'Horrid Mysteries' and the Jane Austen Connection
By Joan Bruce, Specialist Librarian, Queensland Memory | 22 June 2023
Grosse, & Will, P. (1927). Horrid mysteries / Translated from the German by P. Will. Holden. Australian Library of Art, State Library of Queensland.
The second edition of the gothic novel Horrid mysteries was published in 1927 in the guise of a Victorian yellowback, complete with Pears advertisement on the back cover.
Grosse, & Will, P. (1927). Horrid mysteries / Translated from the German by P. Will. Holden. Australian Library of Art, State Library of Queensland.
Originally published in 1796 by the famous Minerva Press, it has been lambasted as “a dreary plethora of trash” or more kindly described as “A bizarre work whose labyrinthine plot defies summary”.
Left: Horrid mysteries, 1796. Minerva Press. Jane Austen Society of North America. Photo courtesy Jane Austen Society of North America.
Right: Horrid mysteries was a translation of an earlier German “shudder novel” Der Genius. Photo courtesy British Library.
The plot involves a grand international conspiracy, with the hero caught between a secret revolutionary society advocating murder and mayhem and a rival society he created to combat them.
To further complicate matters, Horrid mysteries was a translation of an earlier German “shudder novel” Der Genius.
It would have disappeared without trace but for the fact that Jane Austen included it in the list of 7 “horrid novels” recommended to Catherine Morland, the heroine of her gothic spoof Northanger Abbey.
Isabella: “I will read you their names directly; here they are, in my pocket-book. Castle of Wolfenbach, Clermont, Mysterious Warnings, Necromancer of the Black Forest, Midnight Bell, Orphan of the Rhine, and Horrid Mysteries. Those will last us some time.”
For more than a hundred years it was thought that Austen had made these titles up – until in the early 20th century the originals were re-discovered by literary scholars and biblio-maniacs Michael Sadleir and Montague Summers.
Montague Summers, 1923. Wikipedia Commons, Montague Summers: A Memoire, Summers family.
The 7 gothic novels of the “Northanger Canon” have been republished several times since then, most recently by specialist publisher Valancourt Books.
A “lurid portrayal of sex, violence and barbarism”, or simply a bit of a page turner. Buy a copy online to find out for yourself, or if you prefer, download a free copy of the 1796 edition.
Horrid mysteries, 1796. Chapter 1, Page 1. Image courtesy Google Books.
The 1927 edition of Horrid mysteries is part of State Library’s History and Art of the Book Collection and will be on display in the ALA Showcase on level 4 from February to 27 August 2023.
Joan Bruce
Specialist Librarian, Queensland Memory.
Read Horrid Mysteries
- Horrid mysteries, 1927. 2nd edition
- Horrid mysteries, 1796. 1st edition
- Horrid mysteries, 2016. Valancourt Books
About Horrid Mysteries
- Northanger Abbey’s “horrid novels”
- “All Horrid” – but not all German - there was a definite German influence on English gothic fiction. This came partly via the works of the Sturm und Drang movement and partly from the translations of the more popular and less literary ‘Schauerromane’ (literally ‘shudder novels’), themselves often influenced by British gothic models.
- Jane Austen’s horrid novels - all of the Valancourt Books editions include the unabridged text of the original novels, along with new introductions by top Gothic scholars.
About the People and Publishers
- Michael Sadleir
- Montague Summers
- Carl Grosse - German author, translator, aesthetic philosopher and mineralogist.
- Der Genius – A Teutonic shocker
- Minerva Press
- Valancourt Books
About Gothic Novels
-
Montague Summers. The Gothic Quest: a history of the gothic novel. (London: Fortune Press, [1941])
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