GOTHIC FICTION
 Gothic fiction, or Gothic horror, is a genre of literature that
combines fiction, horror, and romance. Melodrama and
parody are other long-standing features of the Gothic.
 It originated in England in the second half of the 18th
century and had much success in the 19th as witnessed by
Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, Bram Stoker’s Dracula, and
the works of Edgar Allan Poe.
 The name Gothic refers to the (pseudo)-medieval
buildings in which many of these stories take place –
castles, dungeons, decaying ruins, monasteries, and
haunted mansions.
THE GOTHIC SETTING
 English Gothic writers often associated medieval
buildings with what they saw as a dark and terrifying
period, characterized by harsh laws enforced by
torture, and with mysterious, fantastic, and
superstitious rituals.
 Prominent features of Gothic fiction include terror
(both psychological and physical), mystery, the
supernatural, ghosts, haunted houses and Gothic
architecture, castles, darkness, death, decay, doubles,
madness, secrets, and hereditary curses.
STOCK CHARACTERS
The stock characters of Gothic fiction
include tyrants, villains, bandits, maniacs,
Byronic heroes (based on Lord Byron’s
works), persecuted maidens, femmes fatales,
monks, nuns, madwomen, magicians,
vampires, werewolves, demons, dragons,
angels, fallen angels, ghosts, perambulating
skeletons, and the Devil himself.
CHARACTERISTIC ELEMENTS
OF GOTHIC FICTION
 A castle, ruined or intact, haunted or not
 Ruined, sinister buildings
 Dungeons, underground passages, crypts, and catacombs which, in
modern houses, become spooky basements or attics
 Labyrinths, dark corridors, and winding stairs
 Shadows, a beam of moonlight in the blackness, a flickering candle,
or the only source of light failing
 Extreme landscapes, like rugged mountains, thick forests, or icy
wastes, and extreme weather
OTHER CHARACTERISTICS:
 Omens and ancestral curses
 Magic, supernatural manifestations, or the suggestion of
the supernatural
 A passion-driven, willful villain-hero or villain
 A curious heroine with a tendency to faint and a need to be
rescued–frequently
 A hero whose true identity is revealed by the end of the
novel
 Horrifying (or terrifying) events or the threat of such
happenings
EDGAR ALLAN POE
“Poe is the supreme
short story writer of
all time.”
– Sir Arthur Conan
Doyle.
“I think Edgar Poe is the most original American genius.” Alfred, Lord Tennyson
“The prince of American Literature.” - Victor Hugo
“Poe’s genius has yet conquer’d a special recognition for
itself, and I too have come to fully admit it, and to fully
appreciate it and him.” - Walt Whitman
“It’s because I liked Edgar Allen Poe’s stories so much that I
began to make suspense films.” - Alfred Hitchcock
 The name Poe brings to mind images of murderers and
madmen, premature burials, and mysterious women who return
from the dead. His works have been in print since 1827 and
include such literary classics as “The Tell-Tale Heart,” “The
Raven,” and “The Fall of the House of Usher.”
 This versatile writer’s oeuvre includes short stories, poetry, a
novel, a textbook, a book of scientific theory, and hundreds of
essays and book reviews. He is widely acknowledged as the
inventor of the modern detective story and an innovator in the
science fiction genre, but he made his living as America’s first
great literary critic and theoretician.
 Poe’s reputation today rests primarily on his tales of terror as
well as on his haunting lyric poetry.