1. Dark Romanticism: Brooding Romantics The American Gothic Tradition

2. Basic Concept:
Fascination to the “literature of lament” emerged in England which gave rise to the Gothic Romance.
The purpose of these works was to provide the reader with one ghastly thrill after another
There was something sophisticated about the nature of the human mind

3. What makes a novel “Gothic?”

4. Setting in a Castle

5. Other Elements An atmosphere of mystery and suspense
An ancient prophecy/ A legend
Omens, premonitions, visions
Emotional extremes

6. Supernatural or otherwise inexplicable events

7. Women in Distress

8. Women threatened by a powerful, impulsive, tyrannical male

9. Edgar Allan Poe “All that we see or seem Is but a dream within a dream”

10. A Gothic Author:
Sense of ambiguity: the dream shares the same character of reality as the shapes and expressions of our beliefs; both are constructs of the mind. Individuals may decide to act on the basis of these “realities” but in effect, the decision is enacted in other people’s realities where the impact is difficult to predict
Many times people die-each a target in someone else’s world

11. Many of his stories have similarities
Gothic Elements
Poe uses the mystic qualities of the numbers three and seven in his stories as well as gothic settings, incidents, and characters
Many of his stories have similarities

12. Nathaniel Hawthorne and Herman Melville
Both authors explore the dark side of the human soul in conflict with itself
The gothic element of witches, deviltry, and madmen are metaphors for the turmoil all people experience in the quest for sanctuary in the comfort of some absolute virtue or “truth”

13. The Gothic Legacy What is the nature of mankind?
Is evil presented in the cool, sagacious logic of Calvinism, or is it the innocent goodness of the “noble savage?”
Wherein lie the roots of human sin?
Is there an innate attribute that mars the character of everyone?
Is there a supernatural malevolence that tempts us to err?

14. We may never know….