ENG 451/551 -- Course Description --    Prof. Teich 

ORIGINS OF HORROR

The Origins of Horror: from mid-18th through19th century British Literature

From the 18th century, the supposed "Age of Reason," the genre labeled "The Gothic" emerged. At its height of popularity, during the decades before and after 1800, gothic novels were often written by women for women -- the growing numbers of young women readers. Both female and male writers of gothic novels, as well as several male romantic poets, were interested in exploring excessive or deviant personalities, the workings of powerful human emotions, and the identification of the unconscious in the psychological motivation of their fictional characters.

One of our goals will be to explore what these texts reveal about developments in literary history and human society in the authors' times and ours today. We will examine texts from various critical approaches: historical, socio/economic, structural, psychological, gender and culture. Texts to include: Horace Walpole, Castle of Otranto; Matthew Lewis, The Monk; Ann Radcliffe, Romance of the Forest; Jane Austin, Northanger Abbey; Mary Shelley, Frankenstein; S.T. Coleridge, "The Ancient Mariner"; Polidori, "The Vampire," and concluding with Bram Stoker, Dracula. Also, theoretical and continental influences, with selections from: de Sade, and Kant and Burke on the sublime.

Fulfills major requirement from 1789.