How this Gothic writer mysteriously disappeared

The Origin of The Gothic, and Why We Love Scaring Ourselves:    • Why we love scaring ourselves  
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What really happened to the Gothic genre:    • How Gothic Literature Died  

Hailed as the 'Shakespeare of Romance writers', Ann Radcliffe was the most popular, and highest earning, writer of her day. She was a trailblazer of Gothic fiction and achieved incredible success during the 1790s.

But then, despite her immense popularity, she disappeared from the public eye… for nearly 30 years. Where did she go? Did her meteoric rise to fame turn her into an unhinged recluse? Did she die a mysterious, premature death? Find out now in our latest video!


Chapters
00:00 Introduction
03:14 Who Was Ann Radcliffe?
05:31 "The Missing Author"


Written, presented, and edited by Rosie Whitcombe
@books_ncats

Directed, produced, and edited by Matty Phillips
@ma_ps_
mphotos.uk

Guest Gaffer: Chris O'Grady
@cog_photo


Bibliography
The Annual Biography and Obituary for the Year 1824 (London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, Brown, and Green, 1824)

‘Art. III. Wallace; or the Fight of Falkirk. A Metrical Romance’, Monthly Review, or, Literary Journal, vol. 62 (May 1810)

‘Art. IX. Oakendale Abbey’, The Monthly Visitor, vol. 2 (November 1797)

‘Art. XXXV. The Italian; or, The Confessional of the Black Penitents. A Romance […]’, English Review of Literature, Science, Discoveries, Inventions, and Practical Controversies and Contests, vol. 28 (December 1796)

‘Cotemporary [sic] Authors. Estimate of the Literary Character of Mrs. Ann Ratcliffe [sic]’, Monthly Magazine, or, British Register, vol. 47 (March 1819)

De Quincey, Thomas, Confessions of an English Opium-Eater (London: Collins' Clear-Type Press, 1856)

Drake, Nathan, Literary Hours: Or, Sketches Critical and Narrative (London: T. Cadell, Junior, and W. Davies, 1800) 2 vols. (vol. 1)

Facer, Ruth, Ann Radcliffe (1764-1823) https://chawtonhouse.org/wp-content/u...

‘The Italian; or, The Confessional of the Black Penitents, A Romance [...]’, The European Magazine, and London Review, vol. 31 (January 1797)

Miles, Robert, Ann Radcliffe: The Great Enchantress (Manchester: Mancheser University Press, 1995)

Norton, Rictor, Mistress of Udolpho: The Life of Ann Radcliffe (London: Leicester University Press, 1999)

‘On British Novels and Romances, Introductory to a Series of Criticisms on the Living Novelists’, The New Monthly Magazine and Universal Register, vol. 13 (February 1820)

‘Public Amusements for July’, La Belle Assemblée: or Court and Fashionable Magazine, vol. 7 (July 1809)

Scott, Walter, Lives of the Novelists (Oxford: OUP, 1906)

Townshend, Dale, 'An Introduction to Ann Radcliffe', British Library: Discovering Literature: Romantics & Victorians https://www.bl.uk/romantics-and-victo...

Townshend, Dale, and Wright, Angela, 'Gothic and Romantic engagements: The critical reception of Ann Radcliffe, 1789-1850', Ann Radcliffe, Romanticism and the Gothic, ed. by Townshend and Wright (Cambridge: CUP, 2014)


Music Licences

Summer Mvt 3 Presto by John Harrison with the Wichita State University Chamber Players is licensed under a Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 International License.
Winter Mvt 1 Allegro non molto by John Harrison with the Wichita State University Chamber Players is licensed under a Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 International License.
Source: https://freemusicarchive.org/music/Jo...

Other music
Pride Of The Job (Part 1), L.A. Noire: Official Soundtrack, Andrew Hale
Main Theme, L.A. Noire: Official Soundtrack, Andrew Hale