is present because of guilt in some form. The scene and characters are unchanging though as there is always a brutal atmosphere with the weather and as for characters there is always a villain and a hero. These stock characters are in every novel but are fleshed out for the sake of advancing in the novel. The genre of gothic is said to be historically closed, I disagree with this declarative because historians can play with time, making a tragedy from many centuries ago tasteful and appealing to the modern audience.

The French Revolution is what created the Gothic genre, this is how having a glum setting is attractive to a modern audience. Gothic literature in many cases is also a form of escapism, it is so far from our everyday life. Miles also adds that Gothic is a taste and is not just applied to novels. I believe this is the case that Gothic is a taste that does not belong to a certain time period and is certainly not enclosed. It cannot be an enclosed drama because of different types of media like dramas and poetry. Poetry and dramas are still being produced today with the same motifs. Also, relating it back to Walpole being inspired by Shakespeare’s use of mental health, if Walpole used this because he recongnised that an audience liked this type of genre, it cannot be enclosed because it has been done before. So, Walpole parodying Shakespeare’s work proves the Gothic genre cannot be an enclosed genre. Gender is viewed in Gothic where the woman typically waits for the man to rescue her and there afterwards is dominant. Heathcliff is below the standard of what Cathy is expected to marry into so she goes for Edgar. By the time Catherine undergoes the trials and tribulations of family life she is dead. Heathcliff tries to see her but is simply too late. Ellen Moers theory is true because women writers were not thought of as equal compared to Byron or Keats. It was not thought a woman’s place to write or even make a living for themselves. She liked a woman that was capable of writing but did not choose to as this would not fit in well with society. Some believe that Gothic was written for working class, while some like Punter believe Gothic novels are rather chaotic compared to a classic which is well structured and well organised. My problem with this is if gothic novels were though of as chaotic, surely it would take someone of higher intellect to understand it and get feelings of enjoyment from it, rather than being left in a bemused state by the genre. Mile’s then goes on to say that gender is the law of Gothic genre.

By this does he mean that women cannot or should not be able to read Gothic? Surely, he cannot mean this because Gothic was said to be written for women to read secretly because it rotted their brains. However, in the 1790’s when Gothic was a fairly new genre it was expensive to afford a gothic novel, so men would have to purchase them for women to read. This does not cut-off women from reading the genre though, if anything it would entice them, making them want to read it more. Gamer argues that women hid the fact that they read Gothic as ideas conjured up on it were classed as unfeminine and this had the power to break British culture. Romance fits in with Gothic and can tie in really well making Gothic Romantic novels and in turn these end up being very popular. Gothic novels are so popular because they evoke the emotion of fear about the supernatural rather than being about the supernatural itself. In Frankenstein, Viktor and the creature are doubles of each other. Both protagonists are heavily isolated and this could be why the bond seems to happen naturally. Veeder states that Viktor, has females as correspondents as opposed to companions. He cannot love Elizabeth as he does not unite with her, instead he ‘substitutes her. He kills Elizabeth, and becomes the female himself allowing the monster to become masculine. So, if Frankenstein can be classed as a Romantic novel, it is Romantic between Viktor and the creature, not Viktor and Elizabeth. Darwin captured the idea of evolution, that we have grown from simple species. It could be said that Mr. Hyde is a small organism of his mind who has an animal-like appearance and is referred to as the ‘child of hell’ throughout the novel. This could fit with the split personality aspect and the duality because everything is not always as it meets the eye. He could get called the child of hell and look animal like but he could be intellectual and think highly of himself. Dr. Jekyll, the other half of Mr. Hyde says “With every day and from both sides of my intelligence, the moral and intellectual, I thus drew steadily to that truth by whose partial discovery I have been doomed to such a dreadful shipwreck: that man is not truly one, but truly two”. This clearly reveals his intelligence, so maybe Mr. Hyde’s intellect is hidden. This is on the grounds that Dr. Jekyll in the last periods of his clarity perceives the threat that Mr. Hyde postures to society and benevolently chooses to get rid of himself. Stevenson appears to dispose of Christian ideas of monism and hold onto dualism as depicted previously. You need to be clever to be evil and pose a danger to society, so he clearly comes across as a child of hell when in reality he is smart enough to case havoc for everyone that surrounds him in London.