ABSTRACT
This chapter considers a very literal form of 'Romantic adaptation', which took place in what is now thought of as 'the Romantic period': the adaptation of the romance form itself, which had flourished during the medieval and early modern period, to the literary culture of late eighteenth-century Britain. It discusses the antiquarian revival of the mid-eighteenth century, which led to a reconsideration of the cultural significance of Britain's pre-modern literary heritage. The early Gothic romances of Walpole, Reeve and Radcliffe are discussed in this context, along with the contemporary controversy over the value and validity of the Gothic romance as a literary form. The chapter discusses the Coleridge and Scott's engagements with early Gothic fiction gestures towards the significance of these new 'romances' for canonical British Romanticism. It explains the process through which the major Romantics attempted to disassociate themselves from the increasingly controversial and disreputable genre of Gothic romance.
