McDonald, Keith ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7477-5963 and Johnson, Wayne (2025) The Spectral West: Supenature and the Gothic in the Western Film. United Kingdom, Anthem Press

Full text not available from this repository.

Abstract

This book considers the presence of the supernatural and Gothic elements of the Western on screen. These dark and sinister undertones often exist in Western narratives to draw attention to the ever-present issue of death and its haunting resonance which characters encounter. This book examines this through key historic moments in Western film and its contemporary incarnations. The book detects imposing correlations in themes and currents between the Gothic and the Western relating to existential crisis and a loss of faith in ideologies and institutions. These themes represent the tensions between the old and the new, the deranged insistence on civility and order in a chaotic landscape, disillusionment and the shattering of faith in the natural order, and even nature and order themselves. The Western, just like the Gothic tale, reminds us that new frontiers are mired in the past, and optimism and survival are hunted down and haunted by guilt-ridden past and passed anxieties and traumas.

Item Type:	Book
Status:	Published
Subjects:	A General Works > AC Collections. Series. Collected works A General Works > AZ History of Scholarship The Humanities F History United States, Canada, Latin America > F001 United States local history N Fine Arts > N Visual arts (General) For photography, see TR N Fine Arts > N Visual arts (General) For photography, see TR > N0061-72 Theory. Philosophy. Aesthetics of the visual arts
School/Department:	School of Humanities
URI:	https://ray.yorksj.ac.uk/id/eprint/13334

University Staff: Request a correction | RaY Editors: Update this record