A pictorial counterpart to "Gothick" literature: Fuseli's The Nightmare. From: Mosaic (Winnipeg) | Date: March 1, 2002| Author: Moffitt, John F. | COPYRIGHT 2002 University of Manitoba, Mosaic. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan.  All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group.Copyright information

Painted in 1781, then often reproduced, Fuseli's The Nightmare became widely influential. Its real context is the "Demonism" current in contemporary "Gothick" literature, and the key to this is Fuseli's haunting "incubus," first described in the Malleus Maleficarum.

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It has been argued in various monographs (see: Antal; Schiff, 1741-1825; Schiff et al.; Schiff and Viotto; and Tomory) that, among the many artists working in eighteenth-century Britain...