Gothic critical quotations

for homework

How the gothic emerges in times of social disorder

‘A cyclical genre that re-emerges in times of cultural stress in order to negotiate anxieties for its readership by working through them in displaced (sometimes supernaturalized) form. ‘

Kelly Hurley 2002

Contradicting societal norms of respectability quote

‘Gothic always remains the symbolic site of a culture’s discursive struggle to define and claim possession of the civilised, and to abject, or throw off, what is seen as being other to that civilised self.’

from ‘Civilisation and the Goths’ in David Punter and Glennis Byron: The Gothic (2003)

Classical vs gothic

‘Where the classical was well ordered, the gothic was chaotic; where the classical was simple and pure, gothic was ornate and convoluted; where the classics offered a world of clear rules and limits, gothic represented excess and exaggeration’

from ‘Gothic in the 18th century’ in David punter and Glennis Byron: The Gothic (2003)

how the genre as a whole is about excess

‘Its plot elements and setting may change, but its plots still remain exorbitant, piling incident upon incident for its own sake, and its settings are still overcharged with a fearsome and brooding atmosphere.’

k. Hurley 2002