Horror Literature through History

by Matt Cardin

  However, the chansons de geste cannot really be characterized as “horror” fiction, as they lack a fully developed psychological component. There are numerous descriptions of fear in these texts, but this is most commonly presented as a straightforward and easily overcome response to a life-threatening situation. It was only with the development of a new type of fiction that emotions of dread and terror would start to be explored.

  In the twelfth century, the first romance narratives started to circulate in Europe. The earliest examples of romance include the Arthurian stories of Chrétien de Troyes and the lais of Marie de France (short narrative poems that combined chivalric and supernatural themes). The rise of the knightly class in twelfth-century France, partly as a result of the Crusades and partly as a result of political power shifts, meant that this fiction, while often written by clerical and monastic writers, was commissioned and owned by royalty and the aristocracy. The figure of the knight (rather than the king) was central to this new fiction, and the stories abounded with fantastical elements, including monsters, ghosts, fairies, werewolves, magical weapons, supernatural transformations, and mysterious castles.

  The increasing power of the aristocracy led to the development of “courtly” culture, including romanticized “codes of conduct” for knights, elaborate entertainments, and an increased desire for fiction that reflected this idealized self-image. Hand-in-hand with this, however, were shifts in theological thinking, particularly in terms of the conceptualization of the figure of Christ. Early medieval representations of Christ had focused on his divine strength and his role as the “King of Heaven” (and it is possible that Beowulf was intended to reflect this all-powerful masculine Messiah). By contrast, the twelfth century began to see a focus on Christ’s suffering as the “Man of Sorrows,” with iconography drawing attention to his wounds and his pain. As a figure of idealized masculinity, the romance knight also suffered—both physically and mentally. Later medieval narratives are often concerned with the interior life of the knight, and with the toll his adventures might take on his mind, body, and soul.

  The first Middle English romances appeared in the late thirteenth century, but the genre really flourished in the fourteenth century. In the 1330s, a number of narratives appeared that told of fairy knights and kings who threatened and attacked the human realm, including Sir Orfeo and Sir Degaré, and of women seduced by demons, including Sir Gowther. Old French romances were adapted for English-speaking audiences, including William of Palerne, a werewolf story translated in the mid-fourteenth century. For modern audiences, one of the best-known Middle English romances is Sir Gawain and the Green Knight (late fourteenth century), which tells the story of a monstrous intruder at Arthur’s court at Camelot. The hero’s battle with the monster, the desolate and terrifying landscape through which he must travel, the constant indications of the man’s fear, and the final supernatural denouement are all features that connect this poem to contemporary horror fiction. Less well known—at least to modern audiences—is the later, shorter version of the same story, known as The Greene Knight, in which the inner thoughts and motivations of the supernatural intruder are presented, paving the way for many of horror fiction’s monstrous antiheroes.

  When looking at medieval fiction, it is important to view it in relation to broader cultural concerns. These narratives did not occur in isolation, and various elements—for example, ideas about monsters, the physical body, and death—are reflected in all sorts of contemporaneous cultural productions, from religious sermons to medical writing, and from architectural decoration to maps of the world. It is possible to discern cultural patterns and trends, and to situate romance fiction, with its terrifying monsters, sadistic fairies, and traumatized werewolves, within this broader picture. Like a lot of horror fiction, these narratives reveal a profound concern with understanding the human condition, and with determining the limits to which a person can be pushed.

  Hannah Priest

  See also: Horror in the Ancient World; Horror in the Early Modern Era; Part Two, Themes, Topics, and Genres: Religion, Horror, and the Supernatural; Part Three, Reference Entries: Devils and Demons; Incubi and Succubi; Monsters; Transformation and Metamorphosis; Werewolves; Witches and Witchcraft.

  Further Reading

  Bildhauer, Bettina, and Robert Mills, eds. 2003. The Monstrous Middle Ages. Toronto and Buffalo: University of Toronto Press.

  Database of Middle English Romance. 2012. University of York. http://www.middleenglishromance.org.uk.

