Southern Gothic
Literary Tradition
Gothic literature is fiction in which strange, gloomy settings and mysterious, violent, often supernatural events create suspense and terror. Southern gothic literature uses gothic motifs to explore social issues and reveal the cultural character of the American South.
Following are a few characteristics of gothic and southern gothic literature:
- The gothic novel tries to evoke chilling terror and gloom by exploiting mystery and horror. Gothic is about haunting and possession. We are supposed to feel a chill at some point in the story, and this emotional response is in part the point of the gothic experience. Paradoxically, this fear is a source of pleasure. "Tis so appalling--it exhilarates," Emily Dickinson says in a poem.
- In a Gothic work, there is usually confusion about good and evil. What does ‘good’ actually mean? What about ‘evil’? And how can we tell the difference?
- Gothic reveals a fear of institutions, such as religion, education, or marriage.
- Gothic shows the dark and hidden side of things. It rips open the lies and shows a world of cruelty, lust, perversion, and crime hidden beneath society’s rules and customs.
- Gothic tears through censorship and explodes hypocrisies. It exposes the world as a corrupt, reeking place.
- Gothic is a reaction to the conventional, common sense, and enlightened world. If society is supposed to be orderly and sensible, gothic shows how it really isn’t.
- Southern gothic tips stereotypes on their side and kicks them in the gut. Sweet Southern belles are crafty and greedy, chivalrous gentlemen are sneaky and perverse, and righteous preachers are manipulative and evil.
Your task: We've tackled two short stories that can be considered Southern Gothic - "Good Country People" and "A Rose for Emily." We also viewed Night of the Hunter - again, classic Southern Gothic. Select one of the stories, and in a paragraph explain how one aspect of the story meets one of the criteria listed above.
Be sure that your response is thoughtful and thorough and includes a cited quotation. Keep in mind all of the elements of a good paragraph: topic sentence, set-up, cited quotation, explanation (claim - evidence - warrant). Write in formal third person. Follow all of the Road to Formal Essay Writing criteria (which can be found HERE.) Post your paragraphs in the comments below. Include you name. you may comment on your peers' entries for extra credit.
The text for "A Rose for Emily" can be found HERE. The text for "Good Country People" can be found HERE.
Be sure that your response is thoughtful and thorough and includes a cited quotation. Keep in mind all of the elements of a good paragraph: topic sentence, set-up, cited quotation, explanation (claim - evidence - warrant). Write in formal third person. Follow all of the Road to Formal Essay Writing criteria (which can be found HERE.) Post your paragraphs in the comments below. Include you name. you may comment on your peers' entries for extra credit.
The text for "A Rose for Emily" can be found HERE. The text for "Good Country People" can be found HERE.
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteIn the short story A Rose for Emily by William Faulkner, an old woman’s father dies, and her lover goes missing. After this she announces that she will no longer come out of her house. This story has a few elements of southern gothic, but one shows out the most: that it shows the faults of stereotypes. The story is set as many flashbacks about a woman after she has died. Throughout the story, the narrator is saying how the mysterious but at the same time respectful Emily, the woman who has died, was in her life. After her father died, she was courted by a young man, Homer Barron, who one night disappeared. Later on in the story it says ”And, as we had expected all along, within three days Homer Barron was back in town. A neighbor saw the Negro man admit him at the kitchen door at dusk one evening. And that was the last we saw of Homer Barron” (Faulkner 7). As the flashbacks get closer and closer to her death, people start to get worried about Emily’s health, as she had not come out of her house since Homer had disappeared. Once he disappeared a smell began to form around her house. When Emily died, the townspeople went into her house to see what this smell was. They opened a door at the top of the stairs of her house, and found the decaying body of the dead Homer Barron, and next to him was a pillow with a gray hair on it. This has the element of showing the faults of stereotypes because, the people of Emily’s town all thought that she was just a depressed old lady with no one to love, but really she was a twisted woman who could not deal with losing her form of love.
