1. Exploring Gothic Literature The Pit and the Pendulum
Edgar Allen Poe
Get your paper read to create a Note Cloud:
Write the words Gothic Literature in large letters.
Add these words using smaller letters:
Characters
Setting
Plot
Supernaturals
Famous works
The dark side of Romanticism

2. Write “Elements of Gothic Literature” on your paper.
Take notes as you watch the videos.
Write a summary explaining all of the elements of Gothic Literature.

3. Let’s Take a Look at the Assignments!

4. Gothic Fiction: Horror and Romance Sinister Settings
Extreme landscapes, decaying castles, hazy forests
Elements of supernatural
Stimulation of fear, horror, macabre (grisly, gruesome, morbid)
Villains, tyrants, maniacs
Madwoman, femme fatales, persecuted maidens
Byronic heroes

5. Metonymy
It is a figure of speech that replaces the name of a thing with the name of something else with which it is closely associated.
The pen is mightier than the sword. (Pen refers to written words and sword to military force.)
The Oval Office was busy in work. (“The Oval Office” is a metonymy as it stands for people at work in the office.)
Let me give you a hand. (Hand means help.)

6. Synesthesia
When one kind of sensory stimulus evokes the subjective experience of another.
We tasted the salty grin on the trickster's face.
The sight of red ants makes you itchy.
Red Hot Chili Peppers’ song title, “Taste the Pain”

7. Your Task is to Create a Gothic Tale
Exposition

8. Exposition
The exposition is the part of the story that sets the stage for the drama to follow.
It introduces the theme, setting, characters, and circumstances at the beginning of the story.
Consider these for a Gothic Tale:
a setting in a castle, ancestral family home, vault or crypt
supernatural beings - monsters, vampires, ghosts, werewolves, and such
a person, particularly a damsel (or 2, or 3!) in distress
an atmosphere of suspense and/or terror
women threatened by tyrannical male/patriarchal figures
an exotic locale, often in a country other than that of the story's origin.

9. Conflict
The conflict is the struggle between the characters in the story.
In a Gothic Tale consider these:
a vendetta or vengeance perpetrated against the protagonist and/or his/her family by the antagonist
an unrequited love, or illicit love affair or romance
an ancient prophecy foretelling the doom of the protagonist and/or his/her family
Insanity explored

10. Rising Action
The rising action is a series of events building toward the point of greatest interest.
These events begin immediately after the exposition of the story and builds up to the climax.
For your Gothic Tale, consider plot twists that the reader did not see coming.

11. Climax
The climax is the apex of the story, where the ‘battle’ will take place. All of the drama and conflict has led to this point where it is determined if the leading character will succeed or fail.

12. Falling Action The falling action occurs right after the climax.
It is what happens after the main problem of the story has been solved.
Consider this, what are the direct effects of the climax?
The falling action gives the reader satisfaction of the whole story; knowing what happened next.

13. Resolution
The resolution ties up any loose ends that may be left in the story.
Sometimes the rising action and the resolution mix together in a plot.