Warning: SPOILERS! SPOILERS!! SPOILERS!!!

Get lost vampires: there are some even scarier monsters in the Gothic-sphere. They live in High Place, the mysterious, ramshackled (...and seemingly undulating) house at the center of Silvia Moreno-Garcia’s Best-Selling 2021 novel, MEXICAN GOTHIC.

Join IWAW this week as Sonja shares some deep and fascinating research into Mexican history, European Victorians’ cultural fears, competing theories of eugenics, colonial tropes, and some inside info on the world of mushrooms. Vanessa sits raptly at Sonja’s knee for this one, and you should join us because Sonja’s research truly helps a reader appreciate the wealth of historical and cultural knowledge that Moreno-Garcia weaves through her atmospheric, unpredictable, and satisfyingly subversive Gothic tale.

Along the way, there are plenty of ghostie Gothic Easter eggs, and Sonja and Vanessa agree on everything except the fate of one character: Vanessa argues for cuddles and Sonja for incineration.

REFERENCES

To start your own mushroom culinary adventures, do check out Sonja’s dad’s book, A Cook's Book of Mushrooms by Jack Czarnecki

When the Past Isn't Dead: Post Colonialism and Horror in Mexican Gothic

A Piece of Britain Lost in Mexico, BBC

Real de Monte: A British Mining Venture in Mexico

Fungal Colonialism in Silvia Moreno-Garcia's Mexican Gothic

"Kubla Khan" by Samuel Taylor Coleridge

"You Foolish Men" by Sor Juana

WARNING: SPOILERS!!! SPOILERS!!! SPOILERS!!!

What if Count Dracula came to small-town America? That’s the premise of this brilliant vampire novel by the most famous and successful “What if?” writer, ever: Stephen King. Not only is this novel gripping and satisfyingly plotted, it’s beautifully written and goes way beyond the mere category of “horror” novel. The characters are engaging and the analysis of small-town American life is loving, honest, and unflinching. Treat yourself to reading it before you dive into this episode–you won’t regret it.

Join Sonja and Vanessa as they explore what ‘SALEM’S LOT owes to the Gothic tradition, and to Bram Stoker’s DRACULA, in particular. With Stoker in mind, we also consider King’s use of female characters. Do we like them? Is there a Mina Harker in this American town? Is there a vampy Lucy, snacking on innocent American children?

There’s for sure a creepy house–the Marsten House–and we will discuss parallels with Hill House, given that we dedicated an episode to Shirley Jackson’s THE HAUNTING OF HILL HOUSE, and King literally quotes and references her novel in ‘SALEM’S LOT.

Finally, as we’ve established this season, writers use Gothic to metaphorically explore a real-life fear…King’s Gothic work is no exception, but for him, it’s not patriarchy. It is, however, not unrelated to patriarchy, and it goes back to a story that’s one of the oldest and most influential in human history. Hint: think talking snake.

Along the way, we bump into Sigmund Freud and a priest with “serious mojo,” Sonja explains how to ward off a vampire when at the doctor’s office, and Vanessa makes a rare comment about being older than her co-host.

REFERENCES

Check out our episodes on Shirley Jackson’s THE HAUNTING OF HILL HOUSE and on Bram Stoker’s DRACULA.

Thanksgiving is a time to be grateful for the amazing women in your life, and in honor of that, we’re proud to air this fresh, energetic, edgy interview with comedian, author, and entrepreneur, Lynn Harris. Lynn has lived and breathed comedy for over 30 years, and she has dedicated over a decade to bringing more diversity into comedy through her company, Gold Comedy, by offering classes, resources, and a supportive network of people in the industry who help women and non-binary people bring their humor to an audience for fun or as a career move.

Comedians, after all, are storytellers. And, at IWAW, we are all about how stories shape reality. From a female perspective, what kind of reality are we living when so few women get to share what is funny or absurd about their daily life? We all know there is comedy in our jobs, our kids, our spouses, and our weird, wildly fluctuating female bodies…so why isn’t there a deep bench of women to explore our existence with the vital energy that only comedy offers?

It won’t take long for Lynn to convince you that many, many more women should be in comedy–and that the underrepresentation of women has NOTHING to do with whether they are funny. It has to do with traditionally-male pipelines, legacies, networks, and gatekeeping. Lynn has worked hard over the last decade, creating a new structure to help women and non-binary people find their “crew.” If you’ve ever felt like you or someone you know “missed their calling” by not being on stage or writing for a comedy show, don’t miss this chance to hear about Gold Comedy, built to help make those dreams come true.

REFERENCES:

Check out Gold Comedy's Website, and you’ll be impressed by all the resources available to any woman who has an internet connection.

If you are interested in the Gold Comedy discount offer via our podcast, please write to IWAWpod@gmail.com.

