Transatlantic Gothic

Catalog description

In this course we will examine the rise of the Gothic in England [including Scotland and Ireland] and the American colonies/United States. While the Gothic as a recognized narrative subgenre begins with Horace Walpole's Castle of Otranto (1764), we will challenge a view of this genre as a one-way literary transmission from Britain to the pre- and post-revolutionary United State. In the process, we will consider the historical association of the realist and Gothic novels, and the transatlantic literary connections that fostered the growth and cultural ramifications of the form. We will look closely at a number of interrelated issues: The political uses of the Gothic in the context of revolution (French, American, and Haitian), nation-building; The paranoia associated with racial violence, the infiltration of transatlantic secret societies intended to undermine social and political stability; The patriarchy and forms of sexual violence, including the imprisonment of women; The uncanny and its manifestations: literature, environment, architecture, etc; Anti-Catholicism and other forms of religious violence; The unmaking of social stratifications.