  Heng, Geraldine. 2004. Empire of Magic: Medieval Romance and the Politics of Cultural Fantasy. New York and Chichester: Columbia University Press.

  Pernoud, Régine. 2000. Those Terrible Middle Ages: Debunking the Myths. Translated by Anne Englund Nash. San Francisco: Ignatius Press.

  Priest, Hannah. 2014. “Christ’s Wounds and the Birth of Romance.” In Wounds in the Middle Ages, edited by Anne Kirkham and Cordelia Warr, 131–150. Farnham: Ashgate.

  Steinberg, Theodore L. 2003. Reading the Middle Ages: An Introduction to Medieval Literature. Jefferson, NC: McFarland.

  Tolkien, J. R. R. 2006. The Monsters and the Critics and Other Essays. Edited by Christopher Tolkien. London: HarperCollins.

  HORROR IN THE EARLY MODERN ERA

  The early modern era is generally defined as between 1500 and 1800, although many disciplines consider the eighteenth century the period of the Enlightenment. As a literary period, the early modern era is renowned for the output of what used to be called the Renaissance (a term that has fallen out of fashion because what is understood by “Renaissance” took place at different times in different parts of Europe) and is dominated by major canonical figures such as Christopher Marlowe, William Shakespeare, John Donne, and John Milton. Traditionally horror is considered to begin after this time, with many studies citing Edgar Allan Poe as the first writer of true horror. More recently, however, critics have begun to highlight the rich veins of horror texts to be found in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. The period as a whole is characterized by upheaval—both social and religious. Although encompassing the artistic achievements of the Renaissance, the early modern era also contained persecution, torture, and colonization on a massive scale. The uncertainties created by radical shifts in religion, science, and exploration created a space in which writers of various literary modes could utilize the embryonic motifs and tropes of horror to comment on and interrogate the issues of their time.

  The main forms of literature in the early modern era all utilize early notions of horror. Drama and poetry have been the focus of most critical attention over the centuries, but prose writing and ballads are becoming more important in understanding the concerns and ideas of the time. The increased visibility of these popular forms enables the recognition of the more sensationalist aspects of early modern horror. As can be seen in later periods, horror literature took a range of forms and approaches, each of which can be linked to particular anxieties in the wider culture of the time.

  One of the key sources of horror in the early modern era was the religious domain. Conflicts between the worldviews of traditional Catholicism and the newer reformed Protestant theologies led to fault lines that were explored in literary works (and that have continued to be explored even today). Religion was a fundamental part of early modern society and identity, and therefore the ruptures of the Reformation were powerful and long lasting. This can be seen in the popularity of supernatural and demonic figures such as ghosts, demons, and witches throughout the period.

  A series of important prose works set out the parameters of early modern supernatural belief and therefore its implementation in horror. The demand for such writing can be seen by the translation into English of several prominent European examples, although surprisingly not the most infamous, Malleus Maleficarum (1487). Perhaps the two most influential of these translated works are Of ghostes and spirites walking by nyght, and of strange noyses, crackes, and sundry forewarnynges, which commonly happen before the death of
menne, great slaughters & alterations of kyngdomes (1572) by the Swiss theologian Ludwig Lavatar, and French scholar Pierre le Loyer’s A treatise of spectres or straunge sights, visions and apparitions appearing sensibly unto men (1605). Important vernacular works include Reginald Scot’s Discoverie of Witchcraft (1584), in which the skeptical author reveals the misconceptions and artifices that lie behind many superstitious ideas, and King James I’s Daemonologie, In Forme of a Dialogue, Divided into three Books (1597). Although these texts are not traditionally considered to be horror, the lurid details and fascination with the darker aspects of human behavior contained within speak to a similar desire on the part of the reader. In fact, these “nonfiction” texts work in the same way as modern-day true-crime narratives in which information and sensationalism sit side-by-side. The potential for such texts to be intended as entertainment can be seen by the popularity of Thomas Nashe’s satirical Terrors of the Night (1594), a convincing parody of the kind of beliefs described in the other works.

