The Castle of Otranto

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The Castle of Otranto (1766)
by Horace Walpole

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The Castle of Otranto is a 1764 novel by Horace Walpole. It is generally held to be the first gothic novel, initiating a literary genre which would become extremely popular in the later 18th century and early 19th century. Thus, Castle, and Walpole by extension is arguably the forerunner to such authors as Ann Radcliffe, Bram Stoker, Daphne du Maurier, and Stephen King.

The Castle of Otranto was first published (anonymously) on 24th December 1764 (but dated 1765). The second edition appeared on April 11th 1765, in the preface to which Walpole acknowledged authorship. This transcription is of the third edition from 1766. [Based on A Bibliography Of Horace Walpole (1948), by Allen Tracy Hazen, pp. 52-54.]

The layout and punctuation of this work is rather different from more modern ones. Although it contains dialogue, this is not differentiated by the use of single or double quotation marks, and the speech of each character is not in separate paragraphs.

The work also makes a lot of use of dashes. These vary in length, the variation seeming to be related to typesetting (to avoid breaking words across lines) rather than to convey meaning. For the most part, a standard 'em' dash has been used throughout the transcription, but a longer dash has been used where the context seems to require one.

27062The Castle of Otranto1766Horace Walpole

THE

Castle of Otranto,

A

GOTHIC STORY.

THE

Castle of Otranto,

A

GOTHIC STORY.

————Vanæ
Fingentur species, tamen ut Pes, & Caput uni
Reddantur formæ.————
Hor.

THE THIRD EDITION.

LONDON:
Printed for William Bathoe in the Strand.

M.DCC.LXVI.

Contents (not listed in original)

This work was published before January 1, 1929, and is in the public domain worldwide because the author died at least 100 years ago.

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