THE EVOLUTION OF THE GOTHIC
Luigi Capuana, Ugo Tarchetti, M.R. James and Gerald
Durrell
LECTURE OVERVIEW AND STORIES
The changing function
of the Gothic

Ugo Tarchetti, ‘Le
leggende del castello
nero’ (1869)

Later Gothic and the
Uncanny

Luigi Capuana, ‘Un
Vampiro’ (1906)

M.R. James, ‘A School
Story’ (1911)

Gerald Durrell, ‘The
Entrance’ (1979)

Fear in later Gothic
narratives
Copyright: R. Sibley, University of Warwick
2014

THE EVOLUTION OF THE GOTHIC
Every literary movement and genre evolves over time.

What happens when the Gothic is detached from
Romanticism and the Sublime?

Do later Gothic texts have the same function as earlier
ones?

How do these later texts compare to the earlier
narratives in terms of content and narration?
Copyright: R. Sibley, University of Warwick
2014

James Gillray, Tales of Wonder 1802
Copyright R. SIbley, University of Warwick
2013
THE GOTHIC AND THE SUBLIME
Casper David Friedrich, Cloister Cemetery in
the Snow (1817-19)
Horace Vernet, Stormy Coast Scene After a
Shipwreck (1830s)
What happens when the Gothic becomes detached
from the Sublime?
1818
1847
Jane Austen, Northanger Abbey
Emily Bronte, Wuthering Heights
1922
1931
1955
1979
1999
2008
Todd Browning, Dracula / James
Whale, Franeknstein
Charles Laughton, Night of the Hunter
Gerald Durrell, ‘The Entrance’
Alan Moore, From Hell
True Blood
1907
1897
F. W. Murnau, Nosferatu
M.R. James, Ghost Stories of an
Antiquary
Bram Stoker, Dracula
1886
1869
1808
Mary Shelley, Frankenstein
Ugo Tarchetti, ‘Le leggende del castello
nero’
Robert Louis Stevenson, Dr Jekyll and
Mr Hyde
1796
1764
Matthew Lewis, The Monk
Hroace Walpole, The Castle of Otranto
LATER GOTHIC TIMELINE
FROM THE SUBLIME TO THE SUPERNATURAL
Movement from the Sublime of Romanticism towards a
new form of Gothic after the mid C19th.

Texts like Stevenson’s The Strange Case of Doctor
Jekyll and Mister Hyde pick up on elements of Shelley’s
Frankenstein but are moving closer to science fiction.

Later C19th Gothic narratives are less revolutionary –
are part of an established tradition within C19th
literature.

Capuana interesting example of ‘scientific’ response to
supernatural events – blends verismo with the Gothic to
create a ghost story.
Copyright: R. Sibley, University of Warwick
2014

THE GOTHIC IN FILM
Copyright: R. Sibley, University of Warwick
2014
TWENTIETH-CENTURY GOTHIC
M.R. James a key figure in C20th Gothic – saw himself
as a Victorian so his stories often look back to that age.

His stories are very contained and are not commenting
on the wider world – just there to scare the reader.

Move towards psychological horror – terrible events are
suggested rather than explicitly outlined.

Same with Durrell’s story – is a very effective piece of
entertainment but not trying to critique contemporary
society.
Copyright: R. Sibley, University of Warwick
2014

THE GHOST STORY VS THE GOTHIC
The Gothic is now synonymous with the ghost story –
such as the work of M.R. James.

The ghost story is far simpler than the earlier Gothic
narratives – intended to scare rather than anything else.

Also, the ghost story rarely challenges accepted
authorities or social orders.

It is also a ‘safe’ form of entertainment – the audience
enjoys being scared in a predictable or formulaic way,
whereas earlier Gothic narratives were innovative and
wholly unpredictable for their readership.
Copyright: R. Sibley, University of Warwick
2014

