The Tale of Terror: A Study of the Gothic Romance

  CHAPTER XII - CONCLUSION.

  This book is an attempt to trace in outline the origin anddevelopment of the Gothic romance and the tale of terror. Such asurvey is necessarily incomplete. For more than fifty years afterthe publication of _The Castle of Otranto_ the Gothic Romanceremained a definitely recognised kind of fiction; but, as thescope of the novel gradually came to include the whole range ofhuman expression, it lost its individuality, and was merged intoother forms. To follow every trail of its influence would lead usfar afield. The Tale of Terror, if we use the term in its widersense, may be said to include the magnificent story of theWriting on the Wall at Belshazzar's Feast, the Book of Job, thelegends of the Deluge and of the Tower of Babel, and Saul's Visitto the Witch of Endor, which Byron regarded as the best ghoststory in the world. In the Hebrew writings fear is used to endowa hero with superhuman powers or to instil a moral truth. The sunstands still in the heavens that Joshua may prevail over hisenemies. In modern days the tale of terror is told for its ownsake. It has become an end in itself, and is probably appreciatedmost fully by those who are secure from peril. It satisfies thehuman desire to experience new emotions and sensations, withoutactual danger.

  There is little doubt that the Gothic Romance primarily made itsappeal to women readers, though we know that Mrs. Radcliffe hadmany men among her admirers, and that Cherubina of _The Heroine_had a companion in folly, The Story-Haunted Youth. It is remotelyallied, as its name implies, to the mediaeval romances, at whichCervantes tilts in _Don Quixote_. It was more closely akin,however, to the heroic romances satirised in Mrs. CharlotteLennox's _Female Quixote_ (1752). When the voluminous works of LeCalprenede and of Mademoiselle de Scudery were translated intoEnglish, they found many imitators and admirers, and their vogueoutlasted the seventeenth century. _Artamene ou le Grand Cyrus_,out of which Mrs. Pepys told her husband long stories, "thoughnothing to the purpose, nor in any good manner," is to be found,with a pin stuck through one of the middle leaves, in the lady'slibrary described by Addison in the _Spectator_, Mrs. Aphra Behn,in _Oroonoko_ and _The Fair Jilt_, had made some attempt to bringromance nearer to real life; but it was not until the middle ofthe eighteenth century, when the novel, with the rise ofRichardson, Fielding, Smollett and Sterne, took firm root onEnglish soil, that the popularity of Cassandra, Parthenissa andAretina was superseded. Then, if we may trust the evidence ofColman's farce, _Polly Honeycombe_, first acted in 1760, Pamela,Clarissa Harlowe and Sophia Western reigned in their stead. Forthe reader who had patiently followed the eddying, circlingcourse of the heroic romance, with its high-flown language andmarvellous adventures, Richardson's novel of sentiment probablyheld more attraction than Fielding's novel of manners. Fielding,on his broad canvas, paints the life of his day on the highway,in coaches, taverns, sponging-houses or at Vauxhall masquerades.Every class of society is represented, from the vagabond to thenoble lord. Richardson, in describing the shifts and subterfugesof Mr. B--and the elaborate intrigue of Lovelace, moves within anarrow circle, devoting himself, not to the portrayal ofcharacter, but to the minute analysis of a woman's heart. Thesentiment of Richardson descends to Mrs. Radcliffe. Her heroinesare fashioned in the likeness of Clarissa Harlowe; her heroesinherit many of the traits of the immaculate Grandison. She addszest to her plots by wafting her heroines to distant climes andbygone centuries, and by playing on their nerves withsuperstitious fears. Since human nature often looks to fictionfor a refuge from the world, there is always room for theillusion of romance side by side with the picture of actual life.Fanny Burney's spirited record of Evelina's visit to her vulgar,but human, relatives, the Branghtons, in London, is not enough.We need too the sojourn of Emily, with her thick-coming fancies,in the castle of Udolpho.

