“Terror and Horror are so far opposite that the first expands the soul, and awakens the faculties to a high degree of life; the other contracts, freezes and nearly annihilates them .... And where lies the differentce between horror and terror, but in the uncertainty and obscurity that accompany the first, respecting the dreading evil?" (Radcliffe)
So begins my discussion of The Mysteries of Udolpho, perhaps the quintessential Gothic Horror novel. Published in four volumes by Ann Radcliffe (called the Queen of the Gothic and the Stephen King of her own time) in 1794. I begin with this quote not only because it is from Miss Radcliffe, as she is affectionately known, but also because her distinctions between terror and horror continue to inform discussion of the Gothic, even to this day. Udolpho is filled to the brim with terror--that is, the emotional response solicited by the unknown and the unseen. The most obvious example is in the black veil that Emily, our persecuted heroine, lifts--Radcliffe refuses to describe what's hidden underneath until the end of the novel, which facilitates a fear of the unknown in her reader.
Udolpho is also filled to the brim with what I want to call the weird. There is absolutely nothing of a supernatural nature in the novel: everything that seems supernatural is perfectly (and rationally!) explainable. This is in obvious contrast to Walpole before, and most Gothic writers after. But there's plenty of weird to go around--secret passages, foreign armies, mysterious scientific phenomena, odd religious rituals, and a healthy dose of superstition. This aspect of the novel is especially important, given later developments in the Gothic--there's nothing explicitly supernatural in works like We Have Always Live in the Castle, after all.
Udolpho is also long, in contrast to its Gothic siblings. This is partially due to its time frame, of course: the eighteenth century novel was full of experimentation because the novel as a genre was one giant experiment. Therefore, it's no surprise the immense influence that the Picturesque has on this novel as well--gloriously purple-prosed and meticulously descriptive, the novel is an excellent travel-book, like many of its contemporaries. As such, the plot seems a bit wanderous, very Cervantes-esque in its lack of clear rising and falling action. Rather, the novel reads much more like real life as opposed to the conventions of what modern readers expect from a novel. That said, the four different volumes do seem to contain more coherent conflicts, separate from each other. In some ways, Udolpho reads like a quartet of novels, rather than a single one.
The characterization by Radcliffe, furthermore, is definitely a step up from Walpole. No longer simply caricatures, the depth that Radcliffe has managed to convey is surprising, given the very plot-driven (or rather life-driven) feel of the novel. Each character is fairly unique--there is no replacing of one woman for another like is capable in Walpole. The Persecuted Heroine makes a much more solid appearance in this novel as well. Given the similarities, and vast differences, between Jane Eyre and Emily, it seems fairly obvious that Charlotte is writing back to Radcliffe with her novel. The nature of the characters, however, continues to follow the fairy-tale like archetypes that Walpole uses. The Persecuted Heroine is our Virgin, of course, but we also having the loving (and dying) father from Cinderella, the wicked step-mother from Snow White, and the overbearing, dangerous male from Bluebeard. It does seem interesting to me one, that Montoni is a clear villain, given his near Byronic characterization, and two, that Valancourt has his own brush with corruption and darkness. The seeds of Rochester are clearly in the making.
All right, so next week we'll be discussing The Monk (1796) by Matthew Gregory "Monk" Lewis, which shares many things with this week's novel. It was apparently written in only ten weeks, so who knows what it will be like.
Cheers!
Radcliffe, Ann. "On the Supernatural in Poetry." New Monthly Magazine, volume 16, number 1. (1826), pp. 145-152.
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