The Castle of Otranto A Gothic Story

by Walpole, Horace; Lewis, W. S.; Clery, E. J.

• ISBN13: 9780192834409
• ISBN10: 0192834401
• Edition: Reprint
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 1998-07-16
• Publisher: Oxford University Press

Summary

First published pseudonymously in 1764, The Castle of Otranto purported to be a translation of an Italian story of the time of the crusades. In it Walpole attempted, as he declared in the Preface to the second edition, 'to blend the two kinds of romance: the ancient and the modern'. He givesus a series of catastrophes, ghostly interventions, revelations of identity, and exciting contests. Crammed with invention, entertainment, terror, and pathos, the novel was an immediate success and Walpole's own favourite among his numerous works. His friend, the poet Thomas Gray, wrote that he andhis family, having read Otranto, were now 'afraid to go to bed o'nights'. The novel is here reprinted from a text of 1798, the last that Walpole himself prepared for the press.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgements	vi	(1)
Introduction	vii	(27)
Note on the Text	xxxiv	(1)
Select Bibliography	xxxv	(2)
Chronology of Horace Walpole, Fourth Earl of Orford	xxxvii
Preface to the First Edition	5	(4)
Preface to the Second Edition	9	(6)
Sonnet to the Right Honourable Lady Mary Coke	15	(2)
THE CASTLE OF OTRANTO	17	(99)
Explanatory Notes	116