The Rise of Supernatural Fiction, 1762-1800
By E.J. Clery
1995
First Published
3.94
Average Rating
238
Number of Pages
A genre of supernatural fiction was among the more improbable products of the Age of Enlightenment. This book questions the historical reasons for its growing popularity in the late eighteenth century. Beginning with the notorious case of the Cock Lane ghost, a performing poltergeist who became a major attraction in London in 1762, and with Garrick's spellbinding and paradigmatic performance as the ghost-seeing Hamlet, it moves on to look at the Gothic novels of Horace Walpole, Ann Radcliffe, M. G. Lewis, and others, in unexpected new lights, drawing out the connection between fictions of the supernatural and the growth of consumerism.
Avg Rating
3.94
Number of Ratings
31
5 STARS
26%
4 STARS
55%
3 STARS
10%
2 STARS
6%
1 STARS
3%
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Author
E.J. Clery
Author · 3 books
Emma Clery is a Professor of English at the University of Southampton.
