>Gothic< und >Gothic Novel<

Abstract

After Horace Walpole published his Castle of Otranto in 1764 the Gothic Novel, or the >Schauerroman<, spread all over Europe. Many of these Gothic Novels took place in a fictitious medieval world. For Walpole the idea of this world is connected to the idea of his own neo-Gothic house Strawberry Hill, which the Apulian castle of Otranto is also based on. For other British and German novelists of the 18th century, the idea of the Middle Ages remained completely vague. Only Clara Reeve tried to combine the Gothic Novel with an exact description of medieval customs and historical facts. But for all authors of Gothic Novels, medieval times were the age of superstition, before Reformation and Enlightenment. This perspective allowed Walpole and his followers to justify the appearance of supernatural powers, since the supernatural belongs to medieval culture. In novels or romances with medieval scenes the novelist has to tell the story using customs fitting to the scene; and superstition, as the belief in the presence of supernatural powers in the world, is a part of these customs. Walpole turns principles of French classicism which had dominated the theory of literature during the Enlightenment to his own advantage. These principles banned all supernatural occurrences in dramas and novels. Many authors of northern Europe connected such superstition with the Catholicism of the south. Where this Catholicism dominated society, the Middle Ages seemed to be extended. Therefore modern (southern) Italy and Spain became popular scenes in Gothic Novels.