ENGLISH LITERATURE (CBSE/UGC NET)

Detailed explanation-1: -Traditionally, female authors of Female Gothic novels use their trapped heroines as a tool, exploring anxieties concerning marriage, childbirth, and independence (or lack thereof) through the seemingly supernatural.” “The Female Gothic imparted lessons for domestic life.

Detailed explanation-2: -Although Horace Walpole’s (1717–1797) The Castle of Otranto (1764) is widely considered to have been the first gothic novel, it was a female author, Ann Radcliffe (1764–1823) who popularised the form in the final decades of the eighteenth century. Radcliffe was a bone fide literary star.

Detailed explanation-3: -From this statement can be deduced that in Male Gothic fiction, women are seen as unnatural and artificial. Consequently, women are always presented in a negative way. This is of course in contrast with Female Gothic fiction, that mostly presents women as victims and questions their identity.

Detailed explanation-4: -In a Gothic novel, the heroine is usually beautiful and virtuous and suffers great misfortune, often as the victim of a male villain, before achieving a happy ending.