The Biology of Horror

by

The Biology of Horror

Author:

Publisher: SIU Press

ISBN: 9780809389131

Page:

View: 522

Unearthing the fearful flesh and sinful skins at the heart of gothic horror, Jack Morgan rends the genre’s biological core from its oft-discussed psychological elements and argues for a more transhistorical conception of the gothic, one negatively related to comedy. The Biology of Horror: Gothic Literature and Film dissects popular examples from the gothic literary and cinematic canon, exposing the inverted comic paradigm within each text. Morgan’s study begins with an extensive treatment of comedy as theoretically conceived by Suzanne Langer, C. L. Barber, and Mikhail Bakhtin. Then, Morgan analyzes the physical and mythological nature of horror in inverted comic terms, identifying a biologically grounded mythos of horror. Motifs such as sinister loci, languishment, masquerade, and subversion of sensual perception are contextualized here as embedded in an organic reality, resonating with biological motives and consequences. Morgan also devotes a chapter to the migration of the gothic tradition into American horror, emphasizing the body as horror’s essential place in American gothic. The bulk of Morgan’s study is applied to popular gothic literature and films ranging from high gothic classics like Matthew Lewis’s The Monk, Ann Radcliffe’s The Mysteries of Udolpho, Charles Maturin’s Melmoth the Wanderer, and Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, to later literary works such as Poe’s macabre tales, Melville’s “Benito Cereno,” J.S. Le Fanu’s Uncle Silas, H.P. Lovecraft’s “The Shadow over Innsmouth,” Shirley Jackson’s The Haunting of Hillhouse, Stephen King’s Salem’s Lot, and Clive Barker’s The Damnation Game. Considered films include Nosferatu, Invasion of the Body Snatchers, Friday the 13th, Halloween, Night of the Living Dead, Angel Heart, The Stand, and The Shining. Morgan concludes his physical examination of the Gothic reality with a consideration born of Julia Kristeva’s theoretical rubric which addresses horror’s existential and cultural significance, its lasting fascination, and its uncanny positive—and often therapeutic—direction in literature and film.

Poe The House of Usher and the American Gothic

by D. Perry

Therefore, one of the significant aspects of cosmic horror by which Lovecraft
seeks to go beyond Poe is to specify more precisely the horror of biological
revulsion. That is, just as Whitman went beyond Emerson by balancing attention
on both ...

Poe The House of Usher and the American Gothic

Author: D. Perry

Publisher: Springer

ISBN: 0230620825

Page: 190

View: 235

Poe, 'The House of Usher,' and the American Gothic discusses the interrelation between Poe's tale and the modern horror genre, demonstrating how Poe's work continues to serve as a model for exploring the deepest and most primitive corners of the human mind and heart.

The Horror Film

by Peter Hutchings

The Powers of Horror, a book that, like Douglas' Purity and Danger, shows no
interest at all in horror cinema but from which ... In abjection we have a concept
that has the potential to help us understand the biological nature of many horror ...

The Horror Film

Author: Peter Hutchings

Publisher: Routledge

ISBN: 1317874102

Page: 256

View: 795

The Horror Film is an in-depth exploration of one of the most consistently popular, but also most disreputable, of all the mainstream film genres. Since the early 1930s there has never been a time when horror films were not being produced in substantial numbers somewhere in the world and never a time when they were not being criticised, censored or banned. The Horror Film engages with the key issues raised by this most contentious of genres. It considers the reasons for horror's disreputability and seeks to explain why despite this horror has been so successful. Where precisely does the appeal of horror lie? An extended introductory chapter identifies what it is about horror that makes the genre so difficult to define. The chapter then maps out the historical development of the horror genre, paying particular attention to the international breadth and variety of horror production, with reference to films made in the United States, Britain, Italy, Spain and elsewhere. Subsequent chapters explore: The role of monsters, focusing on the vampire and the serial killer. The usefulness (and limitations) of psychological approaches to horror. The horror audience: what kind of people like horror (and what do other people think of them)? Gender, race and class in horror: how do horror films such as Bride of Frankenstein, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Blade relate to the social and political realities within which they are produced? Sound and horror: in what ways has sound contributed to the development of horror? Performance in horror: how have performers conveyed fear and terror throughout horror's history? 1970s horror: was this the golden age of horror production? Slashers and post-slashers: from Halloween to Scream and beyond. The Horror Film throws new light on some well-known horror films but also introduces the reader to examples of noteworthy but more obscure horror work. A final section provides a guide to further reading and an extensive bibliography. Accessibly written, The Horror Film is a lively and informative account of the genre that will appeal to students of cinema, film teachers and researchers, and horror lovers everywhere.

