Explain the ways in which Gothic is about reading and misreading

        Whilst novels, and the reading of them, feature in all of these texts, books are not the only things to be read and misread. Catherine Morland misreads the situation at Northanger Abbey completely, suspecting General Tilney of terrible crimes, with the suggestion, or rather the unavoidable truth, that her novel-reading and imagination have led her to these false conclusions. Even Catherine’s sudden ejection from Northanger Abbey so early in the morning is misread by her: whilst she is aware that she had ‘offended the General’, but she is wrong in her reading of the situation, her crime, in fact, being nothing more than her situation, rather than her actions.

        The misreading of situations and events causes much of the tension in the novel: in Shelley’s Frankenstein, the misreading of the situation concerning the trial of Justine. Whilst all evidence did indeed point towards Justine, in her possession of the picture, ‘which had been judged to be the temptation of the murder’. Frankenstein’s Monster reads the situation with the De Lacey family, and indeed, reads enough correctly to understand that his appearance is enough to disgust those around him. Ambrosio misreads the relationship he should have with Antonia, choosing to notice lust above love of brother for his sister, or that of a priest to his parishioner. Indeed, unknown family relationships are a trope of the gothic genre, and result in situations such as that in The Monk.

        The unexpected family relationships in The Monk are an example of the twists in plot often found in the genre. In the case of the bleeding nun, what seems a perfect plan for elopement instead turns into something of a horror story. It is easy to believe that the document found by Catherine in Northanger Abbey could be some secret letters, as Catherine does, and the disappointment when they transpire to be nothing more than laundry lists function as another surprise for the reader.

        These plot twists form another potential for misunderstanding in anticipation: the events which the reader expects are not those intended by the author. As such, the reader is forced to read, or be faced with the possibility of misreading and misinterpreting the events of the novel. The elopement of Alphonso and Agnes seems to have been laid perfectly, and the twist of the appearance of the true bleeding nun surprised the reader. The reappearance of Agnes, too, after her supposed death, comes as a surprise to the readership, after the vehement belief of the characters as to her death.

        The plot twists and complex storyline of Gothic writing can cause the reader to become disorientated within the text, and in search for firm grounding. As with many genres, the Gothic is interdependent on other pieces of literature, for no literary work can exist as a purely freestanding edifice. Whilst it is not necessary to have read ‘Isabella Thorpe’s seven “horrid” novels’, they are all real novels, and Jane Austen’s knowledge of them proves ‘that she knew well a broad range of the literary competition of the Gothic marketplace. Without at least a fair knowledge of the genre which is parodied, we cannot have as great an understanding of the text, and our understanding of the text as a single piece is enhanced by knowledge of the genre as a whole. The gothic, is of course, not the only genre or period of writing to which this applies, our understanding must be drawn from a wide range of sources to gain a full insight.

        Of course, references to other texts are not always so obviously made as in Northanger Abbey. The inter-dependence of literature on other literature adds depth to a storyline, such as the appearance of the wandering Jew in The Monk, which adds in not only another part of the story, thereby creating interest, but also give the readership a sense of cohesion with other novels, other stories and other times. To read within a novel reference to another work grounds our understanding in a genre which tends to feature confusing plots and utilises the tale story within a story, and allows us to use this as a point of reference.

        This organization of the gothic novel can give rise to a sense of need for careful reading. The presence of the extra stories within the main narrative can leave the reader with a sense of bewilderment. ‘Numerous critics have insisted that the burlesque is imperfectly joined to the main narrative, with the result that Catherine's fantastic delusions at Northanger Abbey are regarded as deficient in logical connection with her earlier experiences at Bath’. Anne Ehrenpreis claims the transition to be ‘uncomfortable’ in an introduction to the novel. However, the complex, and perhaps at times uncomfortable and convoluted plots maintain the reader through the novel, creating interest. Robert Hume holds that ‘Mrs. Radcliffe's easy manipulation of drawn-out suspense holds the reader's attention through long books with slight plots’. The same can be said for other Gothic novels: The Monk is largely taken up with the side plot of the Bleeding Nun, padding out the main story of Ambrosio’s lust for Antonia. Even the story of Agnes’ disappearance is nothing but an addition to the story, and an extra source of tension to keep the reader occupied whilst the story of Ambrosio spins out. As such, the Gothic novel is perhaps largely about reading through the subplots to the main part of the story.