Check out links to comedians Lynn recommends: Murray Hill's website, Cameron Esposito's website, Cole Escola's website, Maria Bamford's website, Naomi Ekperigin's website, Bob the Drag Queen's website, the United Talent Agency’s page for Julio Torres, and Karry Coddett's website.

For more info on the Miss Piggy Movie, check out this article.

WARNING: This episode contains SPOILERS!!!!

In 1959, one hundred and sixty five years after Ann Radcliffe’s THE MYSTERIES OF UDOLPHO, one might reasonably have thought that there was nothing new to be found under the gloomy Gothic moon. Such a supposition, however, would be discounting the immense talent of Shirley Jackson, one of America’s greatest writers.

In THE HAUNTING OF HILL HOUSE, Jackson not only created a uniquely terrifying novel–per the master horror writer, Stephen King— but she also innovates the Gothic genre. In this episode, Sonja and Vanessa explore what it was about Jackson’s life that made her the only person who could write this singular book. And yet, despite HILL HOUSE's sui generis status, the novel depicts a widespread, bleak existence that many female readers of the mid-twentieth century would have recognized. Jackson fully explores the metaphorical possibilities of the Gothic genre to dramatize invisible forces shaping 1950's and 1960's American women’s identities, dreams, and place in the fabled nuclear family.

Along the way, Sonja speculates on the possibility that all children carry a dash of the demonic, and Vanessa confirms that the family “portrait” that Sonja thinks is naked is, indeed, naked.

REFERENCES:

Here is a link to the article by Barb Lien-Cooper that makes the case that Hill House works to rid itself of the non-Crain-family guests, not unlike the Oscar Wilde story, "The Canterville Ghost," (that is mentioned in Jackson’s novel).

Vanessa quotes a writer wondering if we are beyond needing a haunted house metaphor to express the condition of women’s lives, and it’s worth checking out the whole article, by C.J. Hauser, entitled “Some Reasons My Niece is Probably the Reincarnation of Shirley Jackson.”

To read about what Vanessa calls the “happy ending” theory, check out this fascinating 2017 article by Brittany Roberts, “Helping Eleanor Come Home: A Reassessment of Shirley Jackson’s The Haunting of Hill House.” Roberts makes a very convincing argument that the house is actually trying to help Eleanor. Roberts argues: “If previous readings of Hill House have largely focused on the relationship between Eleanor and Hill House as abusive and unidirectional, a relationship that ignites a process of madness and dissolution of selfhood for Eleanor, I instead argue that the process undergone by Eleanor and Hill House is one of mutual fulfilment, a process of accommodating one another’s needs. As I demonstrate, Hill House encourages Eleanor to achieve the romance of isolation that she fantasises about, thereby propelling Eleanor to actualise both the self she has begun to construct through fantasy and her most inwardly cherished desires.15 In return, Eleanor provides a genuine love and appreciation for Hill House and the seclusion, isolation, and silence it promises. Far from participating in the dissolution of Eleanor’s selfhood, then, Hill House, and the many nonhuman emblems of domesticity and seclusion that Eleanor comes to care for throughout the novel, are instead co-creators of Eleanor’s newfound identity.”

Welcome to Manderley…or, rather, the romantic dream of Manderley. Who needs a repurposed abbey or a Alpine castle when you have the genuine fire-devastated, ivy-swarmed, misty ruins of a historic manor house along the tempestuous north Atlantic coast? As if that were not Gothic enough, let’s go all out with an orphaned heroine and a very carefully guarded family secret.

SPOILERS Ahoy when you join Sonja and Vanessa as they discuss this 1938 bestseller, REBECCA. It’s often promoted as a Gothic romance…but is it? Is Maxim De Winter a proper Gothic hero? Would you ride in his car? Are there real ghosts? How are we defining a haunting? Is our unnamed narrator reliable? Do we like her? Do the servants–once again–add a vital dimension to the mood and twists to the plot? And which Mrs. De Winter wins? It probably depends on how you feel about having tea with bread and butter.

Along the way, Sonja redefines “gentle flirtation,” and Vanessa blushes, perusing a sexy botanical Tinder profile.

REFERENCES:

The edition of REBECCA with the really insightful Afterword by Sally Beauman that Vanessa mentions is the 2023 Back Bay Books Edition.

If you’ve ever contemplated a governess career, perhaps Henry James’s THE TURN OF THE SCREW will give you pause. Or maybe this bite-sized Gothic ghost story will thrill you with the chance of being in charge of a beautiful English country house with no master to tell you what to do. But choose your adventure carefully because you might end up haunted and/or crazy and/or murdering someone.

