Hauntology - by Merlin Coverley (Paperback)

Book Synopsis

Ghosts and specters, the eerie and the occult. Why is contemporary culture so preoccupied by the supernatural, so captivated by the revenants of an earlier age, so haunted? The concept of Hauntology has evolved since first emerging in the 1990s, and has now entered the cultural mainstream as a shorthand for our new-found obsession with the recent past. But where does this term come from and what exactly does it mean?

This book seeks to answer these questions by examining the history of our fascination with the uncanny from the golden age of the Victorian ghost story to the present day. From Dickens to Derrida, MR James to Mark Fisher; from the rise of Spiritualism to the folk horror revival, Hauntology traces our continuing engagement with these esoteric ideas. Moving between the literary and the theoretical, the visual and the political, Hauntology explores our nostalgia for the cultural artifacts of a past from which we seem unable to break free.

Review Quotes

"Splendid, scholarly and suffused with evocative stories and biographical sketches." --Booklist on The Art of Wandering

"South takes in an impressive array of artists, from Samuel Taylor Coleridge to Jorge Luis Borges, while Coverley comes up with some astute readings of great literature, and has a perceptive eye for how tourism has shaped our understanding of place." --Herald

"Coverley's approach is an enlightening one." --Huffington Post UK

"Highly recommended." --Cauldron

"Moving between geography and mythology, literature and history, [South] is the first book to look at all things southern in one volume." --Nick Rennison, author, Sherlock Holmes: The Unauthorized Biography

"This little book [Psychogeography] does exactly what an introduction should; it examines, explains, and whets the appetite." --Telegraph

"This succinct book is a definite first port of call for anyone interested in this most esoteric of theories. A portmanteau of information, a pin-pointing of psychogeography's literary impact and standing, and a stimulating read." --3AM Magazine

About the Author

Merlin Coverley is the author of six books: London Writing, Psychogeography, Occult London, Utopia, The Art of Wandering, and South, a critical and wide-ranging study of the allure of the South across geography, mythology, literature, and history. He lives in London.