ReplyDeleteMichal Praczuk
ReplyDeleteThe story A Rose For Emily by William Faulkner, is a great example of a southern gothic story, incorporating all of the elements of the genre. The story of Emily is written out of chronological order. The story starts with her death in the point of view of the townspeople. The town in which she lived is remember the major events that occurred in her life starting with the death of her father. When the story tells of Miss Emily she is portrayed as a poor old woman who is all alone with no one in her life besides a negro who went to the market for her. Eventually she meets a man that she seems to really like and they seemed to be getting into a serious relationship. However one day the man is thought to have left town and Miss Emily is all alone again. At the very end of the story, when town officials go to see the house they discover the man who Miss Emily once loved, she killed and slept in bed with him every night. “The man himself lay in bed. For a long while we just stood there, looking down at the profound and fleshless grin. The body had apparently once lain in the attitude of embrace, but now the long sleep that outlasts love, that conquers every grimace of love, had cuckolded him[...] Then in the second pillow was the indentation of a head.” (Faulkner 9) One of the elements of southern gothic is the confusion between good and evil. During the story the reader feels pity for Miss Emily because she seems like a woman that has only experienced loss, then at the end of the story it turns out that Miss Emily had murdered the man and kept for years and spent nights with the dead body. This element is one of the most defined element of southern gothic that is in the story, while the jumping around between time periods creates small confusion to the reader that one makes them want to read more. The story satisfies your need for the chill that runs down your spine when you read a southern gothic story.
The movie, “Night of the Hunter,” is a classic example of southern gothic cinema. It shows the dark and hidden side of things. In the movie, There are two young children who lost their father due to a mass amount of money he stole. He was put to death. After losing their father, they also have to deal with a new character in their life. Their step-dad, Mr. Harry Powell. This film, during its day, was definitely not one of the most “Acclaimed” films of its time. People seemed to not enjoy it because to them, it seem unlikely, as it went against most of society's rules and social “norms.” But, in reality, that is exactly what a good southern gothic piece of literature or cinema is supposed to do. The world is a dark, and can be, revolting place. It isn’t filled with families all living above the poverty level with a mom, a dad, a dog named spot and a perfect yellow house surrounded by a white picket fence. It shows that people, Like Mr. Powell, can have such utterly twisted and sick minds to the point where they don’t care who they hurt, or even slotter on their way to the top. He really wanted the money that these childrens father stole. So, in order to get what he wanted, he pretended to be a good, holy man. He tried to trick everyone into believing that he was a good guy. This was all unveiled at the end when he ended up killing the childrens mother, and attempting to hurt them in order to get the money. In the movie, Mr. Harry Powell said, “Not that you mind the killings! There's plenty of killings in your book, Lord…” Flannery O’Conner. Not only is he ok with murdering humans, but he also thinks that its ok, since god does it. Exactly what a good southern gothic literature character should think like.
ReplyDeleteA Rose for Emily is a short story that is a great example of southern gothic literature. A Rose for Emily has many aspects of what southern gothic is, one aspect of southern gothic is it reveals the gloomy side of things, it also reveals the truth but in a very corrupt and distorted way. Emily the main character, was a strange and quiet woman who was pitied. She had met a construction worker named Homer, they were dating and after a while he had disappeared. “From that time on her front door remained closed…” ( Faulkner). Not a lot of people knew who she was or anything about her, they just pitied her. “The man himself lay in the bed...Then we noticed that in the second pillow was the indentation of a head...we saw a long strand of iron-gray hair” (Faulkner). In the previous parts, she was described as fat with iron-gray hair. While her and Homer were dating she had bought arsenic, and after a few days he disappeared. This had revealed that Emily had killed Homer with arsenic and had slept in that same bed every night beside him. The fact that Emily had slept in the same bed as her dead boyfriend is just one of the aspects of how A Rose for Emily is southern gothic.
