In the same way antagonists require rules, it is important that readers have a chance to see the answer to their questions revealed, or that the readers are given enough clues to formulate an answer for themselves. The gothic seeks to understand viewpoints outside the normal and Jack Skellington's wish to understand Christmas makes him an excellent gothic protagonist. Consider also that his actions are motivated by a lack of understanding: he changes his actions after his motivations are revealed to him – through reason – to be harmful. Think of the ways in which Jack from Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas is all of these: narrator, hero, villain. This advice is, of course, relevant across many genres, but it is a necessity of gothic texts.
It doesn't matter to the reader of gothic literature whether what the antagonist is doing is morally good, but only that the antagonist has reasons for their decisions.
In any of these cases it is important that you justify the actions of the antagonist. The genre is grounded in reason, and there should be an underlying cause, explanation, and logic to the actions of your antagonists.ĭon't be afraid to engage with the darker side of a character's psyche, especially the antagonist and don't be afraid to search for an antagonist in strange places: the narrator may be the antagonist, the protagonist may work against themselves, or the antagonist may be a culture – a group of people with a similar ideology. If this killer has rules about who they kill, where they kill or how they kill, then they will be much more palatable to the reader who is seeking a truly gothic feel. Perhaps the antagonist is a killer like Jack the Ripper – another gothic touchstone. These might be the qualities of a monster: slain using silver, transforms during moonlight or it might be the rules of engagement that the antagonist uses. Establish a set of the rules by which your antagonist functions, and adhere to these rules. With this as a guiding principle, we can outline a few "do" and "do nots" for gothic writers. Rather than reach the conclusion "I don't understand this evil" as eldritch horror often does, gothic horror often seeks to delve deeply into the source of evil, and the nature of the antagonists of its works. Where Eldritch horror seeks to paint a picture of something so incomprehensible that it breaks minds and shatters souls, gothic literature is the exploration of the dark unknown, in an effort to reveal the sensations associated with these mysteries. This is by contrast to Eldritch or Lovecraftian horror which deals with the horror of the fundamentally unknowable. Not all gothic fiction is horror, but a fair amount of the most famous works deal with the horrific and the unknown.
In short, early gothic works were rooted in science and exploration of the natural world. "Natural philosophers" were early scientists which attempted to find logical, objective truth, through reason. There is a common thread within these works, but it cannot be pursued without understanding the concept of "natural philosophy." During the period in which early gothic writers began producing their best works, there was a push in culture to approach the unknown via a scientific lens. Touchstones of the gothic tradition include Bram Stoker's Dracula, Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, and Shirley Jackson's The Lottery.
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