Horror: The Test for Insanity

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            Horror in art dates back to the 18^th century with its earliest contribution being Horace Walpole’s The Castle of Otranto (1764). This genre may be characterized by terror, or suspense, and horror itself, gruesomeness. By the 19^th century, writers like Mary Shelley, author of Frankenstein (1818), and Edgar Allen Poe began to popularize the horror genre. With the introduction of film, later in the century, as an alternative to theatre, many works of literature were adapted into screen. As a result of people’s fascination and contribution to film, a different form of expression, or art, emerged. All genres of writing have been in some way adapted into movies. However, horror has been one of the most scrutinized and exploited of all.  Perhaps one of the most successful horror writers of our time is Stephen King. King became popular in the late 20^th century, and since then, most of his works have been adapted into movies. In one of his essays, titled “Why We Crave Horror Movies”, Stephen King argues that we are all mentally ill, and insinuates that we have developed an obsession for such types of films (par. 1). At first, King’s arguments may seem logical and perhaps valid. However, further in-depth analysis of his many theories as to why we “crave” for horror movies might indeed, disprove them. Over all, Stephen King’s arguments can be refuted, for there may be different reasons why people watch horror films, and it is in our nature to be violent; also, he analyzes his thoughts from the perspective of a horror writer, therefore, his overall argument might be aimed to persuade, rather than inform.

            Stephen King proposes that there are three main reasons why people go see horror movies. Associated with these reasons, certain psychological characteristics may be present in people who watch them; because fear is a basic human emotion that mainly deals with our mental state. King believes the first reason is “[to] show that we can, that we are not afraid…” (par. 3). Because of this, King also warns that we are daring the nightmare (par. 2). Those people who go see horror films for this reason are the least likely to be affected psychologically because these type of people tend to be fearless in general. Also, the type of horror that these group of people might watch more often is not the gruesome type, rather, the one filled with suspense. An example of this type of movie is Paranormal Activity (2007) directed by Oren Peli. In this film, a married couple video records their everyday living in search for the supernatural being that is haunting their house.

            Another valid reason why people watch horror movies, King states, is “to re-establish our feelings of essential normality…” (par. 4). These type of people are most likely to feel insecure about themselves and might go see the type of horror movie that contains hideous, horrific monsters; however, not necessarily violent in any way. An example of such film is Bram Stoker’s Dracula (1992) directed by Francis Ford Coppola. In the film, Count Dracula tries to gain back his lover, Elisabeta, who committed suicide upon false news of his death, through a young woman whom he claims is her reincarnation. However, “By watching monsters on the screen, we reassure ourselves that we are not monsters ourselves.” (The Longman Writer, Rhetoric and Reader Handbook 110). As a result, people try to become what they erroneously believe is normal, by comparing themselves with others. To them, being normal does not mean following one’s own natural instinct, but rather, to become socially accepted. As Susan Sontag in her essay, “Regarding the Pain of Others”, puts it: “[We] live in a society of ‘spectacle’. Each situation has to be turned into a spectacle to be real…People themselves aspire to become images: celebrities” (109). Now-a-days, and perhaps as a result  of the success of the film industry, people have begun to doubt whether or  not they are normal, or good enough. Just like clothes advertisement has become a standard-setter for how a person should dress like, movies have become a standard-setter for how we should behave and act like. Hence, many people lose confidence in themselves when they realize they act in certain ways not commonly accepted anymore because of this phenomenon. Therefore, people watch these types of movies to comfort themselves in thinking that even though they may not be like a certain celebrity; they are also not like the horrific monster in the horror film.