ReplyDeleteAlex Polakow
ReplyDeleteMr. Cowlin
English
29 October 2013
Paragraph on Night of the Hunter
Night of the Hunter is a southern gothic film because it flips around stereotypes. In it, a corrupt preacher, John Powell who is only out for money is placed in jail for stealing a car. His cell mate, Ben Harper, is the father of two children, John and Pearl, that has robbed a bank and will be hung for it. The preacher knows he will leave the money and wife behind so when he gets out of jail; he runs to the family. The children do not like the preacher, but the mother likes him and marries him. He appears nice to the town, but he is actually very corrupt. Powell says in the beginning after Ben Harper falls asleep “Lord, you sure knew what you were doing when you brung me to this very cell at this very time. A man with ten thousand dollars hid somewhere, and a widder in the makin' ”. This proves that he is not righteous like the stereotype of preachers, but he is actually quite the opposite. Powell is only looking for the money that Harper stole when he marries Harper’s widow. Preachers are supposed to live a life of poverty and not marry, as the example that Jesus set forth. The only vow that Powell has not broken is the vow of chastity. The stereotype involved with preachers has been effectively been flipped over when he kills Harper’s widow and tries to kill the children. This proves that the film Night of the Hunter is a southern gothic movie.
Haylie Routburg
ReplyDeletePeriod 7 - Mr. Cowlin - 10/29/13
In the film, Night of the Hunter, director Charles Laughton, tells about a family and how the new husband does whatever he can do to get $10,000 from the kids. The man then goes out of his way to find out from the kids, John and Pearl, where that money is. The father says to Pearl, “Pearl be a good girl and tell daddy where the money is hidden” (Night of the Hunter). When the Pearl says that she can not tell because her brother told her not to, the father looks towards the brother and yells, “John doesn't matter!” (Night of the Hunter). This film is very Southern Gothic because the father kills the childrens mother and later tries to kill them when they won't tell him where the money is hidden. By the end of the film, John and Pearl run away and end up staying with a lady who cares for them very much. When the father comes and finds them he tries to kill them right in front of the lady so she shoots him. Not only is this man ok with killing people, but he thinks that it is ok if he does so. This shows what a good Southern Gothic film should percent.
Camille Uzee
ReplyDeleteA Rose for Emily is a fantastic example of Southern Gothic Literature because it has most of the key elements a story need to be southern gothic. One element that sticks out among the crowd of ideas in A Rose for Emily is the fact that almost all stereotypes are completely kicked to the curb and tarnished. A prime example is the fact that all throughout the story the “southern bells” of the town are judgemental and self-righteous when they are suppose to be nice and regal. This can be seen specifically when Emily’s relationship with Homer Barron started. They would gossip “behind the jalousies as they passed on Sunday afternoon in the glittering buggy”(Faulkner) They would say things like “poor emily”(Faulkner).At first it was meant in a caring and worried way but “then some of the ladies began to say it with disgrace”(Faulkner) and that she was a disgrace to the town.This shows the element of killing the stereotypes because, it takes away the initial thought of the classic Southern Bell and twists it into a real and raw reality.
Annie Lim
ReplyDeleteRose for Emily, a short story written by William Faulkner is definitely a Southern Gothic because it evokes chilling terror by creating mystery and horror. Faulkner continuously “supplies” the reader with mysterious mood throughout the story. Miss Emily buying arsenic, Homer Barron’s disappearance, the strange odor, no one except Miss Emily’s servant coming out of her house for decades all create suspicions and mysterious mood. At the end of the story, Miss Emily is found dead in her dust-filled house. Also, Homer Barron, the man who disappeared decades ago “[lays] in the bed” (Faulkner). Unlike Miss Emily, he is found “beneath what [is] left of the nightshirt” (Faulkner). The fact that Miss Emily kills Homer Barron and lives with his dead body for decades evokes a chilling terror for the readers. Not only this, but “a long strand of iron-gray hair” (Faulkner) is found by the dead body of Homer. This part definitely leaves terror for the readers because it shows that Miss Emily has slept with the dead body everyday for years.
Great job! But Southern Gothic is more than just being a scary story. There are more elements in A Rose for Emily such as that Emily is actually a murderer, yet you feel sorry for her. In Southern Gothic, there is confusion about who is good and bad.
DeleteAmelia Papajohn
ReplyDeleteSouthern Gothic Paragraph on Night of the Hunter:
Night of the Hunter is a chilling example of a southern gothic tale. This movie shows the characteristics of southern gothic because it is thrilling and very frightening. Throughout the story, there is confusion about who is good and who is evil, there is fear of the police who are really the good guys, it shows that this normal family (and maybe others) have some abnormal events happen to them, and that the preacher turns out to be the antagonist of the story. The preacher (Mr. Powell) is very spooky when he sings the song “Leaning, leaning, safe and secure from all alarms, leaning, leaning, leaning on the everlasting arms” (Night of the Hunter). This kind of becomes a song that is played at his entrance as a warning that he is coming. Harry Powell is very freaky because he will lash out when he asks Pearl, the littlest, for the money. He has no care for god since he is doing all of these bad things.There is also confusion of who is good because John is actually the bad guy for stealing/hiding the money. You don’t want the police to find out.
