This book examines writing in the Gothic mode which subverts the dominant national narrative of the British home front. Instead of seeing wartime experience as a site of fellowship and emotional resilience, Elizabeth Bowen, Anna Kavan, Mervyn Peake, Roy Fuller and others depict shadowy figures on the margin of the nation.

SARA WASSON is Lecturer in Literature and Culture at Edinburgh Napier University, UK. She received her doctorate from Cornell University, USA, and publishes research on cities in literature and kinship in twentieth-century science fiction and horror. This monograph was supported by research grants from the Carnegie Trust and the Mario Einaudi Centre.