Horror in the Wax Museum

While Edith Nesbit is mainly known as an author of children’s fiction, she also wrote numerous gothic tales that have only recently begun to attract scholarly attention. With emphasis on her 1905 thriller The Power of Darkness, this talk examines a series of Nesbit’s gothic short stories that appeared in the famous Strand Magazine. These delightfully lurid works of horror fiction share one thing in common: they are all set inside wax museums. Exploring the significance of wax figures, this talk proposes that these monstrous and abject statues suggest a feminist critique of British society. By considering the commodification of the sensation of the uncanny — in both real wax museums as well as in magazines such as the Strand, which offered its readers the thrill of the waxworks through the surrogate medium of Nesbit’s fictions — this talk reveals important connections between modern metropolitan space, with its system of urban attractions and entertainments, and the literary space of the popular periodical. Costumes encouraged! There will be candy!
Location:
Archives and Special Collections – Taylor Family Digital Library
Speaker:
Dr. Anthony Camara, Department of English
More information at http://www.ucalgary.ca/events/calendar/horror-wax-museum