A list of tropes found within the Gothic Horror genre. While you don't need all of them to write a gothic horror novel, the more you have the better. Horror has some things that are universal to all genres of horror but not everything on that page is used in gothic horror.
Other genres that might employ heavy use of these tropes:
- Cosmic Horror Story
- Dark Fantasy
- Fairy Tale
- Gaslamp Fantasy
- Ghost Fiction
- Mystery Fiction - depends on the subgenre
- Punk Punk
- Romance - depends on the subgenre
- Southern Gothic
- Suburban Gothic
- Supernatural Fiction
- Urban Fantasy
- Vampire Fiction
- Weird West
- Werewolf Works
Note: Zombies didn't start appearing until the 1920s, but many older creatures were absorbed into the zombie mythos. So use caution when adding zombie examples. (Technically speaking, vampires are a kind of undead, so they can easily be swapped.)
Public Domain Characters
- Archangel Gabriel
- Carmilla
- Dracula
- Dr. Frankenstein
- Faust
- Frankenstein's Monster
- The Grim Reaper
- Headless Horseman
- Jack the Ripper
- Mummy
- Satan
- Sweeney Todd
- Wandering Jew
- Wolf Man
Characterization Tropes/Stock Characters
- Aloof Dark-Haired Girl
- Brother–Sister Incest
- Byronic Hero
- Corrupt Church
- Creepy Housekeeper
- Crusty Caretaker
- Damsel in Distress
- Death Glare
- Dhampyr
- Dirty Old Monk
- Doppelgänger
- Eerie Pale-Skinned Brunette
- Evil Jesuit
- Evil Mentor
- The Evil Prince
- Evil Twin
- Evil Sorcerer
- Femme Fatale
- Friend to All Living Things
- Grande Dame
- Greedy Jew
- The Grotesque
- Hair of Gold, Heart of Gold
- Herr Doktor
- The Highwayman
- Hunter of Monsters
- The Igor
- Impoverished Patrician
- Incorruptible Pure Pureness
- The Ingenue
- Jack the Ripoff
- Jekyll & Hyde
- Lady in Red
- Lesbian Vampire
- Light Feminine and Dark Feminine
- Looks Like Cesare
- Looks Like Orlok
- Louis Cypher
- Lunacy
- Mad Scientist
- Madwoman in the Attic
- Naïve Newcomer
- Nun Too Holy
- Occult Detective
- The Ophelia
- Pirate
- Pedophile Priest
- Really 700 Years Old
- Rags to Riches
- Religion of Evil
- Serial Killer
- Servile Snarker
- Sexy Priests and Naughty Nuns
- Sinister Minister
- Sleep Paralysis Creature
- The Sociopath
- Southern Gothic Satan
- Stalker with a Crush
- Stringy-Haired Ghost Girl
- The Svengali
- That Man Is Dead
- Theatre Phantom
- They Look Just Like Everyone Else!
- Undeathly Pallor
- The Vamp
- Virgin in a White Dress
- Wicked Witch
- Wight in a Wedding Dress
- Woman Scorned
Cultural Tropes
- Alchemy
- All Women Are Prudes/All Women Are Lustful
- Arranged Marriage
- Brain Fever
- Death by Childbirth
- Gorgeous Period Dress
- High-Class Glass
- Hysterical Woman
- Of Corsets Sexy
- Parasol of Prettiness
- Parental Marriage Veto
- Proper Lady
- Psychological Horror
- Religious Horror
- Romanticism
- Romanticism Versus Enlightenment
- Royalty and Nobility Tropes
- Victorian Novel Disease
Fictional/Legendary Species
- Angels
- Banshees
- Demons
- Dragons
- Eldritch Abominations
- The Fair Folk
- Gargoyles
- Ghosts
- Ghouls
- Gods
- Hellhounds
- Homunculi
- Necromancers
- Revenants
- Skeletons
- Succubi and Incubi
- The Undead
- Vampires
- Werewolves
- Will-o'-the-Wisps
- Witches
Geography
- Ruritania
- Scenery Porn: You can bet good money that a Gothic novel will describe the setting in painstaking detail.
