Anthem Studies in Gothic Literature

Originally published in 1860, the formative Gothic novel by Harriet Prescott Spofford (1835–1921), one of nineteenth-century America’s most significant woman writers, relates the tale of a tormented British aristocrat who struggles to retain his sanity while suffering horrifying visitations from the spectre of his dead lover amid the agonies of an already fragile mind.

This innovative and interdisciplinary collection of essays considers examples of monstrous children since the 16th century to the present, spanning real-life and popular culture, to exhibit the manifestation of the Western cultural anxiety around the problematic, anomalous child as naughty, dangerous, or just plain evil.

Twelve uncanny tales of the race-haunted nineteenth-century South, by authors both celebrated and obscure, are presented along with background readings, themselves often chilling, placing the tales in a historical context.

‘Neo-Gothic Narratives’ defines and theorises what mobilises the employment of the Gothic to speak to our own times.

Focussing on written and visual culture that is made in or made about Cornwall, this book argues that Cornwall and the Scilly Isles (known as ‘Kernow’ in the Cornish language) have a special relationship with Gothic, one that has been overlooked in the literature on regional Gothic.

The Gothic Literature and History of New England surveys the origin, nature and future of the Gothic mode in New England’s history and literature, from the Puritans to the present, showing how the legacy of religious intolerance, racism and misogyny haunts fiction, film and popular culture.

The monograph gives an overview of the development and characteristic features of Swedish Gothic from the Romantic age until today. 

Gulf Gothic examines haunted, secret-laden narratives that emerge from the gulfs between peoples all along the Gulf of Mexico and on both sides of the Rio Grande. The Gulf is presented as a unified region and as dynamic ground zero of North American (and global) cross-culturality and traumas.

Theology in the Early British and Irish Gothic, 1764–1834 reassesses the relationship between contemporary theology and the Gothic. Investigating Gothic aesthetics, depictions of the supernatural and portrayals of religious organisations, it explores how the Gothic engages with contemporary theologies, both Dissenting and Anglican.

California has always represented new beginnings and opportunities in a golden land. In constructing the California Dream, much has been omitted or repressed. This study explores the dark side of the dream, as revealed in the state’s rich tradition of Gothic literature and film.

Taxidermy and the Gothic: The Horror of Still Life is the first extended study of the Gothic’s collusion with taxidermy. Focusing on contemporary cultural and material texts, it shows how taxidermy’s imbrication with Gothic horror is more than skin deep: these are rich discourses stuffed by affinities for corporeal transgressions, the uncanny, and the counterfeit.

Gothic Appalachian Literature examines the ways contemporary Appalachian authors utilize gothic tropes to explore the complex history and contemporary problems of the region, particularly in terms of the representation of economic, environmental, and political concerns.