Important dates for the Gothic

Dates of key Gothic novels and important world events which may have influenced this.

1757 (Theory)

Edmund Burke publishes his essay ‘A Philosophical Enquiry into the Origin of Our Ideas of the Sublime and Beautiful’.

1764 (Novel)

‘The Castle of Otranto’ by Horace Walpole

1782 (Novel)

‘Vathek’ by William Beckford

1789-1799 (Event)

The French Revolution

1794 (Novel)

‘The Mysteries of Udolpho’ by Ann Radcliffe

1796 (Novel)

‘The Monk’ by Matthew Lewis

1796 (Theory)

Jean-Paul coins the term ‘Doppelganger’ - a double of a living person.

1797 (Novel)

‘The Italian’ by Ann Radcliffe

1815 (Event)

Napolean is defeated at the Battle of Waterloo

1814 (Novel)

‘Waverley’ by Walter Scott

1816 (Novel)

‘The Vampyre’ by John Polidori

1818 (Novel - 2)

‘Frankenstein’ by Mary Shelley

‘Northanger Abbey’ by Jane Austen

1834 (Novel)

‘The Fall of the House of Usher’ by Edgar Allen Poe

1840 (Event)

Rebuilding the Houses of Parliament - Gothic revival in architecture

1845 (Poem)

‘The Raven’ by Edgar Allen Poe

1847 (Novel)

‘Wuthering Heights’ by Emily Bronte

1848 (Event)

The ‘Communist Manifesto’ is published. Socialist ideologies begin to challenge longstanding orders.

1854 (Theory)

‘The Angel in the House’ by Coventry Patmore is published

1859 (Theory)

Charles Darwin publishes ‘On the Origins of Species’.

1861-65 (Event)

American Civil War

1872 (Novel)

‘Carmilla’ by Sheridan Le Fanu

1886 (Novel)

‘The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde’ by Robert Louis Stevenson

1890

‘The Picture of Dorian Grey’ by Oscar Wilde

1897 (Novel)

‘Dracula’ by Bram Stoker

1898 (Novel)

‘The Turn of the Screw’ by Henry James

1914-18 (Event)

World War 1

1919 (Theory)

Sigmund Freud theory of ‘The Uncanny’

1932 (Novel)

‘Light in August’ by William Faulkner

1936 (Novel)

‘Rebecca’ by Daphne du Marier

1939-45 (Event)

World War 2

1968 (Novel)

‘Outer Dark’ by Cormac McCarthy

1975 (Novel)

‘Salem’s Lot’ by Stephen King

1976 (Theory)

Ellen Moers coins ‘Female Gothic’

1976 (Novel)

‘Interview with a Vampire’ by Ann Rice

1978 (Theory)

Edward Said coins ‘Orientalism’

1979 (Novel)

‘The Bloody Chamber’ by Angela Carter

1980 (Theory)

Julia Kristeva coins ‘The Abject

1983 (Novel)

‘The Woman in Black’ by Susan Hill

1984 (Novel)

‘The Wasp Factory’ by Ian Banks

1987 (Novel)

‘Beloved’ by Toni Morrison

2000 (Novel)

‘House of leaves’ by Mark Danielewski