The nature of horror is, in a word, to horrify.

The nature of horror is, in a word, to horrify.

While that should come as a surprise to absolutely no one, “horror” as a word means “the standing of the end of the hair”[1],or in common English, goose bumps. To achieve this is something all horror strives to do, at least in the figurative sense.                                                                     

Of course, what horror is and what horror ought to do is a debate as old as time (or at least the literary genre, which is considerably younger). Before then, horror predominantly existed as folklore, where they would be a symbol of social values and the wish to either affirm to or change them,[2] or as morality tales, commonly found in religions to warn against disobedience and apostasy. The most prominent example in modern western culture is the idea of Hell, where sinners and others who have turned their back on God ends up, which in turn has been heavily influenced by Dante’s Inferno.

The question is, how?

Much of modern horror is rooted in religion or religious traditions, or rather taking those traditions and flipping them on their head. A rather amusing example is the inverted cross, which by horror logic must be profane if the upright cross is divine. Except that it’s the cross of St. Peter and also a symbol used by the Pope.[3] Most religious horror bases itself around the pagan or shamanistic, usually through burial grounds (looking at you, Pet Sematary) or Biblical mythology, something the whole Conjuring universe is built upon, the latest addition being The Nun. So much effort for a horror story centred on the catholic clergy; they seem to be far more horrible in real life anyway.

Horror is “[…] predominantly concerned with the fear of death, the multiple ways in which it can occur, and the untimely nature of its occurrence.”[4] This might be the reason for why ghosts, zombies and other spirits show up in horror narratives time and time again; they are already dead, and therefore offer an unnatural glimpse into what comes after. Or it might be that it presents us with something unknown, and as Lovecraft put it; “The oldest and strongest emotion of mankind is fear, and the oldest and strongest kind of fear is fear of the unknown.”

Lovecraft’s affinity for creating Japanese schoolgirl nightmare fuel aside, he had a point. No horror narrative has ever taken place in an ordinary setting, where ordinary events unfolds. There is always something strange, something lurking in the shadows. Or it’s something familiar, twisted just so much that it’s still the same, but also not quite.  

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[1] Victor Sage, Horror Fiction in the Protestant Tradition, St. Martin’s Press, New York, 1988, p. xxi

[2] Jack Zipes, Breaking the Magic Spell: Radical Theories of Folk and Fairy Tales, Routledge, New York, p. 5

[3] Hector Molina, The Upside Down Cross: Satanic or Symbolic?, Catholic Answers, 2014, http://www.catholic.com/magazine/online-edition/the-upside-down-cross-satanic-or-symbolic (accessed 18.03.2019)

[4] Paul Wells, The Horror Genre: From Beelzebub to Blair Witch, Wallflower, London, 2000, p. 10

Bibliography

Alighieri, Dante, La Divina Comedia, Florence, Italy

Carroll, Noël, The Philosophy of Horror, Routledge, New York, 1990

Friedkin, William, The Exorcist, Warner Bros, 1973

Hardy, Corin, The Nun, Warner Bros. Pictures, 2018

Molina, Hector, The Upside Down Cross: Satanic or Symbolic?, Catholic Answers, 2014, http://www.catholic.com/magazine/online-edition/the-upside-down-cross-satanic-or-symbolic (accessed 18.03.2019)

Sage, Victor, Horror Fiction in the Protestant Tradition, St. Martin’s Press, New York, 1988

Wells, Paul, The Horror Genre: From Beelzebub to Blair Witch, Wallflower, London, 2000, p. 10

Zamora, Natalie, The 25 Highest-Grossing Horror Movies of All Time, Mentalfloss, 2018 mentalfloss.com/article/561769/highest-grossing-horror-movies-all-time (accessed 18.03.2019)

Zipes, Jack, Breaking the Magic Spell: Radical Theories of Folk and Fairy Tales, Routledge, New York

Haunted houses

Cemeteries

Torture chambers

We’ve all seen it, both as bad (The Conjuring), as good (Haunting of Hill House) and as a parody (The Cabin in the Woods). Horror puts the protagonist(s) in an isolated location where spooky stuff happens. Isolate the characters, and the viewer, reader or player will feel so much more vulnerable. Modern horror as a genre deviated from the gothic, which was all about mystery, dread, the supernatural and sex.[1] Think Supernatural, but with much less rootin’ tootin’ cowboy shootin’ and more girth. Quite literally.

