Paradox of Horror: A Violation of Reality

Why do we enjoy watching scary movies? Why do we wait in line for an hour just to get scared in a haunted house? Why do we spend hours a day reading horror novels, or watching "Ghost Hunters"? Because we love a thrill. We love the feeling of uncertainty. Sitting on the edge of our seat, waiting for what will happen next. Why do we enjoy seeing someone tied to a chair, receiving an ultimatum from Jigsaw in the Saw thrillers? It's all because of a little thing that Carroll likes to refer to as the "Paradox of Horror".

The Paradox of Horror is referred to as an attempt to rationalize the horrific, terrifying myths and fictions of todays literature as well as media. In my opinion, we enjoy being enthralled into stories that contain elements of death and immortality, because it is so far from what we would want to surround ourselves with. It's like looking at a car accident. We would never want it to happen to us, but we can't look away. Its an eerie thought, and such a peculiar thrill. We look for ways, day after day, to scare ourselves in some way. To test reality, in some sorts, is the best way to know you are living. When something is so close, yet couldn't physically harm us, we get a thrill, a rush of adrenaline. Something that we can get from movies, books, tv shows, and haunted houses. In different ways, this media can pull us in, and keep us until we break. We want a thrill, always looking for a way to keep yourself on the edge of your seat.

I personally love movies where people are literally ripped apart. I love the thrill of knowing something terrible is happening, but I am not hurt. I will stand in line in freezing temperatures just to walk through a haunted house and get scared. I love the thrill of knowing I can be scared, but its only for a moment. A moment that won't truly hurt me, but make my heart jump, and wake me up.

The Paradox of Horror is truly a violation of reality. We almost want these things to be real, but know that they never will be. We look at urban legends as something that could possibly be true, but hasn't been proven to us in real life. These things all give us thrills, in very different ways. We love it. And that is why Carroll proves humans to be "thrill seekers" of sorts. It's a way of life, a way to know that you are living.

The Tell-Tale Heart: Gothic-ly Fantastic

It is true that we are all so transfixed on figuring out the afterlife, that we enthrall ourselves into such horrific stories to fill our minds, just so we can “catch a glimpse” into the other world. We assume that these stories are not true-life, and will never be. Yet we enjoy places ourselves in the character’s shoes, just to see what it would feel like if we were faced with the horror on the pages of these books.

A story that we didn’t discuss, yet is wildly popular and highly read, is “The Tell-Tale Heart” by Edgar Allan Poe. Poe surrounds you with the nervousness and mad mind of the narrator, making you feel as though you are the murderer, the mad one. I find this story to be fantastic in many ways, as well as gothic in others. The “fantastic” is created throughout, which causes the reader to draw conclusions as to the missing parts of a plot, as well as the afterthoughts of endings. Why did the story end this way? And what really and truly occurred during this last scene? We are all left wondering, yet we love the fact that we can make up our own endings and scenes to such classic and horrific stories.

The narrator claims that he is “sensitive to what others cannot hear. Sensitive to be able to see and hear things in heaven, hell, and on earth that would otherwise not be experienced”. The over-sensitivity gives way to the reasoning behind why he kills his victim, an old man with a very strange eye. He developed an obsession with the eye, calling it “the eye of a vulture – a pale blue eye with a film over it.” No reason other than the obsession gave way to the murder.

For seven nights, the narrator would spend close to seven hours making his way through the creeky door, into the old man’s room, just so that he could witness his “vulture eye”. Every morning after his venture, he would act as cheerful as ever, being cordial and having small-talk with the old man, like nothing ever happened. And on the 8^th night of the repeating visits, the narrator startles the old man in his sleep when the lantern he is using accidently clangs against the wooden door. The old man began to moan in terror, scared of the light that was coming before him. And there, in front of him, he saw the vulture eye.

As quickly as the eye caught the light, the narrator’s acute senses were awakened by a noise, which was the rapid beating of a heart. The “fantastic” finally comes into play when the question to the reader is, whose heart is beating so loudly? Is it his own, or the old man’s? The sound began getting louder and louder, as if the narrator believes the neighbors may begin to hear it. So he smothers the old man with his mattress, until the loudly beating heart, would beat no more.

After the old man is dead, the narrator dismembers him, leaving no traces of blood, so that there is no question of murder. He then took the pieces left of the body and placed them beneath the boards of the floor in the old man’s room. And at 4am, a knock came on the door. It was the police, coming to investigate reports of a “shriek”. There seemed to be no evidence after they searched the house, so the narrator pulled up a chair to sit in, on top of the boards that hid beneath it, the old man’s body parts.

The narrator began to hear the old man’s heart yet again. Pounding away in his ears, loudly, and even more loudly. The narrator became wild and uncontrollable, and after not being able to keep his composure, he admitted loudly to the deed of killing the man, and told them to rip up the boards underneath them, exposing the old man’s body. His conscience was literally eating him alive, exposing his guilt. His own beating heart, we assume, is the sound that he keeps hearing. But we are never told that it was his own heart. We have no idea, and in this case, we are dealing with both Gothic and Fantastic horror.