Asian Horror Encyclopedia

by Laurence C. Bush

Biological Horrors: Beginning before Mary Shelley wrote Frankenstein, biological
science has been the subject of horror. Contemporary Japanese horror exploits
biology as a major theme using DNA, parasites, mutations and even ...

Asian Horror Encyclopedia

Author: Laurence C. Bush

Publisher: iUniverse

ISBN: 9781469715032

Page: 248

View: 443

The Asian Horror Encyclopedia is the first reference work of its kind in English. It covers Asian horror culture in literature, art, film and comics. From its roots in ancient Chinese folklore to the best-selling Japanese horror novelists of today, this book is a handy alphabetic reference, collecting scarce information from obscure sources.

Screening the Gothic

by Lisa Hopkins

... and psychoanalysis is by no means accepted as an universal truth. In The
Biology of Horror: Gothic Literature and Film, Jack Morgan treats the horror
generated by the xii screening the gothic.

Screening the Gothic

Author: Lisa Hopkins

Publisher: University of Texas Press

ISBN: 0292779593

Page: 188

View: 148

Filmmakers have long been drawn to the Gothic with its eerie settings and promise of horror lurking beneath the surface. Moreover, the Gothic allows filmmakers to hold a mirror up to their own age and reveal society's deepest fears. Franco Zeffirelli's Jane Eyre, Francis Ford Coppola's Bram Stoker's Dracula, and Kenneth Branagh's Hamlet are just a few examples of film adaptations of literary Gothic texts. In this ground-breaking study, Lisa Hopkins explores how the Gothic has been deployed in these and other contemporary films and comes to some surprising conclusions. For instance, in a brilliant chapter on films geared to children, Hopkins finds that horror resides not in the trolls, wizards, and goblins that abound in Harry Potter, but in the heart of the family. Screening the Gothic offers a radical new way of understanding the relationship between film and the Gothic as it surveys a wide range of films, many of which have received scant critical attention. Its central claim is that, paradoxically, those texts whose affiliations with the Gothic were the clearest became the least Gothic when filmed. Thus, Hopkins surprises readers by revealing Gothic elements in films such as Sense and Sensibility and Mansfield Park, as well as exploring more obviously Gothic films like The Mummy and The Fellowship of the Ring. Written in an accessible and engaging manner, Screening the Gothic will be of interest to film lovers as well as students and scholars.

Journal of Film and Video

by

Frankenstein ( 1931 ) , in addition to being a most important early - sound
American horror film , is a good illustration of Carroll ' s concept of the biological
parameters for horror . Unit 4 : Defining the Horror Genre In this unit , the students
 ...

Journal of Film and Video

Author:

Publisher:

ISBN:

Page:

View: 983

Feeding Culture

by Wojciech Kalaga

Katarzyna Ancuta Meat Hooks , Chain Saws and the Meataphysics of Horror You
cannot understand Horror unless ... ( the “ anthropology ” of Horror ) , the images
of meat as flesh ( the “ biology ” of Horror ) , and finally , the images of meat as ...

Feeding Culture

Author: Wojciech Kalaga

Publisher: Peter Lang Publishing

ISBN:

Page: 175

View: 308

There is no sapient question: to eat or not to eat? Eating comes before culture, but with culture it becomes more than just eating. It is with the purpose of exploring the relation between culture and consuming food--a relation far more complex than it might seem at first sight--that this book has been intended. In this sense, the book inscribes itself within that trend in cultural studies whose main objectives include the defamiliarization of the commonplace. While its subject matter is quite specific, the range of particular issues--apart from theoretical ones--involves different geo-cultural areas and different temporal environments: from Sri Lanka via Europe to South America, and from ancient Rome via medieval times to contemporary England. Likewise, the cultural realms in which food and eating appeal as significant and meaningful components of reality range from fiction to practices of everyday life, from gender identity to eroticism, from economy to epistemology.

Book Review Digest

by

... Fossil See Fossil hominids Homoplasy See also Evolution ( Biology )
Homosexual desire in Revolutionary Russia . ... J . The biology of horror
Psychological aspects The Horror film and psychoanalysis Horror tales See also
Ghost stories ...

Book Review Digest

Author:

Publisher:

ISBN:

Page:

View: 809

Terror All Around

by Amy Kalmanofsky

The Rhetoric of Horror in the Book of Jeremiah Amy Kalmanofsky Andrew Mein,
Claudia V. Camp. The text rhetorically asks : Does the ... The first is that horror
rhetoric conveys what Morgan terms “ biological failure . ” A horrific world is a
sterile ...

