Beginning with Clara Reeve's The Old English Baron (1778), the 1780s saw more writers attempting the Gothic combination of supernatural plots with emotionally realistic characters.
The motive of secret societies is also present in Carl Grosse's Horrid Mysteries (1791–1794) and Christian August Vulpius's Rinaldo Rinaldini, the Robber Captain (1797).
[11] Genres of Gespensterroman/Geisterroman ("ghost novel"), Räuberroman [de] ("robber novel"), and Ritterroman (chivalric romance) also frequently share plot and motifs with the British "gothic novel".
The Ritterroman focuses on the life and deeds of the knights and soldiers, but features many elements found in the gothic novel, such as magic, secret tribunals, and medieval setting.
Contemporary critics of the genre also noted the correlation between the French Revolutionary Terror and the "terrorist school" of writing represented by Radcliffe and Lewis.
[15] Female Anglo-Irish authors also wrote Gothic fiction in the 19th century, including Regina Maria Roche, whose novel Clermont (1798) went through several editions, and Sydney Owenson, most famous for The Wild Irish Girl (1806).
Further contributions to the Gothic genre were seen in the work of the first generation of Romantic poets: Samuel Taylor Coleridge's The Rime of the Ancient Mariner (1798) and Christabel (1816).