  Accounts of hauntings and suspected witchcraft were not restricted to large published tracts, however. Scores of cheap, popular ballads and chapbooks (small, cheap, paper-covered books of mass popular appeal) recounted supernatural happenings of every imaginable kind, clearly illustrating the demand for horror as entertainment. This demand can also be seen by the popularity of supernatural horror in the dramatic works of the time. Shakespeare’s Macbeth is probably the most famous example, but there were also hugely popular plays by other playwrights, such as Christopher Marlowe’s Doctor Faustus (1594), featuring a cast of demons that infamously caused contemporary audiences to believe they were real, and Thomas Middleton’s The Witch (1612), a play largely overshadowed by its textual links to Macbeth. Thomas Dekker, John Ford, and William Rowley’s The Witch of Edmonton (1621) and Thomas Heywood and Richard Brome’s The Late Lancashire Witches (1634) were both dramatic versions of “real” accounts of witchcraft. This “true-horror” subgenre shows the closeness between literature and other cultural uses of horror in the period. Alongside these plays centered on aspects of haunting or demonology, the tropes and devices of supernatural horror became widely used on stage, with ghosts in particular being a defining characteristic of the hugely successful genre of revenge tragedy.

  Revenge tragedies are perhaps the clearest horror texts of the time, featuring as they do lurid representations of blood, death, and mutilation. Even William Shakespeare was not immune to the savage delights of the form, as can be seen in his blood-drenched Titus Andronicus. The origins of the revenge tragedy can be traced to a particularly English combination of the ghosts and described atrocities of classical drama and the highly visual and physical staging of the medieval mystery plays. The result was a style of drama that pushed the limits of taste and decency much as horror continues to do today. Although all revenge tragedies contain some element of supernatural or physical horror, particular exemplars illustrate the extremes to which playwrights took the horror. Thomas Kyd’s The Spanish Tragedy (ca. 1587) is the most famous early revenge tragedy and is often considered alongside Titus. Detailing the mental disintegration and torment of the Knight Marshal of Spain, Hieronimo, the play contains a litany of mutilations and murders, including an onstage glossectomy (removal of a tongue) and the Saw-like (2004) display of Hieronimo’s murdered son’s corpse. The play also popularized the metatheatrical ideas of plays-within-plays and a supernatural observer on stage—here both in the personification of Revenge and a Ghost. The inevitable bloodbath at the conclusion of the play brings to mind the tagline to the classic horror movie The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974): “Who will survive, and what will be left of them?” Indeed, this question can be applied to the entire genre of revenge tragedy.

  A Timeline of Early Modern Horror

  1440

  Johannes Gutenberg invents the printing press, signaling the beginning of the literary early modern period.

  1487

  Malleus Maleficarum is published in Germany.

  1517

  Martin Luther posts his Ninety-five Theses on the door of Wittenburg Cathedral, generally seen to be the formal beginning of the Reformation.

  1576

  The Theatre is built in Shoreditch, London.

  1587

  The Spanish Tragedy is first performed.

  1594

  Thomas Nashe’s The Terrors of the Night is published, showing a demand for literary treatment of demonological ideas.

  1607

  Shakespeare’s Macbeth stages horror and witchcraft.

  1623

  Webster’s Duchess of Malfi cements his role as playwright of horror.

  1649

  The English king, Charles I, is executed. The civil wars that follow bring a new kind of horror to the population.

  1701

  The Age of Enlightenment commences, in which science and skepticism replace the superstition of what came before. Such a view, despite its reductive aspects, does provide an end point to the early modern period.

