Marija Dalbello

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Image credit Victor GAD
Marija Dalbello Horror
Rutgers School of Communication, Information, and
Library Studies dalbello_at_scils.rutgers.edu http//
www.scils.rutgers.edu/dalbello
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Horror _______________________________________ p
aradoxes of the heart 1) How can anyone be
frightened by what they know does not exist? 2)
Why would anyone ever be interested in horror,
since being horrified is so unpleasant? art
horror vs. natural horror emotion caused by the
characteristic structures, imagery, and figures
in the genre vs. reality
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Horror _______________________________________ pr
e-theoretical history of the horror
genre English gothic novel (Schauer-Roman,
roman noir) historical gothic (imagined past
without supernatural events) natural or
explained gothic (introduces supernatural and
explains it away) Radcliffes Mysteries of
Udolpho (1794) supernatural gothic (supernatural
events) equivocal gothic (supernatural origin of
events in the text rendered ambiguous by means of
psychologically disturbed characters) Mary
Shelleys Frankenstein (1818) John Polidoris The
Vampyre (1819) Charles Robert Maturins Melmoth
the Wanderer (1820) Edgar Allan Poe popularity
of gothic 1820-1870
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Horror _______________________________________ M
onsters (extraordinary characters in an ordinary
world ) incomplete representatives of their
class abominations monsters categorical
incompleteness disintegrating things, formless,
rotting interstitial, indescribable,
inconceivable, It / Them Revulsion (violation of
schemes of cultural categorization category
mistakes are impure) What are monsters made
of? fission fusion
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Horror _______________________________________ Pl
ot structure 1. Complex discovery plot onset
discovery confirmation confrontation 2.
Discovery plot onset discovery
confirmation 3. Over-reacher plot (forbidden
knowledge) preparation experiment boomerang confr
ontation Suspense (relative probabilities at
the heart of horror appeal) Fantastic hesitation
(fantastic uncanny vs. fantastic marvelous)
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Horror _______________________________________ Wh
at is horror about? Concerned with knowledge
as theme rendering the unknown known Cognitive
threat as a major factor in the generation of
art-horror Reaction to the culture of
materialistic sophistication (post-Enlightenment)
(Carroll, p. 162) instinctual attraction
capacity for awe religious feeling in our
culture was demeaned by materialistic
sophistication intuition is denied by the
culture of materialistic sophistication horror
evokes cosmic fear coeval with religious
feeling gratifications of being in an emotional
state Numinous experience (mysterium tremendum
fascinans et augustum) nonrational element as
object of religious experience numen
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Horror _______________________________________ T
he politics of horror Is art-horror
ideological? (xenophobic, progressive,
misogynist, politically repressive) Horror as
carnival (rituals of inversion)