            Finally, King’s third reason for why people “crave” horror movies is to go have fun (par. 5). Most people who look to have fun at these type of horror movies are the people whose sole purpose for going to see a specific movie is to see others suffer and die in the most macabre of ways. Movies of such sort include Saw (2003), directed by James Wan, and The Final Destination (2009), directed by David R. Ellis. In these movies, people die in the sickest ways possible, either through sick, twisted games, or random, violent, and unrealistic sequence of accidental events, such as having heads chopped off by ceiling fans or getting split in half from a falling car engine at a NASCAR event. The sole purpose of these films is to show blood and inhumane conditions. These are the types of people that Stephen King should refer to as insane. However, not everybody watches horror movies; and out of those that do, not all of them like to see these types of gruesome films. Hence, when King claims that we are all insane, he is generalizing and giving people a common stereotype, resulting in a misjudging from his part. These people are truly insane, for, according to André Breton in his Manifesto of Surrealism, they “derive a great deal of comfort and consolation from their imagination, that they enjoy their madness sufficiently to endure the thought that its validity does not extend beyond themselves” (par. 5). In other words, people’s imagination reaches such an extent that it comforts them when their sick and twisted ideas do not become reality. It is for these type of people that “[the] mythic horror movie…has a dirty job to do… lifting a trap door in the civilized forebrain and throwing a basket of raw meat to the hungry alligators swimming around in that subterranean river beneath” (King, par. 12). These types of horror movies satiate the lust for blood, violence, and gruesomeness that these people crave for. According to King, where it not for horror movies, people would not be able to relieve their desire and would go out and do things themselves. For, according to Andrea Sabanovich’s The Media Encourages Society to be Mentally Ill, “[All] people still have an ‘anticivilization’ emotion within them that needs to be let out once in a while” (par. 2).

            Human beings, like any other natural living creature, are violent in nature. This does not mean, however, that we are constantly aggressive. It means that we tend to respond more often with violence, since violence is often easier to accomplish than patience. According to King’s twisted logic, “If we share a brotherhood of man, then we also share and insanity of man” (par. 11). This allegation can quickly be disproved, stating that if that were true, then the opposite could also be true: If we share a brotherhood of man, then we also share a sanity of man. In other words, by this statement one could argue that we are all insane, or the opposite: we are all sane. To clarify King’s statement, we do indeed share something as we share a brotherhood. However, it is not insanity. It is the fact that we are naturally driven towards violence. Stephen Meck, a student at Mt. Hood Community College, in Gresham, Oregon, states in his essay Which Came First: Violence or the Media?, “[Violence] is malleable, and often serves a vital function…Nature abounds with examples of violence; there is the violent storm, the competition between siblings for scraps of food or the sometimes bloody and debilitating sparring between males of various species for the attention of a female” (par.4-5). Therefore, since us as humans tend to be violent in this sense, we are all normal. In other words, to be a part of normality is to be functioning or occurring in a natural way (“normal,” American Heritage Dictionary). Using the logical approach of deductive reasoning, we deduce that to be insane is to be out of the natural, for insanity is a mental disorder impairing a person’s capacity to function normally (“insanity,” Roget’s Thesaurus). Therefore, King’s accusation would also claim that none of us function in a natural way.

            Stephen King is a horror genre writer; therefore, his intentions, in the development of his essay might not have been solely informative, rather, persuasive. After all, he might have personal interests in making want to think the way he wants us to. King uses various techniques of persuasion, excluding the fact that he is one of the most influential writers of our time, to accomplish his goal of driving us into the world of horror. He begins is essay with a very clever hook: “I think that we’re all mentally ill; those of us outside the asylums only hide it a little better…” (par. 1). By stating his claim in this manner, he attempts to catch attention of the reader, and sequentially persuade him to think as he thinks. After all, “King’s theory also functions as a defense of his own craft… In persuading us of our psychological need for horror movies, he simultaneously (and implicitly) seeks to persuade us of our practical need for horror writers—like King himself” (Nadell 111).  With his essay, Stephen King might be attempting to drive people, or lead them to believe that watching horror movies is completely normal. Hence, from what we have discussed previously about normality, we have seen that people always want to do what is normal, or rather, what the rest of society is doing. Therefore, if King generates a feeling among people that everybody is watching horror movies, there will be more people watching them as well; and, perhaps they will “coincidentally” come across a film about one based on one of King’s horror stories.

