Gothic Monstrosity In Gothic Literature

In a lot of gothic literature, the idea of monsters and ‘otherly’ figures represent the author’s own personal fears or the stereotype of villain or beast from a fairytale etc. But in some cases, the gothic monstrosity in the texts are a representation of national identity and its’ problems through these creatures and beasts. Many authors wanted to show the problems that were happening in the world at the time, by making them into monsters it allows the reader to ask the questions that need to be asked about why the monsters are representing what they represent and it gives them a new and very different outlook on the monsters and the villains of the story. In this essay I will look at two texts, Claire Kilroy’s novel The Devil I Know and the

The novel follows Tristram St Lawrence, an earl who has not been back in Ireland for some time due to missing his own mum’s death due to being so intoxicated. He has since become sober and is living with the help of a mysterious man called M. Deauville who gives him money. He accidentally lands back in Ireland due to his flight crashing and meets an old school bully who has become big in the construction business and puts forward an idea that Deauville has an interest in and makes Tristram go back to his father and watch over the project. As the novel goes on it is discovered that the property market has been corrupted and billions of euro borrowed had been used to buy a huge amount of land. The controllers of all of these are corrupted politicians who look to bring in as much money as they can without caring about what they are doing to the economy. By having this power over the banks they lead to the destruction of the economy. This book shows the loopholes that the rich businessmen were able to get through in the property market and getting out of taxes. In the end, it shows the economy boom and the consequences that come with it with the Recession (Kilroy,