#Spooktober 15 – Welsh Gothic

October 15, 2023

Pairing with last week’s book suggestion and springing from the fact that technically my Main Character is Welsh, here’s another excellent book on spooky stuff from that area.

The book is part of the amazing Gothic Literary Studies series published by the University of Wales Press and they’re a bit pricey, but they’re worth every dime. The author is Jane Aaron, Professor of English at the University of South Wales, who also published an amazing book on XIX-century women’s literature called Nineteenth-Century Women’s Writing in Wales.

This book explores the origin of Gothic, spanning from the end of the XVIII Century till 1997, and then highlights a couple of recurring elements in Welsh folklore: the Wild Hunt, Witches and the Sin-eater.

Part 1: Haunted by History

Cambia Gothica (1780s – 1820s)
An Underworld of One’s Own (18302 – 1900s)
Haunted Communities (1900s – 1940s)
Land of the Living dead (1940s – 1997)

Part 2: Things that go Bump in the Celtic Twilight

Witches, Druids, and the Hounds of Annwn
The Sin-eater

comics and illustration

Leo Ortolani, Tapum

A un certo punto ci sarà una battuta, in questo fumetto, e riderete. Sappiate che è l’unica. Com’è giusto che sia. Se devo paragonare quest’opera a qualcosa, il confronto più azzeccato è probabilmente lo spettacolo che Marco Paolini trasse dal Sergente nella neve di Rigoni

August 9, 2026 9:00 am

Summertime

Omeros in the Caribbeans

Derek Walcott was a Saint Lucian poet, playwright, and painter, and one of the major voices of Caribbean literature. He won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1992, and his work often explores Caribbean history, identity, colonial inheritance, and the meeting of European and African

August 9, 2026 6:00 am

books and literature

Ioanna Papadopoulou’s The Castaway and the Witch

I had a genuine “oh shit” moment when I read the author’s preface saying this was darker than “Winter Harvest” because – and I absolutely ADORED “Winter Harvest” – that was pitch-black dark. I thought “we’re all going to die”. This maybe has something to

August 8, 2026 9:00 am