Gothic Tales - Paperback

by Elizabeth Gaskell (Author), Laura Kranzler (Editor)

Chilling tales that blend the real and the supernatural to eerie, compelling effect

Victorian author Elizabeth Gaskell combines historical incidents and otherworldly tales in this collection of classic Gothic stories. "Disappearances," inspired by local legends of mysterious vanishings, mixes gossip and fact; while "Lois the Witch," a novella based on an account of the Salem witch hunts, shows how sexual desire and jealousy lead to hysteria. In "The Old Nurse's Story," a mysterious child roams the freezing Northumberland moors; in "The Poor Clare," an evil doppelgänger is formed by a woman's bitter curse; and "Curious, if True," features a playful reworking of fairy tales. Whether darkly surreal or micheievous, all the stories in this volume form a stark contrast to the social realism of Gaskell's novels, revealing a darker and more unsettling style of writing.

Laura Kranzler's introduction discusses how Gaskell's tales, with their ghostly doublings and transgressive passions, show the Gothic underside of female identity, domestic relations and male authority. This edition also contains a chronology, further reading and explanatory notes.

Back Jacket

The curse -- the curse! I looked up in terror. In the great mirror opposite I saw myself, and right behind, another wicked, fearful self'

An encounter with the supernatural in an everyday setting accentuates its strangeness; a truth used to eerie effect in Gaskell's Gothic tales. A portrait turned to the wall, a hidden manuscript, a mysterious child that lives on the freezing moors, a doppelganger formed by a woman's bitter curse: all of these things hint at male tyranny and woman as avenging angel -- or devil.

Gaskell was fascinated by the dualities in women's lives and the way in which fact and fiction merge. 'Disappearances', a mix of gossip, legend and fact, relates stories of mysterious vanishings, 'Lois the Witch', a novella based on an account of the Salem witch hunts, shows how sexual desire and jealousy lead to communal hysteria and persecution, while 'The Grey Woman' explores a common Gothic theme, the way in which the ghosts of the past always return to haunt us.

Author Biography

Elizabeth Gaskell (1810-65) wrote her first novel, MARY BARTON, in 1848 as a distraction from her sorrow at the death of her only son in infancy. It won the attention of Dickens and was followed by 5 other full-length novels as well as numerous short stories and novellas. Laura Kranzler has written on Mary Shelley and Virginia Woolf and has published a novel.