Abstract
The Gothic as a mode has a clear visual language—particularly in regard to Gothic landscapes. Nature in Gothic literature vacillates between awe-inspiring sublimity and oppressive hell-scapes. Central to these depictions is the idea of wild spaces untouched by humanity, and the concept of ‘wilderness,’ a recurring trope within the subgenre of ecogothic. Concomitant to the fear and reverence that wilderness invokes are the wild animals that lived therein. This chapter uncovers the importance of wilderness, including monstrous animals, to ecogothic texts considering how its portrayal as an overwhelming threat to both the ideals of humanity and its very existence.
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Franck, K. (2020). The Wilderness. In: Bloom, C. (eds) The Palgrave Handbook of Contemporary Gothic. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-33136-8_15
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