I’m not going to blather on for too long about how Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë is a handy template for most Gothic Romance Paperback plots: Little Miss Nobody from Nowhere shows up at a Mansion, falls in love with its Master, and experiences lots of weird and eerie frights before an Awful Secret is uncloaked. This plot was lifted by Daphne DuMaurier for Rebecca in 1938, and by Virginia Coffman for Moura in 1959. The latter is credited with beginning the Golden Era of Gothic Romance Paperbacks — the 60s and early 70s — when a zillion of these potboilers were churned out, all with one stunning cover after another, as per Always in August above.
Until the end of 1966, the first season of the Gothic soap opera Dark Shadows also used elements of the Jane Eyre scenario, as you can see for yourself in Minisode #1. (It’s 11 minutes long, but Victoria Winters’s hair is so mesmerizing time flies.) (Oops, YouTube yanked this video clip, but you can order it here.) Then, in early 1967, Barnabas Collins escapes from his crypt and begins biting necks. That's when the series turned grotesque and funny. Terror vs. horror: monsters of the mind, conjured from a black cauldron of longings and forebodings, are just so much stranger and scarier than corpses dressed up as vampires. In any case, the popularity of Dark Shadows kept the Gothic Romance Paperback publishing business booming until about 4 years after the TV show's 1971 cancellation. Minisodes note: #2 features a bar fight provoked by Bad Girl Carolyn Stoddard, set to one of the greatest jukebox tunes ever recorded, Back at the Blue Whale. And it's worth watching the first few minutes of #1 — #13 just to hear the quavering voiced-over intros, such as this gem from #7: "My name is Victoria Winters. The dead past drifts through the corridors of Collinwood, and settles like dust in its corners."
Until the end of 1966, the first season of the Gothic soap opera Dark Shadows also used elements of the Jane Eyre scenario, as you can see for yourself in Minisode #1. (It’s 11 minutes long, but Victoria Winters’s hair is so mesmerizing time flies.) (Oops, YouTube yanked this video clip, but you can order it here.) Then, in early 1967, Barnabas Collins escapes from his crypt and begins biting necks. That's when the series turned grotesque and funny. Terror vs. horror: monsters of the mind, conjured from a black cauldron of longings and forebodings, are just so much stranger and scarier than corpses dressed up as vampires. In any case, the popularity of Dark Shadows kept the Gothic Romance Paperback publishing business booming until about 4 years after the TV show's 1971 cancellation. Minisodes note: #2 features a bar fight provoked by Bad Girl Carolyn Stoddard, set to one of the greatest jukebox tunes ever recorded, Back at the Blue Whale. And it's worth watching the first few minutes of #1 — #13 just to hear the quavering voiced-over intros, such as this gem from #7: "My name is Victoria Winters. The dead past drifts through the corridors of Collinwood, and settles like dust in its corners."
Assignment: In 100 words or less, describe how the culture of the 60s and 70s influenced the craze for Gothic Romance Paperbacks. Plagiarism encouraged! (And remember, the more coursework you complete here, the closer you get to an Internet Certified Doctorate in Gothic Romance Paperback Studies.)
10 comments:
Assignment
The metaphore of a modern Gothic Romance is to equate the terror of the unknown with the revelation of sex between the protagonist (female) and the hero (male). The unwinding of the social-sexual mores in the 1960s unleashed the idea of a man taking a woman. However when overlaid against a gothic mystery (and the spector of the unmentionable thing that must be resolved before any passion could unwind), together become a mask for the surrendering of the protagonists self. Ergo, sex without shame is merely sex, but with the shame released, it becomes a fulfilling communion of the soul.
From the initial quality of your work, Ask the Cool Cookie, it's clear that by the end of these 13 lessons you will have far surpassed your professor in both scope of learning and ability to apply it! A+++
I cabn't wait for the lesson on walking the moors - its so loaded with symbolism, no wonder they are trapped on them. Gives me goosebumps.
I am obsessed with Dark Shadows. It being the only TV "forbidden" to me as a child, I was relegated to the kitchen by my teenage babysitter aunts while they smoked and watched - and my keyhole viewing only made it even better.
The 60s and the 70s were consumed with terror that women would escape their bondage and no longer be required to put out for whatever old goat had snagged them in order to survive. The gothic reinforced the idea that conquering a Man (preferably a brooding, emotionally unavailable one) was the only path for a little missy who didn't want to spend her miserable life as a domestic slave.
Good times.
Mr. Penee, I'm impressed with the tersely perceptive "nailed it" factor of your essay. A+++
Cool Cookie, I'm saving the moor walking lesson for last, since it's best. Field trip to Yorkshire possible.
When Dark Shadows came on after school when I was a kid Donna, we'd turn it off and go play kick the can. The one neighborhood kid who liked it ended up sleeping in a coffin.
Lily - and that one kid would have been my boyfriend, right up until the time he either went to jail or OD'd.
One of the things i loved about Dark Shadows, which scared the living daylights out of me when the originally aired (I think I would have been about four years old) was discovering years later in the 1970s was that an entire episode could be spent not talking about anything of substance.
Person 1 "Mother, isn't it time we faced this issue?"
Person 2 "Why must you bring this up?"
Person 1 "Because..." (something crashes off camera that wasn't suppose to crash, or a set light flashes as it burns out) "...I sense that something could happen..."
Stuff like that made me love this show.
That's exactly why - we are the same age! It's perfect for the toddler set.
Person 1 "Mother, isn't it time we faced this issue?"
Person 2 "Why must you bring this up?"
Person 1 "Because..." (something crashes off camera that wasn't suppose to crash, or a set light flashes as it burns out) "...I sense that something could happen..."
Ha! I couldn't appreciate something so profound as a child, especially since the station it aired on in 1970 ran our favorite Tobor the 8 Man right before. (Read Tobor backwards.)
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