The Castle of Otranto (1763) - Horace Walpole Audiobook

Written by Horace Walpole
Read by Neville Jason
Format: MP3
Bitrate: 64 Kbps
Unabridged

Length: 4 hrs and 39 mins
Release date: 07-25-14
Publisher: Naxos AudioBooks

On the day of his wedding, Conrad, heir to the house of Otranto, is killed under mysterious circumstances. His calculating father, Manfred, fears that his dynasty will now come to an end and determines to marry his son’s bride himself—despite the fact he is already married. But a series of terrifying supernatural omens soon threaten this unlawful union, as the curse placed on Manfred’s ancestor, who usurped the lawful prince of Otranto, begins to unfold.

The Castle of Otranto wonderfully combines the inner turmoils of a most demonic villain, a valiant hero, whose strength lies in his innocent willingness to go along with his fate; ineffectual, well-meaning friars, a psychic hermit and virtuous maidens. All the internal struggles are played out against the most dramatic landscape of snaking dungeon passages, lightning-struck battlements, thick woods and huge supernatural coats of armour waving giant black plumes at castle windows. The inner and outer aspects of the story are so perfectly matched that it is hard to know which is having most effect and driving the plot.

There is, for the listener, a satisfying inevitability that gathers force as the story unrolls, that comes from being caught up in something much larger than the mere mortal. This illuminates the action as dramatically as lightning hits the castle, and makes it as fresh and thrilling today as when it was first devised.The Gothic novel has been extensively parodied. Here is the real thing: larger-than-life emotions that have a power and intensity overwhelmingly their own

Walpole wrote The Castle of Otranto between June and August of 1764. He tried to pass it off as an actual translation, from the original Italian, of a medieval text written by ‘Onuphrio Muralto’. The book has rarely, if ever, been out of print since.The Castle of Otranto is often called the first Gothic novel. It contains almost all the classic elements: a foreign setting, walking skeleton, haunted castle, long-lost child identified by his birthmark, ominous threats and events leading to a denouement that seems unavoidable because it is the logical conclusion of all the converging, providential actions in the plot.

The Tony Jay versions is also excellent.