Horror is one of the most popular genres of cinema and literature. For people looking to tickle their nerves or experience intense emotions, horror books or movies can be a great option.
Who likes horror?
Horror is a word derived from the English horror, which means "horror" in translation. In fact, this is just another name for various "horror films": movies, books, comics, cartoons. If you like experiencing strong emotions, experiencing fear, experiencing adrenaline rushes, this is your genre. Horror is good because it allows you to concentrate on difficult and strong emotions, "disconnecting" at any moment. For example, if we are talking about literature, you can put the book aside, feeling that there are too many emotions. Then you can make yourself some tea, turn on a romantic comedy, and so on. The book allows you to return to difficult, strong and negative emotions at any time. With films it is a little more difficult, in the cinema it will not be possible to pause the screening, but the very understanding that a scary film will end after a certain amount of time allows fans to tickle their nerves to focus on their emotions.
The first films in this genre appeared at the end of the nineteenth century.
It is believed that horror is gaining popularity during difficult, critical times. For example, Howard Lovecraft worked during the Great American Depression. Then his books were forgotten, and again "surfaced" during the Cold War.
The popularity of scary movies or horror books in difficult times is understandable. The fact is that an unstable situation motivates people to pay more attention to the imperfection of the world, to the lack of tools for understanding the world. In difficult times, the world, as it were, turns to people with a frightening, difficult side.
How does horror work?
The main agent of horror is fear. It is through fear that horror entertains and penetrates the reader or viewer. Literary or bookish fear is divided into three main types. Fear of the unknown and unknown (supernatural creatures, mysticism), hypertrophied real fear (political, social) and fear-disgust (disfigured bodies, severed limbs). The main conflict of any horror can be called an active clash of irrational, moral, rational and immoral principles. Moreover, this conflict can occur in the head of one person (one of the best representatives of this genre is "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde"), and in the format of a struggle between heroes, each of which personifies one of the origins (a vivid representative of this genre - "Silence of the Lambs ").
One of the most popular modern types of horror is zombie movies and books.
For a horror to work properly, the reader or viewer must constantly be aware of the reality of what is happening. Maintaining a complex, tense atmosphere is the main task of a horror writer. Almost all good works in this genre are based on the fact that the author “finds” the necessary lever of pressure, and leaves the rest of the work to the imagination of the reader or viewer.
