British Author Challenge October 2024: Gothic Fiction
Talk 75 Books Challenge for 2024
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1amanda4242
Creepy buildings. Men with secrets. Women who faint a lot. Welcome to Gothic fiction.
The Guardian has some helpful infographics for identifying Gothic novels. https://www.theguardian.com/books/interactive/2014/may/09/reading-gothic-novel-p...
Suggested works
The Castle of Otranto by Horace Walpole
Caleb Williams by William Godwin
The Mysteries of Udolpho by Ann Radcliffe
Rebecca by Daphne Du Maurier
The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde
The Castle of Wolfenbach by Eliza Parsons
Dracula by Bram Stoker
The Orphan of the Rhine by Eleanor Sleath
The Bishop of Hell and Other Stories by Marjorie Bowen
Zofloya, or, The Moor by Charlotte Dacre
Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë
Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë
The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield
The Monk by Matthew Lewis
The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins
The Woman in Black by Susan Hill
Gothic Tales by Elizabeth Gaskell
The Lifted Veil by George Eliot
The Witch of Ravensworth by George Brewer
Affinity by Sarah Waters
The Essex Serpent by Sarah Perry
Asylum by Patrick McGrath
Mistress of Mellyn by Victoria Holt
2kac522
It's the 200th anniversary of the birth of Wilkie Collins. I'll be reading Man and Wife. I don't think it is as Gothic as The Woman in White (which I loved), but I'm sure Collins won't let me down.
This month I read Ann Radcliffe's first novel The Castles of Athlin and Dunbayne, which is more adventure tale with some gothic elements (kidnappings and escapes, underground passages, spooky castles, etc.) It's relatively short, too.
This month I read Ann Radcliffe's first novel The Castles of Athlin and Dunbayne, which is more adventure tale with some gothic elements (kidnappings and escapes, underground passages, spooky castles, etc.) It's relatively short, too.
3PaulCranswick
>1 amanda4242: I have read a surprising number of the books listed above (9) but I will try to shoehorn at least one in next month.
4alcottacre
It will be The Woman in White for me. October seems like a perfect time to re-read this old classic.
5PawsforThought
Oh, such a fun theme! Trying to decide what to read is really hard. I need to think about it a little.
6m.belljackson
Jane Eyre, Wuthering Heights, and Frankenstein all sound appealing...started with Jane.
I could not face Dracula again - after seeing the movie with my younger brother in the 1950s,
it was years before I could look out a dark window at night without a clench of fear of his face!
I could not face Dracula again - after seeing the movie with my younger brother in the 1950s,
it was years before I could look out a dark window at night without a clench of fear of his face!
7amanda4242
Carmilla by Sheridan Le Fanu
A lot better than I expected. The writing style isn't exactly to my taste, but it's atmospheric and the story's pretty good. I'd certainly recommend it over the turgid Dracula.
A lot better than I expected. The writing style isn't exactly to my taste, but it's atmospheric and the story's pretty good. I'd certainly recommend it over the turgid Dracula.
8kac522
>7 amanda4242: I've heard good things about Uncle Silas, but haven't read it myself.
9PawsforThought
>7 amanda4242: Really? I much preferred Dracula to Carmella, which felt like badly written fanfic to me (but not as bad as the atrocious The Vampyre).
10amanda4242
>9 PawsforThought: Epistolary novels and I don't tend to get on well which is a part of why I don't like Dracula, but mostly I thought it just dragged on forever.
11PawsforThought
>10 amanda4242: I completely agree that it would have been better if it had been a bit shorter.
12kac522
I finished Man and Wife by Wilkie Collins (1870). The plot is entirely too complicated and twisty/turny to do it justice here, but it includes mistaken identities; creepy houses; a mute servant who has visions; a murder plot; a healthy dose of fainting; and "missed" chances at every step. It was quite the page-turner.
Amidst all of this, Collins criticizes the strange marriage laws of Ireland; the stranger marriage laws of Scotland; the plight of a British married woman who must give up all rights and property to her husband, no matter how cruel; and the obsessive male physical fitness craze of the mid-Victorian era. Fun stuff!
Amidst all of this, Collins criticizes the strange marriage laws of Ireland; the stranger marriage laws of Scotland; the plight of a British married woman who must give up all rights and property to her husband, no matter how cruel; and the obsessive male physical fitness craze of the mid-Victorian era. Fun stuff!
13amanda4242
>12 kac522: That sounds really good! I'll have to track down a copy.
14kac522
>13 amanda4242: It was a lot of fun and hard to put down...it starts out a bit slow, but ramps up quickly. The first half has some funny moments (which surprised me), but the second half gets pretty gothic. There's even an Appendix which Collins included, citing the specific marriage laws that he was condemning. I have the Oxford Classics edition, which had good notes and a great intro (which I read at the end).
It's considered the last of his 5 best novels, all from 1860-1870: The Woman in White, No Name, Armadale and The Moonstone are the others. I have No Name and Armadale left to read of the 5.
It's considered the last of his 5 best novels, all from 1860-1870: The Woman in White, No Name, Armadale and The Moonstone are the others. I have No Name and Armadale left to read of the 5.
15amanda4242
I snuck in one more Gothic read, Susan Hill's The Man in the Picture. The story isn't exactly original, but it's well told with good atmosphere.
