My Love for Horror

I have always had a morbid fascination for history's bizarre, obscure tales; banshees, wendigos, elves, carmans, aliens, zombies, demons, and other folklore creatures. Immersing myself in worlds created by authors like Andrzej Sapkowski, Junji Ito, Alexandre Dumas, Stephen King, and Edgar Allan Poe, I have wondered why we need these stories. Is it just fantasy? Or a cultural meta-narrative about something else? Something more profound?

I have learned that monsters have been inside us the whole time. They are created by humans through acts of thoughtless cruelty, anger, and cowardice. In an effort to absolve ourselves from the horrible things we’ve done, we have always seemed to instinctively blame otherworldly beings. Great writers have employed fantasy as a reflection on human morality. Their stories have conveyed that the evils in the world are, pointedly, of our own making. Exploring the darkest facets of human behavior is precisely why I find the horror genre so appealing.