Research Overview

Haonan Yang’s research interests lie in British Romanticism and contemporary American Gothic. More specifically, he explores the influence of William Blake, the British Romantic poet and artist, on the creation of the Hannibal Lecter novels and their film and television adaptations. Blake is a significant intertextual presence in the Hannibal Lecter franchise, and Blakean contraries, particularly those of innocence and experience, have shaped the characterization of serial killers and FBI agents throughout the franchise. Haonan has also developed a digital humanities website on the instrumentalization of drugs in the Hannibal Lecter tetralogy: myhanniballecterproject.com.