The Gothic Literature and History of New England surveys the history, nature and future of the Gothic mode in the region, from the witch trials through the Black Lives Matter Movement. Texts include Cotton Mather and other Puritan divines who collected folklore of the supernatural; the Frontier Gothic of Indian captivity narratives; the canonical authors of the American Renaissance such as Melville and Hawthorne; the women's ghost story tradition and the Domestic Gothic from Harriet Beecher Stowe to Charlotte Perkins Gilman to Shirley Jackson; H. P. Lovecraft; Stephen King; and writers of the current generation who respond to racial and gender issues. The work brings to the surface the religious intolerance, racism and misogyny inherent in the New England Gothic, and how these nightmares continue to haunt literature and popular culture—films, television and more.

Transatlantic approach: This project explores British and American texts in conversation together. Use of archival materials, which is relatively unusual within Gothic studies, and even in literary studies more generally. A focus on poetry, drama, and periodical writing, genres that are often ignored in the study of the Gothic. A focus on women’s work (both on the labor of women and on texts by women). A focus on local Gothic (especially in Lowell and Manchester), with a connection to larger international trends of the genre.

“Brown’s comic take on America today is both amazing and memorable . . . One of the most brilliant and original new writers to appear for a long time.” (Alison Lurie, Pulitzer Prize–winning author) “Everything Natalie said seemed, to herself, to have been said better by him. He was less fond of speaking, however, than he was of hitting people in the face, which seemed a more likely source of her love to those of us who knew him,” begins Jason Brown’s linked collection of beautifully haunted, violent, and wry stories set in the densely forested lands of northern New England. In these tales of forbidden love, runaway children, patrimony, alcohol, class, inheritance, and survival, Brown’s elegant prose emits both quiet despair and a poignant sense of hope and redemption. These vivid accounts of troubled lives combine the powerful family drama of Andre Dubus and Russell Banks, the dark wit of Denis Johnson, the lost souls of Charles D’Ambrosio, and the New England gothic of Nathaniel Hawthorne. “One quality that makes these stories feel unmistakably new is Brown’s . . . seamless, oddly cinematic shifts among points of view . . . He has a gift for crisp, angular sentences, some of which are embedded with a quiet humor.” —Time Out New York “In Jason Brown’s fine story collection . . . the inhabitants of Vaughn, Maine, are stalked not by Stephen King horror but by intimate afflictions of blood, accident, and history. Yet their stories are too vivid to be entirely bleak. Maine’s woods and rivers, its changing light, are the beautifully rendered constants in a harsh, even malevolent, world.” —The Boston Globe

Provides an extensive chronology and an introduction which explains the nature of Gothic and shows how it has evolved. Includes entries on major writers, and works of geographical variants like Irish, Scottish or Russian Gothic and Female Gothic, Queer Gothic and Science Fiction.

This comprehensive comparative approach to the folklore, fantasy, and horror literature of New England stretches from the earliest European exploration to Stephen King, John Updike, and Shirley Jackson. Includes interviews with Les Daniels, Grandt, and other horror writers who reside or set their stories in New England.

New England is the oldest and most influential region of America. Although it has changed much through the centuries, it remains a place that even the Colonials may still recognize. Through a collection of photos, illustrations, history, and stories, this book explores the architectural history of New England and how, although it has changed much through the centuries, it remains a place that even the Colonials might still recognize. The book begins with the influence of climate and geography on the architectural choices and follows with the basics of the well-known New England homes––the cape, the saltbox, the colonial––all of which were created to serve the very specific needs of this corner of America, the people, the land and the climate. We look at the earliest settlers, understanding the challenges they faced, and follow their descendants as they convert and adapt the traditional New England home into something still clearly New England but different, newer and, ultimately, even modern. We watch how the people and houses evolve and how they become what are still clearly identifiable as New England––and all over New England, from Connecticut’s Gold Coast to the rocky shores of Maine. Sprinkled throughout the story of this evolution are sidebars such as A New England State of Mind and I Live Here, etc… where we meet the quintessential New England personalities and characters, who speak through letters, epitaphs, remembrances, books, newspapers, and others, and hear and see in their own words and images what they make or made of this place and life in it. People who buy this book will enjoy a very visual sense of what it’s like to be a New Englander and what it’s like to live in New England––whose houses have been copied and adapted in every state, city and neighborhood of America.