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Philosophy Of Horror

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In previous chapters of Philosophy of Horror, author Noel Carroll seeks to understand horror as an artistic concept, exploring its philosophy, narrative conventions, and role as a genre. In doing so, Carroll identifies many fundamental emotional states and narrative requirements, including the use of a monster, and the feeling of dread and disgust. With the use of terror as entertainment, Carroll leads his discussion to the chapter “Why Horror,” where he seeks to explain the paradox of horror where audiences are “attracted to what is repulsive,” developing a balance between the two moral feelings (160). While many other genres instil positive emotional states, like comedy and laughter, it is worth exploring how a genre like horror functions …show more content…
Much of this application to psychoanalysis is focussed on the use of monsters to showcase unconscious desires, which produce many of the instinctual feelings of wish-fulfillment. Carroll uses the example of vampires, who carry attributes of bloodsucking, which he substitutes for the sexual desire of seduction (169). While this explains the attractiveness of horror, it differs from the previous application of horror and religious feelings. While the explanation of horror’s attractiveness is explained by the awe of the unknown, this differs because the application of psychoanalysis is based on the desires of the known, however unconsciously. Similar to the previous criticism Carroll used in his application to cosmic fear, the application of psychoanalysis served to be limited in its scope, not being comprehensive to the genre as a whole (171). For example, while the vampire example works in an unconscious application to seduction, other monsters like the Blair Witch does not exhibit sexualized characteristics as she is not seen throughout the movie. Despite Carroll discounting the use of psychoanalysis as a comprehensive answer to the horror paradox, its application did identify aspects of art-horror like the creatures being a manifestation of what is culturally repressed (174). In other words, the use of psychoanalysis failed to generalize the horror audience as being attracted to horror due to their unconscious sexual desires, but identified how aspects of their narrative feature characteristics that are culturally

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