Despite Disney’s carefully crafted image of family friendliness, Gothic elements are pervasive in all of Disney’s productions, ranging from its theme parks to its films and television programs. The contributors to Disney Gothic reveal that the Gothic, in fact, serves as the unacknowledged motor of the Disney machine. Exploring representations of villains, ghosts, and monsters, this book sheds important new light on the role these Gothic elements play throughout the Disney universe...

While still relatively unknown to the general public, early twentieth century American horror author H.P. Lovecraft left an indelible stamp upon popular culture. Images of tentacled horrors, forbidden tomes, and protagonists struggling against the insanity that comes with the revelation of the terrible truth of reality–Lovecraft pioneered all of these. Best known for his short story “The Call of Cthulhu,” Lovecraft instantiated his philosophy of cosmicism into every one of his tal...

Dandy Dick; or, The King's Highway (1900-1901), written by Ned Neolan and Ben Brightly and here edited and introduced by J. S. Mackley, was originally serialised in The Halfpenny Marvel over forty-two issues between April 1900 and February 1901. Unlike the earlier penny-dreadful tales of Spring-Heeled Jack, this narrative casts the leaping phantom as a mysterious side figure while its focus turns to the gallant world of English highwaymen...

Spring-Heeled Jack: The Terror of London (1886) is the second major serial devoted to the character, following the 1863 penny dreadful that transformed Jack into a folk hero. Published in 48 issues, the 1886 story represents Jack's longest and most visually striking appearance in Victorian print culture. It is a gripping tale of villainy, abduction, and nocturnal justice - a sensational adventure steeped in the atmosphere of fog-shrouded London streets and Gothic melodrama.

Spring-Heeled Jack: The Terror of London (1863) is the first full-length serial novel featuring one of Victorian Britain's most notorious urban legends. First published as a penny dreadful in 1863 and reprinted in 1867, this extraordinary narrative transformed Spring-Heeled Jack from whispered terror and theatrical villain into a fully realised Gothic anti-hero.Leaping from the gaslit streets of London and the fevered imagination of the nineteenth century, Spring-H...