            Another way we may deduce that King is perhaps attempting to persuade the audience rather than informing them, is by analyzing one of his quotes from his essay, “We’ve all known people who… have some hysterical fear – of snakes, the dark, the tight place, the long drop…” (par. 1). One’s first thought on this quote might lead one to believe that King did not analyze his own words carefully. People who have a hysterical fear, or phobias, of snakes (ophidiophopia) or fear of clowns (coulrophobia), for example, most likely developed these fears as a result of watching a horror movie very early in their lives. Movies like Snakes on a Plane (2006) or Stephen King’s It (1990) are movies certain to leave these types of scars on people. Most of us, if not ourselves, know others who might have these types of phobias.

            The genre of horror, since its roots in the 18^th century, was one of the many genres that blossomed with the rise of the film industry. Evidence of this resultant growth of horror is Stephen King himself, whose dozens of horror stories have already been adapted into film. Even though there exists that possibility that King might be using his essay to persuade the reader to continue watching horror, we must admit that for some, horror movies have become a “way out” for people to relieve their violent nature, “The media has created a safe outlet for society to free their ‘anticivilization’ emotions – horror movies” (Sabanovich, par. 1). Many people, indeed, use horror movies as “stress-balls” to relieve any sort of violence they may carry inside, due to whatever circumstances. This is how horror movies affect those individuals who seek relief in them in a positive way. After all, there are several ways in which a horror movie may serve a person: for the risk-takers, it helps them “dare the nightmare”. For the insecure, it comforts them, reminding them of their position in the “sliding scale” (Meck, par. 2). For the insane, it offers them a fun (as twisted as it may sound) time and a feel of gruesome inhumanity, which is what they enjoy watching. For others, it offers an escape from the actual possibility of having to become that horror. At last, one possibility that King avoids mentioning (for persuasive reasons obviously): the horror movie enriches the insane person’s imagination with ideas; ideas that may one day come in handy when the thirst of a sudden rush of violent insanity may be unquenchable by two-hours of visual entertainment.

Should Batman Kill the Joker?

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Justice: a topic of discussion that has generated debate amongst people since the origins of humanity. What is it, and who decides what true justice is? Some say vengeance is justice. Others define justice based on a common agreement between a majority of people which they call the law. Laws were written to form a civilized society. They were created to seclude those who mean harm and have no respect for other humans. These laws, however, give us no rights; rather, they remind us of them. The most important of these, written down in the Constitution of the United States, is the right to life. Our right to live is unconditional, and should always be respected. In the movie The Dark Knight (2008), directed by Christopher Nolan, the topic of justice is discussed, and a person’s right to life questioned. The feud between Batman and the Joker is a topic that generates further discussion, not only on the literal sense but also in the symbolic. How does Batman killing the Joker apply to a real-life situation? According to Mark D. White from The Boston Globe, “While there are good reasons to kill the Joker… there are also good reasons not to kill him, based on what killing would mean about Batman and his motives, mission, and character.” Based on the philosophy of deontology, which states that although the Joker may be evil, he is still human and deserving of the minimum level of respect and humanity, Batman should not kill the Joker because he is human as well, our right to life is unconditional and is not to be taken away by anybody; and, by doing so, Batman would lower himself down to the level of a criminal.

