Dale is starting by pointing out the 'terror' of Radcliffe and 'horror' of Lewis from the 1st wave of Gothic has entrenched itself in our critical readings of subsequent Gothic, and in a sense the ideas of male and female Gothic
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However this means another element of the Gothic has been neglected, and that is the sense of enchantment. The 'fairy kind of writing', Addison argues, raises a pleasing kind of horror, the supernatural excesses are recognised by their historical contect
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Fairies were crucial in how notions of the Gothic was about the revival of the past in English writings, such as how Shakespeare deploys fairies in A Midsummer Night's dream
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Walpole's Castle of Otranto was an enchanted castle through which the characters had to navigate. And with his own Strawberry Hill construction, this was also viewed to be enchanted
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There are works that predate Walpole's, that are equally important when looking the Gothic and enchantment, such as Christoph Wieland, with 22 translated Shakespearean works in german prose, and a collection of fairytales and ghost stories
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Weiland's 'Oberon', is about a knight who has to complete three quests in order to seek redemption and stave off his execution. He passes through an enchanted wood, and encounters a castle, and then comes upon Oberon, who aids the knight
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Weiland's poems allow us to look at the anatomy of enchantment in the 18th century, such as magic, sexual power, allure & attraction, of being charmed or bewitched, as romantic love & devotion, of mere pleasure & delight
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Enchantment ranges broadly in Weiland's work, and these sentiments are through which Gothic at the time routinely traffics
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We can see the influences of ideas of enchantment in works of such like Coleridge, Keats, Southey.
However, a letter from Lewis (The Monk) to Weiland in 1792, with his typical faux modest style, that have his translations of Weilands poems, which are now lost
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The topography important in Lewis's poems, as Bothwell Castle was a ruin, and Blantyre Priory across the Clyde river, at the time he was challenged by Lady Douglas to write. He explains The Three Sisters (rocks that separate the ruins) as elfin like
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The sisters: Brown Marion, Black Margaret and Beautiful Lillia, and they wish to make contact with the Bothwell Bownie (Scottish fairies) The Brownie advices to kill the spaniel at the Priory, in order the sister's wishes be granted. (Not the dog!)
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Sadly they succeed in killing the puppy, yet the spaniel's body transforms into Zelim (Lillia's wish), the Brownie has then exacted revenge for the death of her son. And technically, all three wishes are granted. The sisters are punished by being turned to stone
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There is a fairy funeral for Zelim, and kelpies dig a grave in the bed of the Clyde. The local landscape become infused with enchantment, and this text 'Oberon's Henchman' has been overlooked
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