Abstract

In the present paper I analyze the theme of death in Gothic Metal songs such as Forever Failure by Paradise Lost, Everything Dies by Type O Negative, The Hanged Man by Moonspell or Gone with The Sin by HIM. The subthemes I am mostly interested in are the death of anima, the suicide of the self and the universal death. Several Romanian poets – Mihai Eminescu, Iuliu Cezar Săvescu, George Bacovia and D. Iacobescu, who all have in common the pursuit of nihilism – used death to enhance their nihilist poetical universe. I will trace the aforementioned subthemes in some of their most spectacular poems.