Criticism Archives - Page 8 of 30 - Home For Fiction

Criticism

Southern Gothic Tropes: Meaning “Beyond the South”

February 21, 2022

The so-called “Southern Gothic” is a subcategory of the Gothic mode that nominally revolves around the American South – as in, the Southern US States. However, as we’ll see in this post, Southern Gothic tropes far exceed the strict topical confines of the American South. Indeed, understanding these Southern Gothic tropes can reveal hidden meaning in a vast literary space.

As is the case with the Gothic in general, the Southern Gothic, too, is difficult to pinpoint. Perhaps paradoxically, considering its (again, nominal) narrow focus, the Southern Gothic describes not a place but an experience. Though Southern Gothic tropes are generally well-defined, as we’ll soon see, their metaphorical dimensions and repercussions are far more flexible.

In simpler words: The Southern Gothic isn’t about the US South.

So, let’s take an analytic but accessible look at this intriguing subcategory of the Gothic mode. We’ll start with a basic outline of Southern Gothic tropes, and then I’ll explain what these tropes really signify. As a result, we’ll discover why the Southern Gothic framework can inform our reading of a vast number of other narratives.

Southern Gothic Tropes — As with so many other things in literature, Southern Gothic tropes are more about the “how it feels”, **affect**, rather than the “what it is”

(more…)

Vampire Capital: Social Classes in Dracula

December 27, 2021

Criticism

academia, capitalism, criticism, Gothic, society

Note: the following article on Vampire Capital and Social Classes in Dracula is a modified excerpt (pp. 127-131) from my doctoral dissertation, “Time is Everything with Him”: The Concept of the Eternal Now in Nineteenth-Century Gothic, which can be downloaded (for free) from the repository of the Tampere University Press. For a list of my other academic publications, see the list on the main website.

The emergence of the Gothic – particularly the Victorian Gothic – can be traced to the development of the market. The mid-nineteenth century also coincides with one of the most important theoreticians on capital, Karl Marx, who used numerous Gothic metaphors for his references to capitalism:

Capital is dead labour which, vampire-like, lives only by sucking living labour, and lives the more, the more labour it sucks. The time during which the worker works is the time during which the capitalist consumes the labour-power he has bought from him. If the worker consumes his disposable time for himself, he robs the capitalist (342).

Additionally, there is an association between, on the one hand, ghosts and specters, and, on the other, the transcendent nature of commodities and the invisibility of wealth. The association is facilitated through the introduction of economic devices such as the stock market and the prevalence of paper money (Smith, 149–150).

Andrew Smith claims that such an element can also be found in A Christmas Carol, as Scrooge’s wealth “is both there (hoarded) and not there (not in circulation)”, with a parallel formed between the “spectrality” of money and that of ghosts (150). Scrooge becomes a prime example – if not an actual personification – of this very invisibility of wealth.

For Marx, vampire capital was an apt metaphor of how capitalism becomes engorged by parasitically sucking life out of labor

(more…)

How Did Dracula Become a Vampire: Ethics and Accountability

November 29, 2021

Criticism

academia, criticism, Dracula, Gothic, literature, responsibility

At first, you might consider the question “How did Dracula become a vampire?” meaningless. The obvious reason is that Bram Stoker’s novel doesn’t offer a clear answer. However, not only is there actual meaning in this deceptively simple question, but it’s one that is fundamental for the way ethics and accountability are presented in the novel.

After all, ethics as well as accountability are not consciously dealt with in Dracula. Rather, there is only an attempt by the text to explain (away) some uncomfortable truths. Of course, in a true Victorian Streisand effect, the more the novel wants to hide these uncomfortable truths, the more they emerge.

How did Dracula become a vampire?

This question – which I’m using as a starting point and metaphor – allows us to talk about a crucial aspect of the novel. Indeed, one containing another question: Is Dracula evil?

(more…)