Three Gothic Novels: The Castle of Otranto; Vathek; Frankenstein

I will finish reading all three of the novels covered in here, but until then I will review them as I read them.

I read The Castle of Otranto on a short plane flight on 30 April 2009. It was difficult to read, not because of the vocabulary particularly, but because of the way it is laid out. No quotation marks, despite the presence of direct speech, and the paragraphs went on for pages at a time. The characters seemed exaggerated and stereotyped, and the more virtuous ones were annoyingly stupid, the over virtuous Hippolyta in particular. The story of the rapacious ruler wanting to get rid of an old and barren Queen to make way for a young girl might have got Horace Walpole into trouble a couple of centuries earlier too.

A couple of the characters were not what they seemed at first, and the ending is a surprise, so this short novel is not a total waste of space. Walpole's posthumous reputation, at least among the very few academics who study these things, will probably survive my critical onslaught, but I honestly could not recommend this to anyone except as an esoteric and quaint curiosity. ( )

This is a fantastic collection of 3 novels which greatly impacted (or created) the Gothic genre, but which are also important in their own rights.

Walpole's novel The Castle of Otranto is arguably the first Gothic novel. It is a parody of the Romance genre, written before "novel" became a common part of English vocabulary. It definitely sets a standard of conventions that later Gothic novels follow: a medieval Catholic setting, contrast of science and superstition, winding passages, confined female, &c.
Penguin attempted to present Otranto as accurately as possible, therefore there are no quotation marks to indicate dialogue, nor are there very many paragraph or line breaks. This makes it difficult for the modern reader at first, but it is worth working through to read the very funny story.

Because, yes, Otranto is a funny novel which parodies many elements of the romances popular in the 18th century, as well as containing humourous wordplay. The image of a giant helmet crashing out of the sky and killing a bridegroom on his way to the wedding is just one of many humourous incidents in the book.

Vathek is a translation from the French and an example of the combination of foreign horror with Walpole's British Gothic. It played a strong influence for Percy Bysshe Shelley's work, seen as early as the novel Zastrozzi.

Of course, nearly everyone is probably familiar with Frankenstein (itself heavily edited by Percy Shelley), which is probably one of the greatest Gothic novels. Its themes are numerous and I've found that each time I read it (and I've done so several times for different courses), there's always something new to discover, whether it's a philosophical thread echoing Rousseau, or a literary technique previously unappreciated.

This is a fantastic addition to my personal library and a great choice for those interested in the Gothic. The only better introduction I could think of would be Four Gothic Novels, and only then because it also includes Mathew Lewis's The Monk, my favorite of all Gothic novels. ( )

Note: this review pertains only to the novel Vathek.

William Beckford's Vathek is a decadent jewel and a masterpiece of faux Orientalism. The Caliph Vathek seeks ultimate knowledge, using violence and sensory indulgence (precursor of Rimbaud!). He finds this knowledge, and eternal damnation, in the subterranean kingdom of Iblis, the Islamic Satan.

The archaic 18th century prose drips of a heady perfume, a reflection of the baroque pleasures of Vathek. There are dim echoes of Dante's Hell, and of the sorcery of the Pharsalia, as the Caliph's mother raises the dead for necromantic purposes. The halls of perdition reflect Piranesi's labyrinthine prisons, and the palaces of the five senses are a libertine's paradise, with fantastic abundance of sensual pleasures for a man with a truly gargantuan appetite.

Borges wrote an essay on the novel, noting that Vathek's reward and his punishment are one and the same. Lured by a mysterious sword with ever-changing characters, Vathek's odyssey is an inversion of the spiritual quest, as he descends from his station as a beloved, if arrogant, defender of the faith, through cruelty and blasphemy to find himself in possession of all the riches and knowledge he desires, at the price of eternal damnation and torment. A rich and brilliant fantasy, the Arabian Nights as seen through the lens of a decadent 18th century British aristocrat.

Castle of Otranto by Horace Walpole

The accidental death of Manfred's, a tyrannt, son on his wedding day spirals into the dark family secrets. Putatively to be the first gothic novel, it is disappointing. The plot is just insane and doesn't and won't make sense.

Rating: 1.5 stars

Vathek by William Beckford

A better title would be Beckford on Drugs or Inversion of the Temptation of Satan. Goaded by his evil mother, Vathek, an Arabic king, makes a deal with the devil for riches despite the several warnings from God. (Like hello, you are the damn king and already have so much gold and you want more?!) There are no chapters so this book has a dreamlike, stream of consciousness quality to it. The writing is quite fine and in excess, which is the point of the story. (Oscar Wilde may probably have read this as I can see its influence on Picture of Dorian Gray.) I like how Beckford is rewriting an inversion of the temptation of Christ but like Otranto, the narrative is just silly.

Rating: 2.5 stars

Frankenstein

Rating: 4 stars

Average: 2.5 stars ( )

Gothic novel. Comparisons with 19th century novels: the prose has a breathless, breathy precipitate feel to it, helped largely by the almost non-existence of paragraphs. Punctuation is different: semi colons have a different function, used to divide the narrative voice from speakers. There are no quotations for speech and no paragraphing here either: speakers merge in and out of each other and in and out of the narrative voice in an endlessly long paragraph, which sometimes extends for a whole chapter. The text is amazingly fractured, with remarks left hanging in mid air, interruptions, inconsistencies and infelicitous innuendoes. The plotting is extremely slapdash, with crucial details added as and when they are needed, with absolutely no self-consciousness about the artificiality of this technique: the whole theory of narrative is different. Instead of Barthes’s “seeds planted that will later grow into fruition”, the plot lurches unsteadily from one crisis to another, with details supplied in order to extricate characters from impossible situations....

Read the full review on The Lectern.

http://thelectern.blogspot.com/2006/08/castle-of-otranto-horace-walpole.html ( )