Gothic Horror: Origins & Genre

   Gothic fiction, which is largely known by the genre of Gothic horror and gothic fiction, is a genre or mode of literature and film that combines fiction, horror, death and romance. Its 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, an extension of Romantic literary pleasures that were relatively new at the time of Walpole's novel. 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 and the works of Edgar Allan Poe. Another well known novel in this genre, dating from the late Victorian era, is Bram Stoker’s Dracula. The name Gothic refers to the (pseudo)-medieval buildings, emulating Gothic architecture, in which many of these stories take place. This extreme form of romanticism was very popular in England and Germany. The English Gothic novel also led to new novel types such as the German Schauerroman and the French Georgia.

   The novel usually regarded as the "first Gothic novel" is Horace Walpole's The Castle of Otranto, first published in 1764. Horace Walpole's declared aim was to combine elements of the medieval romance. The basic plot created many other staple Gothic generic traits, including a threatening mystery and an ancestral curse, as well as countless trappings such as hidden passages and oft-fainting heroines. Walpole published the first edition disguised as a medieval romance from Italy discovered and republished by a fictitious translator. When Walpole admitted to his authorship in the second edition, its originally favourable reception by literary reviewers changed into rejection. The reviewers's rejection reflected a larger cultural bias. A romance with superstitious elements, and moreover void of didactical intention, was considered a setback and not acceptable. Walpole's forgery, together with the blend of history and fiction contravened the principles of the Enlightenment, associated the Gothic novel with fake documentation.

Key Motifs:

1. strange places
2. clashing time periods
3. power & constraint
4. sexual power
5. the uncanny
6. the sublime
7. crisis
8. the supernatural & the real
9. terror and wonder