Gothic Literature Writing that employs dark and picturesque scenery, startling and melodramatic narrative devices, and an overall impression of exoticism, suspense and dread is defined as gothic literature. Charles Dickens’ “The Signalman” and Roald Dahl’s “Lamb to the Slaughter” are renowned traditional and contemporary gothic texts. Both authors use contrasting techniques to attain the same overall result; a sense of suspense. For instance, Dickens frequently utilizes the odd Signalman and a gloomy atmosphere to recreate a buildup of tension. On the other hand, Dahl uses subversion and dramatic irony as supporting factors to enhance the formation of suspense. Firstly, Dickens effectively creates suspense through the Signalman’s appearance …show more content…
Dahl uses subversion to emphasize on the unexpected change of Mary Maloney to convey aspects of suspense in “Lamb to the Slaughter”. Initially, it is evident that Mary is deemed as an innocent and tranquil person in the quote “There was a slow smiling air about her”. This also links in with Mary being a stereotypically ordinary, submissive housewife. A good example of this is “Darling, shall I get your slippers”. Through words such as “Darling” and “slippers”, a domestic image is illustrated which paints ideology of a typical family. However, further in the text, Mary is a different person and has stolen the dominance from Patrick. She adopts Patrick’s characteristics, such as being cunning, self-centered and emotionless which are noticeable in the quote “All right…so I have killed him”. Mary's response to Patrick's bad news is unexpected. She does not scream, cry, plead, question or demand answers. Her calm response intensifies the suspense; she confidently gets a frozen lamb leg out of the freezer and hits her husband over the head. This reinforces the idea that even though readers first see Mary as a stereotypically submissive housewife who caters to her husband's every need, she's not the weak and innocent "lamb" Patrick presumes; she just plays the part thus indicating that Patrick was the “lamb” all this time hence fabricating