This historical survey of Victorian Gothic fiction offers original readings of familiar texts, from Dickens to Stoker, Wilkie Collins to Conan Doyle; but also includes a rich store of original sources, from European travelogues to sexological textbooks, from ecclesiastic histories to pamphlets on the perils of self-abuse.

Introduction: Outside in: Gothic Criticism and the Pull into Interiority ; 1. History as Nightmare ; 2. From Udolpho to Spitalfields: Mapping Gothic London ; 3. Haunted Houses I and II ; 4. Atavism: A Darwinian Nightmare ; 5. Unspeakable Vices: Moral Monstrosity and Representation ; 6. Making a Case: Vampirism, Sexuality, and Interpretation ; Postcript: From Landscape to Dreamscape: Redrawing the Gothic Map ; Bibliography ; Index

`judiciously and convincingly using different discursive contexts to shed light on the heritage from the Gothic of Victorian fiction.' Victor Sage `always remains genuinely challenging' Victor Sage `this book is a serious and well-documented contribution to the study of the Gothic mode, which sheds some fascinating light on what currently remains a really problematic area for the scholar; namely, the mysterious transition from the popular gene of the literary histories (1764-1820) to the survival and diffusion of the mode in Victorian texts ... It is Mighall's sharpness and detail which makes the book's anti-essentialism a real contribution to the history of the Gothic in the nineteenth century.' Victor Sage `He ... provides an excellent demonstration of the gothic foundations of detective fiction. Mighall's command of the primary and secondary literature makes for illuminating readings of many contributors to Victorian fiction, both great and small.' B. F. Fisher, Choice, Sept. 00. 'an important and robustly argumentative definition of the Gothic. ... [It] redraws the critical map'. John Sutherland, Independent on Sunday 29/11/99 `... excellent book .. this is an original, thoughtful and ground-breaking book. No student of Victorian literature can afford to neglect it. Unusually for a critical book, it is also great fun' Michael Newton, THES