From Anne Rice’s best-selling novels to our recurrent interest in vampires and the occult, the Gothic has an unyielding hold on our imagination. But what exactly does "Gothic" mean? How does it differ from "terror" or "horror," and where do its parameters lie? Through a wide range of brief essays written by leading scholars, The Handbook of the Gothic , second edition, provides a virtual encyclopedia of things Gothic. From the Demonic to the Uncanny, the Bronte sisters to Melville, this volume plots the characteristics of Gothic’s vastly different schools and manifestations, offering a comprehensive guide of Gothic writing and culture. Among the many topics and figures discussed American Gothic, the Bronte Sisters, Angela Carter, the Demonic, Female Gothic, Ghost Stories, Film, Washington Irving, Henry James, H. P. Lovecraft, Madness, Herman Melville, Monstrosity, Orientalism, Post-Colonial Gothic, Anne Rice, Romanticism, Sado-Masochism, Bram Stoker, the Sublime, the Uncanny, Vampires, and Werewolves. This revised edition of The Handbook of the Gothic contains over twenty new entries on Gothic writers such as Stephen King and Daphne Du Maurier, new genres such as African-American Gothic, new terms like Gothic Graphic Novel and Comic, and a new preface which situates the handbook within current studies of the Gothic.
More comprehensive than the first edition, the new edition includes new entries on Anglo-Caribbean Gothic, Gothic Graphic Novels, and the Gothic in Children's Literature. It's also better organized with three sub-sections: Gothic writers, Gothic terminology, and Gothic locations.
'The Handbook of the Gothic' by Marie Mulvey-Roberts The best encyclopaedia of the topic that I have found. Huge list of contributors detailing heaps of cool stuff. “Gothic music encompassing the work of mystical writers such as Hildegard von Bingen (1098-1179), whose overtly passionate and spiritually fuelled output was produced in an age typified by the great Gothic cathedrals of Chartres and Notre Dame de Paris.” (p145)
Writers of Gothic include: The Bronte’s (by Elizabeth Imlay, p9); Polidori, John (p75), and Mary Shelley (by Marie Mulvey-Roberts, p86)
But notable errors: Whole sections of text are reproduced in double form – Post-Colonial Gothic (by Ken Gelder, pages 2-19 & 306); Roman Noir (by Terry Hal, pages 220 & 307). …..