Why do we feel horror? Where does it come from? If we shun what causes grief, why are so many of us attracted, even fascinated, by stories that horrify us?
Derived from the eighteenth-century Gothic tradition, horror literature and cinema is named after the feeling it aims to instil in its audiences through a diverse range of situations: otherworldly visitations, depraved aristocrats, perverse serial killers, the undead, the freak show parade, the occult ceremonies, lycanthropy.
The horror genre is a transgressive genre. It delves into what is usually repressed by society, providing insights into issues that are often considered to be too extreme or taboo to be acceptable by other genres. It also explores forms of personal distress and trauma that we often repress in our subconscious. In its obsession on what is considered to be the ‘dark’ side to life, it can signal ways of responding to such issues in a constructive and ethical manner.
This course will explore the nature of horror and the reasons it is present in our lives from a largely philosophical and psychological perspective. It will also provide a historical overview of the development of horror literature and cinema. Focus will be given to the themes and plot patterns of the genre in the twenty-first-century along with its various subgenres, including body, Lovecraftian, psycho, cosmic, and occult horror. Horror in other media, namely, social media andvideogames, will be constantly referenced and compared.
Main Reading List
- Students will be asked to read some studies like the ones from the list below. Important articles on several aspects of the genre will be provided throughout the course.
- Bloom, Clive, Gothic Horror: A Guide for Students and Readers (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007).
- Carroll, Noël, The Philosophy of Horror: Or, Paradoxes of the Heart (London and New York: Routledge, 1990).
- Cavarero, Adriana, Horrorism: Naming Contemporary Violence (New York: Columbia University Press, 2009).
- Frayling, Christopher, Nightmare: Birth of Horror (London: BBC Books, 1996). Halberstam, Judith, Skin Shows: Gothic Horror and the Technology of Monsters (London and Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1995). Hills, Matt, The Pleasures of Horror (London: Continuum, 2005). Jones, Darryl (ed.), Horror Stories: Classic Tales from Hoffmann to Hodgson (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014).
- Horror: A Thematic History in Fiction and Film (London: Arnold, 2002).
- Joshi, S. T., Unutterable Horror: A History of Supernatural Fiction, 2 vols (New York: Hippocampus Press, 2012).
- King, Stephen, Danse Macabre (London: Hodder, 1991).
- Punter, David, The Literature of Terror: A History of Gothic Fictions from 1765 to the Present Day (London:
- Longman, 1980). Townshend, Dale (ed.), Terror and Wonder: The Gothic Imagination (London: British Library Publishing, 2014).
- Tudor, Andrew, 'Why Horror? The Peculiar Pleasures of a Popular Genre', Cultural Studies, 11.3 (1997), 443-63.
- Tymn, Marshall B., Horror Literature: A Core Collection and Reference Guide (London and New York: R. R. Bowker, 1981).
- Wisker, Gina, Horror Fiction: An Introduction (New York: Continuum, 2005).
