Horror Literature through History
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Ainsworth, William Harrison
Ajvide Lindqvist, John
Alcott, Louisa May
Ballard, J. G.
Barker, Clive
Books of Blood
The Damnation Game
Barlow, R. H.
Barron, Laird
Baudelaire, Charles
“The Beast with Five Fingers” by W. F. Harvey
Beaumont, Charles
Benson, E. F.
Bierce, Ambrose
“The Death of Halpin Frayser”
Blackwood, Algernon
John Silence: Physician Extraordinary
“The Willows”
Bleiler, E. F.
Bloch, Robert
“Yours Truly, Jack the Ripper”
Borges, Jorge Luis
Bowen, Marjorie
Bradbury, Ray
The October Country
Something Wicked This Way Comes
Brennan, Joseph Payne
Brite, Poppy Z.
The Brontë Sisters
Brown, Charles Brockden
Bulwer-Lytton, Edward
Burnt Offerings by Robert Marasco
Butler, Octavia E.
Buzzati, Dino
Byron, Lord
Campbell, Ramsey
Alone with the Horrors
“The Chimney”
“Mackintosh Willie”
Carroll, Jonathan
Carter, Angela
Chambers, Robert W.
The King in Yellow
Charnas, Suzy McKee
Cisco, Michael
Coleridge, Samuel Taylor
Collier, John
Collins, Wilkie
Communion by Whitley Strieber
Coppard, A. E.
Crawford, F. Marion
“The Screaming Skull”
Dagon by Fred Chappell
Datlow, Ellen
de la Mare, Walter
“The Listeners”
“Out of the Deep”
The Return
“Demon Lover” by Elizabeth Bowen
Derleth, August
The Lurker at the Threshold
Dick, Philip K.
du Maurier, Daphne
Due, Tananarive
Ellison, Harlan
“I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream”
“The Whimper of Whipped Dogs”
Etchison, Dennis
Ewers, Hanns Heinz
Alraune
The Exorcist by William Peter Blatty
Farris, John
Faulkner, William
Féval, Paul
Gaiman, Neil
Gautier, Théophile
“The Ghost Ship” by Richard Middleton
Gogol, Nikolai
Grabiński, Stefan
The Dark Domain
Grant, Charles L.
Haggard, H. Rider
She
Haining, Peter
Hand, Elizabeth
The Hands of Orlac by Maurice Renard
Hardy, Thomas
Harris, Thomas
Hartley, L. P.
Harvest Home by Thomas Tryon
Hawthorne, Nathaniel
The House of the Seven Gables
“Young Goodman Brown”
Hearn, Lafcadio
Kwaidan: Stories and Studies of Strange Things
Herbert, James
The Rats
Hichens, Robert
Hill, Joe
Hill, Susan
The Woman in Black
The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova
Hodgson, William Hope
The House on the Borderland
The Night Land
Hoffmann, E. T. A.
“The Sand-man”
The Hound of the Baskervilles by Arthur Conan Doyle
House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski
The House Next Door by Anne Rivers Siddons
Howard, Robert E.
Hubbard, L. Ron
Fear
Hugo, Victor
Huysmans, J. K.
The Damned
Irving, Washington
“The Legend of Sleepy Hollow”
Jackson, Shirley
The Haunting of Hill House
James, Henry
The Turn of the Screw
James, M. R.
“Casting the Runes”
Joshi, S. T.
Joyce, Graham
Kafka, Franz
Keene, Brian
Ketchum, Jack
The Girl Next Door
Kiernan, Caitlín R.
The Drowning Girl
King, Stephen
It
Misery
Night Shift
“The Reach”
The Shining
The Dark Tower
Kipling, Rudyard
“The Phantom ‘Rickshaw”
“The Recrudescence of Imray,”/“The Return of Imray”
“They”
Kirk, Russell
“There’s a Long, Long Trail A-Winding”
Klein, T. E. D.
The Ceremonies
Dark Gods
Kneale, Nigel
Koja, Kathe
Koontz, Dean
Phantoms
Kuttner, Henry
Lane, Joel
Lansdale, Joe R.
“Lazarus” by Leonid Andreyev
Le Fanu, J. Sheridan
Carmilla
“Green Tea”
In a Glass Darkly
“Schalken the Painter”
Lee, Tanith
Lee, Vernon
Leiber, Fritz
Conjure Wife
“The Girl with the Hungry Eyes”
Our Lady of Darkness
Lewis, Matthew
The Monk
Ligotti, Thomas
“The Last Feast of Harlequin”
Link, Kelly
Long, Frank Belknap
“Lot No. 249” by Arthur Conan Doyle
Lovecraft, H. P.
At the Mountains of Madness
“The Call of Cthulhu”
The Case of Charles Dexter Ward
“The Colour out of Space”
“The Dunwich Horror”
“The Music of Erich Zann”
“Pickman’s Model”
“The Rats in the Walls”
Machen, Arthur
“The Great God Pan”
“The Novel of the Black Seal”
“The White People”
The Manuscript Found in Saragossa by Jan Potocki
Martin, George R. R.
