The Gothic tale has been with us for over two hundred years, but this collection is the first to illustrate the continuing strength of this special fictional tradition from its origins in the late eighteenth century. Gothic fiction is generally identified from Horace Walpole's Castle of Otranto and the works of Ann Radcliffe, and with heroes and heroines menaced by feudal villains amid crumbling ruins. While the repertoire of claustrophobic settings, gloomy themes, and threatening atmosphere established the Gothic genre, later writers from Poe onwards achieved an ever greater sophistication, and a shift in emphasis from cruelty to decadence. Modern Gothic is distinguished by its imaginative variety of voice, from the chilling depiction of a disordered mind to the sinister suggestion of vampirism.
This anthology brings together the work of writers such as Le Fanu, Hawthorne, Hardy, Faulkner, and Borges with their earliest literary forebears, and emphasizes the central role of women writers from Anna Laetitia Aikin to Isabel Allende and Angela Carter. While the Gothic tale shares some characteristics with the ghost story and tales of horror and fantasy, the present volume triumphantly celebrates the distinctive features that define this powerful and unsettling literary form.
Introduction
I. Beginnings
Sir Bertrand: A Fragment, Anna Laetitia Aikin
The Poisoner of Monremos, Richard Cumberland
The Firar's Tale, Anonymous
Raymond: A Fragment, 'Juvenis'
The Parricide Punished, Anonymous
The Ruins of the Abbey of Fritz-Martin, Anonymous
The Vindictive Monk or The Fatal Ring, Isaac Crookenden
II. The Nineteenth Century
The Astrologer's Prediction or The Maniac's Fate, Anonymous
Andreas Vesalius the Anatomist, Petrus Borel
Lady Eltringham or The Castle of Ratcliffe Cross, J. Wadham
The Fall of the House of Usher, Edgar Allan Poe
A Chapter in the History of a Tyrone Family, Sheridan Le Fanu
Rappacini's Daughter, Nathaniel Hawthorne
Selina Sedilia, Bret Harte
Jean-Ah Poquelin, Gerge Washington Cable
Olalla, Robert Louis Stevenson
Barbara of the House of Grebe, Thomas Hardy
Bloody Blanche, Marcel Schwob
The Yellow Wall-Paper, Charlotte Perkins Stetson
The Adventure of the Speckled Band, Arthur Conan Doyle
Hurst of Hurstcote, E. Nesbit
III. The Twentieth Century
A Vine on a House, Ambrose Bierce
Jordan's End, Ellen Glasgow
The Outsider, H. P. Lovecraft
A Rose for Emily, William Faulker
A Rendezvous in Averoigne, Clark Ashton Smith
The Monkey, Isak Dinesen
Miss de Mannering of Asham, F. M. Mayor
The Vampire of Kaldenstein, Frederick Cowles
Clytie, Eudora Welty
Sardonicus, Ray Russell
The Boody Countess, Alejandra Pizarnik
The Gospel According to Mark, Jorge Luis Borges
The Lady of the House of Love, Angela Carter
Secret Observations on the Goat-Girl, Joyce Carol Oates
Blood Disease, Patrick McGrath
If You Touched My Heart, Isabel Allende
Notes
the perfect book to put beside the bed of a timorous guest you wish would go home - The Economist
a sumptuous spread of eeriness, horror and decay, plus an astute introduction that lays bare the gothic's vitals...there will be something in this book to chill the blood of any reader. - John Carey, Sunday Times
Armed with this anthology...the faint-hearted connoisseur can make his way down the gloomy halls and secret passageways of the genre. - Peter Ackroyd, The Times
this is a generous selection from the eighteenth century up to the present day ... Deliciously unsettling. - The Observer
ISBN : 9780199561537
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