Degree Name
MA (Master of Arts)
Program
English
Date of Award
5-2023
Committee Chair or Co-Chairs
Judith B. Slagle
Committee Members
Robert Sawyer, David Jones
Abstract
This thesis explores the development of the Gothic novel in England throughout the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. This thesis establishes the Gothic as a literary mode of middle-class terror by analyzing Gothic novels within the historical context of the Industrial and Democratic revolutions. This requires an in-depth understanding of politics throughout both centuries and this thesis engages with several sources such as Maggie Kilgour’s The Rise of the Gothic Novel which adds important context to my claims. Additionally, I use several contemporary sources such as Godwin’s Caleb Williams, the writings of Edmund Burke, and On the Pleasure Derived from Objects of Terror by the Aikins. This thesis offers a method of tracking the Gothic as a consistently middle-class genre throughout history, and it ends with a chapter that questions the continued relevance of the Gothic as a middle-class genre in a world where the division of wealth is so skewed.
Document Type
Thesis - embargo
Recommended Citation
Linkous, Tanner, "“It’s Alive!” The Birth and Afterlife of the Gothic Genre" (2023). Electronic Theses and Dissertations. Paper 4200. https://dc.etsu.edu/etd/4200
Copyright
Copyright by the authors.
Included in
Literature in English, British Isles Commons, Literature in English, North America Commons