First things first, I think it is important that I take the time to look into how Gothic is traditionally defined and the elements that are generally associated with the genre as it pertains to literature. Thank goodness for the wonderful world of the internet!
According to Lilia Melani's class website, The Gothic Experience, "the Gothic creates feelings of gloom, mystery, and suspense and tends to the dramatic and the sensational, like incest, diabolism, and nameless terrors." The conflict of the story is generally an abnormal event that happens as a direct result of the actions of (a) character(s).
Professor Moglen defines the Gothic by its other, the Real. The idea is that the Gothic discusses things that are often avoided in realist literature such as the psychological reasoning behind certain events. In section we discussed the supernatural characteristics of the Gothic, and how it mirrored the real in certain ways.
Horace Walpole's The Castle of Otranto, started the Gothic movement and basically set the standards for what is expected of the Gothic novel. Robert Harris created a list of these elements, which almost all Gothic stories will adhere to, to some degree.
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