M.R. JAMES AND THE GHOST STORY



An institutional location
(abbey, school, cathedral)
Male protagonist with
scholarly pretensions
Discovery of an antiquarian
object that invokes
supernatural events
Why is this formula
significant?
Copyright: R. Sibley, University of Warwick
2014
M.R. James’s ghost
stories involve:
FREUD, ‘THE UNCANNY’ (1919)
As I was walking, one hot summer afternoon, through the deserted streets of a
provincial town in Italy which was unknown to me, [...] I hastened to leave the
narrow street at the next turning. But after having wandered about for a time
where my presence was now beginning to excite attention. I hurried away once
more, only to arrive by another détour at the same place yet a third time. Now,
however, a feeling overcame me which I can only describe as uncanny, and I
was glad enough to find myself back at the piazza I had left a short while before,
without any further voyages of discovery. Other situations which have in common
with my adventure an unintended recurrence of the same situation, but which
differ radically from it in other respects, also result in the same feeling of
helplessness and of uncanniness. So, for instance, when, caught in a mist
perhaps, one has lost one's way in a mountain forest, every attempt to find the
marked or familiar path may bring one back again and again to one and the
same spot, which one can identify by some particular landmark. Or one may
wander about in a dark, strange room, looking for the door or the electric switch,
and collide time after time with the same piece of furniture.
Copyright: R. Sibley, University of Warwick
2014
without enquiring my way, I suddenly found myself back in the same street,
THE ROLE OF THE OBJECT - TARCHETTI
(‘Le leggende del castello nero’)
Copyright: R. Sibley, University of Warwick
2014
“Era, meglio che in involto, un grosso plico quadrato in
vecchia carta grigiastra macchiata di ruggine, e cucita
lungo gli orli con filo bianco e a punti esatti e regolari che
accusavano l’ufficio di una mano di donna. La carta,
tagliata qua e là dal filo, e arrossata e consumata sugli orli,
indicava che quel piego era stato fatto da lungo tempo.
Mio zio lo ricevette dalle mani di mio padre, e lo vidi
tremare ed impallidire nell’osservarlo. Tagliatane la carta,
ne trasse due vecchi volumi impolverati, e non v’ebbe
gettato su gli occhi, che il suo volto si coperse di un pallore
cadaverico...”
THE ROLE OF THE OBJECT - JAMES
(‘A School Story’, p.112)
Copyright: R. Sibley, University of Warwick
2014
“[Sampson] had a charm on his watch-chain [...] a
gold Byzantine coin; there was an effigy of some
absurd emperor on one side; the other side had been
worn practically smooth, and he had had cut on it –
rather barbarously – his own initials, G.W.S., and a
date, 24 July, 1865. Yes, I can see it now: he told me
he had picked it up in Constantinople: it was about
the size of a florin, perhaps rather smaller.
CONTEMPORARY GOTHIC
The Gothic is now associated with High Victorian culture
– the recent BBC adaptations of Dickens’ Great
Expectations for instance.

Also have the idea of Southern Gothic in the US – True
Blood a good example, particularly the opening credit
montage.

For contemporary readers and viewers, the Gothic is
now often distanced from its original impulses and
elements, and is a convention rather than a challenge to
accepted culture.

Now more focused on corporeal fear rather than spiritual
damnation.
Copyright: R. Sibley, University of Warwick
2014

THE RISE OF THE DEAD – MARY SHELLEY
(Frankenstein, 1818, p.59)
Copyright: R. Sibley, University of Warwick
2014
“I slept, indeed, but I was disturbed by the wildest
dreams. I thought I saw Elizabeth, in the bloom of
health, walking in the streets of Ingolstadt. Delighted
and surprised, I embraced her, but as I imprinted the
first kiss on her lips, they became livid with the hue of
death; her features appeared to change, and I
thought that I held the corpse of my dead mother in
my arms; a shroud enveloped her form, and I saw the
grave-worms crawling in the folds of flannel.”
THE RISE OF THE DEAD – TARCHETTI
(‘Le leggende del castello nero’ 1869)
Copyright: R. Sibley, University of Warwick
2014
“Le sue forme piene e delicate che sentiva fremere
sotto la mia mano, si appianarono, rientrarono in sé,
sparirono; e sotto le mie dita incespicate tra le pieghe
che s’erano formate a un tratto nel suo abito, sentii
sporgere qua e là l’ossatura di uno scheletro...
Alzai gli occhi rabbrividendo e vidi il suo volto
impallidire, affilarsi, scarnarsi, curvarsi sopra mia
bocca; e colla bocca priva di labbra imprimervi un
bacio disperato, secco, lungo, terribile...”
THE RISE OF THE DEAD - DURRELL
Copyright: R. Sibley, University of Warwick
2014
“Most of the features below the eyes appeared to have been
eaten away, either by decay or some disease akin to leprosy.
Where the nose should have been there were just two black
holes with tattered rims. The whole of one cheek was missing
and so the upper and lower jaws, with mildewed gums and
decaying teeth, were displayed. Trickles of saliva flooded out
from the mouth and dripped down into the folds of the
shroud. What was left of the lips were serrated with fine
wrinkles, so that they looked as though they had been
stitched together and the cotton pulled tight.”
(‘The Entrance’, 1979, p.208)
CONCLUSIONS
The Gothic has evolved into a literary tradition with
established formulae rather than remaining as a
‘counter-culture’ form.
 In contemporary cultural production, the Gothic is
associated with a High Victorian setting rather than
anything earlier or medieval.
 More recent Gothic narratives play on psychological
horror rather than melodrama.
 The Gothic is now synonymous with the ghost story
rather than more ambiguous narratives.

Copyright: R. Sibley, University of Warwick
2014
QUESTIONS FOR THE SEMINAR
How are these stories developing the Gothic genre
– what are the key differences and similarities with
Poe and Hawthorne?

Who is creating meaning in these stories – the
reader or the narrator?

How do the concepts of good and evil function in
these stories?
Copyright: R. Sibley, University of Warwick
2014

QUESTIONS FOR NEXT WEEK
What is the role of class and social hierarchy in verismo
and naturalism?

How does DeLedda’s view of rural Italy differ from
Verga’s?

What are the similarities and differences in narrative
structure between Verga, Mann and DeLedda?

How does each author use language to control the
reader’s reaction to their work?
Copyright: R. Sibley, University of Warwick
2014
