Head of a Skeleton with a Burning Cigarette (1886)

Artist: Vincent Van Gogh

Bases for Fear, Part III

copyright 2008 by Gary L. Pullman

To paraphrase Elizabeth Barrett Browning, in this post, we continue to ask of life, “How do I fear thee? Let me count the ways.”




Rats. Why do they frighten? The answer is simple. They’re rodents. Oops. That’s circular reasoning. Okay. Try this. Rats are furtive. They hide, and they slink. They have beady eyes, and they’ll eat almost anything, from garbage to a newborn baby. They carry disease. They infected Europe with the bubonic plague that decimated a quarter of the continent’s population--or the fleas on them did. That’s right; rats have fleas, which is another reason they’re feared and detested. They eat crops. They have a reputation for cowardice and opportunism, which may or may not be deserved--attributing human characteristics to animals, even rats, is risky business except for figurative purposes. For all these reasons, and because they have sharp claws and teeth, and are fast on their feet, rats are, in horror fiction, as in life, bases of fear.




Snakes. Why do they frighten? The answer is simple. Snakes are in a class by themselves when it comes to objects of fear. They seem utterly alien, having neither limbs nor wings nor horns nor tusks nor even ears or snouts, and their eyes are, to borrow an apt phrase from William Butler Yeats, “as blank and pitiless as the sun.” Their gaze looks evil. It is penetrating, and it lacks not only humanity but any sort of emotion. A cat or a dog can express sentiments, but not a snake. Its vocabulary is limited to hissing, just as its locomotion is restricted to slithering. It lives in the ground, hidden, and conceals itself in swamps or grasslands, where, unseen, it may strike, embedding its fangs in the foot or leg of an unsuspecting traveler. Many are poisonous, and most have painful bites. Serpents have presence. Their very existence, and even their graceful, sinuous movements, seems to embody evil. The absolutely alien, glaring-eyed snake is, in horror fiction, as in life, bases of fear.




Tarantulas. Why do they frighten? The answer is simple. They’re spiders. Oops. Another tautology. Spiders are hideous in appearance. What’s with all those legs, and why would an innocent creature need to have compound eyes or spin webs to catch unwary insects, wrapping them in silk cocoons for breakfast, lunch, dinner, and snacks? They spin, and they wait, wary, silent predators, to take the unwary by surprise, ambushing them or trapping them for food. Tarantulas are BIG spiders, as big as a man’s fist. The damned things are furry, too--and poisonous! Their gigantic statures multiplies the spider traits that people fear, making tarantulas, in horror fiction, as in life, bases for fear.


Underground places. Why do they frighten? The answer is simple. They’re underground. And they’re dark. Most likely, they’re also clammy. They may be inhabited by creepy creeping things: spiders and lizards and snakes. A tunnel may swarm with bats or rats. A cavern may be haunted by a ghost or a monster or a whole subhuman species of nasty cannibals, headhunters, or mutant thingamajigs. Caverns can be mazes, too. Finding one’s way out may be much more difficult than finding one’s way in--in fact, it might be downright impossible (which could account for the occasional human skull or skeleton one passes along the way through these dark, subterranean labyrinths). Catacombs are creepy and ghastly, because they’re full of skeletal remains, some clothed, others dressed in rags, and still others--the majority, perhaps--naked bones. There are men, women, and, alas, children. Some sleep upon low, narrow berths, others sit slumped in corners or along tunnel walls, and still others are used as decorations, their skulls adorning the arch of a doorway. Think of yourself in an ancient Egyptian pyramid, with all those massive tons of tomb overhead. If that doesn’t make you claustrophobic, you’re ready to join the pharaoh in his or her sarcophagus. Underground places are reminders, too, of graves and tombs, and are, therefore, mementos mori. Because underground places are close, dark, isolated, and damp, and they remind us of our eventual final resting places, they are, in horror fiction, as in life, bases for fear.

Vultures. Why do they frighten? The answer is simple. They eat the dead. As children, when we chanced to spot vultures, we’d lie still on the ground, with our eyes open. The ungainly birds would start circling, descending with each revolution of their narrowing and narrowing gyre. When they’d descended to a height of about 20 feet, their salivary glands no doubt activated by what the birds hoped would be a feast, we’d leap to our feet and frighten these carrion feeders away. What a turn we must have given them! They’d thought we were dead, which is to say, from their perspective, food. Instead, they could have become our food (not that we ever wanted a snack bad enough to eat these particular eaters of the dead). Vultures have a reputation of being unclean (probably because of their fondness for road kill). They’re clumsy, and, let’s face it, these fowl are ugly. Because of their appearance and their eating habits, vultures are, in horror fiction, as in life, bases for fear.


