During the recent NecronomiCon 2013 — a conference of all-things Lovecraftian held in HPL’s beloved Providence — I participated in a panel on weird fiction. During the lively and interesting discussion, the opinion was expressed that much weird or horrific fiction seems to be written from a “bleak existentialist perspective.” While that may well be…
Author: Richard Gavin
Richard Gavin is the author of CHARNEL WINE, OMENS, THE DARKLY SPLENDID REALM, and AT FEAR'S ALTAR. He has been praised by Publishers Weekly and hailed as a master of numinous horror fiction in the tradition of Arthur Machen, Algernon Blackwood, and H.P. Lovecraft. S.T. Joshi calls him "one of the bright new stars of contemporary weird fiction." Richard lives in Ontario, Canada.
Coins for the Ferryman: Horror as the Key to Our Dark Inner Depths
The analysis of Horror is, like almost everything else related to the genre, paradoxical. Because the genre is so rife with archetypal imagery and taboo subjects, it seems that any attempt to rationalize or understand it in purely intellectual terms is ineffectual, or at the very least inadequate. Whereas most other forms of artistic expression…
Art, Mystery, and Magic: A Fireside Chat with Don Webb
“True mysteries give more energy, more questions every time you find an answer. I truly think that searching after mysteries is the source of the immortalization of the human soul. If I ever write anything that makes someone consider that maybe they don’t know everything about everything, then I have succeeded.” — Don Webb Don…
In Praise of Horror that Horrifies
The Horror genre can evoke a panorama of emotions in its audience. Dread, lust, anxiety, giddiness, and even joy often arise, sometimes in paradoxical combinations. Peculiarly enough, it seems that the one emotion the genre evokes most rarely is the one from which its name is derived. In plain speaking, the genre is rarely frightening….
To Suffer This World or Illuminate Another? On the Meanings and Uses of Horror
In his interesting book-length meditation, Danse Macabre (1981), Stephen King posited the following theory regarding the intrinsic and perennial appeal of Horror: Why do you want to make up horrible things when there is so much real horror in the world? The answer seems to be that we make up horrors to help us cope…
Deep Shadows and Numinous Horror: Introducing “Echoes from Hades”
The question of whether I found Horror or Horror found me is a longstanding one, and despite much contemplation, I’m no closer to a definitive answer. Perhaps there isn’t one to be had. Either way, Horror unquestionably crept into my world early, and with indelible power. My name is Richard Gavin. I am a Canadian…