Sandkings
Matheson, Richard
Hell House
I Am Legend
Maturin, Charles
Melmoth the Wanderer
Maupassant, Guy de
“The Horla”
McCammon, Robert R.
McDowell, Michael
McGrath, Patrick
Metcalfe, John
Meyrink, Gustav
The Golem
Miéville, China
The Mind Parasites by Colin Wilson
“The Monkey’s Paw” by W. W. Jacobs
Moore, Alan
Morrell, David
Morrison, Toni
Beloved
Morrow, W. C.
“Mr. Arcularis” by Conrad Aiken
Newman, Kim
Nolan, William F.
Northanger Abbey by Jane Austen
Oates, Joyce Carol
O’Brien, Fitz-James
O’Connor, Flannery
“Good Country People”
Oliver, Reggie
Onions, Oliver
The Other by Thomas Tryon
Palahniuk, Chuck
The Phantom of the Opera by Gaston Leroux
The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde
Poe, Edgar Allan
“The Fall of the House of Usher”
“Ligeia”
The Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner by James Hogg
Quinn, Seabury
Quiroga, Horacio
Radcliffe, Ann
The Mysteries of Udolpho
Ray, Jean
Malpertuis
Rice, Anne
Interview with the Vampire
“The Rocking-horse Winner” by D. H. Lawrence
Rohmer, Sax
Rosemary’s Baby by Ira Levin
Russell, Ray
“Sardonicus”
Saki
“Sredni Vashtar”
Samuels, Mark
“The White Hands”
Sarban
Schulz, Bruno
Schweitzer, Darrell
Shea, Michael
Shelley, Mary
Frankenstein
Shiel, M. P.
Shirley, John
“A Short Trip Home” by F. Scott Fitzgerald
“Silent Snow, Secret Snow” by Conrad Aiken
Simmons, Dan
Carrion Comfort
Song of Kali
Smith, Clark Ashton
The Songs of Maldoror by Comte de Lautréamont
Stevenson, Robert Louis
The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde
“Thrawn Janet”
Stoker, Bram
Dracula
The Jewel of Seven Stars
Straub, Peter
Ghost Story
Sturgeon, Theodore
Summers, Montague
Tem, Melanie
Tessier, Thomas
Trilby by George du Maurier
“The Vampyre” by John Polidori
VanderMeer, Jeff
Varney the Vampire; or, The Feast of Blood by James Malcolm Rymer and Thomas Peckett Prest
Vathek by William Beckford
Wagner, Karl Edward
Wakefield, H. R.
Walpole, Horace
The Castle of Otranto
Wandrei, Donald
Wellman, Manly Wade
Wells, H. G.
The Invisible Man
The Island of Doctor Moreau
Welty, Eudora
The Werewolf of Paris by Guy Endore
Wharton, Edith
Wheatley, Dennis
The Devil Rides Out
Whitehead, Henry S.
Wilson, F. Paul
Wyndham, John
Yarbro, Chelsea Quinn
“The Yellow Wall-Paper” by Charlotte Perkins Gilman
Preface
Horror is not only one of the most popular types of literature but one of the oldest. People have always been mesmerized by stories that speak to their deepest fears. Horror Literature through History, in both the scope of its coverage and the currency of its contents, is uniquely suited to speak to this primal and perennial fascination.
It is also a pointedly timely work, as it arrives at a cultural moment when horror is experiencing a fierce resurgence after having gone through a relative cultural downswing during the previous decade. It was not that horror had ever actually died, for it is, as many have enjoyed noting, an undying—or perhaps undead—form of art and entertainment. But it had become somewhat sluggish in the mid- and late 1990s, aided by the flaming out of the great horror publishing boom of the previous decade-plus, whose high-water mark on the mass market end was represented by the soaring popularity of novels by the likes of Stephen King, Peter Straub, Anne Rice, Ramsey Campbell, and Dean Koontz. And so the revival of the early 2000s constitutes a distinct and discernable phenomenon.
Significantly, this revitalization of horror has not been just a literary matter; in this new era, horror’s chief audience and consumer base, consisting largely of high school–aged and college-aged young people, has begun eagerly absorbing horror, especially of the supernatural variety, from a variety of sources. Along with novels and short fiction collections, there are television programs, movies, comic books, and video (and other types of) games. Weird horror fiction—a form to be defined and discussed in the pages to follow—has entered what some began to call a new golden age, not just in literary form but in film and television, as in HBO’s True Detective, whose first season in 2014 displayed the distinct influence of such authors as Robert W. Chambers, Thomas Ligotti, and Laird Barron. Horror gaming—like other gaming—has rapidly attained new heights of technological and narrative sophistication. Horror movie subgenres both old (such as exorcism) and new (such as “torture porn” and the found-footage world of movies like Paranormal Activity) have become enormously popular and profitable. Armies of zombies have begun to infest the pages of comic books and the proliferating sea of screens both large and small.
