Crossing Boundaries: Transgression and Subversion in Gothic Literature

Crossing Boundaries: Transgression and Subversion in Gothic Literature

The Gothic genre is primarily characterised by its tendency to transgress and subvert the already precariously established laws and codes of its time. As Fred Botting succinctly puts it: ‘Gothic signifies a writing of excess.’ [1] The emergence of Gothic literature was a marked product of the social and political upheaval which was prevalent in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century, and the period of the Gothic novel’s greatest popularity in the 1790s coincided with the French Revolution which overthrew the traditional monarchy and challenged many received ideas, as well as precipitating a period of reaction and nationalist fervour in British society. The relationship between Gothic as a revolutionary new literary movement and political revolution was one recognised by some at the time, including the Marquis de Sade, who claimed the Gothic genre was 'the inevitable product of the revolutionary shocks with which the whole of Europe resounded.'[2] As a result of these ‘revolutionary shocks’, great uncertainties were sparked regarding the nature of power, law, sexuality, religion and hierarchy. Societal principles were not the only thing to be put in question, so were the very boundaries of the individual mind, as Gothic literature attempts to move into the subconscious psyche, exploring the very darkest aspects of human nature. In this blog the ways in which these transgressions and subversions of physical, moral and societal boundaries and norms function in the Gothic novel will be explored through two primary texts:  Horace Walpole’s The Castle of Otranto (1764) [3] which is widely regarded as the first Gothic novel and Matthew Lewis’ scandalous The Monk (1796) [4].

Firstly, it is necessary to acknowledge the difference between transgression and subversion in Gothic literature. While subversion seeks to transform or undermine the established social orders and its hierarchy of power, transgression is perhaps more sinister in its meaning. Transgression, in this blog posting, is to be understood as an extreme crossing of social and moral codes of value. Lewis’ The Monk explores the notion of illicit sexuality against the backdrop of the Catholic church. The fact that the abbot Ambrosio’s transgressions takes place against the backdrop of the Catholic church make the revelations of depravity perhaps more shocking to the reader, simultaneously illustrating the anti-Catholic feeling which was prevalent in eighteenth century England. This demonising of the Catholic ‘Other’ was a result of the ideological emergence of the English, Protestant national rhetoric. This anti Catholic feeling was exemplified by the Gordon riots, a violent Protestant reaction to the Papist Act of 1778 which intended to reduce discrimination against Catholics.

The French Revolution reawakened these fears of political crisis, and latent attitudes towards Catholicism were reanimated in England. As stated by Maggie Kilgour ‘While the nature of past and its relation to the present was debated through the eighteenth century, it gained new life with the French Revolution, as the Terror proved fertile for a literature of terror’ [5]. It can be suggested that Lewis exploits this national fear and its dramatic anti-clericalism through his novel. The re-demonisation of the Catholic religion is personified through the depiction of the sinful monk, Ambrosio. The ‘desires of the lustful monk’ (p.300) transgress moral boundaries, with the intention of keeping a young woman; the archetypally virtuous Antonia, in a crypt against her will, in order to have unlimited sexual access to her ‘cut off from all the world and totally in his power, Antonia should comply with his desires.’(p.392). Hidden away from the boundaries of the law, the crypt could be viewed as a physical manifestation the ‘ID’ coined by Sigmund Freud as the deepest, most unconscious part of the mind in which socially and morally unacceptable desires are stored. Whilst The Monk is heavily influenced by the societal and political chaos of the French Revolution, perhaps reliving it through the lens of the Gordon Riots, subversion of power structures in Walpole’s The Castle of Otranto address issues of constitutional power in the monarchy. It has been suggested by Toni Wein that ‘Manfred represents, if not the person, then the actions of, George III.’. Walpole wrote his novel during the reign of George the Third. Wein posits that ‘Manfred’s irrational attack on Theodore, culminating in the hero’s imprisonment for making empirical observations’, she suggests, ‘could be likened to George III’s wilful ignoring of common law in his use of general warrants, ultimately deemed an illegal violation of individual liberty’ [6].

While transgressions against morality and the law are explored in The Monk, Walpole’s novel The Castle of Otranto focuses of the subversion of societal hierarchies of power. The young, upper class female character Matilda, is portrayed helping the peasant Theodore to escape prison, in order to overthrow the tyrannical force of her father Manfred, the owner of the castle. Not only does this disturb the hierarchy of class, it can also be interpreted as a subversion of classic gender roles. Walpole draws on the medieval tradition of chivalry, yet he alters it to place Matilda in the position of power, through rescuing Theodore. Through this act of rebellion, Matilda also undermines her father’s patriarchal power, to which he reacts by stabbing her fatally. As stated by Kate Ferguson Ellis, ‘Resistance to parents or husbands, no matter how malicious these seeming pillars of patriarchy may be, leaves a typical heroine no alternative than to die with her virtue intact’[7]. In the Gothic imagination, there is no space in which a woman can be both rebellious and pure. This is particularly true of Matilda’s premature death ‘commend me to Heaven: —where is my father? —forgive him, dearest mother —forgive him my death; it was an error’ (p.85). Through this depiction of Matilda as forgiving of her father’s deadly transgression, and the mention of heaven, she is given a status of martyrdom through death.

