Danse Macabre (book)

“The good horror tale will dance its way to the center of your life and find the secret door to the room you believed no one but you knew of—as both Albert Camus and Billy Joel have pointed out, The Stranger makes us nervous... but we love to try on his face in secret.”

“Terror...often arises from a pervasive sense of disestablishment; that things are in the unmaking.”

“I recognize terror as the finest emotion (used to almost quintessential effect in Robert Wise's film The Haunting, where, as in The Monkey's Paw, we are never allowed to see what is behind the door), and so I will try to terrorize the reader. But if I find I cannot terrify him/her, I will try to horrify; and if I find I cannot horrify, I'll go for the gross-out. I'm not proud.”

“We may only feel really comfortable with horror as long as we can see the zipper running up the monster's back, when we understand that we are not playing for keepsies.”

“Monstrosity fascinates us because it appeals to the conservative Republican in a three-piece suit who resides within all of us. We love and need the concept of monstrosity because it is a reaffirmation of the order we all crave as human beings...and let me further suggest that it is not the physical or mental aberration in itself which horrifies us, but rather the lack of order which these aberrations seem to imply.”

“...but talent is a dreadfully cheap commodity, cheaper than table salt. What separates the talented individual from the successful one is a lot of hard work and study; a constant process of honing. Talent is a dull knife that will cut nothing unless it is wielded with great force...”

“Talent is a dull knife that will cut nothing unless it is wielded with great force.”

“...the best horror films, like the best fairy tales, manage to be reactionary, anarchistic, and revolutionary all at the same time.”

“I think we're all a little mentally ill; those of us outside the asylums only hide it a little better-and maybe not all that much better, after all.”

“The purpose of horror fiction is not only to explore taboo lands but to confirm our own good feelings about the status quo by showing us extravagant visions of what the alternative might be.”

“Perhaps we go to the forbidden door or window willingly because we understand that a time comes when we must go whether we want to or not...and not just to look, but to be pushed through. Forever.”

“We fall from womb to tomb, from one blackness and toward another, remembering little of the one and knowing nothing of the other...except through faith.”