accent, which contributes to highlight Poe’s Gothic effect, is still under analysis, in company with the supernatural phenomenon intersperd in the fictions that strongly characterize Gothicism of the author, both of which rve to the terminal effect of Poe’s Gothic tales —terror from the soul.
The conclusion part brings the whole thesis to an end and points out through the three chapters discusd above that Gothicism is profoundly improved and explored in Edgar Allan Poe’s short stories. It also articulates Poe’s uniqueness and significance in this subgenre, which renders him the growing popularity in the literary world. Edgar Allan Poe’s accomplishments share the universal appreciation and fondness for the value and success of his person of genuis as well as his masterpieces of talent for any ages.
Chapter One
Edgar Allan Poe and Gothic Literature
The word “Gothic” in literary criticism is unfortunately a synonym of the pejorative term—terror. The writing style has even been scorned as a formula, bristled with violence, murder, revenge, rape, incest, or even with prence of ghost, monster or some other preternatural phenomena; the prevailing atmosphere of such fictions is somber, mysterious, horrible and always filled with a n of suspen
(Xiao 91). Gothicism, while budding from late eighteenth century to nineteenth century and still flourishing in modernist writing or even contemporary works, remains a special branch in the western romanticist movement, entitled by the critics as the “dark romanticism”, which is far from the conceptual Romanticism. It concerns not the smiling aspects of life as general Romanticism does; on the contrary, the preference of Gothic tales that account for the title of “dark romanticism” exclusively focus on the evil facets of the human psyche along with the society. Gothicism is strongly characterized by its distinctive feature of “dark” both in plot and theme: in plot-knitting, it romances denly on ferocity and devilishness; thematically, it aims at profoundly probing into the human nature of wickedness, especially on ethics through the unveiling of the gloomy side and malice in society, politics, religion, morality as well as humanity. (Xiao 94)
The subgenre of “Gothic novel”, originated by Horace Walpole through The Castle of Otranto, (1764) with its subtitle “A Gothic Story”, has been increasingly employed and improved by his successors such as Ann Radicliffe, Mathew G. Lewis, Mary W Shelly, Bronte sisters, Washington Irving, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Edgar Allan Poe, till the Modern novelists like Henry James, William Faulkner and Toni Morrison in their worldwide celebrated masterpieces.
1.1 The Definition of the term “Gothic”
“Gothic” comes from the word “Goth”, which indicates one of veral Germanic tribes that was “instrumental in the fall of the Roman Empire” (Punter1 3) in the medieval times. Confirmed by the archaeologists, their early ttlement was in the Baltic, and gradually they migrated down to the Black Sea. During the third century, the Goths were proved to initiate their incursion into Roman territory. In AD 410, they took Rome under King Alaric and subquently established kingdoms in France and Italy. Therefore, the impressive tribe of the Goths has long left people with the indelible image of truculence, barbarian and ghastfulness. Sometimes the word is even ud to scare children.
The Myths that developed around the tribe are far more important than any sketchy history of the actual Goths, who have come to be remembered only as invaders and destroyers of the great Roman civilization since no literature or art of their own has been left. Following the fall of Rome, very little has been known about the medieval world during the Renaissance, when the idea of the “Dark Ages” expanded to include the period, and “Gothic” “became a term applied to all things medieval” (Punter1 3). In Dr Johnson’s dictionary, “Goth” is defined as “one not civilized, one deficient, in general knowledge, a barbarian” and the medieval or “Gothic” age as a cultural wasteland, primitive and superstitious. (Punter1 4) The term was first ud in an aesthetic n, i.e.
a style of architecture of the Germanic tribe that sacked Rome, which was disliked by the ideologists in Renaissance. Its typical characteristics are long and narrow corridor, dark-tinct pane and somber castle always with bament for corps and so on. As a result, the style has been erroneously identified as barbaric, disorder and irrational opposite to the classic one.
In literary n, it is clearly possible to speak of the Gothic as a historical phenomenon, originating in the late eighteenth century. According
to many critics in terms of a psychological argument, Gothic literature is the product of represd fears reprented in textual form. Perhaps despite, or perhaps becau of the concentration of critical activity, the Gothic remains a notorious difficult field to define. (Punter xviii) It consists of many subgenres: the ghost story, the horror story, the “techno-Gothic”, while their difference might be en as important as their similarities although all of the have obvious connections with the “original” Gothic. Since 1970s, the Gothic has become a highly popular field in academic study. Many books both on the Gothic in general or particular subgenres and on authors have been published.
1.2 Gothic Tradition in English Literature
One of the most studied writers is Edgar Allan Poe, to whom the development of this subgenre is gre
atly indebted and significantly contributed. Gothic literature inhabits the culture of England as well as the whole western world since the engendering of Horace Walpole’s The Castle of Otranto in 1764. Afterwards, there teemed numerous world-wide celebrated Gothic fictions, among which are The Mysteries of Udolpho by Ann Radcliffe, The Monk by Mathew G Lewis, Frankenstein by Mary Shelly and, of cour, Tales of the Grotesque and Arabesque by Edgar Allan Poe and so on. The emergence and flourish of the Gothic fiction in the eighteenth century have particular roots in the aspects of society, history and culture. The vital factor rests on the challenge against Rationalism by Romanticism. Renaissance in European countries has developed humanism into its full fledge, which ultimately, through allying with Reformation, overwhelms the tyranny and dictator of Roman Catholics. Romanticism has become the rage, resisting verely against Rationalism and Neoclassicism, which dominated the whole literary world then. Gothicism is a special branch of the movement, defined by critics as the “Dark Romanticism”, playing its unique role distinctively in the swim.
Conventionally, Gothic novel has been scorned by critics who advocate neoclassicism as some inferior subgenre as “aesthetically weak and morally corrupt” (Ellis 20) for its vicious pursuit thematically. It often incorporates older or traditional plots, and it has appealed to fantastical or super
natural events, which cannot be justified or analyzed by empirical or rational methods. Instead of singing high prai for the virtues or exhibiting the smiling aspects of the society, Gothic fiction depicts psychological and social dilemmas and demonstrates the potential revolution by daring to speak the socially unspeakable, although the very act of speaking is an ambiguous gesture (Punter 417). Therefore, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, in his “Lecture on Literature” in 1818, devoted the first lecture to “a portrait of the (so called) Dark ages of Europe”, which he entitled the “General Character of the Gothic Mind in the Middle Ages.” (Ellis 23)
Gothic fiction, with its attempted formal effects that cannot completely be described as the hallmark of the “formal realism”, appears sometimes as a specific reaction to certain features of eighteenth century cultural and social life in plot-knitting and theme-probing. In the first place, it ems impossible to make much n out of Gothic fiction without continual recour to the conception of paranoia. (Punter 404) Many Gothic writers, who perspectives are quite different from tho of realistic, can be en as paranoia contributors, who insist that realism is not the whole story; in many cas, the world is much more inexplicable. Thus they are zealous in creating a strong n of suspending and inviting the reader to share in the fears or uncertainties that pervade the story along with the protagonist. Besides, Gothic fiction is intimately to do with the notion of barbaric and the nat
ure of taboo. Violence, revenge, xuality and homicide as well as incest are bristled in plots of gothic writings. Furthermore, supernatural phenomena such as ghost, vampire and Dracula always haunt the stories. Thematically, traditional Gothi c literature—take Mary Shelly’s The Mysteries of Udolphos, Mathew G
