Gothic War on Terror

After 9/11, the world felt the “shock and awe” of the War on Terror. But that war also exploded inside novels, films, comics, and gaming. Danel Olson investigates why the paranormal, ghostly, and conspiratorial entered such media between 2002-2022, and how this Gothic presence connects to the most recent theories on PTSD. Set in New York/Gotham, Afghanistan, Iraq, and CIA black sites, the traumatic and weird works interrogated here ask how killing affects the killers. The protagonists probed are artillery, infantry, and armored-cavalry soldiers; military intelligence; the Air Force; counter-terrorism officers of the NYPD, NCIS, FBI, and CIA; and even the ultimate crime-fighting vigilante, Batman.

"Terrifically interesting with riveting material fastidiously assembled, this is so impressive--a major work.  Even video games!  Amazing ... brilliant .... all-encompassing. Should be required reading." -Joyce Carol Oates, Prolific American author of novels, novellas, stories, poetry, essays, and children's books.

“In this penetrating study, Danel Olson undertakes an exhilarating critical triangulation of trauma theory, Gothic Studies, and the global war on terror in post-9/11 American culture. Daring to lift the dark veil that shrouds the counterterrorism initiative, it brings to light the Gothic motifs that inhabit the gaps, the silences, and the elisions that have been wrought by internecine acts of violence. Through a series of illuminating close readings, the book foregrounds the extent to which much modern and contemporary American literature and media, from fiction and comics to film and video games, habitually turns to the Gothic when itattempts to articulate, figure, or otherwise express the ongoing effects of trauma, offering up, in the end, a poignant reflection on the profound losses and manifold aggressions that have come to affect us all. As much a contribution to the study of trauma as a timely intervention within the field of Gothic Studies, Gothic War on Terror will be crucial reading for scholars, students, practitioners, and general readers like.”  

 —Dale Townshend, Professor of Gothic Literature (Manchester Centre for Gothic Studies) and Co-Editor, The Cambridge History of the Gothic, Volumes I-III (2020-2021)

“Danel Olson has delivered a spectacular companion to his earlier study, 9/11 Gothic.  While that book employed Gothic and trauma theories to explore 9/11 from the perspective of New York City-based fiction, this present volume expands his focus to encompass comics, video games, and film (including a not-to-be-missed section on the Batman movies where the Joker forms an uncanny parallel with Osama bin Laden).  Olson has emerged as America’s guru of post-9/11 inspired Gothic art and popular culture.” 

-Tony Magistrale, Professor of English, University of Vermont, and Co-Editor, Violence in the Films of Stephen King

“Olson’s excellent study of how American Gothic culture narrates the trauma of 9/11 and the ongoing War on Terror is essential reading. Covering a captivating range of media, Olson convincingly demonstrates that American Gothic constitutes a unique and powerful voice capable of articulating an era of grief, guilt, and conflict, from the ruins of the Twin Towers to the atrocities of Abu Ghraib and beyond.” 

--Johan Höglund, Professor of English, Linnaeus University, and Co-Editor, Dark Scenes from Damaged Earth: The Gothic Anthropocene (2022)

“From the Dark Knight of Gotham to the darkest recesses of the soul, Olson’s authoritative study  – ranging from video games and art to popular cinema – probes the postmillennial Gothic turn and traumatised present in the American cultural imagination. Compelling and necessary reading for students and scholars in contemporary Gothic Studies.”

—Sorcha Ní Fhlainn, Senior Lecturer in Film Studies Manchester Centre for Gothic Studies, and Co-Editor of Twentieth-Century Gothic. 

"Trauma and its aftermath, violence and the gothic: Danel Olson is uniquely qualified to splice these themes together. In the process, he has created a priceless contribution to the literature of invasions and insurgencies, to the study of slaying and its mental health consequences.”

—Patrick McGrath, Author of Last Days in Cleaver Square (2021)

“Olson’s book is a welcome contribution to the ongoing debate about the impact of America’s post-9/11 actions. The bookprovides both a passionate critique of American foreign policy and a detailed account of its effect on domestic culture. Olson’s argument is marked by erudition, clarity, and theoretical agility, across a rich selection of contemporary cultural forms, including novels, comics, video games, and films.”

--Alan Gibbs, Lecturer in American Literature, University College Cork -- Ireland, Author of Contemporary American Trauma Narratives

"An important and timely study of the ways war, violence, and trauma saturate the cultural imaginary and find expression through Gothic narrative. Wide-ranging and admirably interdisciplinary, Olson’s study helps us understand why the Gothic mode is so pervasive in contemporary culture. Theoretically adept and very current, Gothic War on Terror accomplishes what the best analyses of cultural artifacts strive for: it helps us know ourselves better."   

--Jeffrey Andrew Weinstock, Professor of English,Central Michigan University, and Editor of The Monster Theory Reader (2020)        

Danel Olson is Professor of film, argument, and literature at Lone Star College, Houston, Texas, USA. He has edited twelve books on fiction and film including 21st Century Gothic (2010), The Shining: Studies in the Horror Film (2015), and Writing Madness: Short Fiction of Patrick McGrath (2018).