And throughout it all, the various nonliterary forms continue to draw deeply on their literary cousins for their basic plots, themes, and ideas. This was always true of horror films, but it is critically important to recognize that it remains equally true during the present era of exploding new forms and media, when it might be possible for a partaker of these new forms—the horror video games, the creepypastas, and so on—to ignore or forget the literary foundations of the whole phenomenon. Literary horror predates all of the other types. It has a vastly longer, and therefore richer and deeper, history. And this is where and why a reference work like the present one comes in: because it serves to illuminate the roots of modern horror, both literary and otherwise, by laying out the field’s deep history and evolutionary development.
To this end, Horror Literature through History is presented in a three-part structure that is designed for maximum usefulness in assisting all kinds of readers, including those who seek a comprehensive overview of horror’s rich literary heritage and those who want to conduct a focused study of specific authors, works, and/or topics. It is also well suited to piecemeal browsing.
Part One, titled “Horror through History,” consists of eight essays presenting a comprehensive chronological overview of horror literature during different historical periods. These essays take the form of narrative and critical surveys that situate literary works within the social, cultural, historical, and intellectual currents of their respective eras, creating a seamless narrative of the genre’s evolution from ancient times to the present
Part Two, “Themes, Topics, and Genres,” contains twenty-three essays that show how otherwise unrelated works of horror have influenced each other, how horror subgenres have evolved, and how a broad range of topics within horror—such as ghosts, vampires, religion, and gender roles, as well as the academic study of these things—have been handled across time.
Part Three, “Reference Entries,” presents nearly 400 alphabetically arranged reference entries on authors, works, and specialized topics. It serves as both a source of stand-alone reference reading in its own right and, importantly, a supplement to the encyclopedia’s preceding sections. In effect, many of the reference entries serve as “close-ups” on information and concepts presented in the preceding two sections, allowing readers to understand specific authors, works, and topics within the wider context of horror literature’s evolutionary history and thematic universe.
Supplementing the main entries are seven original interviews with important contemporary horror authors and editors plus nearly 150 sidebars featuring mini-analyses of literary works, excerpts from primary and secondary works, excerpts from reviews, timelines, trivia, information about media adaptations, and more.
With this unique structure, Horror Literature through History offers a variety of uses both to students and to general readers:
•The excerpts from horror novels and stories exemplify topics discussed in the entries, such as theme, language, and characterization. Students are thus able to read these excerpts critically in light of the entries. This supports Common Core State Standards for English language arts.
•The excerpts from background texts work in tandem with the entries by providing contextual material to help students re
ad the literary works critically and understand how authors have engaged the major scientific, social, artistic, psychological, religious, and other issues of their respective eras.
•The historical overview essays in Part One and the topical essays in Part Two distinguish Horror Literature through History from works consisting of relatively short A–Z entries. These essays prompt readers to consider the nature of horror as a genre and the ways in which horror literature intersects with mainstream concerns such as religion, politics, education, and more.
•The information on such topics as film adaptations, television shows, video games, and other nonliterary matters helps readers connect horror literature to popular culture at large.
•The interviews provide insights from horror authors about what they have written and why, as well as their thoughts on other writers, works, themes, trends, and issues in the field. Students can apply these views and opinions to analyzing and evaluating the work of the interviewees, as well as many additional works, authors, and topics.
In sum, the encyclopedia enables readers to discover the roots of modern horror literature, trace the evolution of horror literature across time, recognize the influence of literary horror on popular culture, examine how works of horror have related to key issues at different periods in history, and conduct focused research on specific authors, literary works, genres, themes, and topics related to horror. Written by seventy scholars and authors from half a dozen countries, Horror Literature through History: An Encyclopedia of the Stories That Speak to Our Deepest Fears offers the reader an in-depth education, in two volumes, about the literary background of popular modern horror entertainments and the rich intrinsic value of this enduring art form in its own right.
Introduction: Spookhouses, Catharsis,
and Dark Consolations
Why Horror?
From the outset, a reference work like this one begs an important question, and one that strikes right to the heart of the stated project: Why horror? Why do people seek stories, novels, movies, plays, and games that horrify? It is an old question, and one that has become virtually clichéd from overuse, as many horror novelists and movie directors can testify after years of having been asked some version of it by multiple interviewers, often with an affected attitude of mild amazement or disbelief: “Why horror? Why do you (or how can you) write, direct, imagine, envision, such unpleasant things? Why do you think your readers/viewers flock to them? Why are we insatiably addicted to tales of horror and dread?”
What Is Horror?
In answering this question, one could immediately jump into offering various theories and speculations, but to do this would be to beg yet another question, one that is usually missed or ignored by those attempting to deal with the “Why?” question, but that is properly prior to it: namely, the question of horror’s definition. The very word and concept of “horror” is a noun, and also an adjective (as in “horror novel” and “horror movie”), that is too often left uninterrogated. Not by everyone, to be sure, but by a great many of the people who read the books, watch the movies, and play the games labeled as “horror” year in and year out. Many such people, if pressed, would likely say something to the effect that horror has something to do with being scared, and leave it at that. They would assert that “horror” is simply another word for “fear.”