“Rewriting the Gothic: Psychological Fear and Urban Modernity in Fiction”

Abstract

Gothic tradition has changed drastically since its initial identification with the concepts of medieval ruins, supernatural horror, and feudal topography to modern illustrations hidden within the city environment and psychological multifaceted Ness. In this research paper, the analysis is focused on the modern way of rewriting the Gothic mode through displacing the fear out of the exterior haunted place to the discontinuous mind of people as they move within the contemporary cities. The research postulates that these anxieties of industrialization, capitalism and alienation in cities have substituted supernatural aspects with psychological fear, alienation, and existential anxiety. The paper presents a theoretical analysis of the role of repression, surveillance and identity fragmentation in the development of Gothic sensibility based on the theoretical works by Sigmund Freud and Michel Foucault. The study goes further to examine some of the urban-based stories to show how the Gothic tropes are being reformulated in modern fictions of haunting locations, monstrosity, doping, and paranoia in the realities of suburban and urban places. The paper comes to the conclusion that the Gothic was not obligated to die and it has evolved into modernity, where castles have been turned into apartment complexes and ghosts have become their psychological traumas.