Simone Rieck
Dr. Craig White
LITR 5535
10 October 2003

Nature and the Gothic in American Romantic Literature

            Nature is a common element in literature, especially literature from the American Renaissance (approx. 1820-1860).  During this time in American history, several genres of literature surfaced in the developing country, such as transcendentalist fiction, slave narratives, and romance narratives.  The three literary forms represent the various types and classes of Americans during this time, but natural landscapes are consistently appreciated (Rieck 1).  The use of nature in romantic fiction differs from its use in the other genres.  Though nature steadily acts as a fusion in the stratified society, landscapes are often used as an effect supporting the storyline.  In American literature, the romance genre usually involves some combination of “high adventure, thwarted love, mysterious circumstances, arduous quests, and improbably triumphs” (Murfin & Ray 414-415).  According to Sheshe Giddens, “Thematically, Romanticism is characterized by […] its idealization of nature” (midterm 2000 par. 1).  Nature’s universal quality acts as an effect to captivate readers, commonly through the gothic, in an attempt to draw emotions from the conditions of the story.

            The roots of the term gothic can be traced back to the Medieval Period in Europe.  It was most often used to describe a style of architecture “characterized by a wealth of ornamental and intricate de4tail, flying buttresses, pointed arches and vaults, narrow spires, stained glass windows, and prominent verticality” (Murfin & Ray 191).  In addition to its characteristic architectural style, Europe’s history, which includes hundreds of years of war and disease, helps to create the natural setting for darkness and mystery, another gothic theme.  Without the capacious history, American authors were forced to create a new gothic effect by using the lush untapped natural settings of their young country.

            One of the first and possibly the best author to achieve the gothic was Washington Irving.  The finest illustration of gothic in his writing is “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow.”  His depiction of the main character, Ichabod Crane, alone creates an eerie and peculiar effect.  Irving paints a picture of the surroundings of cowardly Ichabod as he is compelled to enter the “haunted” forest and confront the Hessian trooper:

In the center of the road stood an enormous tulip-tree, which towered like a giant above all the other trees of the neighborhood, and formed a kind of landmark.  Its limbs were gnarled, and fantastic, large enough to form trunks for ordinary trees, twisting down almost to the earth, and rising again into the air. (2108).

The “gnarled” limbs craft a monstrous picture, and the way they twist and rise, causing an archway of sorts, transforms an element of European architecture to fit the natural settings of young America.  Ichabod’s rides through the dark woods of Sleepy Hollow create the ultimate gothic scene.  Readers are drawn in to Ichabod’s frame of mind as he traverses “broken rocks and trunks of fallen trees” (Irving 2107).  When he finally does see the Hessian trooper, Ichabod’s terror is evident in Irving’s frightening description of the ghost as “something huge, misshapen, black, and towering […] gathered up in the gloom, like some gigantic monster ready to spring upon the traveler” (2109).  Without the elaborate descriptions of the gangly character’s surroundings, the legend would be difficult to imagine.  Irving’s descriptions of the natural settings of Sleepy Hollow connect readers to the story’s characters. 

            Similar to slave narratives that appear later in history, “A Narrative of the Captivity and Restoration if Mrs. Mary Rowlandson” provides a tale of detainment followed by triumph.  Rowlandson’s story gives insight into her life and experiences with Native Americans in 1675.  Her story enthralls readers with her frightening capture by “Indians.”  However, perhaps the most effective images are the gothic images of the capturers and the night, or nature.  Rowlandson expresses, “This was the dolefulest night that ever my eyes saw.  Oh the roaring, and singing and dancing, and yelling of those black creatures in the night, which made the place a lively resemblance of hell” (138).  The description creates an image of a night without the revealing light of a moon or stars.  The complete darkness generates panic, not only in Rowlandson, but also in her readers.  Her journey continues as she crosses the “vast and desolate wilderness” (138).  The endless and barren wilderness creates a feeling of hopelessness and grief.  Readers, along with Rowlandson, fear what could possibly be ahead.  This establishment of fear produces a gothic image in nature.

