World Goth Day: Five stories that will get you hooked to dark literature

Diving into Gothic literature can be a really atmospheric and thought-provoking experience. On World Goth Day this year, Here are five books, including some Indian options, that a new Goth enthusiast might enjoy.

Five must-read stories to celebrate World Goth Day 2025

The Castle of Otranto by Horace Walpole

This is effectively the first Gothic novel, released in 1764! It's a fast, crazy ride with an old curse, a brutal prince, deaths that are suspicious, hidden passages, and even a giant helmet. It basically set the template for all things Gothic. It may be a bit melodramatic by today's standards, but it's necessary to know where the genre came from and an enjoyable, fast read.

The Fall of the House of Usher by Edgar Allan Poe

If you prefer intense atmosphere and psychological horror in a compact package, Poe is your man. The tale here is about a rotting mansion that appears to be sentient and exerting its dark influence over its own rotting inhabitants, Roderick and Madeline Usher. It's beautifully creepy, with an emphasis on madness, isolation and a general sense of inherited catastrophe.

Cry, the Peacock by Anita Desai

This one really fits the bill. It's a very psychological novel about Maya, a young woman tormented by a childhood vision of her husband's death. The suffocating atmosphere, the growing paranoia and mental unhappiness of Maya, the claustrophobic family relationships, and the feeling of impending disaster all build a rich Indian Gothic experience. It's less a matter of ghosts and more a matter of the internal horrors.

Khudito Pashan (The Hungry Stones) by Rabindranath Tagore

Rabindranath definitely penned a number of effective Gothic short stories, and The Hungry Stones is no exception. It's about a tax collector who falls in love with a crumbling, mysterious-sounding palace that speaks in whispers of its rich and terrible history, confusing history, reality and the supernatural. It has the crumbling environment, the haunting history, and an unsettling mood ideal for a nascent Gothic fan.

Carmilla by Sheridan Le Fanu

This novella is a classic of vampire fiction and an excellent work of Gothic. It concerns a lone young woman, Laura, residing in a remote castle in Styria, who becomes infatuated with the enigmatic and seductive Carmilla. It's replete with tension, sensual overtones, and an underlying sense of the uncanny, discussing the desire of women and old evils.