American gothic tales

Author(s)

• Oates, Joyce Carol

Bibliographic Information

American gothic tales

edited by Joyce Carol Oates

（A William Abrahams book）

Plume, c1996

Note

"Edited and with an introduction by Joyce Carol Oates"--Cover

Description and Table of Contents

Description

This remarkable anthology of gothic fiction, spanning two centuries of American writing, gives us an intriguing and entertaining look at how the gothic imagination makes for great literature in the works of forty-six exceptional writers. Joyce Carol Oates has a special perspective on the "gothic" in American short fiction, at least partially because her own horror yarns rank on the spine-tingling chart with the masters. She is able to see the unbroken link of the macabre that ties Edgar Allan Poe to Anne Rice and to recognize the dark psychological bonds between Henry James and Stephen King. In showing us the gothic vision-a world askew where mankind's forbidden impulses are set free from the repressions of the psyche, and nature turns malevolent and lawless-Joyce Carol Oates includes Henry James's "The Romance of Certain Old Clothes," Herman Melville's horrific tale of factory women, "The Tartarus of Maids," and Edith Wharton's "Afterward," which are rarely collected and appear together here for the first time. Added to these stories of the past are new ones that explore the wounded worlds of Stephen King, Anne Rice, Peter Straub, Raymond Carver, and more than twenty other wonderful contemporary writers. This impressive collection reveals the astonishing scope of the gothic writer's subject matter, style, and incomparable genius for manipulating our emotions and penetrating our dreams. With Joyce Carol Oates's superb introduction, American Gothic Tales is destined to become the standard one-volume edition of the genre that American writers, if they didn't create it outright, have brought to its chilling zenith.

Table of Contents

Introduction Charles Brockden Brown (1771-1810), from Wieland, or the Transformation Washington Irving (1783-1859), The Legend of Sleepy Hollow Nathaniel Hawthorne (1804-1864), The Man of Adamant, Young Goodman Brown Herman Melville (1819-1891), The Tartarus of Maids Edgar Allan Poe (1809-1849), The Black Cat Charlotte Perkins Gilman (1860-1935), The Yellow Wallpaper Henry James (1843-1916), The Romance of Certain Old Clothes Ambrose Bierce (1842-1914?), The Damned Thing Edith Wharton (1862-1937), Afterward Gertrude Atherton (1857-1948), The Striding Place Sherwood Anderson (1876-1941), Death in the Woods H.P. Lovecraft (1890-1937), The Outsider William Faulkner (1893-1962), A Rose for Emily August Derleth (1909-1971), The Lonesome Place E.B. White (1899-1985), The Door Shirley Jackson (1919-1965), The Lovely House Paul Bowles (1910- ), Allal Isaac Bashevis Singer (1904-1991), The Reencounter William Goyen (1915-1983), In the Icebound Hothouse John Cheever (1912-1982), The Enormous Radio Ray Bradbury (1920- ), The Veldt W.S. Merwin (1927- ), The Dachau Shoe, the Approved, Spiders I Have Known, Postcards from the Maginot Line Sylvia Plath (1932-1963), Johnny Panic and the Bible of Dreams Robert Coover (1932- ), In Bed One Night Ursula K. LeGuin (1929- ), Schroedinger's Cat E.L. Doctorow (1931- ), The Waterworks Harlan Ellison (1934- ), Shattered Like a Glass Goblin Don DeLillo (1936- ), Human Moments in World War III John L'Heureux (1938- ), The Anatomy of Desire Raymond Carver (1938-1988), Little Things Joyce Carol Oates (1938- ), The Temple Anne Rice (1941- ), Freniere Peter Straub (1943- ), A Short Guide to the City Steven Millhauser (1943- ), In the Penny Arcade Stephen King (1947- ), The Reach Charles Johnson (1948- ), Exchange Value John Crowley (1942- ), Snow Thomas Ligotti (1947- ), The Last Feast of Harlequin Breece D'J Pancake (1952-1979), Time and Again Lisa Tuttle (1952- ), Replacements Melissa Pritchard (1948- ), Spirit Seizures Nancy Etchemendy (1952- ), Cat in Glass Bruce McAllister (1946- ), The Girl Who Loved Animals Kathe Koja and Barry N. Malzberg, Ursus Triad, Later Katherine Dunn, The Nuclear Family: His Talk, Her Teeth Nicholson Baker (1957- ), Subsoil

by "Nielsen BookData"

Details

• NCID: BA32020748
• ISBN:
  • 9780452274891
• LCCN: 96026698
• Country Code: us
• Title Language Code: eng
• Text Language Code: eng
• Place of Publication: [New York]
• Pages/Volumes: viii, 544 p.
• Size: 23 cm
• Classification:
  • LCC : PS648.H6
  • DC20 : 813/.0872908
  • NDC8 : 933
• Subject Headings:
  • LCSH : Horror tales, American
  • LCSH : Gothic revival (Literature) -- United States
• Parent Bibliography ID:
  • BA18644470