The findings show that there is a noticeable “shift” in political views, where Radcliffe seem to write more liberally and more sympathetic to the revolutionary ideas, whilst Dacre´s writing is affected by increasing anxieties that such ideas will lead to chaos and disorder. According to many critics, this affects the authors´ view and portrayal of their contemporary politics, especially their view of the French revolution and its revolutionary ideas. A point of significance here is the fact that The Romance of the Forest was written at the end of the eighteenth century, whilst Zofloya was written at the start of the nineteenth century. Furthermore, I have looked at how both authors incorporate politics in their novels. The most prominent example of this is the character Zofloya, who at first is introduced as a human before later revealing himself to be the devil. However, whilst the “mysteries” in Radcliffe is often rationally disclosed without the need for a supernatural explanation, Dacre does the opposite when emphasising on the dangers of the supernatural. My final method has been close reading, with ecerpts from both novels that have helped illustrate the arguments made throughout the paper.Īs they were both written within the same genre, Gothic fiction, there are similarities regarding how they use features such as the sublime and terror, sometimes combining them. Additionally, I have looked at Hoeveler´s (1997) gender theory when it comes to Zofloya. I have combined historicist approaches with genre theory, with the use of Williams (2017) Crawford (2013), Chard (2009), Davison (2009), Frank (2008), and Miles (2002). In my analysis, I have used many methods to look at this topic.

In relation to this, I have looked at how nature and the supernatural is portrayed in both novels.

In this paper, I have compared and contrasted the gothic novels The Romance of the Forest (1791) by Ann Radcliffe and Zofloya(1806) by Charlotte Dacre, and analysed how they portray the cultural values of the Enlightenment.

The romance of the forest