            The groundwork of Washington Irving and Mary Rowlandson in the Pre-Romantic Era acted as a precursor for Romantic writers, such as James Fennimore Cooper, who begin to utilize the natural settings of their romance narratives to provide gothic imagery.  Though Cooper’s novels are not filled with gothic descriptions, he does achieve an ambiance that effortlessly engulfs the reader.  Cooper’s Deerslayer enchants readers with descriptions of the extremely young New York landscape.  As Cooper tries to educate readers on the historic framework of the story, he also describes “the tangled labyrinth of a small swamp” (3) and later gives a lengthy illustration of a fallen tree:

This tree, like so many millions of its brethren, lay where it had fallen, and was moldering under the slow but certain influence of the seasons.  The decay, however, had attacked its center, even while it stood erect in the pride of vegetation, hollowing out its heart, as disease sometimes destroys the vitals of animal life, even while a fair exterior is presented to the observer. (17)

Death, decay, and disease become familiar elements of the American gothic image.  Not only does Cooper achieve gaining the attention of readers, he also provides an elaborate depiction of the reality of walking through the relatively unsettled frontier of early America.  

            Cooper’s earlier novel, The Last of the Mohicans, also uses the beautiful New York landscape to mesmerize readers.  In effect, this novel also contains several depictions of the gothic in nature.  When Heyward and the sisters realize they are on a Mohawk graveyard, they are overcome with unease.  Cooper illustrates:

The gray light, the gloomy little area of dark grass, surrounded by its border of brush, beyond with the pines rose, in breathing silence, apparently, into the very clouds, and the death-like stillness of the vast forest, were all in unison to deepen such a sensation. (126)

This passage contains many elements of the gothic. There is a contrast between light and dark with the description of the “gray light” and the “gloomy […] dark grass.”  In addition, the “death-like stillness” involves the image of decay and illustrates the fear of the characters.  Previously in the story, Cooper describes a secret entrance to a cave as “a narrow, deep, cavern in the rock, whose length appeared much extended by the perspective and the nature of the light by which it was seen” (52).  The secrecy of the entrance generates mystery, and again, there is a contrast between light and dark.  There is yet another gothic image later in the novel as Hawk-eye, Chingachgook, and Heyward “left the soft light of the moon, to bury themselves in the gloom of the woods” (133).  Again, there is a contrast between light and dark with the descriptions of the moon and the woods.  In addition, their evasion into the dark woods produces fear and anticipation, as well as mystery. 

Still a new country, much of the common knowledge among citizens remained in the memory of Europe.  In effect, without such in-depth particulars of the environment by authors such as Irving, Rowlandson, and Cooper, readers could not fully experience the tales of love and mystery present in American romantic fiction.  In effect, nature serves as an illuminating detail.  It provides an alliance among American people (Rieck 8).  Every human is capable of appreciating what nature has to offer, whether it is torment, hope, peace, love, conquest, life, or death.  Gothic imagery is present in many aspects of nature including night and day.  So, as long as we all experience life in day and night, we are all bonded as people.

Works Cited

Cooper, James Fennimore.  The Last of the Mohicans.  New York: Penguin Books, 1986.

- - -.  Deerslayer.  New York: Bantam Books, 1982.   

Irving, Washington.  “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow.”  The Heath Anthology of American Literature, 4^th ed.  Ed. Paul Lauter.  Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2002.  2093-2112.

Murfin, Ross and Ray, Supryia M.  The Bedford Glossary of Critical and Literary Terms, 2^nd ed.  Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2003.

Rieck, Simone.  “Nature: The Universal Bond.”  Essay.  UHCL, 2003.

Rowlandson, Mary.  “A Narrative of the Captivity and Restoration of Mrs. Mary Rowlandson.”  The Norton Anthology of American Literature, Shorter 6^th ed.  Ed. Nina Baym.  New York: Noron &Co., 2003.  136-152.