However, when setting up such a location, by describing the tombstones or torture instruments, the audience will not only expect something gruesome, they will, in a sense, become hardened. They know it’s coming and can prepare for it. Worse still; try too hard and the location runs the risk of becoming an unintentional parody of itself.

Which is why that putting horror in a familiar location, perhaps even without twisting it into something sinister, can catch the reader by surprise and therefore amplify the effect of horror. A good example of this is Jaws; a nice, rural summer resort town terrorised by a Great White roughly seven meters long, with the average female measuring from 4.6 to 4.9 meters. Although Brody does get isolated out on the ocean two thirds into the film, it’s not without considerable effort to keep the situation at bay by other means. Of course, getting blocked by the mayor who can’t look further than next week’s pay check doesn’t help things and is perhaps the true horror of Jaws.

Humans. Bleh.

However, that is not to say that ‘traditional’ isolation does not work or is a bad idea. It’s just a silver lining there. Too little, and it fails to be scary; too much and in place of becoming scary it becomes funny. A good example of that in the anthology would be The Family Car.[2] Lindsay never encounters the car when she’s with another person, and she feels more and more isolated as she spirals into insanity. Even though we see classical modern horror locations (hospitals, caravans) they are not abandoned; Lindsay just feels so alone.

But; when it comes to traditional horror settings, one thing stays unparalleled in my mind, partially because it amps up the creepy factor of an already creepy setting. Pet Sematary. I almost managed the entire post without mentioning it. Sorry not sorry.

Do you cry when the dog dies in a movie? Of course you do. That’s why doesthedogdie.com exists. So what do you get when you have a suburban town, a road with a bit too eager truck drivers, kid’s pets and a pagan history?

You get a pet sematary, adorable typo and all.                                                                                      

And considering I finished the book in the book in a steaming bathtub and it still sent shivers down my spine, I’d say this is a book that in regards to setting hits the proverbial nail on the head.

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[1] John Bowen, Gothic Motifs, British Library, May 15, 2014 http://www.bl.uk/romantics-and-victorians/articles/gothic-motifs (accessed 03.03.2019)

[2] Brady Golden, ‘The family Car’, New Fears, Titan Books, 2017

Bibliography:

Bowen, John, Gothic Motifs, British Library, May 15, 2014, http://www.bl.uk/romantics-and-victorians/articles/gothic-motifs (accessed 03.03.2019)

Flanagan, Mike, The Haunting of Hill House, Netflix, 2018 – present

Goddard, Drew, The Cabin in the Woods, Lionsgate, 2012

Golden, Brady ‘The family Car’, New Fears, Titan Books, 2017

King, Stephen, Pet Sematary, Doubleday, 1983

Kripke, Eric, Supernatural, The CW, 2005-present

Long, Dale, Horror, Mysteries and Setting: Playing on the Unexpected, Writer’s Digest, October 2, 2012 https://www.writersdigest.com/tip-of-the-day/horror-mysteries-and-setting-playing-on-the-unexpected (Accessed 02.03.2019)

Spielberg, Stephen, Jaws, Universal Pictures, 1975

Wan, James, The Conjuring, Warner Bros. Pictures, 2013

Writer’s Digest, Setting And Description in Horror Fiction, http://www.writersdigest.com/wp-content/uploads/Setting-And-Description-In-Horror-Fiction-Extended-Short-Story-Workshop.pdf (accessed 02.03.2019)

«I ask myself what is forbidden? What can’t I write about? And then I write about it.” – Stephen King

Writing about what is deemed “forbidden” might seem counterintuitive, but considering that King’s thousand pages about a child-eating clown is about to get its third (second-and-a-half?) big screen adaptation, it’s the exact opposite. IT is filled with gruesome descriptions, ranging from heads popping out of fridges (“The losers are still losing, but Stanley Uris is finally ahead.”) to deadbeat and abusive parents.

So if this does not affect a man such as King, what does?

The answer; Pet Sematary. It is the one novel King locked away in a drawer, never intending to publish it. I, for one, am glad his wife managed to talk him out of it, as it has become one of my favourite horror stories, despite that you can second guess the entire plot halfway through. After all, King was never one for subtle foreshadowing.

As King describes in the introduction to his novel, Pet Sematary is largely based around his house during the year he teached at University of Maine. While idyllic, “That road has used up a lot of animals,” his neighbour had said, just like the road that features so heavily in the novel. And, as you might guess, the title did not come from Mr. King’s vivid imagination; it came from how the local children had misspelt “cemetery”.[1]

“Pet Sematary is the one I put away in a drawer, thinking I had finally gone too far.” 