  The Gothic Romance did not reflect real life, or revealcharacter, or display humour. Its aim was different. It was fullof sentimentality, and it stirred the emotions of pity and fear.The ethereal, sensitive heroine, suffering through no fault ofher own, could not fail to win sympathy. The hero was pale,melancholy, and unfortunate enough to be attractive. The villain,bold and desperate in his crimes, was secretly admired as well asfeared. Hairbreadth escapes and wicked intrigues in castles builtover beetling precipices were sufficiently outside the reader'sown experience to produce a thrill. Ghosts, and rumours ofghosts, touched nearly the eighteenth century reader, who hadoften listened, with bated breath, to winter's tales of spiritsseen on Halloween in the churchyard, or white-robed spectresencountered in dark lanes and lonely ruins. In country houseslike those described in Miss Austen's novels, where life wasdiversified only by paying calls, dining out, taking gentleexercise or playing round games like "commerce" or "word-makingand work-taking," the Gothic Romances must have proved a welcomesource of pleasurable excitement. Mr. Woodhouse, with hismelancholy views on the effects of wedding cake and muffin, wouldhave condemned them, no doubt, as unwholesome; Lady Catherine deBourgh would have been too impatient to read them; but LydiaBennet, Elinor Dashwood and Isabella Thorpe must have found inthem an inestimable solace. Their fame was soon overshadowed bythat of the Waverley Novels, but they had served their turn inproviding an entertaining interlude before the arrival of SirWalter Scott. Even at the very height of his vogue, they probablyenjoyed a surreptitious popularity, not merely in the servants'hall, but in the drawing room. Nineteenth century literatureabounds in references to the vogue of this school of fiction.There were spasmodic attempts at a revival in an anonymous workcalled _Forman_ (1819), dedicated to Scott, and in Ainsworth's_Rookwood_ (1834); and terror has never ceased to be used as amotive in fiction.

  In _Villette_, Lucy Snowe, whose nerves Ginevra describes as"real iron and bend leather," gazes steadily for the space offive minutes at the spectral "nun." This episode indicates achange of fashion; for the lady of Gothic romance could not havesubmitted to the ordeal for five seconds without fainting. A morerobust heroine, who thinks clearly and yet feels strongly, hascome into her own. In _Jane Eyre_ many of the situations arefraught with terror, but it is the power of human passion,transcending the hideous scenes, that grips our imagination.Terror is used as a means to an end, not as an end in itself. In_Wuthering Heights_ the windswept Yorkshire moors are thebackground for elemental feelings. We no longer "tremble withdelicious dread" or "snatch a fearful joy." The gloom neverlightens. We live ourselves beneath the shadow of Heathcliff'sawe-inspiring personality, and there is no escape from a terror,which passes almost beyond the bounds of speech. The Brontes donot trifle with emotion or use supernatural elements to increasethe tension. Theirs are the terrors of actual life.

  Other novelists, contemporary with the Brontes, revel in terrorfor its own sake. Wilkie Collins weaves elaborate plots ofhair-raising events. The charm of _The Moonstone_ and the _Womanin White_ is independent of character or literary finish. Itconsists in the unravelling of a skilfully woven fabric. Le Fanu,who resented the term "sensational" which was justly applied tohis works, plays pitilessly on our nerves with both real andfictitious horrors. He, like Wilkie Collins, made a cult ofterror. Their literary descendants may perhaps be found in suchauthors as Richard Marsh or Bram Stoker, or Sax Rohmer. In BramStoker's _Dracula_ the old vampire legend is brought up to date,and we are held from beginning to end in a state of frightfulsuspense. No one who has read the book will fail to remember thepicture of Dracula climbing up the front of the castle inTransylvania, or the scene in the tomb when a stake is driventhrough the heart of the vampire who has taken possession ofLucy's form. The ineffable horror of the "Un-Dead" would repel usby its painfulness, if it were not made endurable by the love,hope and faith of the living characters, particularly of the oldDutch doctor, Van Helsing. The matter-of-fact style of thenarrative, which is compiled of letters, diaries and journals,and the mention of such familiar places as Whitby and Hampstead,help to enhance the illusion.

