StudyHelp Guide



LitGothic now hosts several types of resources designed to help students and others who are reading and thinking and writing about Gothic-tradition literature. These materials are intended to make the age and cultural distance of these stories a little bit less of an obstacle to their enjoyment and/or use in the classroom.

I've noticed, in my own teaching of C19 material, that the "old-fashioned" language and obscure cultural references commonly encountered in these (usually British) stories increasingly makes them less accessible, and indeed often leads students to feel discouraged or frustrated — and then to give up on or rush through the assigned reading. The "StudyGuides" listed in the first section below are designed to address this in two ways: (1) the StudyGuides offer explanations of those terms and references which are no longer (or, perhaps, never were) common knowledge among typical American undergraduates; (2) the StudyGuides also offer comments and questions designed not to address all issues or "explain" the stories, but to prompt and provoke thought. While they may be consulted directly online, it's my assumption that these StudyGuides (available as PDF documents only) will more commonly be printed out for use alongside printed or online versions of the tales which they reference.

LitGothic also features annotated editions of some Gothic-tradition works. These are PDF versions of tales (full text) which typically include explanatory notes (either as traditional footnotes or as pop-up notes using Acrobat's "comment" feature) and/or brief introductions.

Since most of these documents are in PDF only, you'll need Adobe's free Acrobat Reader to access them; click the button at right if you need to get it.
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General Topics:
From Goth to Gothic (and Back Again)
A brief overview of why Gothic fiction is called "Gothic," and what it has to do with "Goths."

Gothic Chapbooks
A note on this once-popular form of Gothic literature.

The Graveyard School
An important influence on the early Gothic tradition.

The Sentimental Novel
Hugely popular form of fiction in the late C18, another important influence on early Gothic fiction.

The Spectre Bridegroom in Gothic Literature
A quick look at this folk motif and some of its Gothic-tradition incarnations.

The Sublime and the Gothic
Quick intro to the sublime as it relates to the Gothic tradition, along with a collection of links for further exploration.



Work-Specific Resources:

Click the author's name to go to the appropriate author page, whence you can access the StudyGuide or annotated etext in its full context.


StudyGuides:
Rhoda Broughton, "The Truth, the Whole Truth, and Nothing but the Truth"
Bernard Capes, "An Eddy on the Floor"
M. R. James, "Canon Alberic's Scrap-book"
Rudyard Kipling, "At the End of the Passage"


Annotated Editions:
Anonymous, "The Mysterious Stranger"
Algernon Blackwood, "The Kit-Bag"
Walter de La Mare, "Out of the Depths"
Walter de La Mare, "Seaton's Aunt"
Amelia B. Edwards, "Was It an Illusion?"
Elizabeth Gaskell, "The Old Nurse's Story"
Joseph Sheridan LeFanu, "Laura Silver Bell"
Jack London, "Even Unto Death"
Barry Pain, "The Case of Vincent Pyrwhit"
Ann Radcliffe, "On the Supernatural in Poetry"
Samuel Rogers, "The Boy of Egremond"
Bram Stoker, "The Burial of the Rats"
Ellen Price Wood, "All Soul's Eve"
Ellen Price Wood, "Gina Montani"
Ellen Price Wood, "The Mysterious Visitor"




The Literary Gothic