The same type of fatalistic, vulnerable female character is presented in The Monk through Lewis' depiction of Antonia. Antonia is first described in over embellished pieces, describing her virginal beauty:

Her features were hidden by a thick veil; but struggling through the crowd had deranged it sufficiently to discover a neck which for symmetry and beauty might have vied with the Medicean Venus. It was of the most dazzling whiteness, and received additional charms from being shaded by the tresses of her long fair hair, which descended in ringlets to her waist. (p.9) 

This is an example of both the centralisation and dissection of the Gothic female. She is the visual focus of the description, yet she is fragmented into individual body parts. This ‘piecing’ of the female body intertwined with imagery of purity in ‘whiteness’ and ‘fair’ creates a fetishized object of desire for the male reader, subscribing to the misogynistic ideologies of its era. Similarly to Matilda in The Castle of Otranto, she is stabbed by her male oppressor, who in this case is Ambrosio. Antonio is murdered with the intent of highlighting the depth of Ambrosio’s evil. In both texts, it can be argued that female characters are used as disposable casualties of male transgression, which highlights the social injustices of their time. Rebellious women are also punished in Lewis’ novel through the character Agnes, a woman becomes pregnant outside of marriage, leading her to be imprisoned, and forced to give birth to her baby in the crypts below the monastery. In what is perhaps the most poignant moment in the plot, Agnes witnesses the death of her baby due to ‘the want of proper attendance’ (p.412) in complete confinement. The description of the way in which she holds on to her decaying baby ‘no persuasion could induce me to give it up. It soon became a mass of putridity’ (p.412) is particularly harrowing, for Agnes maternal instincts are used against her in order to augment her suffering. This is punishment for transgressing societal codes of conduct which reject female sexual autonomy.

Whilst Gothic fiction does question established gender and class roles to an extent, exemplified through Walpole's depiction of Matilda's rebellion, ultimately, the misogynistic values of the 18^th century are upheld. This shown through the fatal punishment towards females who display autonomy such as Matilda in The Castle of Otranto, and The Monk’s Agnes.  The Gothic era was one marked by instability and blurred boundaries, sometimes even revolutionary in its subversion of hierarchies, however, it is important to acknowledge that each of these transgressions and subversions do not go unpunished. This is also prevalent through Ambrosio’s eventual death as a consequence for his moral and religious transgressions ‘six miserable days did the villain languish’ (p.442). These punishments perhaps deliver a conservative message. Maggie Kilgour suggests of The Monk’s conclusion that ‘extremes are punished, leaving in the end a society reaffirmed by the consolidation of a middle path, the breeding of those who balance difference and likeness’, therefore, the message of the story becomes ‘highly conservative and even reactionary’ (p.164). Furthermore, it can be suggested that both Agnes and Ambrosio’s fates are portrayed a result of the institution of Catholicism. If Ambrosio wasn’t made to suppress his sexual urges due to his status as a monk, perhaps he would not have expressed them in such a damaging and corruptive way. Also, the fact that the Catholic church forbade sex outside marriage led to Agnes’ imprisonment and consequential suffering, could possibly be a means of depicting Catholicism as ineffective. In contrast, the Protestant churches accepted co-habitation with the intent of marriage, conveying the message that if Agnes belonged to a Protestant country such as England, such disturbing scenes might not have had to take place. While in both novels, transgressions and subversions of power hierarchies and moral values take place, the effect is that of a conservative one, displaying the distressing consequences of rebellion.

[1] Fred Botting, Gothic (London: Routledge, 1996), p. 1.

 [2]Timo Airaksinen, The Philosophy of the Marquis de Sade (London: Routledge , 1995), p. 93.

[3]Horace Walpole, The Castle of Otranto (Oxford : Oxford University Press , 2014). (Further reference to this edition will be given after quotations in the text)

[4]Matthew Lewis, The Monk (Oxford: Oxford World Classics , 2008). (Further reference to this edition will be given after quotations in the text)

[5] The Rise of the Gothic Novel (London: Routledge, 1995), p.23. (Further reference to this edition will be given after quotations in the text)

[6] British Identities, Heroic Nationalisms and the Gothic Novel (Basingstoke: Palgrave 2002), p.55.

[7] Kate Ferguson Ellis, The Contested Castle: Gothic Novels and the Subversion of Domestic Ideology, (Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1989), p. 43.