William Faulkner's “A Rose for Emily” certainly exemplifies the characteristics of a southern gothic literary piece. This short story is about a southern town handling Miss Emily and her death. At the end of this story, it is discovered by the townspeople that Miss Emily had not only killed the man known as Homer Barron, but she had also been sleeping with Homer’s corpse for several years. A southern gothic work tries to evoke chilling terror and gloom by exploiting mystery and horror. In other words, southern gothic literature exhilarates the reader by evoking fear or disgust. At the conclusion of “A Rose For Emily”, the townspeople discovered the decayed corpse of Homer Barron, a former acquaintance of Miss Emily who had gone missing earlier in the story. The last paragraph of the story, “Then we noticed that in the second pillow was the indentation of a head. One of us lifted something from it [...] we saw a long strand of iron-gray hair”, revealed the fact that Miss Emily had been sleeping with the corpse of Homer Barron (Faulkner 5). This revelation contributes to the conclusion that William Faulkner’s “A Rose for Emily” is, in fact, southern gothic literature.
ReplyDeleteThe movie “Night of the Hunter” is a great example of southern gothic because it confuses good and evil. In the movie two young children lose their father because he stole a lot of money. He is put to death. But before he gets taken away by the police, he hides the money and tells both his children to never tell anyone about the money. Soon they have to deal with a new character, the childrens mother has found another man that she wants to marry. She wants the children to have a father figure in the their life. Soon after marrying Mr.Powell a goody two shoes preacher. He starts to ask the children about the money. After a couple of times of asking the children about the money, it becomes clear that all he wants is the money. This is the factor that makes this a great example of southern gothic. Many believe preachers might be the the most honest and clean spirited people in the world. They respect god and follow his rules. But in this case, Mr. Powell just married their mother and then killed her just because of the money. You would think that a preacher would be a nice honest man, but not in southern gothic. It confuses good and evil and makes the preacher a horrible person, something movies that are not southern gothic do not do.
ReplyDeleteSam Mikell
ReplyDeleteThe movie Night of the Hunter is a southern gothic movie because it shows all seven aspects of the genre. Harry Powell is the main antagonist of the movie and he sings a song many times throughout the movie. The song is called “Leaning on the Everlasting Arms”. He normally sings over and over again “Leaning. Leaning. Leaning on the everlasting arms” (Night of the Hunter). At first when he sings it, it sounds normal and harmless. But, the more that the viewers get to know his personality and what he does, the song becomes creepy because he is creepy and he sings it. When he starts singing the song and the viewers hear it, it is like a warning call that he is coming and he s going to do something bad. This gives the viewers the chill and horror of the preacher and who he really is. Powell being a preacher gives a sense that he is only trying to do good things and that he is a good man, but he does many bad things so this creates a confusion in the movie if he is good or evil. Since a bad person is acting as a good preacher, this creates a slight fear of religion and it can make the viewer think that even though a preacher in a religion seems good, they can actually be bad. The movie uses a good use of black and white when showing the preacher because it shows his dark side at times and also throughout the movie, when the preacher does something bad, it shows his hidden evil side. The movie showed even the supposedly most righteous preachers can be terrible, bad, and creepy people. It showed a side of the world and society that most people may have not known about; they may have not known that things like murderous preachers can exist, and this shows that things are not always as good as they seem. The movie showed that the supposedly good preacher Harry Powell was actually a murderous, manipulative, and horrible man. Night of the Hunter was a chilling movie at many points and it is definitely all the elements of a southern gothic story.
