Nightmare Abbey

novel by Peacock

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July 1, 2026

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Nightmare Abbey is a satirical novel by Thomas Love Peacock, first published in 1818. It critiques the romantic and intellectual trends of its time through witty dialogue and philosophical discussions, a pattern Peacock established in his earlier work, Headlong Hall.1

The novel satirizes romantic melancholy, featuring characters that are thinly veiled representations of prominent literary figures. Scythrop is based on Percy Bysshe Shelley, Mr. Flosky on Samuel Taylor Coleridge, and Mr. Cypress on Lord Byron. Peacock, who worked for the East India Company, was a friend of Shelley and was influenced by conversations with him and his circle.1

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Thomas Love Peacock
In his best-known work, Nightmare Abbey (1818), romantic melancholy is satirized, with the characters Scythrop drawn from Shelley, Mr. Flosky from Samuel Taylor Coleridge, and Mr. Cypress from Lord Byron.
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In his best-known work, Nightmare Abbey (1818), romantic melancholy is satirized, with the characters Scythrop drawn from Shelley, Mr. Flosky from Samuel Taylor Coleridge, and Mr. Cypress from Lord Byron.
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English literature
The novel: From the Gothic novel to Austen and Scott
…Hall (1816), Melincourt (1817), and Nightmare Abbey (1818) are sharp accounts of contemporary intellectual and cultural fashions, as are the two much later fictions in which Peacock reused this successful formula, Crotchet Castle (1831) and Gryll Grange (1860–61).
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…Hall (1816), Melincourt (1817), and Nightmare Abbey (1818) are sharp accounts of contemporary intellectual and cultural fashions, as are the two much later fictions in which Peacock reused this successful formula, Crotchet Castle (1831) and Gryll Grange (1860–61).
Read More