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Gothic literature and culture
Gothic literature and culture
Romantic and gothic literature
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More handpicked essays just for you.
Gothic literature and culture
Gothic literature and culture
Romantic and gothic literature
Don’t take our word for it - see why 10 million students trust us with their essay needs.
Laura Wakefield Mrs. Schnizler LNG 322 09 February 2018 Everyone Falls The death of a sibling takes a twisted and horrid turn. Roderick Usher is an unstable man with a sister named Madeline Usher who is dying from a disease. The Ushers are old friends with the narrator who goes unnamed the entire story.
So therefore , if someone changed a few things it could actually be Southern Gothic Literature. Southern Gothic Literature can supernatural , disturbing , and suspenseful and clearly the landlady is all of those things. If they changed the setting to a broken down house spaced out away from the other houses and dried up grass with no sidewalks and trees everywhere it would definitely be Southern Gothic. The landlady is already supernatural enough she knew her guest would come before he did!
Have you ever read a story that causes chills or your emotionally invested in a character. The story’s Frankenstein by Mary Shelley and The mysteries of udolpho by Ann Radcliffe are literature that are centered in fear. These story’s cause suspense or has ghost or some type of monster. A gothic is a great example of fear in literature. The settings, characters, and story line has a way of making the reader invested by hooking to their emotions.
The novel “The Haunting of Hill House,” written by Shirley Jackson, closely follows the traditional tropes of an American Gothic. The main character of the novel, Eleanor, begins her journey to self growth after accepting an offer to live in a suspected haunted house for the summer. Moreover, Eleanor meets three other people that have an important effect on her development as a person. These characters slowly begin to question their own sanity due to the house’s destructive nature. Jackson appeals to fans of the American gothic through her particular description of the house and how the characters interact with it in order to show the environments foil of an absolute reality.
In gothic literature, the elements used by the author depicts how the piece of work is going to unfold. Authors such as Edgar Allan Poe and Washington Irving depict the themes of psychological issues and entrapment through the short stories: “Black Cat”by Edgar Allan Poe, “The Raven”by Edgar Allan Poe, and “The Devil and Tom Walker” by Washington Irving. The gothic theme of entrapment is commonly used across various pieces of literature. Entrapment is the idea of being contained by something either physically, mentally, or emotionally.
In Gothic literature, authors use ambiguity to create suspense and add scary details to their stories. Ambiguity defines the Gothic genre by developing questions and have the audience wanting more. The author of “Where is Here?” uses ambiguity more effectively than other Gothic authors like Edgar Alan Poe and Josie Couterez because of the use of fear of the unknown and the frustration of unanswered questions.
Oates reminisces back to when she was a child wandering the fields and abandoned buildings behind her home. As she explores these abandoned structures, she takes notice of the “remnants of a lost household” within this “absolute emptiness of a house whose
Last year me and my family went to universal for horror night. We had decided to go the the Insidious maze last so we continued and went to all the mazes. When the time had came, it was time for the Insidious maze we (me and my family) were all nervous so we voted who was going to be in front of the line. And they all chose me so when we were up I walked slowly since it was pretty dark inside the maze.
Gothic literature is a style of literature that takes place in the past, most of the time it has someone who dies and it has a creepy vibe/tone behind it . Edgar Allen Poe’s “The Fall of the House of Usher,” is a good example of Gothic literature because it shows how a man goes to visit an old friend and see how his friend and his friends twin sister die. “The whole of a dull, dark, and soundless day. ”(13)
Gothic Literature is a genre that was popular between 18th to 19th centuries in North Germany. It is always being associated with Dark Romanticism which the emphasize was more on nature, terror and death, horror and many more. It involves dark and gloomy setting and also unexplainable things that are beyond human senses and reason such as ghosts and monsters. The main characters, on the other hand, are always ineffectual which they do not give much effect on the story plot. This can be seen through Washington Irving’s “Rip van Winkle” and “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow” which can be considered as American gothic work in terms of its description of setting, the involvement of supernatural element in the story and also the characteristics of the main character.
The story “Where is Here” ,written by Joyce Oates, begins when a man goes to look at the house he grew up in. He knocks on the door and the dad invites him in, but he declines and just walks around the outer parts of the house. While he is walking outside, the mom of the house tells him to come inside and walk around. The house brings back many good and bad memories that help the reader piece together the strange man's past. The short story, “Where is Here,” has a bleak setting, tortured characters, and supernatural events which help make it an American gothic piece.
Analyzing Development: “Where is Here?” by Joyce Carol Oates Gothic literature holds an allure that readers and audiences often draw into; its combination of wickedness, mystery, death, and even romance stirs a sensation, a charm no other genre has. Through this charm, Edgar Allan Poe, the "founding voice of American gothic tradition," was able to pioneer interest into many future writers in the American writing industry. Specifically, modern writer Joyce Carol Oates implicated traditional gothic elements from Poe. Using dialogue, diction, and the interaction between characters, Oates carefully establishes the foundations and elements of spookiness into her gothic story—“Where is Here?”
Author Joyce Carol Oates ' discovery of the stories of Edgar Allen Poe and Ann Radcliff “sparked her interest in Gothic fiction”. These Gothic elements typically include gruesome or violent incidents, characters in psychological or physical torment, and strong language full of dangerous meanings. Oates herself is citied as saying that "Horror is a fact of life. As a writer, I’m fascinated by all facets of life". “Where is Here?" This story is sort of eerie and tells the tale of a grown-up man who goes back to visit his childhood home.
Unlike many other works of gothic fiction, this story does not take place in your typical abandoned monastery, haunted house or ominous castle. The setting is described as a dark and shadowy place (“black as pitch with the thick darkness”), but the story probably takes place in a house located in an urban area instead of an isolated one. We know this because of the neighbors, who are able to hear the old man cry out at night and then proceed to call the police who later show up at the house. Because the house is so vaguely described, the reader is forced to imagine the setting and that makes it all the more frightening.
(Poe 412).” One element of gothic literature is a gloomy or decaying setting. This scene describes the gloomy setting the literature place in. The dark setting foreshadows the dark theme of the story. The houses feature also represent Poe as himself as well.