Man, seems forever now that when interviewers ask me why we keep telling each other scary stories, I always say it’s because we evolved to need horror, because we expect teeth in the night, we’re hardwired for it, horror just lets us feel human, but now, finally, thank you, someone smart’s saying that, and with empirical data to back it up. Would snap a pic of my copy, but as soon as I was done with it, I forced it on a friend. It’s what you do with the good books. Anyway, this is solid, the first . . . I think it’s three or four chapters specifically. The analysis/application of those chapters to our iconic horror is fun as well, but, I mean, I know those books, those movies. What was cool here was hearing about the fright mechanisms we’ve evolved, and how, maybe, to trigger them.
And, for a taste of what he says in the book:
There’s something fitting about a Dane writing this book, but I can’t put my finger on it. Maybe I’ve been watching “Vikings” (History Channel) too long. :-) Then again, Norse mythology is pretty damned scary. The thing that bugs me about the premise that horror keeps human lizard brains in fighting trim is that the lizard brain is also responsible for a lot of awful shit: fear of the Other, ostracizing the Other, killing the Other as a scapegoat, etc. Personally, I’d like to remove human lizard brains altogether; to me, it’s too costly to keep if humans ever expect to reach other stars.
yeah, a lot of the bad that happens does start with a fear response, I bet. I mean, one out of proportion or misguided and all that, but still, that mechanism. at the same time, on all the M-class planets we find, we might need some of that looking over the shoulder, to keep the tar monsters from removing us from the series . . .
Point taken. Maybe an off switch would be better. :-)
Seems like if you’re not afraid you’re not paying attention…
However, I’m a complete coward… I watched El Orfanato through a blanket, kept asking what happened, can I look now? And turned Paranormal Activity and The Conjuring off 15 minutes in because I once lived in a terrifyingly haunted house… So, yeah, afraid I have covered…
PA is the scariest movie of all, for me.
I’ve wondered about that too–the fascination Danes have with horror. Mathias is a popular lecturer at libraries in Denmark. Just a speculative notion: maybe Denmark is so safe and civilized now that the Danes particularly need thrills and chills.
kind of think it’s the whole world, maybe: everything’s so sterile and lit up that we think there can’t be monsters anywhere anymore. which is terrifying. so we tell ourselves more and more of these stories. we’re hardwired for them. we need the monsters.