A Star Trap: Stoker’s Mystery Story – Not HORROR

One of Stoker’s stories that doesn’t fit Carroll’s typical horror story formula is “A Star Trap.” The story doesn’t have a monster, there is nothing out of the social norm, and it doesn’t fit any of the “disgusting” factors that make up a horror story. Even though it doesn’t have a monster it is still a very eerie story. It is more of a mystery and crime scene story than a scary story.

The story “A Star Trap” is mostly told through the first-person perspective. The story is told by a grown man who experienced a very dreadful event when he was younger. The grown man tells a committee of people what he experienced and what happened during that tragic night, which he had never told anyone about before.

The story begins with the narrator explaining that as a child he was an apprentice for a man named John (later calls him Jack) Haliday, who was a master machinist/carpenter. The narrator explains to the committee that he was helping Haliday construct a theatre production at a Victorian theatre called the Hulme. The man telling the story says that the Hulme isn’t the real name of the theatre, because he wants to hid the true identity of the place that the tragic event happened. As the narrator explains this, he asks the committee if they remembered the death of Henry Mortimer, a harlequin. He mentions that the case was never solved and nobody knows the true story behind the death, well everyone except him.

He explains to the committee why the death occurred, who killed Mortimer, and what happened to the evidence after the crime occurred. One of the first things that the narrator explains is why the death occurred. The narrator first explains that John (Jack) Haliday, the master carpenter, was an old man, but he had a young wife named Loo who worked as an actress in the theatre. He says, at first, that the couple was very happy and when they came back from their honeymoon everything was good. But as a year went by Jack Haliday became very unhappy.

The reason he had become unhappy was because Loo starting having an affair with Henry Mortimer. The narrator said, “I think the girls were all in love with him, the way they used to stand in the wings when the time was comin’ for his entrance” (222). The affair with Loo and Henry started when Henry took Loo home after practice. When this occurred “she never seemed to take her eyes off of him during every rehearsal, right up to the night of the last rehearsal” (223).

The narrator explains to the committee that everyone seemed to notice that the affair was happening. He even explains that even as a child he knew what was going on between the two, but said he did not want to make trouble so he never told Mr. Haliday. As the affair was going on, the narrator said he noticed some changes in Mr. Haliday. He said he noticed that Mr. Haliday was not well, pale, looked worried, and had a devil of a temper. Even though Haliday was sick and angry he still worked on the stage of the theatre.

One of the biggest works in the theatre was called “he trap.” The trap, as Haliday would call it, was life or death. He would always make sure that there was nothing wrong with the trap, because if something was defected then the person jumping through the trap would probably die. The trap was said to have been in a shape of a star and Mortimer was suppose to jump through it during the theatre production.

On the night that the production occurred the narrator noticed Mr. Haliday chiseling and sharpening something in his office. He did not know what he was sharpening, so he just went on his way. That night as the production began the apprentice (the narrator) noticed that Mr. Haliday kept looking at the star trap, but he didn’t say anything about it. The production still began and when it came time for Mortimer to jump through the star trap something disastrous occurred. The trap had not worked right when Mortimer tried to jump through it. After the jump, the star trap was in pieces on the ground and the body of Mortimer lay on the ground dead in many odd positions.

The audience, actors, and everyone else in the theatre were shrieking and wondering what occurred. The narrator explains that he went to the death scene and noticed that something was weird about the star. They noticed a weird looking piece of steel that was not usually apart of the star trap. The steel piece had many bent points and it seemed as if someone had put the piece in the star trap. He decided that this was the item that did not allow the trap to open like it was supposed to. The narrator explains that he took the steel item and put it in his pocket and walked away. He thought about who had put the item in the star trap and figured it was probably the item that Mr. Haliday was sharpening in his office earlier.

The narrator explains that he left the crime scene with the steel item in his pants’ pocket. Later that night, he remembered that he had put the steel item in his pants and decided that he did not want his master to get in trouble. He threw the evidence outside his window into a quarry. He knew that if his master was caught he would be charged with murder and later be hung. The narrator blamed Mrs. Haliday for the death of Mortimer because she was the one having the affair with him.
After he explains the story he tells the committee that he is the reason why Mortimer’s killer was never found. He was the only person who knew the true story behind the murder besides the killer’s wife (Mrs. Haliday) and the killer himself (Jack Haliday).

In the end, the story is told through a different perspective (third-person). The story ends with the committee talking about the story that the narrator had just told. One man on the committee knew that the story was true and knew exactly what the narrator was talking about (exact people and the real theatre). He explains that the event really happened in a place called Duke’s Theatre and he confirmed that the death really occurred. But there was another lady who calls the story a bluff. She mentions that the story is actually about a clown not a harlequin. She mentions that the carpenter at the theatre was her husband and the rest of the people have the story wrong.

In conclusion, this story is very unique. It really confused me in the end because I can’t figure out what actually happened. Was the story true? Who is telling the right story? All these questions are left for the reader to think about. For these reasons the story becomes eerie and fascinating. Because of these things the story is seen more as a mystery or crime scene story than a horror story. Stoker used a lot of great detail and the story was “dark” which made it more interesting to read. But I think I will stick with Dracula when it comes to picking a great Stoker story to read.