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"Whichever Way You Move... It is Ready to Swallow You": The Gothic Atlantic and the Mobile Oubliette.

  • Published In: Studies in Romanticism, 2024, v. 63, n. 4. P. 473 1 of 3

  • Database: Academic Search Ultimate 2 of 3

  • Authored By: Bedard, Oliver 3 of 3

Abstract

This article delineates the Romantic tropology of the oubliette, a vertically enclosed dungeon whose etymology derives from the French oublier [to forget] and thus denotes the annihilation of the imprisoned subject. In readings of Olaudah Equiano's The Interesting Narrative (1789), Ann Radcliffe's A Sicilian Romance (1790), and William Godwin's Caleb Williams (1794), it argues that two prominent genres of the Romantic Age—the Gothic novel and the slave narrative—transformed this terrifying dungeon from a symbol of the ancien régime into a portable trope responsive to the atrocities of a Gothicized Atlantic World. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Additional Information

  • Source:Studies in Romanticism. 2024/12, Vol. 63, Issue 4, p473
  • Document Type:Article
  • Subject Area:Literature and Writing
  • Publication Date:2024
  • ISSN:0039-3762
  • DOI:10.1353/srm.2024.a951769
  • Accession Number:183254918
  • Copyright Statement:Copyright of Studies in Romanticism is the property of Johns Hopkins University Press and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites without the copyright holder's express written permission. Additionally, content may not be used with any artificial intelligence tools or machine learning technologies. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

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