Académique Documents
Professionnel Documents
Culture Documents
Even the earliest recorded tales have elements of horror, fear, and despair, and the archetypes of horror have likely lasted much longer. The
vampire archetype, for example, can be traced all the way back to the ancient civilization of Sumer; the vampire-like being Emikku would inhabit
the bodies of people who had died violently or who were buried improperly.
By the 1580's, a new kind of horror had come to the London stage. The series of gruesome plays began with Thomas Kyd's The Spanish
Tragedy (1585) and included Shakespeare's Titus Andronicus (1594), Hamlet (1600), and Macbeth (1605). Following the performance of John
Webster's The Duchess of Malfi (1613), death would not appear again on the English stage until Victor Hugo's Hernani was staged in 1730.
Stories like this are sent first to our blog subscribers. Want to join the list?
Sign up free here.
In 1765, Horace Walpole published The Castle of Otranto, considered the first Gothic novel. The book would have incredible impact on the
emerging genre of horror. The next influential novel in the genre would be Anne Radcliffe's Mysteries of Udolpho, a book that left an indelible mark
Lord Byron, Sir Walter Scott, and countless other authors. Legendary authors like Matthew Lewis and Charles Brickden Brown would also
contribute to the gothic novel as a genre.
An illustration of the characters of Castle of Otranto
Though these authors worked within the same genre, they didn't always appreciate each other's work. Inspired by Radcliffe, Matthew Lewis
published The Monk anonymously in 1705 (because at that time he was a member of Parliament). But Radcliffe was so shocked at the luridness
of Lewis' novel, she wrote The Italian (1797) in response.
The Gothic novel would take another dramatic turn in June, 1816. for three days, Lord r, Percy Shelley, Mary Wollenstonecraft Shelley, and Dr.
John Polidori shared a villa at Lake Geneva. Likely under the influence of laudanum, they decided to have a ghost story-writing contest. The result:
Mary Shelley originated the genre of science fiction with Frankenstein (1818), while Dr. Polidori established the vampire sub-genre with the
publication of The Vampyr in the New Monthly Magazine (1819). Dr. Polidori's work was originally attributed to Lord Byron, and the main character
is indeed a caricature of him.
Poe's "MS in a Bottle" first appeared in the
Baltimore Saturday Visitor on Oct 19, 1833.
Meanwhille horror again flourished on the British stage from 1790 to 1825. Three theaters offered spectators a host of horrific options: Fitz
Ball's The Devil's Elixir; Matthew Lewis' The Castle Spectre; and James Planche's The Vampire (1819) were just a few popular productions. The
last actually led to the development of a new stage apparatus called the "vampire trap." These productions were both bloody and expensive, so
they ceased as soon as "the devil was no longer in fashion."
Edgar Allan Poe would bring the Gothic tradition to America; his first story, "MS Found in a Bottle," appeared in the Baltimore Saturday Visitor in
1833. He went on to produce some of the world's most outstanding macabre tales, and has also been called the father of the detective novel.
And although they certainly don't qualify as horror in their own right, Lewis Carroll's Alice in Wonderland (1865) and Through the Looking
Glass (1872) would influence horror writers over a century later, in the 1980's. Lewis Carroll's poem "The Jabberwocky" weaves the ridiculous with
the horrifying, and twentieth-century authors would play with that juxtaposition, and with imaginary worlds and parallel universes such as Alice
inhabited.
Across the channel in France, the movement first known as L'Esprit Decadent and later called Symbolisme had gained a firm foothold among
authors like Charles Baudelaire, Joris Karl Huysmans, and Guy de Maupassant. They produced some of the finest European works of the
macabre. Poet Paul Verlaine did what no Gothic author had attempted to do--he gave horror a definition within the context of his movement,
saying that "it is made of a mixture of the carnal spirit and the sad flesh, of all the violent splendours of the declining empire."
The French stage of the 1890's and 1900's saw the return of overt gore. The Grand Guignol, a term that once referred to puppets, came to denote
short plays full of violence, murder, rape, suicide, and ghostly apparitions. London would eventually host its own less lurid adaptations of these
plays, most notably from 1920 to 1922.
