We read an excerpt from the Cambridge Companion to Gothic (from the introduction) and defined European Gothic for our notes.

On the overhead we compared and contrasted American Gothic and European Gothic elements.
Essential difference: European Gothic tends to focus on exterior setting and dark, abandoned spaces with secrets while American Gothic tends to focus on the interior landscape--our psychological issues, fears and our potential for evil or good.

We read Stephen King's "Why we crave horror movies" and discussed it as a class.

Descriptive writing prompt #4: Write a one page description of the place of your personal nightmares—the most fearsome, spooky setting you imagine (a place you would never willingly go). This setting can be urban and modern (like a dark alley in Portland), from the past (like a graveyard during the Plague years in Europe), or the imagined future (think of the movies The Matrix or The Island).

THE DESCRIPTIVE PROMPTS (all 5) WILL BE COLLECTED ON MONDAY!