The Haunted Priory; Or, the Fortunes of the House of Rayo

by Stephen Cullen, Franz J. Potter (Editor)

Stephen Cullen's The Haunted Priory; or, The Fortunes of the House of Rayo was first published in 1794, the same year Ann Radcliffe's The Mysteries of Udolpho. One of the first Gothic novels set in medieval Spain, it recounts the fall of the House of Rayo during the politically dangerous period of Peter the Cruel. Alphonso, son of Don Isidor, nephew of Baron de Rayo, is led to a ruinous chapel by a cowled spectre where he begins to unearth the mysteries surrounding his family. Skilled at utilizing familiar Gothic conventions, Cullen proves a master of Gothic horror in this early example of the historical Gothic. This new edition of The Haunted Priory includes the nineteenth century chapbook version of the novel, notes on the text and chapbook as well as contextual information on the Gothic novel in the late 18th century.

200 pages, Paperback

First published November 15, 2005

Reviews

[Sarada · Rating 4 out of 5]

Read public domain etext on Nook - despite OCR difficulties in the text, I adjusted to reading the s's rendered as f's and the other anomalies and found it very enjoyable. Yes, half of the characters are named Alphonso, but it was not difficult to follow the twists of ancestry and identity. This has the characteristics you would expect of a gothic novel of its time, though with male protagonists and a male author it some MG Lewis moments of grisly spectres rather than the Radcliffian romance. Unlike many gothic novels it takes place in Spain, rather than Italy or Germany, but I love the feeling of adventure as they move from place to place, exploring ruins and righting wrongs. It is fairly short for a gothic novel and a great introduction to the layer of books that lies beneath the most well-known of the genre.