  The motive of terror has often been mingled with other motives inthe novel as well as in the short tale. In unwinding thecomplicated thread of the modern detective story, which followsthe design
originated by Godwin and perfected by Poe, we arefrequently kept to our task by the force of terror as well as ofcuriosity. In _The Sign of Four_ and in _The Hound of theBaskervilles_, to choose two entirely different stories, ConanDoyle realises that darkness and loneliness place us at the mercyof terror, and he works artfully on our fears of the unknown.Phillips Oppenheim and William Le Queux, in romances which havesometimes a background of international politics, maintain ourinterest by means of mystifications, which screw up ourimagination to the utmost pitch, and then let us down gently witha natural but not too obvious explanation. A certain amount ofterror is almost essential to heighten the interest of a novel ofcostume and adventure, like _The Prisoner of Zenda_ or _Rupert ofHentzau_, or of the fantastic, exciting romances of Jules Verne.Rider Haggard's African romances, _She_ and _King Solomon'sMines_, belong to a large group of supernatural tales with aforeign setting. They combine strangeness, wonder, mystery andhorror. The ancient theme of bartering souls is given a new twistin Robert Hichens' novel, _The Flames_. E.F. Benson, in _TheImage in the Sand_, experiments with Oriental magic. Theinvestigations of the Society for Psychical Research gave a newimpulse to stories of the occult and the uncanny. AlgernonBlackwood is one of the most ingenious exponents of this type ofstory. By means of psychical explanations, he succeeds inrevivifying many ancient superstitions. In _Dr. John Silence_,even the werewolf, whom we believed extinct, manifests himself inmodern days among a party of cheerful campers on a lonely island,and brings unspeakable terror in his trail. Sometimes terror isused nowadays, as Bulwer Lytton used it, to serve a moralpurpose. Oscar Wilde's _Picture of Dorian Gray_ is intended toshow that sin must ultimately affect the soul; and the Sorrows ofSatan, in Miss Corelli's novel, are caused by the wickedness ofthe world. But apart from any ulterior motive there is still adesire for the unusual, there is still pleasure to be found in athrill, and so long as this human instinct endures devices willbe found for satisfying it. Of the making of tales of terrorthere is no end; and almost every novelist of note has, at onetime or another, tried his hand at the art. Early in his careerArnold Bennett fashioned a novelette, _Hugo_, which may be readas a modernised version of the Gothic romance. Instead ofsubterranean vaults in a deserted abbey, we have the strong roomsof an enterprising Sloane Street emporium. The coffin, containingan image of the heroine, is buried not in a mouldering chapel,but in a suburban cemetery. The lovely but harassed heroine hasfallen, indeed, from her high estate, for Camilla earns herliving as a milliner. There are, it is true, no sonnets and nosunsets, but the excitement of the plot, which is partiallyunfolded by means of a phonographic record, renders themsuperfluous. H.G. Wells makes excursions into quasi-scientific,fantastic realms of grotesque horror in his _First Men in theMoon_, and in some of his sketches and short stories. JosephConrad has the power of fear ever at the command of his romanticimagination. In _The Nigger of the Narcissus_, in _Typhoon_, and,above all, in _The Shadow-Line_, he shows his supreme masteryover inexpressible mystery and nameless terror. The voyage of theschooner, doomed by the evil influence of her dead captain, iscomparable only in awe and horror to that of _The AncientMariner_. Conrad touches unfathomable depths of human feelings,and in his hands the tale of terror becomes a finished work ofart. The future of the tale of terror it is impossible to predict;but the experiments of living authors, who continually find newoutlets with the advance of science and of psychological enquiry,suffice to prove that its powers are not yet exhausted. Those whomake the 'moving accident' their trade will no doubt continue toassail us with the shock of startling and sensational events.Others with more insidious art, will set themselves to devisestories which evoke subtler refinements of fear. The interest hasalready been transferred from 'bogle-wark' to the effect of theinexplicable, the mysterious and the uncanny on human thought andemotion. It may well be that this track will lead us intounexplored labyrinths of terror.