This was presented at Horror at the Metcalfe 12 March 2014, co-organised by the NSW Readers Advisory Working Group

1. Going Gothic
Read, Watch, Play (and
Write)
Rachel Franks
@cfwriter
Horror at the Metcalfe: 12 March 2014

2. . . .
spectres, monsters, demons, corps
es, skeletons, evil
aristocrats, monks and
nuns, fainting heroines and bandits
populate . . .
scientists, fathers, husbands, mad
men, criminals and the monstrous
double . . .

3. Character
The very good and the very bad
The facilitation of extreme
emotions

4. Language
Classic and modern
Philosophical and religious
debates

5. Setting
Bleak rural and metropolitan
places
The weather is never very good

6. Story
The idea of the secret
The battle between good and evil

7. Read
Watch
Play
(and Write)

8. The English Beginnings
Horace Walpole
The Castle of Otranto (1764)
Ann Radcliffe
The Mysteries of Udolpho (1794)
Charlotte Bronte Jane Eyre (1847) and
Emily Bronte Wuthering Heights (1847)
Oscar Wilde
The Picture of Dorian Gray (1890)

9. The American Tradition
Charles Brockden Brown
Wieland (1798)
Edgar Allan Poe
The Fall of the House of Usher (1839)
Nathaniel Hawthorne
The Scarlett Letter (1850)

10. Some Modern Examples
Dean Koontz
Almost anything will do. . .
Anne Rice
The Vampire Chronicles (1976-2003)
Susan Hill
The Woman in Black (1983)

11. Read
Watch
Play
(and Write)

12. Nosferatu
(1922)
Rebecca
(1940)

13. Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter

14. True Detective (2014)
http://www.youtube.co
m/watch?v=TXwCoNw
BSkQ

15. Read
Watch
Play
(and Write)

16. Games

17. Read
Watch
Play
(and Write)

18. Gothic Horror
Gothic Romanticism
Classic Gothic
Modern Gothic
Southern Gothic

19. Thank you.
Questions?
Email or Tweet:
crimefictionwriter@gmail.c
om
@cfwriter