Inner Ghosts: Psychological Gothic in Ruskin Bond Compared with British Gothic Subjectivity

Abstract

This article examines the idea of psychological Gothic by comparing the works of Ruskin Bond with the canon of British Gothic subjectivity. Finding the Gothic within the human mind, the study goes beyond traditional Gothic themes like haunted castles and otherworldly terror to demonstrate that both traditions internalize fear. Writings of British Gothic authors like Edgar Allan Poe, Robert Louis Stevenson, and Daphne du Maurier portray worries brought about by modernity, morality, and societal restraint through subjectivity characterized by divided selves, repression, guilt, and obsession. Memory, isolation, childhood trauma, and the eerie presence of nature created Ruskin Bond’s darker, more introspective Gothic sensibility. Rather than terrifying monsters, his “ghosts” often take the form of unsettling thoughts, feelings, and unresolved psychological issues. This thesis compares and contrasts the two genres to show how Bond indigenousizes the Gothic style, turning it into an introspective examination of inner life instead of exterior horror. Various cultural settings manage dread, alienation, and selfhood differently, but psychological gothic becomes a shared aesthetic realm, as the study highlights. In the end, the study contends that Ruskin Bond’s writings take Gothic subjectivity to new heights by establishing its foundation in emotional reality, quiet, and mental interiors.