D&D's Origins in Gothic Literature

[Havard]

Interesting thread over at ENWorld:

I haven't read much Gothic fiction -- just Dracula, really -- and the genre has gone profoundly out of fashion, but in its day it was extremely popular, and, as Michael Moorcock and James Cawthorne declared in Fantasy: The 100 Best Books, the first Gothic novel, Otranto, influenced modern fantasy quite a bit.

This is what jumped out at me though:
The prevalence of castles in the literature was no accident, nor was the frequency with which they were built on the iceberg principle, with nine-tenths of their structure consisting of subterranean vaults. These spectre-infested spaces were rooted in the fantasies of an architect, Giovanni Piranesi. A revised edition of his Carceri d’Invenzione appeared in 1761, featuring a series of drawings of prison interiors conceived on a titanic and overpowering scale.
Welcome to Blackmoor. (Ravenloft came much later, of course, and reintroduced a lot of Gothic elements quite explicitly.)

-Havard

[Rafael]

Uuh, Havard really wants to activate me.

I did my master's about this:

First dungeon-like structure ever, Daniel Caspar von Lophenstein, German, 1661, in the play Cleopatra.


Now, as to drawing a line between Walpole, Radcliffe, etc.and modern fantasy, as a direct infliuence on D&D,
you got to show me that. Like, line by line.

[Rafael]

It's quite boring, actually.

The first "dungeon" ever, that was Arneson himself.

Why?

Ye non-english speakers, check the meaning of the word "dungeon", and rejoice.

First vaults, I think, Erick Rücker Eddison, in "The Worm Ouroboros", but I have never read that one, really.

[The Red Baron]

When do vaults appear in The Worm Ouroboros? There's a lot of action going on in castles, but none of it is happening underground.

[Rafael]

No idea, any more. This thread is kind of old. And Ouroboros wasn't all too interesting to me, back then. I think in the last third of the novel. ...MAYBE.

...And back to watching the UFC, I go.

[Havard]

Interesting thread over at ENWorld:

I haven't read much Gothic fiction -- just Dracula, really -- and the genre has gone profoundly out of fashion, but in its day it was extremely popular, and, as Michael Moorcock and James Cawthorne declared in Fantasy: The 100 Best Books, the first Gothic novel, Otranto, influenced modern fantasy quite a bit.

This is what jumped out at me though:
The prevalence of castles in the literature was no accident, nor was the frequency with which they were built on the iceberg principle, with nine-tenths of their structure consisting of subterranean vaults. These spectre-infested spaces were rooted in the fantasies of an architect, Giovanni Piranesi. A revised edition of his Carceri d’Invenzione appeared in 1761, featuring a series of drawings of prison interiors conceived on a titanic and overpowering scale.
Welcome to Blackmoor. (Ravenloft came much later, of course, and reintroduced a lot of Gothic elements quite explicitly.)

-Havard

Back to Giovanni Piranesi,
check out this very cool video making many of his dungeon vault illustrations come to life. I could very much imagine parts of the Blackmoor Dungeon look a bit like this

-Havard

[Rafael]

I think at this point that the assessment made in the ENW thread, and by user "mmadsen" is wrong:

Said iceberg principle existed before, and continuously ever since the middle ages. Not to mention antique mentions, like the Minotaur legend.

But bottom line, that rift that is supposed to have happened in the Baroque era, it doesn't exist.

Mind you that the catacombs of Paris, for example existed since the 12th century; so, the notion that there were no maze-like structures very much in people's reality of life is also very contestable.

Also, mazes had a long-lastin tradition in European Christian religion.


So, to pinpoint it to one or two sources, really, very constestable, in my opinion.



...Yeah, that's me, nearing old age: "I know one thing: that I know nothing."

[Havard]

Sure, I have no idea how much you can attribute the impact of a single work on gothlic literature. Again, the influences of gothlic literature on D&D is one of many at best.

OTOH, I didnt know about Giovanni Battista Piranesi's works before and they are really fascinating!



-Havard

[Rafael]

Well, the Anglo-centric approach to literary history relies mainly on the idea that you have "key works", as in,
"The Castle of Otranto" would be the first Gothic novel, or, "Ivanhoe" would the first medieval novel -
but that's a political decision, rather than a scientific one.

Piranesi rawks, though. I espeially like one of his modern heirs - you might recall similar art from the video game "Ico":

http://kotaku.com/5863620/the-inspirati ... -cover-art

[Havard]

I do remember Ico. I enjoyed watching the trailers for it and its sequel/Prequels. Never actually played any of them, but still.

-Havard