'The Frighteners'

Picked up 'The Frighteners: Why We Love Monsters, Ghosts, Death & Gore' (2018) by Peter Laws. The author is an ordained Baptist minister who lives in east England. He has a penchant for the spooky and tries to understand why it draws the interest of so many. (Didn't garner many mainstream online reviews.)

I wasn't expecting much from the book, to be honest. But it ended being rather cute, with a fair bit of research thrown in along with paranormal theories, folklore and superstitions. The narration in the book ran like a television series, similar to 'Tales from the Crypt' (1989-1996) and 'Hammer House of Horror' (1980). Or maybe like a podcast, in contemporary terms. Yes, it's supposed to be a non-fiction book.

This fear of falling prey to some sort of 'creature' inside of us found particular resonance in a post-Darwinian world. By 1859, Darwin had published his theory of evolution, and we were coming to grips with our animal ancestry. The cultured, civilised men of the Victorian age wanted to feel they had put a discernible distance between themselves and their simian past. But the thought of the beast within haunted them, and the fear of it found expression in morbid, spooky culture. 

This fear started to shape the fiction of the time. Authors like Matthew Lewis and Ann Radcliffe played on the fears and concerns of the day, helping to give rise to the Gothic novel. They showed us depraved monks and corrupt institutions, and told us that the real monsters weren't found 'out there', but within society itself.

The book opens with Peter Laws heading into Transylvania for a vacation with his wife. It also led him to the Capuchin Crypt in Rome, Italy. It then traces how horror, as a fiction in genre developed, along with widely held Christian beliefs, and pagan traditions. Aside from anecdotes, the content also presented well-researched psychological studies of spooky events and incarnations, and specifically humans turning in were-beasts. Dracula lore, and people with a strong belief in vampires too, or who think they're one. Macabre fuses with everyday life.

We could ignore her. That's an option many people take. But we're not the type to turn away. Instead we've come up with a genius plan. We've invented ways to play with her. We take a deep breath and we dive right in. We turn down the lights and tell tales of monsters, ghosts, death and gore. It helps us organise our fears, our hopes, our curiosities, and what we're left with is fun and adventure. And sometimes Sister Death even drops strange little hints sometimes. That maybe hers won't be the last face we'll see after all. Which gives us chills...but maybe even hope. For now though, she plays best in the shadows. And so we play too. 

We are human, no more no less. 

And we are the frightened.  

We are the frighteners.