Gothic Elements

Description of a fallen world…

Setting: Deterioration implies there was once a thriving world

Hero: protagonist usually isolated (voluntarily or involuntarily)

Villain: evil often by his own fall from grace

Wanderer: perpetual wandering and epitome of isolation form of divine punishment

Plot: mirrors setting and character with protagonist’s fall from grace as he/she succumbs to temptation from

villain. Saved through reunion with loved one

Sublime: something at once immense, terrifying, and beautiful. Particularly something in the natural world,

like a mountain or a storm.

Gothic elements include the following:

1. Setting in a castle2. An atmosphere of mystery and suspense3. An ancient prophecy4. Omens, portents, visions5. Supernatural or otherwise inexplicable events6. High, even overwrought emotion7. Women in distress.8. Women threatened by a powerful, impulsive,

tyrannical male9. The metonymy of gloom and horror10.The vocabulary of the gothic

Metonymy is a subtype of metaphor, in which something (like rain) is used to stand for something else (like sorrow). For example, the film industry likes to use metonymy as a quick shorthand, so we often notice that it is raining in funeral scenes. Note that the following metonymies for "doom and gloom" all suggest some element of mystery, danger, or the supernatural.

The vocabulary of the gothic