By this time, the short story had definitively replaced the novel as the modus operandi for most horror writers. In 1907, Algernon Blackwood
published The Listener, containing his most highly regarded short story, "The Willow." Blackwood was a member of the Order of the Golden Dawn,
an occult society created by Samuel Liddell MacGregor Mathers in 1888. The organization was home to many a prominent writer, from the
infamous Aleister Crowley to William Butler Yeats, Lord Dunsany, Arthur Machen, and Sax Rhomer (who has faded into obscurity now but was
wildly popular with his contemporaries). Members of the Order were responsible for the majority of weird and horror fiction produced in the UK at
the time. Their work also marked the end of an era for horror; soon after, the genre's popularity would fade, not to reemerge in Britain until James
Herbert and Clive Barker began publishing horror in the 1970's and 1980's.
Weird Tales, Nov 1923
In America, on the other hand, horror was flourishing. In 1923, the first issue of Weird Tales appeared. The magazine never turned a profit in its 32
years, but it did feature a number of still-famous authors like HP Lovecraft and Ray Bradbury. Four years later, Lovecraft published The Call of
Cthulhu, earning him critical acclaim and recognition as one of the preeminent horror writers of the era.
The very real horrors of World War II overshadowed fictional ones. Though Bradbury and a few other significant authors continued publishing
horror stories and science fiction, it wasn't until the 1950's that horror again hit a stride. Richard Matheson's 1954 I Am Legend was the first
modern vampire novel, and Shirley Jackson's 1959 The House on Haunted Hill remains one of the most critically acclaimed genre novels of the
past sixty years.
The scene in Gein's kitchen
Also in 1957 was another seminal event in the modern history of the horror genre itself. Ed Gein, a Wisconsin farmer, was arrested for the murder
of Bernice Worden. When authorities searched Gein's home, they discovered the remains of at least fifteen different women--in small pieces. Gein
admitted to exhuming bodies and committing acts of cannibalism. The story shocked--and fascinated--the nation. (Find sordid details here.) Much
earlier Fritz Lang's 1931 movie, M, marked the first serious film about a serial killer and was based on the real-life serial killer Peter Kürten, the
"Vampire of Dusseldorf." But the serial killer hadn't found its way into fiction yet. The Gein story would inspire Robert Bloch's Psycho (1959) and
pave the way for works like Thomas Harris' Hannibal Lecter series. The serial killer has since become an indispensible archetype for the genre.
The Cold War had ushered in a new age of paranoia and fear of invasion. These fears were realized in works like Ira Levin's novel Rosemary's
Baby (1967). This was the first prominent work of speculative fiction. It also marked a shift back towards the novel as the preferred form for horror
writers. The 1970's saw a deluge of horror novels, starting with William Peter Blatty's The Exorcist (1971) and perhaps epitomized by Stephen
King's Carrie (1974). King fairly burst into not only the American horror scene, but the larger world of literature. Peter Benchley published Jaws in
1975, which was a true coming of age for the modern monster tale. And Anne Rice published Interview with the Vampire in 1976, bringing new life
and direction to vampire fiction.
First UK edition of Jaws
New technology brought new possibilities for horror film makers of the 1980's. Soon the emphasis had shifted to gore for gore's sake, and the film
genre fell out of favor with mainstream audiences. But the horror novel was enjoying an excellent reputation for quality writing, despite the growth
in formulaic shocker stories. In 1981, Thomas Harris published Red Dragon, the first novel in his Hannibal Lecter series. The novel remains one of
the most commercially successful portraits of a serial killer, and it heralded the start of the serial-killer craze of the ensuing decades. London
playwright Clive Barker's short story collection The Book of Blood (1984) marked a new age of horror in the UK and Europe. He remained an
influential figure, pushing the boundaries of the genre and fueling discussion over how the genre should be defined.
In recent years, the archetypes of vampires, werewolves, and zombies have come to dominate the horror genre. The 1990's was a time of
compromise and self-consciousness for the genre. RL Stine's Goosebumps series was the publishing phenomenon of the decade, in some ways
setting the stage for JK Rowling's Harry Potter series; Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials saga; and even Stephanie Meyer's Twilight series.
Though horror has come a long way from its Gothic roots, there's no doubt that the genre will continue to flourish and evolve.