Gothicka
By: Victoria Nelson
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Published: 2012
Place of publication: Cambridge, Mass
Language: eng
Number of pages: 333
ISBN-13: 9780674050143
Subjects: Gothic revival (Literature); Horror comic books, strips; History and criticism; Gothic fiction ( Literary genre); Spirituality in literature; Goth culture (Subculture); Horror films; Horror tales
Description: To explain the millennial shift away from the traditionally dark Protestant post-Enlightenment Gothic, Nelson studies the complex arena of contemporary Gothic subgenres that take the form of novels, films, and graphic novels. She considers the work of Dan Brown and Stephenie Meyer, graphic novelists Mike Mignola and Garth Ennis, Christian writer William P. Young (author of The Shack), and filmmaker Guillermo del Toro. She considers twentieth-century Gothic masters H.P. Lovecraft, Anne Rice, and Stephen King in light of both their immediate ancestors in the eighteenth century and the original Gothic--the late medieval period from which Horace Walpole and his successors drew their inspiration. Fictions such as the Twilight and Left Behind series do more than follow the conventions of the classic Gothic novel. They are radically reviving and reinventing the transcendental worldview that informed the West's premodern era. As Jesus becomes mortal in The Da Vinci Code and the child Ofelia becomes a goddess in Pan's Labyrinth, Nelson argues that this unprecedented mainstreaming of a spiritually driven supernaturalism is a harbinger of what a post-Christian religion in America might look like.
Table of contents: title: White dog, the prequel : between imagination and belief; title: Faux Catholic : a Gothick subgenre from Monk Lewis to Dan Brown; title: Gothick God : the worshipful world of Horror Fandom; title: Decommissioning Satan : in favor of his man-god whelps; title: Gothick romance : the danse macabre of women; title: The bright God beckons : the new vampire romance; title: Postapocalyptic Gothick : that means zombies (and the occasional zampire); title: The Gothick theater of Halloween : performing allegory; title: The ten rules of Sitges : global Gothic horror; title: Cathedral head : the Gothick cosmos of Guillermo del Toro; title: The new Christian Gotchik : The shack and other cathedrals; title: Epilogue: questions without answers.