Terror All Around

Author: Amy Kalmanofsky

Publisher: T&T Clark

ISBN:

Page: 164

View: 856

Among the many strategies of persuasive speech, biblical prophets often employ a rhetoric of horror. Prophets use verbal threats and graphic images of destruction to terrify their audience. Contemporary horror theory provides insight into the rhetoric of horror employed by the prophets. In this book, Amy Kalmanofsky applies horror theory to the book of Jeremiah and considers the nature of biblical horror and the objects that provoke horror, as well as the ways texts like Jeremiah work to elicit horror from their audience. Kalmanofsky begins by analyzing the emotional response of horror as reflected in characters' reactions to terrifying entities in the book of Jeremiah. Horror, she concludes, is a composite emotion consisting of fear in response to a threatening entity and a corresponding response of shame either directed toward one's self or felt on behalf of another. Having considered the nature of horror, she turns to the objects that elicit horror and consider their ontological qualities and the nature of the threat they pose. There are two central monstrous figures in the book of Jeremiah-aggressor God and defeated Israel. Both of these monsters refuse to be integrated into and threaten to disintegrate the expected order of the universe. She then presents a close, rhetorical reading of Jeremiah 6 and consider the way this text works to horrify its audience. The book concludes by considering fear's place within religious experience and the theological implications of a rhetoric that portrays God and Israel as monsters.

Transnational Horror Across Visual Media

by Dana Och

Horror. Cinema. Lindsay Hallam The mad scientist is a popular figure found in
horror films from many nations and cultures. Capable of monstrous acts of
violence and transgression, these scientists possessa twisted morality, deeming
scientific ...

Transnational Horror Across Visual Media

Author: Dana Och

Publisher: Routledge

ISBN: 1136744916

Page: 256

View: 273

This volume investigates the horror genre across national boundaries (including locations such as Africa, Turkey, and post-Soviet Russia) and different media forms, illustrating the ways that horror can be theorized through the circulation, reception, and production of transnational media texts. Perhaps more than any other genre, horror is characterized by its ability to be simultaneously aware of the local while able to permeate national boundaries, to function on both regional and international registers. The essays here explore political models and allegories, questions of cult or subcultural media and their distribution practices, the relationship between regional or cultural networks, and the legibility of international horror iconography across distinct media. The book underscores how a discussion of contemporary international horror is not only about genre but about how genre can inform theories of visual cultures and the increasing permeability of their borders.

Horror and the Horror Film

by Bruce F. Kawin

Now, having passed through the horror phase of their relationship, which in this
case has forced them to deal with the nature of life, and to undergo trials and
perils proving themselves right for each other, they can marry. Moreau is a mad ...

Horror and the Horror Film

Author: Bruce F. Kawin

Publisher: Anthem Press

ISBN: 0857282417

Page: 268

View: 115

Horror films can be profound fables of human nature and important works of art, yet many people dismiss them out of hand. ‘Horror and the Horror Film’ conveys a mature appreciation for horror films along with a comprehensive view of their narrative strategies, their relations to reality and fantasy and their cinematic power. The volume covers the horror film and its subgenres – such as the vampire movie – from 1896 to the present. It covers the entire genre by considering every kind of monster in it, including the human.

Religion of Fear

by Jason C Bivins

The Politics of Horror in Conservative Evangelicalism Jason C Bivins, Professor
Department of Philosophy and ... Jack Morgan , The Biology of Horror : Gothic
Literature and Film ( Carbondale : Southern Illinois University Press , 2002 ) . 136
.

Religion of Fear

Author: Jason C Bivins

Publisher: Oxford University Press

ISBN:

Page: 317

View: 934

Conservative evangelicalism has transformed American politics, disseminating a sometimes fearful message not just through conventional channels, but through subcultures and alternate modes of communication. Within this world is a "Religion of Fear," a critical impulse that dramatizes cultural and political conflicts and issues in frightening ways that serve to contrast "orthodox" behaviors and beliefs with those linked to darkness, fear, and demonology. Jason Bivins offers close examinations of several popular evangelical cultural creations including the Left Behind novels, church-sponsored Halloween "Hell Houses," sensational comic books, especially those disseminated by Jack Chick, and anti-rock and -rap rhetoric and censorship. Bivins depicts these fascinating and often troubling phenomena in vivid (sometimes lurid) detail and shows how they seek to shape evangelical cultural identity. As the "Religion of Fear" has developed since the 1960s, Bivins sees its message moving from a place of relative marginality to one of prominence. What does it say about American public life that such ideas of fearful religion and violent politics have become normalized? Addressing this question, Bivins establishes links and resonances between the cultural politics of evangelical pop, the activism of the New Christian Right, and the political exhaustion facing American democracy. Religion of Fear is a significant contribution to our understanding of the new shapes of political religion in the United States, of American evangelicalism, of the relation of religion and the media, and the link between religious pop culture and politics.

