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A review by paguilera
The Castle of Otranto by Horace Walpole
3.0
Actual rating: 3.5 stars.
This was surprisingly not terrible, lol. I read it as part of a study of Gothic literature, this being the progenitor of the genre. Before anything else, I think it's important to remember that this book was first published in 1764. People say, yeah, yeah, it's an old classic, but I don't know if people realize what that means. 1764 means a good decade before the start of the American Revolutionary War; it means Jane Austen would not yet be born for another couple of decades; it means a long-ass time ago. So, if the plot seems unoriginal, maybe that's due to the downsides of producing an entire genre of stories and influencing other genres in addition, rather than lack of originality on the writer's part. I think if you love all of the Gothic things, you can't help but love this book a little when you read it. At least that's how I felt.
Was I terrified? Definitely not, but that doesn't mean I couldn't appreciate the deliciously gloomy melodrama that suffuses every chapter. The preface to the story claims that this it is "a translation of a mysterious Italian tale from the darkest Middle Ages," which true or false, begins the story by tapping that most attractive feature of legends: the possibility that it really did happen. What follows is a very readable, mostly quick-paced story involving a suspiciously hasty wedding, a giant murderous helmet, an ancient prophecy, a tyrannical patriarch of "exquisite villany," haunted portraits, "spectres," lamp-lit flights through castle stairways and subterraneous passages, secret trapdoors, dramatic rays of moonlight, strategic claps of thunder, secret identities revealed, a magic sword, silent knights, brave and clever princesses, loyal female friendship, and, of course, star-crossed lovers! It's not a perfect book by any means, and I think this would indeed work better as a play, or movie, but it sure was a fun read.
This was surprisingly not terrible, lol. I read it as part of a study of Gothic literature, this being the progenitor of the genre. Before anything else, I think it's important to remember that this book was first published in 1764. People say, yeah, yeah, it's an old classic, but I don't know if people realize what that means. 1764 means a good decade before the start of the American Revolutionary War; it means Jane Austen would not yet be born for another couple of decades; it means a long-ass time ago. So, if the plot seems unoriginal, maybe that's due to the downsides of producing an entire genre of stories and influencing other genres in addition, rather than lack of originality on the writer's part. I think if you love all of the Gothic things, you can't help but love this book a little when you read it. At least that's how I felt.
Was I terrified? Definitely not, but that doesn't mean I couldn't appreciate the deliciously gloomy melodrama that suffuses every chapter. The preface to the story claims that this it is "a translation of a mysterious Italian tale from the darkest Middle Ages," which true or false, begins the story by tapping that most attractive feature of legends: the possibility that it really did happen. What follows is a very readable, mostly quick-paced story involving a suspiciously hasty wedding, a giant murderous helmet, an ancient prophecy, a tyrannical patriarch of "exquisite villany," haunted portraits, "spectres," lamp-lit flights through castle stairways and subterraneous passages, secret trapdoors, dramatic rays of moonlight, strategic claps of thunder, secret identities revealed, a magic sword, silent knights, brave and clever princesses, loyal female friendship, and, of course, star-crossed lovers! It's not a perfect book by any means, and I think this would indeed work better as a play, or movie, but it sure was a fun read.