We are all human; therefore, there is a minimum level of respect that all of us should give to and receive from one another. Perhaps the Joker is an evil man who truly deserves to die. Perhaps he is a psychopath, suffering from mental issues. However, who is the Batman to decide whether he lives or dies? It is perhaps Arnold P. Goldstein, author of Violence in America, who best explains why people might argue on whether killing the Joker is better, “The more we are able to view someone as something less than human, the more readily aggression toward that person is possible.  Racial or religious stereotyping, the view of the enemy in wartime, are each good examples of our tendency to give such persons a demeaning label or name, and via such dehumanizing enable ourselves to hurt them” (Us vs. Them, par. 15). Often, as a result of an individual’s actions, we tend to see them as less than human. This causes us to react hostile toward that individual to the point that we may end up contradicting ourselves while trying to seek justice. For example, when a convict is sentenced to death for murder, we perform the same act on him as the one for which we are punishing him/her for. This may sound ironic, and it is. Another irony surrounding the topic of the death penalty is that laws are supposed to be designed to impose order in society; yet, the death penalty is a legal practice which actually generates much controversy and protests from members of the community and American society. There are those who may argue that a person who loses respect for another’s life (like the Joker) deserves the penalty of death. While this may be true in theory, putting it to practice requires that another person, as human as the perpetrator himself, make the voluntary decision to execute him; whether he is the judge who orders the sentence or the executioner who carries it out, and be put in the same position as the perpetrator’s. Because we are all human, we should give the least level of respect to others, unconditionally, as long as others do not represent an immediate threat to our existence.

Just because the death sentence is carried officially through a legal process does not mean that the act itself is morally right. One’s right to life is unconditional and cannot be taken away. When it comes to governing, there are several factors that may influence a government’s decision to legalize the death penalty. Unfortunately, fraud, corruption, and economic issues often determine whether a person lives or dies, whether innocent or guilty. Sadly, there are people who justify the death penalty stating that it is more expensive to maintain a prisoner than to execute him. Regardless of personal points of view, one’s life is, after all, one’s own. Therefore, no person or legal authority is in a position to determine whether one lives or dies.

Finally, there is another aspect of killing the Joker that would not be favorable to Batman. That is, if he kills the Joker, he would not be the symbol of justice he stands for anymore; for killing the Joker would stain his reputation and the good he represents. Let us not forget why Batman is doing this in the first place: In Nolan’s Batman Begins (2005), Batman’s parents are shot dead in front of his own eyes by a cold-blooded criminal trying to rob them off of their money. In “Philosophy of the Superhero”, C.W. Lesher explains, “Since then, he swears to defend Gotham City against such acts and makes every encounter with a criminal a personal encounter with the criminals who murdered his family” (par. 31). Hence, Batman’s principles go against killing others, even if the villains take away from him his beloved parents (Batman Begins) or the love of his life, Rachel (The Dark Knight). As the Joker also points out, towards the end of the movie, and hanging by a thread: “You won’t kill me out of some misplaced sense of self-righteousness…” (Nolan).

Often, we ponder upon whether or not Batman should kill the Joker. We accept the role of the superhero, and despise that of the villain. Hence, as previously stated by Goldstein, not only do we see the villain less than human, we also see the superhero, rather, as a super human, or greater than a regular citizen. This is perhaps the reason why we always identify ourselves with the superheroes: because we want to be and do more than we are naturally capable of doing. While it may be valid to argue in favor of sparing the Joker’s life that everyone’s right to life is unconditional, there is another argument, perhaps the most important one, which nobody could counter: Batman’s. By him swearing to defend Gotham City and bringing all criminals to justice, Bruce Wayne, rather, has set to stone the principles and morals he follows. And as long as he does not break these morals, he will always stand for symbol of good and justice. Therefore, Batman ought not to kill the Joker.aaaaaaa

Irony in the Grotesque Literature

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Horror, violence, mystery, surrealism: terms associated with human emotions which are difficult to comprehend in feeling. It is the mere experience of these which generate emotions that drive us away from; yet, they often trigger a part within us that becomes attracted to them. Perhaps, as distorted as it may sound, this basic concept gives way to a unique style in literature: the grotesque. Grotesque is a genre in literature, and generally in art, characterized by violent, freakish, and horrific scenes which, after all, maybe distorted. However, what sets the grotesque apart from the rest of horror literature is its main purpose. While horror is meant to scare the reader with gruesome/violent imagery, the grotesque accomplishes this by confusing the reader; usually, towards the end of the story, and with the use of irony.  It is irony which ends the literary grotesque effectively; making the reader have to answer his own questions regarding the symbols in the story, or even the purpose and the meaning of the story overall.

