Unit 6
American Gothic
Ambiguity and Anxiety in the Nineteenth Century
Authors and Works 252
Overview Questions 252
Learning Objectives 252
Overview 253
Video Overview 254
Discussion Questions for the Video 255
Timeline 256
Author/Text Review 257
Charles Brockden Brown (1771-1810) 257
Questions 257
Web Archive 257
Washington Irving (1783-1859) 257
Questions 258
Web Archive 258
Nathaniel Hawthorne (1804-1864) 259
Web Archive 259
Questions 260
William Gilmore Simms (1806-1870) 260
Questions 261
Web Archive 261
Edgar Allan Poe (1809-1849) 261
Questions 262
Web Archive 262
Henry Ward Beecher (1813-1887) 262
Questions 263
Web Archive 263
Herman Melville (1819-1891) 264
Questions 264
Web Archive 264
Emily Dickinson (1830-1866) 265
Questions 266
Web Archive 266
Ambrose Bierce (1842-1914?) 267
Questions 267
Web Archive 267
Charlotte Perkins Gilman (1860-1935) 267
Questions 268
Web Archive 268
Core Contexts 268
Swamps, Dismal and Otherwise 268
Questions 269
Web Archive 270
The Spirit is Willing: The Occult and Women in the Nineteenth Century 270
Web Archive 271
Questions 272
America on the Rocks: The Image of the “Ship of State” 272
Web Archive 273
Questions 274
Extended Contexts 274
Unnatural Reason/Weird Science 274
Questions 275
Web Archive 275
“Sleeping Beauty”: Sentimentalizing Death in the Nineteenth Century 276
Question 276
Web Archive 276
Assignments 276
Personal and Creative Responses 276
Problem-Based Learning Projects 277
Glossary 278
Selected Bibliography 279
Further Resources 279