Original scientific paper
Imperial Gothic and Neo-Victorian Adaptations: the Supernatural in Dan Simmons's Novel The Terror (2007) and its Tv Adaptation
Antonija Primorac
; Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, University of Rijeka
Abstract
The article analyses the ways in which the supernatural, as an element of the Victorian genre of imperial Gothic, is used in Dan Simmons's neo-Victorian novel The Terror (2007) and its 2018 TV adaptation. Simmons's The Terror is based on historical facts about the 1845 Franklin Expedition which set out towards what is now Arctic Canada in search of the North-West Passage and then disappeared without a trace. Simmons reconstructs the historical events and introduces elements of the supernatural in order to imagine the destinies of the crew of the expedition's ships, Erebus and Terror. The article focuses on how the supernatural is employed in the depiction of the colonial Other in the novel and its TV adaptation by analysing the ways in which the Victorian imperial Gothic elements of Simmons's novel bring to life Victorian values and worldview. Simmons's use of the imperial Gothic is compared to the 2018 screen adaptation of the novel written by Dan Kajganich and produced by Ridley Scott for AMC. It is argued that the adaptation deconstructs Simmons's use of the supernatural and puts the focus instead on questions of personal and group responsibility within a wider frame of imperialist expansionist policies and the repercussions of these for the environment.
Keywords
adaptation; British Empire; Dan Simmons; horror; imperialism; imperial Gothic; supernatural; neo-Victorianism; North-West Passage; TV series; The Terror
Hrčak ID:
287998
URI
Publication date:
21.12.2022.
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