The Routledge Companion to Gothic (Routledge Companions)
Explores the world of Gothic in its myriad forms throughout the mid-eighteenth Century to the internet age. This title includes discussion on: the history of Gothic gothic throughout the English-speaking world; key themes and concepts ranging from hauntings and the uncanny; and, Gothic femininities and queer gothic in the modern world.
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Sets a New Standard in Gothic Criticism,
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Every major academic press seems to want its own `guide to Gothic’ at the moment. It’ll be interesting to see whether anyone can do better than Routledge’s – which is pretty good, and marks another step forward in the integration of literary and non-narrative Gothic. A series of chapters examine the history of Gothic in European writing, and then trace the influence of place and setting on the development of the tradition. The third part, `Gothic Concepts’, is a delight, and includes the most deft description of Julia Kristeva’s theory of `abjection’ I’ve come across within Gothic criticism, immensely enlightening for those of us who haven’t tackled the original. The final section, `Gothic media’, is more patchy. Emma McEvoy’s chapter on theatre and Kamilla Elliott’s on film both read like rather rushed and breathless summaries of their subjects (and Dr Pickle & Mr Pryde, p.223, wasn’t a `Laurel & Hardy film’ since Oliver Hardy wasn’t in it); but Dr Fred Botting’s apparently recent discovery of the possibilities of `Gothic Culture’ results in a stunning, if rather self-congratulatorily clever, bit of work. In fact, I wonder whether this essay, slinkily making its way around the web of representations and re-representations by which Gothic art and Gothic reality interact and affect one another, actually points towards the end of Gothic Studies itself. It certainly depicts a kaleidoscopic phantasmagoria of imagery and play-acting that (as some of us have been saying for a while, and as Catherine Spooner and Paul Hodkinson in their essays keep reminding readers of this book) it’s difficult to make any conclusion about.
This is perhaps the best-written and most consistently valuable survey of Gothic yet published. If there is a major weakness, it’s the absence of any attention to visual art forms until the last section. It isn’t the last word on the subject; but could it mark the beginning of the end?
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