M. Snodgrass – Encyclopedia of Gothic Literature

Автор: M. Snodgrass
Название книги: Encyclopedia of Gothic Literature
Формат: PDF
Жанр: Литературоведение
Страницы: 497
Качество: Изначально компьютерное, E-book

Encyclopedia of Gothic Literature invites the
writer, literary historian, researcher, student,
teacher, librarian, and general reader to sample a
wide range of works grouped under the definition
of Gothic fiction. The text offers an easy-to-use
source of information arranged alphabetically into
more than 400 entries. Lengthy discussions of
Gothic convention, horror narratives, Gothic
drama, the supernatural, suspense, female victims,
and the rescue motif outline the evolution of genre
parameters. Enhancing the reader’s understanding
of genre development are details of anti-Catholic
themes and subtexts and discussions of such topics
as female Gothic and The Madwoman in the Attic, a
feminist breakthrough in interpretation. Entries on
writers (Joanna Baillie, Isaac Bashevis Singer,
Stephen King), sources (Blackwood’s Edinburgh
Magazine, Gothic bluebooks, Kabbalism, legend),
literary history (preromanticism, censorship), literary
method (hyperbole, atmosphere, mood, tone),
characters (Heathcliff, Bertha Rochester, Montresor,
Hazel Motes), monsters (dybbuk, lycanthropy,
witchcraft, vampirism), motifs (the wandering Jew,
Bluebeard, Faust, otherness), conventions (Byronic
hero, diabolism, flight motif), and settings
(Castle Dracula, Udolpho, Manderley) contribute
to an understanding of the Gothic mode.
Research materials derive from various
sources beginning with a lengthy roll call of Gothic
scholars: Jennifer Carnell, E. J. Clery, Jeffrey
Cohen, Kate Ellis, Teresa Goddu, Claire Gorrara,
Michael Hadley, Judith Halberstam, Cyndy Hendershot,
Brendan Hennessy, Avril Horner, Wolfgang
Kayse, Julia Kristeva, Clara McIntyre, Peter
Messent, Michael Meyer, Robert Mighall, Kay
Mussell, Elizabeth Napier, Margot Northey, Joyce
Carol Oates, Paul Ranger, Gabriel Ronay, Victor
Sage, Cannon Schmitt, Andrew Smith, Robert
Spector, Jack Sullivan, Tsvetan Todorov, Yi-Fu
Tuan, James Twitchell, S. L. Varnado, Andrew
Webber, Susan Williams, Judith Wilt, and Leonard
Wolf. Of particular merit are the analyses of Margaret
Atwood, Susan Gubar, Sandra Gilbert, H. P.
Lovecraft, David Punter, Montague Summers,
Mary Tarr, Devendra Varma, and Anne Williams.
In addition to a panoply of recovered Gothic works
and facsimile editions are the handy electronic
texts, including biographies from the University of
Pennsylvania and Sheffield Hallam University, The
Literary Encyclopedia, Blackwood’s Edinburgh Magazine,
the illustrations of George Cruikshank from
Princeton University, Dickens’s London, The
Northanger Canon, and Chris Willis’s Web sites.
Rounding out the text are additional study
aids to particularize the lives of writers such as
William Cullen Bryant and August Wilson; published
works including Bellefleur and “The House
of Night”; and details of Japanese Gothic, La
Llorona, chiaroscuro, premature burial, and
Gothic serials. Reference helps include alphabetic
listings of major titles and authors, a time line of
the evolution of Gothic literature, an overview of
cinematic versions, and separate bibliographies of
primary and secondary sources. A thorough index
covers people, places, sources, motifs, literary
terms, titles, publishers, and literary authorities.
In collecting primary and secondary source material,
I called on numerous people for assistance and advice. I am indebted to book dealer Avis Gachet
at Wonderland Books; to Beth Bradshaw and
Hannah Owen at the Patrick Beaver Library in
Hickory, North Carolina; to Amy Jew and Wanda
Rozzelle at the Catawba County Library in Newton,
North Carolina; to Susan Keller at Western Piedmont
Community College in Morganton, North
Carolina; and to Mark Schumacher at the Jackson
Library, UNC-Greensboro. Additional thanks go to
Elisabeth McRae at the Toronto Reference Library
in Toronto, Canada.