Witches. Why do they frighten? The answer is simple. They’re in league with the devil himself, who empowers them to do his bidding. They are also his paramours. Medieval literature and Inquisition trials transcripts report witches--or women, at least, who were accused of being witches--as having testified that demon semen is ice cold and chilling to the very marrow of the bone. Demon seed causes bizarre offspring, too, legends claim. Some of the children of demons are feral; others are true imps. Rosemary’s baby had hooves and a tail and horns, and the union of a mortal woman with the devil is supposed to result, by some accounts, in the birth of the antichrist, who may or may not already be in our midst, waiting to usher in Armageddon. Because witches are the sexual and spiritual paramours of demons, they are, in horror fiction, as in life, bases for fear.

Zombies. Why do they frighten? The answer is simple. They are dead men walking, the living dead, the recipients of a curse much like that which was laid upon the Wandering Jew of legend or the ancient mariner of Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s celebrated poem. Fleshly automatons, they are just going through the paces of living, much like many of the living during the weekdays from 9:00 am to 5:00 pm (or whenever these working stiffs work their shifts). They are people without souls. They are the spiritually dead. True, according to legend and cinema, they’re not too bright, especially for creatures whose only sustenance is human brains, and they’re more than a little slow, both mentally and physically, and a whole lot clumsy. Still, there are apt to be hundreds of them, as cemeteries are repositories of many corpses. Worse yet, some among their hordes might have been a friend or a family member before they turned zombie creep. Zombies symbolize spiritual death, and they suggest that such a soulless state is possible for anyone--stranger, friend, family member, or, God forbid, even oneself; for these reasons, zombies, in horror fiction, are, as in life, bases of fear.

'Ere we part, let’s summarize our findings with regard to the nine bases of fear that were listed in this post:

• For many reasons, but especially because they have sharp claws and teeth and are fast on their feet, rats are, in horror fiction, as in life, bases of fear.
• The absolutely alien, glaring-eyed snake is, in horror fiction, as in life, a basis of fear.
• Gigantic stature multiplies the spider traits that people fear, making tarantulas, in horror fiction, as in life, bases for fear.
• Because underground places are close, dark, isolated, damp, and remind us of our eventual final resting places, they are, in horror fiction, as in life, bases for fear.
• Because of their appearance and the eating habits, vultures are, in horror fiction, as in life, bases for fear.
• Because witches are the sexual and spiritual paramours of demons, they are, in horror fiction, as in life, bases for fear.
• Zombies symbolize spiritual death, and they suggest that such a soulless state is possible for anyone--stranger, friend, family member, or, God forbid, even oneself; for these reasons, zombies, in horror fiction, are, as in life, bases of fear.

Source of photographs: U.S. Government Photos and Graphics

Identifying Elements of the Horrific

copyright 2008 by Gary L. Pullman

What constitutes the horrific? While the answer to this question may depend to some degree upon the individual and may vary from one person to another, most people would agree that some features are horrific in general by their very nature. As an aspiring horror writer, one should be familiar with these elements. This post will consider some of things that most people believe to be horrific.

Anything that is subterranean or submarine is frightening: basements, caves, crawlspaces, hell, mines, the ocean bottom or river bottoms, submarine vessels, and tunnels. We know not where (and to what) they might lead. They are paths to mysterious regions that are yet unexplored and uncharted, where there may be monsters. Were we to follow their lead, we might become irretrievably lost. We might die of hunger and thirst and exposure, alone and far from friends, family, and the culture and civilization which, in large part, give meaning to our lives. Even our corpses might be lost, remaining unburied and, worse, unmarked and unremembered. It might be as if we'd never lived at all.

Anything that is close is frightening: narrow spaces of all kinds, many of which overlap with the ones mentioned in the previous paragraph: basements, caves, crawlspaces, submarines, and tunnels. To this list, in “Premature Burial,” Edgar Allan Poe added the grave itself, as a place of absolute confinement, in the case of one who has been buried alive. We might add engines of torture in which the victim is confined, such as the iron maiden or walls that press in upon one, as they do in Poe’s “The Pit and the Pendulum.” We might also add cages, cells, dungeons, and collapsed mines.

That which is of a hideous appearance alarms. Deformities and birth defects and mutations top the list in this category, but those whose faces have been destroyed by acid, disease, or fire are also ghastly and unsettling to those whose own countenances, if not lovely or handsome, are at least of normal appearance. The deformed body is as horrific as the misshapen face, as pitiful stories of the Hunchback of Notre Dame and the Elephant Man attest.



