The importance of the sublime as a means to understanding gothic texts, using examples from of number of gothic works.

An archaic cathedral resides among a savage forest where darkness reigns as the sole inhabitant among the shadows of the trees. This image would fill anyone with a sense of terror in the obscurity and power existing in it. However, delight in the awe and astonishment of this scene would be simultaneously produced. As a result, this setting is considered sublime. According to one of the most prolific and influential theorists on the sublime, Edmund Burke ( 2001:7), the sublime is anything that "is productive of the strongest emotion the mind is capable of feeling." This feeling is that pow…