Urban Gothic is a sub-genre ofGothic fiction,film horror, and television dealing withindustrial andpost-industrial urban society. It was pioneered in the mid-19th century in Britain, Ireland, and the United States, before being developed in British novels such asRobert Louis Stevenson'sStrange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde (1886) and Irish novels such asOscar Wilde'sThe Picture of Dorian Gray (1890) andBram Stoker'sDracula (1897). In the twentieth century, urban Gothic influenced the creation of the sub-genres ofSouthern Gothic andsuburban Gothic. From the 1980s, interest in the urban Gothic was revived with books likeAnne Rice'sVampire Chronicles and a number ofgraphic novels that drew on dark city landscapes, leading to adaptations in film includingBatman (1989),The Crow (1994) andFrom Hell (2001), as well as influencing films likeSeven (1995).[1]
EarlyGothic fiction tended to use the city as a starting point and then move to rural locations, abandoning the settings and securities ofurban civilization for wild and dangerous rural regions. In the mid-nineteenth century, Gothic novels began either to reverse this process or to be conducted entirely in the modern industrial city, which itself became a zone ofliminality, danger, and adventure, coming to be referred to in the late twentieth century as urban Gothic.[2]Robert Mighall sees the urban Gothic as a genre arising in London in the mid-nineteenth century out of the critique of the impact of industrialization, leading to the discourse on urban reform that can be seen inCity Mystery genre, includingThe Mysteries of Paris (1842–43) andG. W. M. Reynolds'Mysteries of London (1844–8) as well asCharles Dickens'Oliver Twist (1837–8) andBleak House (1854).[3] These pointed to the juxtaposition of wealthy, ordered, and affluent civilization against the disorder and barbarity of the poor within the same metropolis.Bleak House in particular is credited with seeing the introduction ofurban fog in the novel, which would become a frequent characteristic of urban Gothic literature and film.[4]
The urban Gothic genre that developed in the Victorianfin de siècle, beginning withRobert Louis Stevenson'sStrange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde (1886), applied the foggy aesthetic and the Gothic trope of doubling to the city.[4] They often incorporated ideas about the influence of modern science on life, and the mixture of science and the supernatural in urban Gothic novels has led Katherine Spencer to describe them as "a mediating form between science fiction and fantasy."[5]Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde explores traditional debates about the nature of good and evil through motifs from folklore while incorporating a modern, scientific explanation.[6]Oscar Wilde'sThe Picture of Dorian Gray (1890) similarly revisits the concept of aFaustian Pact in a modern social context.[7]Bram Stoker'sDracula (1897) presents the eastern fringes of Europe inTransylvania as a point of origin for the arrival in modern provincial and then metropolitan London society of a creature from folklore.[8]
In the early twentieth century, the urban Gothic was extended to other cities, like Paris, such as inGaston Leroux'sThe Phantom of the Opera (1909–10).[2] From the twentieth century urban Gothic helped to spawn other sub-genres, includingSouthern Gothic, using the Southern United States as a location,[9] and laterSuburban Gothic, which shifted the focus from the urban centre to the residential periphery of modern society.[10] Since the 1980s Gothic horror fiction and urban Gothic in particular has revived as a genre, with series of novels likeAnne Rice'sVampire Chronicles andPoppy Z. Brite'sLost Souls[11] both makingNew Orleans a key centre of Gothic fantasy.[12] Urban Gothic themes and images were also used in comics and graphic novels, includingFrank Miller'sDaredevil (from 1979),Batman (from 1986), theSin City series (from 1991),James O'Barr'sThe Crow,Alan Moore'sFrom Hell (from 1991) andThe League of Extraordinary Gentlemen (1999).[13] Urban Gothic aesthetics and themes are also explored in video games by presenting the city as a threat, often as its own character, as inSilent Hill (1999).[14]
In more recent scholarships, critics have identified certain works as New Urban Gothic.[15] These novels possess the qualities of the urban gothic novel while moving the setting to include more diverse urban spaces.[15] For example, Gina Wisker identifiesSandi Tan'sThe Black Isle (2012) as an example of an urban gothic set inSingapore.[16] In the novel, Singapore exists as a Gothic city haunted by the ghosts of war andcolonialism.[16] The filmSuzhou River (2000) also uses Gothic elements to depict the city ofShanghai.[17] Urban gothic elements from the Victorian era carry over to twenty-first century dystopian novels, such asThe City and the City by China Miéville.[18]
Urban Gothic novels were among the earliest and most influential works adapted for the cinema, helping to form the genre of horror film. These includedNosferatu (1922),The Phantom of the Opera (1925),Dracula (1931), andDr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1941).[19] AfterWorld War II, emphasis shifted to films that more often drew inspiration from the insecurities of life, utilizing new technology and dividing into the three sub-genres ofhorror-of-personality, the horror-of-Armageddon and thehorror-of-the-demonic.[20] However, during the late 1950s and early 1960s, the British companyHammer Film Productions enjoyed huge international success fromTechnicolor films involving classic Gothic horror characters, often starringPeter Cushing andChristopher Lee, particularlyDracula (1958), which resulted in many sequels into the 1970s.[11] The 1983 vampire filmThe Hunger provides a highly influential modernized and urbanized version of Gothic culture.[11] The same themes have been revisited periodically in films likeBram Stoker's Dracula (1992).[21]Seven (1995) is another example of a movie dealing with dark themes in an urban landscape.[1] A comparable film from this century isThe Batman (2022), which shares similar gritty elements withSeven (1995).[22]
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