The "art-horrific" subject of this class has inspired me to get out one of my favorite books of all time, or rather one of my favorite series of books, namely, the Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark series written by an expert in American folklore, Alvin Schwartz. This series consists of three books containing collections of particularly short stories from folklore which have the tendency to be scarier than other, less horrific, folklore. All three of the books in this series have been designated for "readers nine and up" which may say something about me, but the fact remains that most of the stories in Schwartz's three collections have drawn from me what I understand from reading Carroll's work to be the emotion of "art-horror" much more effectively than really anything I have ever read and most things I have ever watched. Now that we have finished Carroll's book on the philosophy of horror, curiosity has driven me to subject Schwartz's stories to Carroll's analysis of art-horror as a sort of case study.
One thing which comes to mind immediately is the fact that not all of Schwartz's stories contain monsters but do, in my opinion, still cause the emotion of art-horror. Many such stories stem from urban legends, like the story of the baby sitter receiving calls from a killer inside the house at which she is babysitting, and some are based on actual accounts, like the man who had a frightening encounter with a knife salesman as he walked to his car after work. These stories do not contain "monsters", and, as Schwartz stats in the introduction to his second collection, they don't have to because "scary stories of this kind [without monsters] have a serious purpose. They may warn young people of the dangers that await them when they set out in the world on their own." However, there are a great many monsters which fit Carroll's analysis of monster quite well, my favorite being the living scarecrow who skins his victims.
Another aspect of Schwartz's collections is the absolutely unsettling illustrations which accompany most stories, all drawn by Stephen Gammell. In this respect, nearly every drawing fits Carroll's standards of monsters. However, neither of the points I have made so far have addressed narrative or suspense. Here again I am impressed with how well Carroll's standards are met. I do not intend to give an analysis of every story, but suffice to say that a great many of the stories include one of Carroll's narrative techniques as well as a nice bit of suspense. For example, in the story of the monstrous scarecrow Harold mentioned above, elements of "onset, discovery, confrontation" as well as the "overreacher" plot are present, in modified forms. Two ranchers create a scarecrow out of boredom and name him after a mean farmer. (This could be con trued as onset although it is a stretch.) After the two men abuse the scarecrow when they get frustrated, they notice he starts to move and then he walks around and makes menacing faces (Discovery). The men decide to leave, knowing that they have created a monster (overreacher), but one of them is forced to go back for supplies they left behind. Here, we find both the "confrontation" and suspense elements. The suspense is clear: two possible outcomes are present, with the negative one (death by Harold) more likely than the positive one (triumph over the scarecrow and successful acquisition of supplies). The confrontation is actually unseen, but the outcome is made evident as the man who did not return for supplies watches from afar as Harold stretches the skin of the other, more unfortunate rancher on the roof of the farmhouse to dry.
In the past, I have expressed dissatisfaction with Carroll's analysis, but my case study has, at least for me, helped give Carroll's philosophy of horror more legitimacy. A great amount of the scary stories which have kept me up at night since I first checked them out of my grade school's library in the fourth grade are examples of Carroll's art-horror. Although not all of the stories pass Carroll's analysis, I am delighted that so many (including some of my favorites) do. Thus, although the stories Carroll has provided as examples have yet to scare me, or rather art-horrify me, some stories which fit well into his philosophy of horror do.
2 comments:
I am now sort of a jumpy person so I disagreed when I initially read Tourneur's quote, "...people love to be afraid. It's strange, when we're children, we say to our nurse or to our parents: 'Frighten us,' and we love that." But Bob I'm glad you brought up those Alvin Schwartz books because I too was obsessed with them in grade school. I loved the feeling of the "art-horror" and even for slumber parties my friends and I would rush to check out those books to read them aloud that night. I remember that scarecrow story and I agree with you about how it relates to Carroll's "overreacher plot." Who knew that when we were reveling in the "art-horror" as a child, we would later come to be able to discuss it in a college honors seminar!
I also was a huge fan of these books when I was younger. I can't remember which addition this story appeared in, but in one of the collections there was a story about a man with a hook for a hand who attavked a car that was forced to stop with a couple in it.To this day this story is the main reason why I am scared to have my car break down on any wooded street at night!
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