Is Gothic literature dead?

[GothicLover]

It is also disturbing, and asymptomatic of the malady of our modern age: lack of beauty. Unlike Poe's writing, which was beautiful, there is really no beauty in any of the modern Gothic of today.

So true and so regrettable. Even in relatively recent authors like V. Holt and M. Stewart, there is also beauty -- and intelligence. There are references to classical mythology, to art, to music; there is a sense of history, and the suggestion that the authors were educated in these subjects. Witness On the Night of the Seventh Moon, set in romantic Bavaria and full of allusions to Teutonic folklore, most of which would be completely lost (and hence wasted) on the average reader of popular fiction today. Why is that?

I think it goes back to the school system, which has failed to teach younger generations to read, and the change in information dissemination from written to pictorial format. Younger generations see no real need to read, much less WRITE (except to text each other, if you can call that writing). Reading requires imagination and a bit of "work" to visualize what the words present. Younger generations today have been brought up to expect to be entertained and fed visual data that they do not have to do any work to interpret. They also have short attention spans, so info is expected to be delivered in sound bytes. Reading is mostly being relegated to transmittal of data, via newspapers, internet info, and emails.

The internet has resulted in an overwhelming amount of data to process about the present and future. Therefore most people have little concern about the past, let alone teutonic folklore. An interest in history is passe. There's no money in it. Trying to get a handle on the present and future are the current tasks absorbing most people's attention and energies.

Many are overwhelmed by the present and fearful about the future. I think this leads some to inertia and others to escapism. Reading about tawdry sex, vampires, and werewolves is definitely escapism. Reading romances and gothic romances is escapism. (Count me in as an escapist lover of gothic romances!)

Is there much romance in everyday life in the present? I doubt it. Look at the movies being offered. They are mainly edgy mysteries, thrillers, adventures. The few romances offered are usally filled with swear words, cell phones, traffic, stress, gays, lesbians, absurd situations, and/or weddings. There are very few traditional romantic movies being offered (except maybe on the Hallmark channel) where a man and a woman simply fall in love, overcome obstacles, and live happily ever after.

Look at all the reality shows based on weddings, as if that is the only time in a woman's life that she will be allowed to be truly romantic. After that, it's back to the reality of everyday life, with its extreme stress, worries about fidelity, and fears about the future and bringing kids into this going-crazy world. Thus the extreme pressure to make that wedding day perfect.

I wish I could be more optimistic, but when I do take my head out of a gothic romance novel and look way far down the road, I see books themselves disappearing as a source of entertainment, replaced entirely by visual and audio media. I then take comfort in that probably not happening in my lifetime and go back to my really good read.