The Castle of Otranto
Author: Horace Walpole
Desc: First published pseudonymously in 1764 The Castle of Otranto purported to be a translation of an Italian story of the time of the crusades. In it Walpole attempted as he declared in the Preface to the Second Edition "to blend the two kinds of romance: the ancient and the modern." Crammed with invention entertainment terror and pathos the novel was an immediate success and Walpole's own favorite among his numerous works. The novel is reprinted here from a text of 1798 the last that Walpole himself prepared for the press.