Mary Grace Noteman
ReplyDeleteIn the movie Night of the Hunter, we find that a religious preacher named Harry Powell marries a gullible widow with two young children who secretly hide $10,000 that their father steals before the police take him to prison and kill him. Harry Powell continues to search for the money and eventually the children after he kills his newly wed wife. He is eventually caught and taken to prison. However the young boy named John who is seeing the exact thing that happens to his father, can not handle taking care of the money and gives the money up. Gothic shows the dark and hidden side of things and that is exactly what this movie does. It shows that even preachers, who supposedly have a life of God around every corner, can be evil people. Harry Powell says, “Now just tell me. Where’s the money hid?” (Night of the Hunter). He is searching for the money and he wants to take it from the children. This is the question he asks John. John however refuses to tell him where the money is hidden because he promised his father. Mr. Powell has no problem doing evil things to his “new family.” This proves that this movie shows the dark and hidden things in this movie. No one would expect a preacher to be the antagonist, yet he is. This movie is a clear example of southern gothic.
Creating a chill is hard thing to do to grab your audience’s attention. That is one of the elements of a true Southern Gothic story and one of the most important. Weather or not the chill is constant throughout the entire story, it must always be lingering somewhere. What does it mean to have an exhilarating chill? Take a look at the story A Rose for Emily by William Faulkner. At the beginning of the story, the chill starts immediately with the sentence "When Miss Emily Grierson died [...]" (WIlliam Faulkner). The author uses this to establish the dark nature of this story. Another element of southern gothic is a confusion of who is good and who is bad. At the beginning, the author portrays Miss Emily as fragile and harmless, but she turns out to be the opposite. Through the story, the reader is unsure of who is innocent and who is the real killer. Another thing that Faulkner did was to start off the story hinting at the readers that one character in the story is involved in Miss Emily's death. This adds the other element of southern gothic, mystery and horror. This element builds up to the end of the story in which the readers BELIEVE they will get the answer. Throughout the story, it is a mystery at who is the suspect. In a point of the story, the author almost makes the reader believe that Miss Emily may be the killer after all, making the readers believe that Miss Emily was going insane. For example, when Miss Emily's father died, she refused to believe anyone. "[Miss Emily] told them that her father was not dead [...]. Just as they were about to resort to law and force, she broke down [...]." By making Miss Emily's life such a mystery through the story, the readers start to have doubts. Not only about Miss Emily, but the other characters in the story. So much that the readers start to question the innocent and unestablished characters, like the normal people of the town visiting Miss Emily's house. Even after the resolution of the story, the chilling aspect is still there by ending the story with a cliffhanger. The story ends with the characters in the story discovering that Miss Emily may not be dead after all. This story contains the thrilling, mysterious, chilling, and slightly confusing aspects of Southern Gothic.
ReplyDeleteGood Country People is a southern gothic story about a girl Hugla who got her leg shot off and her mother, Mrs. Hopewell, who lives with her. The plot takes place when a Bible salesman knocks on the door who claims his name is Maly Pointer, eventually manages to have a date with Hulga. At the end of the story, he tricks Hulga into thinking that they are both in love with each other, and he steals her leg and runs off with it. There are many elements of southern gothic, but one of them that strongly shows in this story is that it shows the dark and hidden side of things. Mrs. Hopewell and Hulga think that this salesman is just an innocent man looking for love when really he ends up turning into a robber and steals Hugla’s leg! It shows how one person in the story can show the dark and hidden side of an innocent looking person. “He slammed the lid shut and snatched up the valise and swung it down the hole and then stepped through himself. When all of him had passed but his head, he turned and regarded her with a look that no longer had any admiration in it.” (O’connor, 18) The quote shows how the salesman completely turns on her. From kissing her to stealing her leg, this man, ‘Manly Pointer’ made the story southern gothic.
ReplyDeleteThe movie Night of the Hunter is a classic example of the southern gothic genre. Night of the Hunter is southern gothic because it tips stereotypes on their side and kicks them in the gut. One stereotype in this movie is that the preacher will be “good” because a preacher supposedly speaks the word of God. This stereotype is tipped on its side and is kicked in the gut. In this part of the movie, the shopkeeper is talking about the farmer that was stabbed and had his horse stolen, “What about the one that knifed the farmer and stole his horse” (Mitchum Night of the Hunter). Seconds later it shows the preacher known as Harry Powell on a horse. All throughout the movie, Harry wields his iconic knife, so it shows that he was the one who stole the horse. This is where the preacher stereotype is kicked in the gut. No stereotypical preacher would stab someone and steal their horse, because, in the bible, it is in the ten commandments to not steal and to not kill; the farmer might have died after Harry was stabbed. Night of the Hunter is southern gothic because it incorporates tipping stereotypes and kicking them in the gut, essentially disproving them.