Join Sonja and Vanessa as they do a quick Henry James 101, and explore WITH SPOILERS his classic, 1898 ghost story. Are there ghosts? Is the governess losing her mind? Why did Miles get expelled from boarding school? Are Miles and Flora the OG creepy literary kids? What role does hysteria play? Is there a spell cast over the entire plot? Is the story a trap to catch the reader? How does the novella, set at Bly Manor, link to the Netfilx show, THE HAUNTING OF BLY MANOR?

We’ll address these questions, and along the way, Sonja will propose a sexy theory, and Vanessa will suggest that the bosom can be a murder weapon.

REFERENCES:

While we did not look at JANE EYRE as a Gothic tale, we did think about whether it counts as a female odyssey in Season 1: Can a Lowly Governess Have an Odyssey?

Here is an overview of James Literary Criticism, including Edmund Wilson’s influential article, “The Ambiguity of Henry James” from 1934.

Here is the article about how Henry James felt about Jane Austen.

For more information about the Hysteria Diagnosis in the late 19th/early 20th century, check out this link.

Here’s a great article celebrating the ambiguity of Turn of the Screw.

Here is a link to the article that offers Henry James's take on several women writers that Vanessa cites in the episode.

In the world of the Gothic, after you bang on a few castle doors, you’re bound to run into a vampire. Bram Stoker, barrister and theater manager, notably closed out the 19th century by leaving us with his vampire masterpiece, DRACULA.

In this week’s episode, Sonja and Vanessa explore how Bram Stoker brews his very own brand of Gothic. Legends of the Carpathian mountains mix with modern inventions and modern ideas, like that of the New Woman. With 3 established female vampires, a newly-minted female vampire, and one beloved young wife teetering on the brink of the undead, women make up a crucial part of a tale that spans from England to the heart of eastern Europe. There are undeniably strong women in the novel, but is it a feminist text?

Along the way, we meet a “train fiend,” Sonja muses on sexy lancets, and Vanessa concedes that lawyers may well be the greatest blood suckers of all.

REFERENCES:

Here is a link to the article by Dracula scholar, Elizabeth Miller, and her overview of scholarship of the novel.

If you would like to know more about Dracula scholar, Elizabeth Miller, then check out her wiki page. It’s so impressive how much she single-handedly added to the field. One might say, in walked a woman, and the rest is history.

Sonja read from supporting materials in her edition of Dracula that can be bought new or second hand.

Who wants to break all the rules? Who wants to tear it all down and make the world anew? Emily Brontë does, that’s who.

If you imagined WUTHERING HEIGHTS was some quaint Victorian romantic ghost story…think again. Honestly, there is just no other book like it. This 1848 work is truly sui generis. It’s like Emily Brontë, in her one and only book, before she dies at age 30, writes an off-the-scale earthquake into life under the unassuming and isolated Yorkshire moors, and her quake violently, mercilessly shakes the foundations of Patriarchy, class distinctions, racial hierarchy, traditional marriage, expectations of femininity, the role of the Gothic heroine, traditional ideas of masculinity, Christianity, the legal system, traditions of hospitality, and the tropes of Romance, including the so-called brooding romantic hero. Nothing escapes unscathed.

Join Sonja and Vanessa as they share some brief biographical information on Emily Brontë, explain some notable critical takes on the novel, consider the outer limits of revenge, explain why Heathcliff is rarely portrayed accurately in film adaptations, and pretty much stand in complete awe of WUTHERING HEIGHTS, a page-turning labyrinthian story about storytelling.

Along the way, Sonja pines for a dance with strangers while wearing a red dress, and we try not to think very hard about Heathcliff’s double-wide-coffin fantasy.

REFERENCES:

If you have not read WUTHERING HEIGHTS, check out your local bookstore, and if you don’t have one, consider ordering from our legendary bookstore, The Raven, right here in beautiful, quirky, historical, downtown Lawrence, Kansas.

Here is the link to the Bronte House Museum page that details the racial history of Liverpool and how that affects our reading of Heathcliff.

The article that Sonja mentions about the symbolism of Catherine’s whip, by Sandra Gilbert and Susan Gubar, can be found here.

Here is an online edition of WUTHERING HEIGHTS that includes Charlotte Brontë’s introduction, explaining the sisters’ pen names, their publishing history, Emily’s temperament, and Charlotte’s take on her younger sister’s novel.

Sonja mentions the term “femme covert,” and if you are not sure what that is, here is a link to an article from the National Women's History Museum about the concept and the huge impact it has had on women historically.

We also reference previous IWAW episodes linked here: Interview with Heather Aimee O'Neill; Emily St. Aubert is the heroine of Ann Radcliffe’s novel, The Mysteries of Udolpho, which we cover in a two-part episode; our episode on Tristan & Iseult explores the origins of romance; and we have an episode on Jane Eyre that intersects with the WUTHERING HEIGHTS episode in terms of the Gothic and romance.