        Gothic novels themselves are often designed to be read by the characters within them, often as a result of the plot device of the story within the story. Frankenstein is, although it is easy to forget it in the reading, a story told by Frankenstein to Robert Walton, and the story of the Monster told by him to Frankenstein, bringing the whole into a coherent narrative. This narrative was designed to be read by Walton’s sister, safe at home, in the form of a series of letters. Dracula, too, is designed to be read, written in a collection of journal entries and letters. Without these, and Mina’s fair copy of them, Van Helsing could not have known all that he did, enough to destroy Dracula: indeed, he claims it to be the source of his true realisation on the subject. "Oh, Madam Mina," he said, "how can I say what I owe to you? This paper is as sunshine. It opens the gate to me. I am dazed, I am dazzled, with so much light.

It has been suggested that the Gothic largely concentrates on the internal thoughts and emotions of the characters, which Hume dubs a ‘psychological interest’: ‘As early as Walpole (1764) there is a considerable amount of concern for interior mental processes’. We gain a privileged insight into the mind of Frankenstein’s Monster, and indeed, into the thoughts and emotions of Frankenstein, and the difference between creator and created. Indeed, at times it easy to view Frankenstein, and not his creation, as the monster. We feel pity for the un-named creation, who comments that ‘all men hate the wretched: how, then, must I be hated, who am miserable beyond all living thing!’. Frankenstein can be seen as abandoning his duty in leaving the Monster, and not fulfilling the duty of creator, or indeed, parent, in giving a proper upbringing and knowledge of morality to his creature.

In Northanger, too, we have moments of seeing Catherine’s untamed thoughts, particularly in her distress at being discovered in her foolish imaginings and suspicions by Henry. The reader witnesses her sudden transition from her childish imagination to a more sensible thought process. In The Monk, we see the evolution from the pious, perfect Ambrosio, to one willing to allow satanic worship to pass under his nose, to one who will actually turn to the devil in his desperation. This ‘reading of the internal character as well as the external gives us greater insight into them. We are given a chance to not only view events through the eyes of someone else, but to gain access also to their thoughts, and to read their minds, as it were, like a book.

Gothic fiction, perhaps, shows us the importance of reading, whether it is, in the most noticeable sense, as wider reading which will allow the reader to gain a better understanding and insight to the text, or the reading of the characters and their thoughts.

Word Count: 2168

Bibliography

Austen, Jane, Northanger Abbey in The Collected Works of Jane Austen, (London:

Octopus, 1980)

Ehrenpreis, Anne, Introduction to Northanger Abbey by Jane Austen, (Hammondsworth: Penguin Books, 1972), pp13-17

Glock, Waldo S., ‘Catherine Morland’s  Delusions: A Defence of Northanger Abbey’ in Rocky Mountain Review of Language and Literature, Vol. 32, No. 1 (Winter, 1978), pp. 33-46, http://www.jstor.org/stable/1347760, (accessed 11th February 2009)

Hume, Robert D., ‘Gothic versus Romantic: A revaluation of the Gothic Novel’ in PMLA, Vol. 84, No. 2 (Mar., 1969), pp. 282-290, http://www.jstor.org/stable/1261285, ( accessed 12th February 2009)  

Lewis, Matthew, The Monk, (New York: Dover Publications, 2003)

Shelley, Mary Frankenstein, (London, Penguin, 1994)

Stoker, Bram, Dracula,  (London: Puffin, 1994)

Thompson, Douglass H.  and Frank, Frederick S., ‘Jane Austen and the Northanger Novelists’ in Gothic Writers; A Critical and Bibliographical Guide, ed. Thompson, Douglass H., Voller, Jack G., and Frank, Frederick S., (London: Greenwood Press, 2002)

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