Gothic Nostalgia The Uses of Toxic Memory in 21st Century Popular Culture

This book is an original and innovative study of how Gothic nostalgia and toxic memory

are used to underpin and promote the ongoing culture wars and populist politics in

contemporary popular culture. The essays collected here cover topics from the spectral to

the ecological, deep fakes to toxic ableism, Mary Poppins to John Wick to reveal

how the use of an imaginary past to shape the present, creates truly Gothic times that we

can never escape. These ‘hungry ghosts’ from the past find resonance with the Gothic

which speaks equally of a past that often not only haunts the present but will not let it

escape its grasp. This collection will look at the confluence between various kinds of toxic

nostalgia and popular culture to suggest the ways in which contemporary populism has

resurrected ideological monsters from the grave to gorge on the present and any possibility

of change that the future might represent.

Acknowledgements.- 1. Introduction Simon Bacon and Katarzyna Bronk-Bacon.- 2. 1408 and the Structure of Haunting Jeffrey Andrew Weinstock.- 3. Toxic Nostalgia in Contemporary Gothic Horror Brandon R. Grafius.- 4. Toxic Nostalgia in the Wake of the Postmodern Turn Matthias Stephan.-  5. Deepfake Sockpuppets: The Toxic “Realities” of a Weaponised Internet — Katy Wareham-Morris.-  6. The Nostalgia of Setting, Sex and Sound in the Wicker Men Films Lauren Rosewarne.- 7. The American Dream and American Nightmare: The Toxic Pursuit of Nostalgia and Happiness Presented in Poltergeist (1982) and Poltergeist (2015) Rob Mclaughlin.- 8. “You’re Too Focused on Where You’ve Been”:Uncanny Nostalgia in Mary Poppins Returns Daniel Kasper.- 9. Pulling Our Strings: The Gothic Nostalgia of Luca Guadagnino’s Suspiria J. Simpson.- 10. “I Just Wanted to Preserve It Just as It is”: Gothic Nostalgia in The Watcher Abel Fenwick.- 11. Prevention is Better Than Cure: Anachronistic Therapists and Toxic Wellness Catherine Pugh.- 12.Patriarchy Then and Now — with a Twist: The Postmodern Horror of Alex Garland’s Men M. Keith Booker and Isra Daraiseh.- 13. “But now, yeah, I’m thinking I’m back”: The All-consuming Gothic Nostalgia in the John Wick Franchise Simon Bacon.- 14. Gothic Nostalgia in Louise Welsh’s The Cutting Room and The Second Cut Martyn Colebrook.- 15. Toxic Ableism and Gothic Nostalgia in Fanfiction about Mermaids Martine Mussies.- 16. Of Greed and the Undead Past: Rahi Anil Barve’s Tumbbad as an Exercise in Toxic Nostalgia Aparajita Hazra.- 17. Soviet Nostalgia in the Vampire Trilogy A Tale of the Soviet Vampire by Aleksandr Slepakov (2014-18) Patrycja Pichnicka-Trivedi.- 18. “Oh no. Not again!”: Toxic Nostalgia and Antisemetic Recursive Memory in Ghost Stories.- Vicky Brewster.- 19. Extremist Nostalgia: Mike Ma’s Novellas as 21st Century Far-Right Gothic Helen Young.- Notes on Contributors.

Simon Bacon is an independent scholar based in Poznan, Poland.

Katarzyna Bronk-Bacon is Assistant Professor at Adam Mickiewicz University in

Poznan, Poland.