Famous gothic literature authors windows#

Less well known was his role as a prolific literary critic. But it is for his horror stories that he is world famous today, great short stories that are widely known, including The Pit and the Pendulum, The Cask of Amontillado, The Tell-Tale Heart, The Black Cat, The Fall of the House of Usher, and The Purloined Letter are among his most popular short stories. Poe was one of the earliest American writers to focus on the short story and is credited with inventing the detective fiction genre. He went to the University of Virginia for a term before running out of money, then enlisted in the Army, where he failed as an officer's cadet at West Point. Enjoy this fascinating background on The Many Names of Poe. He was taken in by John and Frances Allan of Richmond, Virginia, but Poe was never formally adopted by them. Visit our study guides for The Pit and the Pendulum and The Raven.Īlthough his writings were well received, Poe struggled financially and was also plagued with 'bouts of depression and madness.' Edgar Allan Poe was orphaned at a young age after his mother died and his father abandoned the family. He became an accomplished poet, short story writer, editor, and literary critic, and gained worldwide fame for his dark, macabre tales of horror, practically inventing the genre of Gothic Literature. Poe was an American writer, considered part of the Romantic Movement, in the sub-genre of Dark Romanticism. There are a multitude of mysteries with Gothic castles as imagined by the earliest Gothic writers, but this little list, spanning three centuries, offers some delightful variations of Gothic motifs.Pen Name: Born: JanuDied: October 7, 1849Įdgar Allan Poe, born in Boston, Massachusetts in 1809, lived a life filled with tragedy. Every other available foot of wall space was filled with weapons-axes, swords, daggers and ancient firearms which I identified as flintlocks and muskets, probably dating from the Greek War of Independence.” To either side the light glimmered yellow on the pathetic heads of deer and ibexes…along with stuffed birds.

One of her characters, a retired actor named Julian Gale, was known for his portrayal of Prospero Gale now resided on Corfu, in a rented castle, the Castello di Forli, which Stewart uses for great Gothic effect The castle is dark and oppressively medieval: “He led the way along the corridor. One of the best was This Rough Magic, a line from The Tempest in fact, Stewart used this Shakespearean play as a repeated motif in her novel. Well-travelled and well-versed in English literature, Stewart imbued all of her novels with Gothic elements. Gothic Romantic Suspense was a dominant genre of the mid-20th century, and perhaps the greatest writer in this genre was Mary Stewart. The house was a sepulcher, our fear and suffering lay buried in the ruins. I looked upon a desolate shell, soulless at last, unhaunted, with no whisper of the past about its staring walls.

Famous gothic literature authors windows#

The illusion went with it, and the lights in the windows were extinguished. “Moreover, the walls of my castle are broken the shadows are many, and the wind breathes cold through the broken battlements and casements.”ĭu Maurier’s setting, Manderley, is a giant family estate off the Cornwall coast it is not officially a castle, yet the setting meets many Gothic criteria, including isolation, a hint of the supernatural, a heroine thrown into an alien environment and utterly without aid, and of course the requisite creepiness of the giant dwelling, Manderley, which the reader first sees in a horrific image via the narrator’s dream:” A cloud, hitherto unseen, came upon the moon, and hovered an instant like a dark hand before a face. Count Dracula himself describes the chilling atmosphere:

Stoker’s novel fits the category of “Gothic Horror,” but there is delicious mystery in his setting: an isolated castle in the Carpathian mountains that cannot be found on a map, and from which one can hear little more than the howling of wolves.