THE GOTHIC CATHEDRAL AS LITERARY SPACE IN EUROPEAN LITERATURE
THE GOTHIC CATHEDRAL AS LITERARY SPACE IN EUROPEAN LITERATURE

Summary/Abstract: The article approaches the cathedral, respectively the Gothic monastery as a literary space. This space is delineated by the limits which circumvent the action of fiction, or as a space in which the characters go on with their life and study. For some other characters, this is a space designated for the connection with God during pilgrimages. The article refers to the gothic cathedrals in some European literary masterpieces. The gothic buildings become governing characters in literature and their perception can influence thoughts, actions and dreams. Gothic novelists must have been cognizant of the emotional resonance brought up by certain spaces favouring light in contrast with stone. The novelists might have wanted, first of all, to evoke an emotional response. They harnessed a dynamic interplay of elements and contrasts projected against the frame of reaching something unreachable.

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