Gothic literature has been both popular and controversial since the birth of the genre in the 1760’s. Popular because it appealed to different social classes and attracted new readers; controversial because it explored the darker side of the human condition and disrupted traditional notions of literary decorum. This course will examine how the Gothic began as a literary phenomenon in the 1760’s and changed over time as it engaged with new levels of cultural anxiety and repression in modern culture. We track the history of the genre from Horace Walpole’s pioneering The Castle of Otranto to recent examples such as Elizabeth Kostova’s The Historian and consider how categories such as self, the body, love, sexuality, home, family, childhood, nature, time, etc. are represented and often interrogated by the Gothic imagination. We also examine the genre’s troubled generic identity and look at the ways in which it interacts with and draws from other genres such as historical romance, crime fiction, science fiction, travel literature, and colonial fiction. While the course focuses mainly on Gothic literature, we will also map relevant developments in art, architecture, film, and music. Most examples will be taken from English literature, but some important American, German, and French texts will be studied to indicate the international dimension of the genre. Ultimately, the course will attempt to answer the question why the Gothic genre has been so phenomenally popular and influential in literature, film, TV, and other media in the past 250 years?

Gothic literature has been both popular and controversial since the birth of the genre in the 1760’s. Popular because it appealed to different social classes and attracted new readers; controversial because it explored the darker side of the human condition and disrupted traditional notions of literature decorum. This course will examine how the Gothic began as a literary phenomenon in the 1760’s and changed over time as it engaged with new levels of cultural anxiety and repression in modern culture. We track the history of the genre from Horace Walpole’s pioneering The Castle of Otranto to recent examples such as Elizabeth Kostova’s The Historian and consider how categories such as self, the body, love, sexuality, home, family, childhood, nature, time, etc. are represented and often interrogated by the Gothic imagination. We also examine the genre’s troubled generic identity and look at the ways in which it interacts with and draws from other genres such as historical romance, crime fiction, science fiction, travel literature, and colonial fiction. While the course focuses mainly on Gothic literature, we will also map relevant developments in art, architecture, film, and music. Most examples will be taken from English literature, but some important American, German, and French texts will be studied to indicate the international dimension of the genre. Ultimately, the course will attempt to answer the question why the Gothic genre has been so typical popular and influential in literature, film, TV, and other media in the past 250 years?

Gothic literature has been both popular and controversial since the birth of the genre in the 1760’s. Popular because it appealed to different social classes and attracted new readers; controversial because it explored the darker side of the human condition and disrupted traditional notions of literary decorum. This course will examine how the Gothic began as a literary phenomenon in the 1760’s and changed over time as it engaged with new levels of cultural anxiety and repression in modern culture. We track the history of the genre from Horace Walpole’s pioneering The Castle of Otranto to recent examples such as Elizabeth Kostova’s The Historian and consider how categories such as self, the body, love, sexuality, home, family, childhood, nature, time, etc. are represented and often interrogated by the Gothic imagination. We also examine the genre’s troubled generic identity and look at the ways in which it interacts with and draws from other genres such as historical romance, crime fiction, science fiction, travel literature, and colonial fiction. While the course focuses mainly on Gothic literature, we will also map relevant developments in art, architecture, film, and music. Most examples will be taken from English literature, but some important American, German, and French texts will be studied to indicate the international dimension of the genre. Ultimately, the course will attempt to answer the question why the Gothic genre has been so phenomenally popular and influential in literature, film, TV, and other media in the past 250 years?

Gothic literature has been both popular and controversial since the birth of the genre in the 1760’s. Popular because it appealed to different social classes and attracted new readers; controversial because it explored the darker side of the human condition and disrupted traditional notions of literature decorum. This course will examine how the Gothic began as a literary phenomenon in the 1760’s and changed over time as it engaged with new levels of cultural anxiety and repression in modern culture. We track the history of the genre from Horace Walpole’s pioneering The Castle of Otranto to recent examples such as Elizabeth Kostova’s The Historian and consider how categories such as self, the body, love, sexuality, home, family, childhood, nature, time, etc. are represented and often interrogated by the Gothic imagination. We also examine the genre’s troubled generic identity and look at the ways in which it interacts with and draws from other genres such as historical romance, crime fiction, science fiction, travel literature, and colonial fiction. While the course focuses mainly on Gothic literature, we will also map relevant developments in art, architecture, film, and music. Most examples will be taken from English literature, but some important American, German, and French texts will be studied to indicate the international dimension of the genre. Ultimately, the course will attempt to answer the question why the Gothic genre has been so typical popular and influential in literature, film, TV, and other media in the past 250 years?

Horace Walpole: The Castle of Otranto
M. G. Lewis: The Monk (Extracts)
Jane Austen: Northanger Abbey
Mary Shelley: Frankenstein
E. Gaskell: “The Old Nurse’s Story”
Stevenson: The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde
Bram Stoker: Dracula
Jean Rhys: Wide Sargasso Sea
Elizabeth Kostova: The Historian
Short stories from a. o. E. T. A. Hoffmann (“Mademoiselle de Scudéri” and “The Sand Man”), E. A. Poe (The Fall of the House of Usher”), H. P. Lovecraft ("Shadows over Innsmouth” and "Rats in the Walls"), and Guy de Maupassant (“The Horla”)

Poetry by among others William Blake, Coleridge, and Baudelaire.

Historical and theoretical readings include: Sigmund Freud: "The Uncanny”(1919); Tvetzan Todorov: The Fantastic: A Structural Approach to a Literary Genre (1970; 1973): Julia Kristeva: Powers of Horror; an Essay on Abjection (1980; 1982); David Punter: The Literature of Terror: A History of Gothic Fictions from 1765 to the Present Day (1980; 1996); Jerrold E. Hogle, The Cambridge Companion to Gothic Fiction (2002).

Horace Walpole: The Castle of Otranto
M. G. Lewis: The Monk (Extracts)
Jane Austen: Northanger Abbey
Mary Shelley: Frankenstein
E. Gaskell: “The Old Nurse’s Story”
Stevenson: The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde
Bram Stoker: Dracula
Jean Rhys: Wide Sargasso Sea
Elizabeth Kostova: The Historian
Short stories from a. o. E. T. A. Hoffmann ("Mademoiselle de Scudéri" and "The Sand Man"), E. A. Poe (The Fall of the House of Usher"), H. P. Lovecraft ("Shadows over Innsmouth" and "Rats in the Walls"), and Guy de Maupassant ("The Horla")

Poetry by among others William Blake, Coleridge, and Baudelaire.

Historical and theoretical readings include: Sigmund Freud: "The Uncanny" (1919); Tvetzan Todorov: The Fantastic: A Structural Approach to a Literary Genre (1970; 1973): Julia Kristeva: Powers of Horror; an Essay on Abjection (1980; 1982); David Punter: The Literature of Terror: A History of Gothic Fictions from 1765 to the Present Day (1980; 1996); Jerrold E. Hogle, The Cambridge Companion to Gothic Fiction (2002).