Contemporary Gothic

This chapter considers important new connections between genre and narrative in the evolving structural framework of the Gothic. In it, the notion of the “gothic” as experience is reinstated and recuperated through “affect”. I read the sensation of the Gothic as not necessarily reliant on surface or imagery and see its machinery as pragmatically closer to the original workings of the “gothic” novels of authors such as Radcliffe or Lewis. The key to this chapter’s reading is the notion of intention: “gothic” literature aimed to horrify, shock, and challenge. These aspects, I contend, are not necessarily perceptible in contemporary objects that borrow aesthetically from the Gothic tradition.

This paper explores the concept of Gothic in relation to the contemporary Japanese Gothic & Lolita movement (G&L). Although it discusses G&L as a whole, it places a specific focus on the Gosurori (Gosu-loli, Gothloli, or Gothic Lolita) by tracing the evolution of the fashion-based Lolita subculture, from its historical, transcultural origins, and the development of its meanings.

The Japanese Lolita subculture, now becoming an increasingly worldwide preoccupation, is represented by women who dress as doll-like children. The image of this “Lolita,” which may either be categorized as “Gothic” or “Sweet,” or both, is inspired by traditional European clothing from the French Rococo and Victorian periods. Whilst it emerged from “little-girl” Japanese street styles of the 1970s, it transitioned through the New Romantic 1980s, picking up more frills, lace and ribbons on the way. For the Gothic Lolita, these influences were also fused with Neo-Victorian characteristics of gothic subcultural fashions, including elements of mourning dress, and accessories such as cameos, crosses, crucifixes, and rosary beads.

The transmigration and translation of ideas that have contributed to the G&L phenomenon are examined in context with the formulation of the gothic aspects of the Gosurori identity. In doing so, the following question will be raised and investigated, “What is gothic about Lolita?”

This article argues that the figure of the reanimated mummy, which appeared with increasing frequency in imperialist adventure fiction as the nineteenth century drew to a close, is the quintessential monster of imperial gothic. The sudden interest in a figure that some would describe as a fundamentally flawed monster (perhaps because it is simply too unambiguously dead) at this moment of turn-of-the-century fears of dissolution, degeneration and loss of control signals, I argue here, a profound anxiety about the epistemological underpinnings of the imperial project. In these stories, reanimated mummies move easily out of their stable positions as artefacts or relics and enter into the Western symbolic order as acting subjects (however conditionally) and as terrifying rivals for epistemological supremacy. HOST 1.1_art_Macfarlane_05-024.indd 5 HOST 1.1_art_Macfarlane_05-024.indd 5

Twenty-First-Century Gothic
Isbn13: 978-1-4438-2389-0
Isbn: 1-4438-2389-9

The essays in this volume reinterpret and contest the Gothic cultural inheritance, each from a specifically twenty-first century perspective. Most are based on papers delivered at a conference held, appropriately, in Horace Walpoleʼs Gothic mansion at Strawberry Hill in West London, which is usually seen as the geographical origin of the first, but not the last, of the many Gothic revivals of the past 300 years. In a contemporary context, the Gothic sensibility could be seen as a mode particularly applicable to the frightening instability of the world in which we find ourselves at the beginning of the twenty-first century.

The truth is probably less epochal: that Gothic never went away (when were we ever without fear?), or at least has persisted since its resurgence in the late nineteenth century. Gothic is at least as modern as it is ancient, and each essay in this collection contributes to current scholarship on the Gothic by exploring a particular aspect of Gothic’s contemporaneity. The volume contains papers on horror novels and cinema, poetry, popular music and fan cultures.

On the whole, this collection supplies a solid scholastic foundation and invites further discussion and debate for academics as well as fans. Catherine Spooner concludes her preface to the collection calling for a focus on what twenty-first-century Gothic does, rather than attempting to establish a generic purity of what it is.

My own chapter traces the rise of what I term 'bodily horror' in Contemporary Gothic.

... From its inception, there has been a kind of critical snobbishness against Gothic, springing from the cultural elitism that decries any form of mass entertainment. In the late twentieth century, however, a critical preoccupation with ...

Obsessed with Pain:Body Politics and Contemporary Gothic. Aldana Reyes, Xavier (2010) Obsessed with Pain:Body Politics and Contemporary Gothic. In: Twenty-First-Century Gothic. Cambridge Scholars Publishing, Newcastle Upon Tyne, pp. 53-68. ISBN 9781443823890. ...

My level six undergraduate module on YA Fiction and the Gothic 2015-16 session course schedule. All over the country in the world of young adult fiction teenagers who die aren't staying dead. This module will interrogate the new high school Gothic, exploring the representation of the undead or living dead (werewolves, vampires and zombies) in dark or paranormal romance. Texts range from Daniel Waters's zombie trilogy to Isaac Marion's Warm Bodies and Holly Black's Coldtown. We'll also look at examples of werewolf fiction (Shiver) and at the folklore inspired novels of Marcus Sedgwick. YA fiction has attracted some of the most gifted writers who address these themes as a means of confronting death or discrimination or to engage with faith and embrace the enduring power of love. We will be theorising folklore and grappling with undead issues such as the notion of free will, damnation and redemption, the sexualisation of early teens, the effects of prejudice and the politics of difference. This module is dedicated to Sophie Lancaster who was beaten to death in a park for being a 'goth'. Please read Simon Armitage's Black Roses: The Killing of Sophie Lancaster on StudyNet before beginning the module (we will draw on this representation of gothic subculture and otherness in our sessions). Stamp Out Prejudice, Hatred, Intolerance Everywhere Generation Dead is taught via two hour workshops on Mondays 9.00-11.00 (room R118), 1.00-3.00 (room N105). The schedule below includes the suggested critical reading and contexts for each week (critical texts are available on StudyNet). Full details of all works cited are given on the critical reading list (under 'Module Information' on StudyNet). Please sign up to follow the Open Graves, Open Minds blog which will be featuring relevant material over the next few weeks and is searchable via topic opengravesopenminds.com