Stirling University Presents

Biography:

 

Tanja Jurković holds an MA in English and French language and literature from the University of Zadar, Croatia. Her main research interests are Grand-Guignol, the French theatre of horror and the identity of the monstrous in the European horror film, focusing on the Balkans. She is a contributor to the Gothic Imagination Blog, hosted by the University of Stirling, she also contributed to the International Gothic Association Postgraduate Blog, and is currently working on a couple of articles on Balkan horror film. She is also preparing for a PhD in Film, Media, covering the monstrous identities in the European (Balkan) horror film. 

 

ABSTRACT

Gothic meets Horror: Grand-Guignol inside the Penny Dreadful’s Demimonde

Grand-Guignol was one of the first theatres of its kind. It opened its doors to the public in 1897, and offered them the ultimate horror experience to get a taste of their own fears. It was an intimate space where monsters came to life and where blood flowed in buckets, in one night of exchanging horror and comedy to shock the audiences who were after something different. This presentation is going to show how this unique theatre stumbled upon the Gothic world of Penny Dreadful TV series, that we know as the Demimonde, a world where science and religion go hand in hand, where there is a thin line between life and death, and where monsters roam freely; it will offer some background on penny dreadful, a 19th century publishing phenomenon and its appeal then and now, the Penny Dreadful TV series from 2014, as well as the historical background of Grand-Guignol, the theatre of horror, explaining the connection between the popular, but underrepresented venue of horror and the above mentioned TV series.