The Tale of Terror: A Study of the Gothic Romance

To pass from the work of Mrs. Radcliffe to that of Matthew Gregory Lewis is to leave "the novel of suspense," which depends for part of its effect on the human instinct of curio...

As the novel of terror passes from the hands of Mrs. Radcliffe to those of "Monk" Lewis, Maturin and their imitators, there is a crashing crescendo of emotion. The villain's sar...

"I could not sit down seriously to write a serious romance under any other motive than to save my life, and if it were indispensable for me to keep it up and never relax into la...

The enthusiasm which greeted Walpole's enchanted castle and Miss Reeve's carefully manipulated ghost, indicated an eager desire for a new type of fiction in which the known and...

In 1797 we are told that in America "the dairymaid and hired man no longer weep over the ballad of the cruel stepmother, but amuse themselves into an agreeable terror with the h...

This book is an attempt to trace in outline the origin and development of the Gothic romance and the tale of terror. Such a survey is necessarily incomplete. For more than fifty...

To Horace Walpole, whose _Castle of Otranto_ was published on Christmas Eve, 1764, must be assigned the honour of having introduced the Gothic romance and of having made it fash...

A conflict between "sense and sensibility" was naturally to be expected; and, the year after Mrs. Radcliffe published _The Italian_, Jane Austen had completed her _Northanger Ab...

The history of the tale of terror is as old as the history of man. Myths were created in the early days of the race to account for sunrise and sunset, storm-winds and thunder, t...

In 1775 we find Miss Lydia Languish's maid ransacking the circulating libraries of Bath, and concealing under her cloak novels of sensibility and of fashionable scandal. Some tw...

For the readers of their own day the Gothic romances of Walpole, Miss Reeve and Mrs. Radcliffe possessed the charm of novelty. Before the close of the century we may trace, in t...

Beckford's _History of the Caliph Vathek_, which was written in French, was translated by the Rev. Samuel Henley, who had the temerity to publish the English version--described...

The vogue of Gothic story in America; the novels of Charles Brockden Brown; his use of the "explained" supernatural; his Godwinian theory; his construction and style; Washington...

The exaggeration of the later terror-mongers; innovations; the stories of Mary Shelley, Byron and Polidori; _Frankenstein_; its purpose; critical estimate; _Valperga_; _The Last...

Lewis's methods contrasted with those of Mrs. Radcliffe; his debt to German terror-mongers; _The Monk_; ballads; _The Bravo of Venice_; minor works and translations; Scott's rev...

Godwin's mind and temper; the plan of _Caleb Williams_ as described by Godwin; his methods; the plot of _Caleb Williams_; its interest as a story; Godwin's limitations as a nove...

Scott's review of fashionable fiction in the Preface to _Waverley_; his early attempts at Gothic story in _Thomas the Rhymer_ and _The Lord of Ennerdale_; his enthusiasm for Bür...

Walpole's admiration for Gothic art and his interest in the middle ages; the mediaeval revival at the close of the eighteenth century; _The Castle of Otranto_; Walpole's bequest...

The vogue of Mrs. Radcliffe; her tentative beginning in _The Castles of Athlin and Dunbayne_, and her gradual advance in skill and power; _The Sicilian Romance_ and her early ex...

The antiquity of the tale of terror; the element of fear in myths, heroic legends, ballads and folk-tales; terror in the romances of the middle ages, in Elizabethan times and in...

The chapbook versions of the Gothic romance; the popularity of sensational story illustrated in Leigh Hunt's _Indicator_; collections of short stories; various types of short st...

The persistence of the tale of terror; the position of the Gothic romance in the history of fiction; the terrors of actual life in the Brontë's novels; sensational stories of Wi...

Jane Austen's raillery in _Northanger Abbey_; Barrett's mockery in _The Heroine_; Peacock's _Nightmare Abbey_; his praise of C.B. Brown in _Gryll Grange_; _The Mystery of the Ab...