  The development of revenge tragedy can be compared to that of horror cinema, as writers competed to include ever more bloodthirsty and horrific content. Antonio’s Revenge (1599) by John Marston repeats the cannibalistic banquet utilized earlier by Shakespeare in Titus (and taken from the classical tragedian Seneca’s Thyestes, ca. 62) but furthers the horror by the meal being made from a young child—a choice made even more horrific by the fact that the play was written for one of the boy’s companies. Thomas Middleton’s The Revenger’s Tragedy (ca. 1607), a play often considered to be a commentary on the entire genre, features a poisoned and disguised skull used to murder a corrupt duke, and the line that perhaps best sums up the particular blend of sensationalism and moralizing that defined the revenge tragedy: “When the bad bleeds, then is the tragedy good” (Middleton 1988, Act 3, Scene 5, line 200).

  Despite their surprisingly modern approach to violent representation, early modern revenge tragedies are clearly steeped in the conventions of the period. Revengers generally receive fatal punishment for taking matters into their own hands rather than leaving justice to the state or God (an approach often rendered impossible due to the villain being in a position of power), and the final words are invariably spoken by the highest ranked character left alive. The fate of almost all female characters in revenge tragedies also predicts their treatment in horror cinema as figures of desire but with little chance of survival.

  Following from these hugely successful plays, the mantle of horror passes to John Webster, a writer so infamous for his macabre approach that he features as a child cameo in the Oscar-winning Shakespeare in Love (1998), declaring: “Plenty of blood. That’s the only writing.” Alongside the obligatory mutilations, stabbings, and poisonings of revenge tragedy, Webster further adds to the horror in his masterpiece, The Duchess of Malfi (1623), through use of contemporary ideas of lycanthropy as an extreme form of mental disorder. The villainous Ferdinand, brother to the titular Duchess, conspires to have her killed out of a mixture of jealousy and family pride when she takes a lover he does not approve of. Following her death, he rapidly descends into madness, a madness that finally manifests itself in wolf-like behavior: “Said he was a wolf, only the difference / Was, a wolf’s skin was hairy on the outside” (Webster 1996, Act 5, Scene 2, lines 16–17). Such use of creature horror was in part influenced by the popularity of Ovid’s Metamorphoses (ca. 8 CE) as a school text and also in part by anxieties and uncertainties about the barriers between human and animal brought about through accounts of strange beasts in travel narratives.

  Horror’s existence on the boundaries can also be seen in early modern literature’s treatment of the closeness of horror and laughter. Modern expectations of comedy as funny and tragedy as sad do not apply to early drama, in which moments of extreme bloodshed and atrocities were punctuated with dark humor and a plethora of puns. This clear literary awareness of the proximity of horror and laughter is a defining characteristic of many forms of horror literature f
rom revenge tragedies onward. The laughter, whether genuine or the result of discomfort at what is being witnessed, becomes a key part of audience response, and the high moral purposes of tragedy described by early modern theorists such as Sir Philip Sidney are subsumed into sensationalism and spectacle.

  The influence of early modern horror literature can be seen across many aspects of later writing, as the period continues to be a popular setting for films and books that set out to exploit the superstitious pretechnological world. In fact, the rural European settings of later classics of Gothic horror such as Frankenstein and Dracula enable an atmosphere that has far more in common with the sixteenth century than the increasingly urbanized and industrialized England. Modern films such as Bram Stoker’s Dracula (1992) and Van Helsing (2004) emphasize this difference through costume and setting. M. Night Shyamalan’s The Village (2004) plays on these cinematic conventions, depicting a primitive community that shares beliefs and traditions that set them aside from the modern setting of the film. More specifically, horror texts set in the early modern era continue to be popular, particularly within the subgenre of folk horror. Notable examples include the novels Deliver Us from Evil (1997) by Tom Holland and The Tale of Raw Head and Bloody Bones (2013) by Jack Wolf, and films ranging from the early classics Hexen (1922) and Day of Wrath (1943) to later standouts such as Witchfinder General (1968) and Blood on Satan’s Claw (1971), and, more recently, A Field in England (2013). The success, critically and commercially, of writer/director Robert Eggers’s The Witch (2015) demonstrates that the popularity and influence of horror in the early modern era is still strong.