And I’m inclined to agree. As I’ve mentioned previously, the novel simply reaches a point about halfway to two thirds through where it’s possible to second guess the rest of the story and hit bulls-eye nine out of ten times; but still it made me shiver even as I was taking a slightly too hot bath.

In terms of my own fear, since I have few irrational ones (assignment deadlines nothwithstanding, and even that being a ‘rationale’ one), I feel like I might be out of my depth. How am I supposed to write scary stuff when I don’t know what scares me?

But horror can be more than a genre, it can be a genuine fear unrelated to what’s put onto the paper itself. I dread the creative piece I need to hand it at some point, because I have a feeling it simply won’t be scary. But if that’s because I’m terrible at the horror genre or a terrible writer in general I couldn’t tell.

Even if I by some stroke of luck should manage to procure something remotely decent within the genre, I suspect it will be either more related to the black comedy-esque Embarassement of Dead Grandmothers or it will fall flat at the punchline, just as did The Family Car.

Sucks to be me, I guess.

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[1] Stephen King, Pet Sematary, Doubleday, November 1983, p. 4-7

Bibliography

Golden, Brady, ‘The Family Car’, New Fears, Titan Books, September 2017

Lotz, Sarah, ‘The Embarassement of Dead Grandmothers’,
New Fears, Titan Books, September 2017

King, Stephen, IT, Hodder and Stoughton, 1986

King, Stephen, Pet Sematary, Doubleday, November 1983

Wisker, Gina, Horror Fiction: An Introduction, The Continuum International Publishing Group, 2005

My own reflections on the genre

“Whoever wins… we lose.”             

The tagline for Alien vs. Predator (2004). At the old age of seven, I heckled my father into letting me watch this movie, rated PG-15. More a high-octane action flick and not a traditional horror like the original Alien films, it still left enough of a mark that I only in recent years have dared delve into the world of thrillers and horror. Its realm is still a strange one to me, but now it’s because I can’t be bothered to dig through the pile of bad horror to find the few nuggets of gold. I’ll let others do that for me, so I might reap the benefits later.

However, it might be the reason I now claim to not be afraid of anything. Nothing irrational, at least. I’m not scared of heights, I think spiders and other insects are cute, and I only use my flashlight in the dark to avoid tripping over my own feet. I do cast the occasional glance over my shoulder after watching, reading or playing something creepy (the survival horror genre has quickly become one of my favourite genres), but probably not as much as I otherwise would have.

As I mentioned above, the survival horror genre has quickly become one of my favourite genres of video games. Part of this, I believe, is that it takes Poe’s formula for horror and stretches it further than what was possible hundred years ago by putting the reader-now-player front and center.

“The isolation of the reader, the stunning of his sensibility, the victimization of his emotions and the premature burial of his reason.”[1]

This applies even more effectively to video games. It contrasts greatly to the literary form of horror, such as The Family Car,[2] IT or Pet Sematary, where we must learn to know the protagonist, the reasons for why they are terrified and then sympathise with them. This is a step that video games vault over. By using The Family Car as an example, the pitch for that, as a short story could go somewhat like,

“So, Lindsay is pursued by her old family car that disappeared a decade ago, and her grandmother goes missing soon after.”

It’s a very similar pitch for it as a potential video game, except the pronouns are all replaced with “I”.

“So, I are pursued by my old family car that disappeared a decade ago, and my grandmother goes missing soon after.”

Games do not make me a passive onlooker, they put me in the driver’s seat. Every action that I take (or don’t) either drives me towards my safety or my death. As such, making me sympathise with the protagonist is unnecessary, given how I am the protagonist. I am alone. Hunted, usually by forces which the means to fight are far beyond reach. Or I’m not, where only sounds and light plays tricks on my mind to make me frightened of what could be there.

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[1] David R. Saliba, A Psychology of Fear, (Washington D.C: University Press of America, 1980), p. 17

[2] Brady Golden, ‘The Family Car’, New Fears, Titan Books, September 2017

Bibliography:

Anderson, Paul W. S., Alien vs. Predator (2004), 20th Century Fox

Flanagan, Mike, The Haunting of Hill House, October 2018, Netflix

Golden, Brady, ‘The Family Car’, New Fears, Titan Books, September 2017

King, Stephen, IT, Hodder and Stoughton, 1986

King, Stephen, Pet Sematary, Doubleday, November 1983

Scott, Ridley, Alien (1979), 20^th Century Fox