Classic Cult Fiction: A Companion to Popular Cult Literature

Classic Cult Fiction is a history, analysis, and reference guide to books that have become bibles to generations of Europeans and Americans over the past 200 years. Though canon formation is an awesome prospect, sure to lead to challenges by scholars and readers alike, author Thomas Whissen identifies his top 50 classic cult books, first presenting an informed interpretation of the phenomenon and its characteristics with examples from different cultures and periods. Cult fiction is shown to be a product of the Romantic movement and a reflection of the persistent romantic temperament in Western civilization. The work offers insights into the mentality of the Golden Age of cult Fiction, the 1960s, by analyzing the cult books that both influenced the age and were influenced by it. The 50 individual works are each discussed relative to time and place, impact, and audience psychology and analyzed in terms of common cult attributes. A chronolgical listing of cult fiction adds a number of titles not chosen for the top fifty. This literary companion argues the case for cult fiction as a distinct genre and offers 50 fresh and thought provoking essays to back up the contention.