Mementos mori frighten us because of what they are: reminders of our own looming deaths. The skull and the skeleton spring to mind as such reminders, but so also are catacombs, cemeteries, coffins, graves, headstones, morgues, mortuaries, tombs, and worms. As John Donne shows us, even the pealing of a bell can recall to us our imminent demise: we need not send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for you and me.

Vast spaces can be intimidating, as cornfields, deserts, forests, icebergs, jungles, mountains, oceans, pastures, planets, and outer space suggest. Many of these places are also isolated, which cuts characters off from society and culture and the defenses that each provides against both brutish nature and the animal nature within humanity. However, smaller places, such as total installations (boarding schools, camps, colleges and universities, forts, hotels, military installations, nursing homes, outposts, prisons, research facilities, resorts, or even trains) can also be remote and, therefore, can be not only lonely but also cut off from the larger world and its comforts, resources, and protections.

Some animals’ appearance is repulsive. Most amphibians and reptiles are, by nature as well as by their looks, abhorrent to many. God himself used a plague of frogs against ancient Egypt in his campaign to force pharaoh to release Moses and the Israelites from bondage. Insects are, likewise, revolting to many, as are worms and many other creepy crawlies. Some contend that amphibians and reptiles (and their eggs and spawn, especially) remind us of sex; others say they are mementos mori.

Wild animals, especially when their strength and abilities are magnified by conferring gigantic size upon them, frighten most people. Think of what the world would be like if it were still populated by dinosaurs and one was as likely to encounter a tyrannosaur as a hamburger at the golden arches.



Wildernesses are frightening, because they tend to be remote. Moreover, most such places are not only inhospitable in themselves, but they are also likely to be home to wild animals that will attack and, quite possibly, eat humans who, for whatever reason, trespass upon their domain. In addition to deserts, forests, islands jungles, mountains, and underwater environments, wildernesses may include the arctic, the Antarctic, hidden valleys, lost worlds, and swamps. Some may also offer dangers peculiar to themselves, such as animals that were thought to have become extinct but have somehow managed to survive in a remote area, pools of quicksand, or tribes of headhunting cannibals.

Anyone who is not only a danger to him- or herself but is also a danger to others, whether intentionally, as Leatherface or Jason might be, or unintentionally, as many teenagers tend to be, are also people to fear. Some people, just by their attitude or behavior, seem to dare the monster to spindle, fold, and mutilate them, and, of course, any monster worth the name is going to be more than happy to oblige.

Instruments of torture and death are also frightful devices, to be avoided at all costs. The number of such devices is many, and they needn’t be listed. Suffice it to say, if something looks as of it could cause pain, suffering, and/or death, most likely it can and it should, therefore, be avoided.

Of course, in a horror story, none of these persons, place, or things should be avoided forever or even for very long; if they are, the story won’t be horrific or even suspenseful. Sooner or later, characters must suffer one or more of these fates before succumbing, at last, to a hideous and ugly death:

• Abduction
• Battery
• Being bound or fettered
• Being chased or stalked
• Being eaten alive
• Being hit over the head with a blunt object
• Being flayed alive
• Being lost
• Being roasted or otherwise cooked alive
• Being shot with a pistol or a rifle (or even a crossbow)
• Being smashed by a falling boulder or other heavy object
• Cannibalism
• Disfigurement
• Dislocation of joints
• Drowning
• Electrocution
• Explosion
• Gassing
• Hanging
• Immolation
• Imprisonment
• Isolation
• Kidnapping
• Live burial
• Mauling
• Mutilation
• Poisoning
• Sexual assault
• Stabbing
• Starvation
• Strangulation
• Suffocation
• Torture

Everyday Horrors: Skeletons

copyright 2008 by Gary L. Pullman

Be honest! Would you feel a bit squeamish touching a human skull or handling a human skeleton? If you’re normal (which is to say, like most people), you’d find such an experience creepy, not delightful. In fact, if you enjoyed handling the bones of a dead person, you’d definitely be more than a little creepy yourself.

Ed Gein, the Plainfield, Wisconsin serial killer upon whose antics the characters of Norman Bates (Psycho), Leatherface (The Texas Chainsaw Massacre), and Buffalo Bill (Silence of the Lambs) are based, collected human skulls. He’d upend them, cut them in half, and, using the lower jaw as a stand of sorts, employ them as soup bowls. (He also fashioned a belt of female nipples, wore a bodysuit made of women’s flesh, wore a mask of female skin, and maintained a collection of women’s noses, among other artifacts of the graveyard, but that’s another story).

Ray Bradbury wrote an interesting little chiller about a character who was obsessessed with the idea that a skeleton inside him was just dying to get out.