Edgar Allen Poe is mostly known for his contributions to the horror/grotesque literature. In one of his works, The Tell-Tale Heart, the Narrator sets off to kill the old man he lives with, according to him, due to his evil eye. Perhaps, what makes this story so disturbing is the Narrator’s unbalanced state of mind, which he claims he is not a madman, and the description of how he sets forth to execute the murder. He describes, “I worked hastily, but in silence. First of all, I dismembered the corpse. I cut off the head and the arms and the legs” (par. 12). The ironic twist to this story comes precisely at the end. In the beginning, the Narrator takes pride in the extreme precautions he takes in order for his plan to go about smoothly (par. 8). However, at the very end of the story, all his efforts go in vain as he turns himself in to the police, “…dissemble no more! I admit the deed! – tear up the planks! –here, here! –it is the beating of his hideous heart!” (par. 18). There are actually two similar ironies present in the story which interrelate with each other. The purpose of killing the old man is to get rid of his evil eye and stop the disturbing beating of his heart. Yet, as he is questioned by the police officers, the beating of the old man’s heart (now in his head) comes back to haunt him, forcing him to confess the crime. This story is very similar to William Shakespeare’s Macbeth, during the scene where the ghost of Banquo, whom Macbeth just ordered to kill, is haunting him at the feast (Act III, Sc. iv).

Another example of irony in the grotesque is Joyce Carol Oates’ Poor Bibi. This type of grotesque is characterized by leaving out important details, such as who/what Bibi is; which causes in the reader major confusion at the end of the story. Due to the lack of details about Bibi, we are led to accept Bibi as a symbolical character which most likely represents, based on the context of the story, the marriage between the Narrator and her husband. The reader is also faced with a big moral dilemma: euthanasia. Such dilemma introduces us to two main ironies which, once again, are interrelated. In the Narrator’s own words, “I, who’d love Bibi so, was forced to become his executioner, in the interest of mercy” (218). The Narrator, at first, intended for Bibi to die a quick, merciful death. But due to the rejection of the doctor, she does it herself in the most gruesome, hence, grotesque of ways, “Fifty feet behind the pet hospital was a deep drainage ditch filled with brackish, ill-smelling water, in which there floated, like shards of dreams, threads of detergent scum… for Bibi would not die for the longest time—grunting, cursing, ugly veins standing out in his forehead as he [husband] held the thrashing, squirming, frantic creature beneath the surface of the ditch water…” (217-218). In this case, the main grotesque act led to the main irony in the story.

In A Good Man is Hard to Find, by Flannery O’Connor, irony in the grotesque leads the reader into a very drastic situation faced by the main characters in the story. In contrast with the irony of Poor Bibi (led by the grotesque moment),  the irony of O’Connor’s story leads into the most grotesque, likewise brutal, of moments. Such a grotesque moment, characterized by evil itself, could not be described better by none other than Joyce Carol Oates in her essay Reflections of the Grotesque as, “…the forbidden truth, the unspeakable taboo—that evil is not always repellant but frequently attractive; that it has the power to make of us not simply victims… but active accomplices”. It results ironic that the Grandmother, who did not want to go to Florida not only because she instead wanted to head to Tennessee, but also because of the danger of the Misfit, is the one person who gets her and her family killed by the Misfit himself. Everything for which she happens to be cautious about ends up happening anyway and thanks to her: “I wouldn’t take my children in any direction with a criminal like that aloose in it” (117). But perhaps another grotesque element out of this story is the Grandmother’s freakishness which, after all, ends up freaking the Misfit out himself and killing her.

Grotesque literature without distortion and irony would just simply be a horror genre. The element of grotesque that makes it so unique is after all, irony. While distortion and gruesome imagery might frighten the reader, irony makes him feel more attracted to the story, as gruesome and distorted as it may be. And this in itself is ironic: that one would feel attracted to gruesome and horrific things which generate fear.  Despite the horrific and ironic elements of the grotesque, these types of stories usually send messages which might be symbolic and stand for something else, or they usually contain an overall message, suggesting a moral or social dilemma.