- Überwald
Magic
Settings
- Afterlife Express
- Always Night
- Ancient Tomb
- Bedlam House
- Big Fancy Castle
- Big Fancy House
- Boarding School of Horrors
- Creepy Cathedral
- Creepy Cave
- Creepy Cemetery
- Criminal Convention
- Dances and Balls
- Don't Go in the Woods
- Eldritch Location
- Evil Tower of Ominousness
- Extranormal Institute
- Ghost Ship
- Gray Rain of Depression
- Haunted Castle
- Haunted House
- Healing Spring
- It Was a Dark and Stormy Night
- The Lost Woods
- Mad Scientist Laboratory
- Old, Dark House
- Orphanage of Fear
- Town with a Dark Secret
- You All Meet in an Inn
Plot Elements
- All Girls Want Bad Boys
- Anachronic Order
- Based on a Dream
- Bizarrchitecture
- Blood Bath
- Book Case Passage (and variants)
- Burn the Witch!
- Chess with Death
- Creepy Crows
- The Dark Arts
- Dark Secret
- Deal with the Devil
- Demonic Possession
- Dramatic Thunder
- Empathic Environment
- Evil Is Sexy
- Faint in Shock
- Flashbacks
- Freak Lab Accident
- Gaslighting
- Ghost Story
- Ghostly Chill
- Haunted Fetter
- Haunting the Guilty
- Heel Realization
- Hollywood Exorcism
- How We Got Here
- I Have You Now, My Pretty
- If I Can't Have You…
- Inbred and Evil
- Incest Is Relative
- Incurable Cough of Death
- In Medias Res
- I Should Write a Book About This
- Let the Past Burn
- Let's Split Up, Gang!
- Love at First Sight
- Luke, I Am Your Father
- Malevolent Architecture
- Melancholy Moon
- Mundane Ghost Story
- Not Quite Dead
- Ominous Fog
- Pendulum of Death
- Portrait Painting Peephole
- Quieting the Unquiet Dead
- Rape Is a Special Kind of Evil
- Real After All
- Red Sky, Take Warning
- Sanity Slippage
- Scarpia Ultimatum
- Scrapbook Story
- Secret Room
- Secret Underground Passage
- Spooky Séance
- Supernatural Aid
- Surprise Incest
- A Storm Is Coming
- Strapped to an Operating Table
- Torches and Pitchforks
- The Tragic Rose
- Villainous Crush
- Villainous Incest
- Weird Moon
Soundtrack/Music
- For Doom the Bell Tolls
- Lonely Piano Piece
- Ominous Latin Chanting
- Ominous Pipe Organ
- "Psycho" Strings
- Scare Chord
Themes
- Be Careful What You Wish For
- Death and the Maiden
- Maybe Magic, Maybe Mundane
- The Power of Love
- Science Is Bad
- Sex Is Evil
- Sins of Our Fathers - a lot of the time, the characters suffer because of something that their ancestors did long ago
- These Are Things Man Was Not Meant to Know
Time Period
- The Cavalier Years - the first gothic horror story came out towards the end of this era
- The Edwardian Era - the genre was on its death bed by then but there were still authors willing to write in it
- The Enlightenment
- The Gay '90s
- Genteel Interbellum Setting - primarily for later, more rationalist takes on the genre, but also because this was the last era when Big Fancy House settings were still commonly lived in in popular media. At least in developed countries it's also the last era when electric lighting was still generally unreliable, not too widespread, and prone enough to flickering out.
- The Middle Ages - used to be a popular setting for gothic fiction authors but nowadays is associated with "Tolkienesque" elements.
- Regency England
- The Renaissance
- The Spanish Inquisition
- Victorian Britain
- Victorian London