Most of us find skeletons horrific because they are mementos mori, reminders of death. However, Dream Moods, an online dream dictionary, suggests that skeletons can symbolize other things, too:

To see a skeleton in your dream, [sic] represents something that is not fully developed. You may still in be the planning stages of some situation or project.

Alternatively, it may suggest that you need to get to the bottom of some matter. You need to stand up for yourself and your rights. To see someone depicted as a skeleton, signifies that your relationship with them [sic] is long dead.

Forensic scientists often turn to skeletons, when corpses are no longer available, in their attempts to solve crimes. For example, they can use the bones to determine whether the person of whom they were once a part was male or female. The male skull has a more prominent bony ridge over its eye sockets, and the female skeleton has wider hips. No, Genesis notwithstanding, female skeletons do not have one fewer rib than their male counterparts. Each has the same dozen pairs. Although the sex chromosomes determine the basic model, male or female, that the skeleton will follow, hormones are also determinants in the size and shape of the skeleton.

Testosterone causes the male model to grow longer and thicker bones and a narrower set of hips. This hormone is almost absent in the female skeleton, so it is typically shorter, more delicate, and has wider hips that give the skeleton a knock-kneed appearance. Other differences are subtler: the male skeleton has wider shoulders, a longer ribcage, and a pelvic girdle that facilitates walking and running.

According to “Male and Female Skeletons,” male and female skulls also exhibit a few differences. The former tends to be rugged and square-shaped, with bony ridges over the eye sockets; a larger, broader nose; and a bigger jaw, with larger teeth, whereas the latter is more often of lighter construction, having an oval or triangular shape; minimal bony ridges over the eye sockets; a higher, more vertical forehead; a smaller nose; smaller teeth; and a pointed chin.

Skeletons are strange enough in themselves, when you think of it, but some are stranger than others. One, found in Concepción, Chile, has no upper limbs, but its lower legs show what appear to be talons. The wildest guess as to the identity of the creature? It was supposed to have been an extraterrestrial! As it turns out, scientists identified it as the skeleton of (drum roll, please) a cat! (crashing cymbals).

Some strange skeletons are man-made, such as the “Fiji mermaid’s” skeleton that showman P. T. Barnum pieced together. It was part monkey and part fish, but Barnum passed it off as a siren such as those who harassed and tempted poor Odysseus. Another such skeleton, Live Science’s “Scientists Build 'Frankenstein' Neanderthal Skeleton” article explains, is one that anthropologists are assembling as “the first and only full-body reconstruction” of the Neanderthal “species.” The fossilized skeletal remains of two actual Neanderthals donated most of the bones for the project, the few missing bits and pieces coming from a half-dozen of their peers and a few lucky modern humans' skeletons. As a result of assembling their bony Frankenstein’s skeleton, the scientists learned a thing or two about Neanderthals that they hadn’t known before:

The biggest surprise by all means is that they have a rib cage radically different than a modern human's rib cage. . . . As we stood back, we noticed one interesting thing was that these are kind of a short, squat people. These guys had no waist at all--they were compact, dwarfy-like beings.

The anthropologists also confirmed the scientific belief that modern humans couldn’t have descended from their Neanderthal cousins: “There is no way that modern humans. . . could have evolved from a species like Neanderthal. . . . They're certainly a cousin--they're human--but they're one of those strange little offshoots.

One other fact that the scientists learned is that the Neanderthals were amazingly strong, despite their Hobbit-like appearance: “"If you shook hands with one, he would turn your hand to pulp."

Scientists believe that the discovery of dinosaurs by the ancients resulted in many of the legendary and mythical tales of fabulous and fantastic creatures, as the post on "How to Create Monstrous Monsters" explains. Such beasts are studied by cryptozoologists, whom no one appears to take seriously.

Occasionally, skeletons appear as antagonists in short stories and novels, including Perceval Landon’s “Thurnley Abbey” (1908), George MacDonald’s Lilith (1985), and Ray Bradbury’s “Skeleton” (1943).

Skeletons have been featured in fantasy movies such as The Seventh Voyage of Sinbad [1958], Jason and the Argonauts [1963], and The Mummy [1999]. A few horror movies also feature skeletons (House on Haunted Hill [1959], The Horror of Party Beach [1964], Return of the Living Dead [1985], A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors [1987], Army of Darkness [1993], Skeleton Warriors [1993], and Skeleton Man [2005].)

“Everyday Horrors: Skeletons” is part of a series of “everyday horrors” that will be featured in Chillers and Thrillers: The Fiction of Fear. These “everyday horrors” continue, in many cases, to appear in horror fiction, literary, cinematographic, and otherwise.