Portrait of “Rosa Matilda,” a pseudonym of Charlotte Dacre, unknown artist/date
Gothic Credentials: Charlotte Dacre was a Gothic poet and author whose work was considered eminently unsuitable for fostering good morals in its female readers at the time. Always a good sign. Unlike many of the women writers of the early Gothic, she has no time for mealy-mouthed heroines following all the rules. Indeed, in her most famous work
Zofloya (1806), said weeble-heroine is gleefully hurled off a cliff. What Dacre brings us are some good old-fashioned murder ladies. Well… new-fashioned in her time.
Zofloya is all about the voluptuous and half-demonic Victoria and her dealings with the all-demonic Zofloya the devil disguised as a handsome Moorish servant. Although Victoria is suitably punished for her transgressions at the end, Dacre revels in depicting female desire (for a man of colour no less scandalous) and you can’t help wondering if she isn’t rather on the devil’s side.