Neil Jordan

by Maria Pramaggiore

The Biology of Horror : Gothic Literature and Film . Carbondale : Southern Illinois
University Press , 2002 . Morris , David . “ Gothic Sublimity . ” New Literary History
16 . 2 ( Winter 1985 ) : 299 – 319 . Moses , Michael Valdez . “ The Irish Vampire ...

Neil Jordan

Author: Maria Pramaggiore

Publisher:

ISBN:

Page: 200

View: 309

An Irish director of dark narratives with a postmodern sense of irony

What Do I Read Next 2003

by Neil Barron

... Probably : Essays on Horror and Sundry Fantasies by Ramsey Campbell
Runners - up : Algernon Blackwood : An Extraordinary Life by Mike Ashley , The
Biology of Horror : Gothic Literature and Film by Jack Morgan , Clive Barker : The
Dark ...

What Do I Read Next 2003

Author: Neil Barron

Publisher: Gale / Cengage Learning

ISBN: 9780787661823

Page: 667

View: 108

Provides synopses for over 1,500 titles of current popular fiction and recommends other books by such criteria as authors, characters portrayed, time period, geographical setting, or genre

The Cinema of Neil Jordan

by Carole Zucker

Kristeva , J . ( 1982 ) Powers of Horror : An Essay on Abjection , trans . L . S .
Roudiez . New York : Columbia University Press . Lacey , C . ( 1998 ) ' Patrick
McCabe ' , Publishers Weekly , 16 November , 50 . Lanser , S . ( 1981 ) The
Narrative ...

The Cinema of Neil Jordan

Author: Carole Zucker

Publisher: Wallflower Press

ISBN:

Page: 203

View: 395

'The Cinema of Neil Jordan' discusses his entire output as part of the first comprehensive study of Jordan's career, looking beyond ideological and national concerns to view his films through the prism of Celtic folklore.

For a Semiotics of Emotion

by Walter A. Koch

9 TOWARDS A THEORY OF EMPATHY - ON THE BIOLOGY OF HORROR ,
COMIC , AND PATHOS - Walter A. Koch CONTENTS 9.1 A HOLISTIC WORLD
MODEL : " ELPIS " 9.2 THREE STRATA FOR NATURE AND CULTURE 9.3
EMOTION ...

For a Semiotics of Emotion

Author: Walter A. Koch

Publisher: N. Brockmeyer

ISBN:

Page: 205

View: 497

Technology Monstrosity and Reproduction in Twenty first Century Horror

by K. Jackson

These narratives reveal the fragility of the human—its body and biology, its
reason andmind, itsholdonthe world—and itsinevitable replacement by
somethingelse, something stronger and more adaptable. Bothour horrorof and
fascination for ...

Technology Monstrosity and Reproduction in Twenty first Century Horror

Author: K. Jackson

Publisher: Springer

ISBN: 1137360267

Page: 175

View: 768

Through a wide spectrum of horror sub-genres, this book examines how the current state of horror reflects the anxieties in Western culture. Horror films bring them to a mass audience and offer new figures for the nameless faceless 'antagonist' that plagues us and provides material with which to build a different understanding of ourselves.

Trauma Wildfire Chronicles Vol 5 post apocalyptic zombie horror

by K.R. Griffiths

Thecastle didn't have doctors; it had Linda: a former schoolteacher with ageneral
grasp of biology and little in the way of equipment and medication. For those
bleeding internally like Colin, there was nothing to be done. Their lives
trickledaway ...

Trauma Wildfire Chronicles Vol 5 post apocalyptic zombie horror

Author: K.R. Griffiths

Publisher: K.R. Griffiths

ISBN:

Page: 350

View: 302

The worst is over. All that remains for the survivors hiding in the castle is to gather supplies to prevent starvation. It is a problem they believe they can solve without further loss of life. But there is another problem: the castle has come to the attention of somebody else. Somebody with strength in numbers. And among that number is a man who might just hold the key to destroying the Infected. A man supposed to be dead already... Zombie, Horror, Post-apocalyptic, Action, Dystopian, Series, Science Fiction