ReplyDeleteThe movie The Night of the Hunter is a southern gothic film because it deals with the confusion between what is good and what is evil. The story's antagonist, Reverend Harry Powell, comes off as a nice man with good intentions in the beginning, but as the film continues, his true motives are revealed. Only John, the protagonist child, realizes the exact reason why the Rev. Powell is chasing after his mother. The reverend wants ten thousand dollars that John’s father left him with and goes to all lengths of the Earth to try and get it. By becoming the town’s preacher, he wins their approval along with that of Willa- John’s mother. Each day he gets closer and closer to the money, taking Pearl to the tipping as she was on the brink of giving him the money. At this point the reverend becomes desperate and wants the money now. The children took it with them and are hiding in the cellar while he searches throughout the house; “ I can hear you whisperin' children, so I know you're down there. I can feel myself gettin' awful mad. I'm out of patience children. I'm coming to find you now” (The Night of the Hunter). Here, the struggle between good and evil is at its greatest. The children are trying to escape with the money in check, while Rev. Powell is chasing after them. The other key factor is that the true and hidden dark side of Rev. Powell is exploited and it highlights his lies to the entire community and throws away whatever good the townspeople thought of him.
ReplyDeleteIn the movie Night of the Hunter, A preacher with the name of Harry Powell get married to a gullible and vulnerable widow who has two young children. Harry Powell married the widow because he found out that her late husband has hidden ten thousand dollars somewhere hidden in the house. Harry continues to search for the money and eventually the children tell him after he kills his newly wed wife and the kids mother. He is eventually caught and taken back to prison and is put there for the rest of his life. However the young boy named John who is the son and who is seeing the exact thing that happens to his father, can not handle taking care of the money anymore and finally gives the money up to Harry. In the Presi presentation it says that Gothic shows the dark and hidden side of things and that is exactly what this movie shows. Night of the Hunter shows that even preachers, who supposedly have a life of God around every corner and one who except everyone for who they are with a life without violence, can be such an evil heartless person. Harry says, “Now just tell me. Where’s the money hid? Just tell me!” (Night of the Hunter).When he is searching for the money he even harrasses the kids just over some money and he even kills the mother over it. This is the question he asks John the son who is protection the money. Every time Harry asks John refuses to give it up because he promised his real father he would never tell a soul. Harry has no problem doing evil things to his family, killing, harassing, hitting, it is obvious that this is not a real family. No one would expect a preacher to be the antagonist, yet he is a pathological l lier and a killer. This movie is a very good example of southern gothic.
ReplyDeleteScott Merdinger
ReplyDeletePeriod 7
In the book Good Country People Hulga; the main character has a fake leg. Mainly Pointer a bible seller appears at her door trying to sell a bible. As he talks to her he lures her in, and takes her out on a date. As he talks to her he takes her leg and runs away with it. The movie is definitely Southern Gothic in the sense of it shows the dark side of things. The book has a person who claims he is a religious christian who takes a fake leg off of a woman. The woman (Hulga) protects her leg and cares about it a lot so when it is taken she feels like she is raped. That’s the main reason the Good Country People is Southern Gothic.
Alex
ReplyDelete10-29-13
Period 7
In The Night of The Hunter Harry Powell, a pseudo-preacher who has twisted thoughts about reality. We can see that he has tattoos on his knuckles, on the left he has “HATE” printed across his knuckles and on the right he has “LOVE” Printed across his knuckles. Mr. Powell is a friendly preacher on the outside but on the inside he is a villainous person, In several parts of the movie there are a few parts of southern Gothic, in the beginning there is no mention or real show of who is the antagonist nor protagonist so it shows an element of confusion. Another element of southern Gothic in The Night of The Hunter is mystery because we don’t know who the villain is because the actual introduction does not show the villains.