From Poster to Prologue to Sale?

Copyright 2019 by Gary L. Pullman

I'm browsing horror movie posters again. This time, I'm checking out erotic horror movie posters. There are strong parallels between erotica and horror, after all, so movie posters that advertise a cross between the two are apt to be doubly erotic or horrific or both. That, at least, is my hypothesis.

But I'm also looking for originality, so if there are more than a couple erotic movie posters concerning the same theme—vampires, werewolves, or witches, say—I eliminate those based on this theme. Thus, the poster for Vampire Lesbos, which features a beautiful, topless brunette vampire drinking what appears to be a wineglass of blood, as her largely unseen lover embraces her from behind, ends up, as it were, on the cutting-room floor; so does An Erotic Werewolf in London, whose fanged female rips away her own blouse as she begins to undergo her transformation from woman into wolf.

One of the posters that remain is that for the movie Cadaver. The poster shows a nude female body being sliced, or mutilated, by a scalpel in the gloved hand of someone (presumably, a medical examiner). The surgical knife, instead of making the “Y” incision characteristic of autopsies, cuts through the front of the woman's right breast and down the same side of her abdomen.

Blood, rising from the wound, suggests she isn't dead, after all, because, of course, cadavers don't bleed. She's a victim, it seems, rather than a dead body.

Her ordeal begs the question, Why is she being treated in this manner? Is she being tortured? Did the medical examiner (if he is a medical examiner) mistake a condition or conditions which may mimic death—catatonia, perhaps, coupled with paralysis—for her apparent absence of life? The text, which frequently unlocks the implications of the images on movie posters is, this time, of no help: “The anatomy of evil, the pathology of curse.” The film itself provides an explanation for the bleeding body that potential moviegoers aren't apt to guess.

The movie poster for Hostel: Part II (2007) seems to have been inspired by Washington Irving's short story, “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow.” Instead of a headless horseman, though, the poster features the body of an apparently decapitated nude woman, shown from neck to knees, holding what seems to be her own head, the eyes of which are turned up, showing white, and the tongue of which lolls between its parted lips.

Hostel: Part II is nothing like the legend of the headless horseman, in either its American version (Irving's version) or any of its medieval variants. However, the apparent allusion to Irving's story (or, perhaps, more generally, to the legend of the headless horseman per se) may yet be intentional, a red herring, as it were, to imply a reference that doesn't exist and a context irrelevant to the movie's actual storyline. By suggesting parallels where there are none, the advertisers of the film may have intentionally misled potential viewers, the better to intrigue them while, at the same time, preventing them from guessing the movie's plot.

The Maniac (1980) movie poster shows what, at first glance, seems to be a naked young woman wearing a veil. She is beautiful of face and attractive in “all the right places,” as the euphemistic phrase states.

However, as one begins to look closer, it's clear that what seem to be the straps of a transparent bra and the lines of sheer panties are actually seams, and the blue-eyed blonde's staring, vacant gaze suggests there's nothing human behind her stare. She is, in fact, a mannequin—a mannequin that bleeds, for blood appears at her hairline and streams down her brow and the side of her face. (I must admit, I saw these details only after taking in other of the mannequin's features.) The smooth contours of her body, like her erect posture and her empty, glazed look make it clear she's a mannequin, which makes her bleeding all the eerier.

The movie's plot clears up the mystery of the bleeding mannequin, and the explanation actually makes sense, in its own twisted way: the “maniac” implied by the movie's title is a particular type of madman, a man with a fetish for agalmatophilia, like Pygmalion.

By searching for erotic movie posters that don't depend on cliched themes, such as Vampirism, lycanthropy, and witchcraft, one is apt to find more unusual and creative possibilities for accounting for a story's erotic character or, at the very least, as in Cadaver, an innovative use of a rite theme.

But there's another use to which such approaches can be put in a horror novel (or film). A prologue or the opening scene of the story proper, can describe such a situation as a movie poster such as the one's we've considered, without presenting the explanation for its bizarre nature (or with an implied explanation which turns out, for a believable reason, to be false), thereby, like a movie poster or a movie trailer, hooking readers with the mystery of the horror and making them want to read on, even if it makes them buy the book. By the same token, such an approach might hook an editor, making him or her decide to commit to the purchase of the author's rights to his or her story.

. . . And So It Begins. . . .

Copyright 2010 by Gary L. Pullman

Elsewhere, I have analyzed the basic plot that is common to horror fiction in general. One of the elements of such a plot is the introduction, following an initial period of relative calm and normalcy, of a bizarre incident which is followed, in turn, by a series of other strange occurrences.

Most of the time, writers of horror fiction, accomplished or aspiring, have little trouble imagining such incidents, and the news supplies a wealth of possibilities when one’s imagination does fail. However, as the proverb suggests, “all is grist for the mill,” and no source of ideas for such incidents should be overlooked. One such source, for me (and, I daresay, many others) are the drawings, paintings, and photographs that are readily accessible in any Internet image browser, such as AOL, Google, Yahoo!, or Flickr.

Such browsers are easy to use, of course: simply type a specific word or group of words into the browser’s “search” window and press the SEARCH button on the computer screen or press your keyboard’s Enter key. A whole page of thumbnail images will appear, from which a specific one may be selected with the click of a mouse and enlarged, once it appears, by another click of the mouse atop the picture.

A list or keywords (“bizarre,” “eerie,” “horror,” “scary,” “strange,” “weird,” for example), will solicit hundreds of such images. More than one is likely to be appropriate as a basis for the bizarre incident that will kick off your narrative, and several may be chosen to continue the series of bizarre events that follow it. Here are a few that I came across as I prepared this post:

• A bloody, open mouth screams from within the palm of a hand.
• A streetlamp illuminates the side of a massive building, but leaves dark everything without the circle of its light.
• A set of butcher’s knives hangs from a magnetic wall strip; one of the knives is missing from the lineup.
• A close-up shot of a toy soldier’s face, looking eerily inhuman.
• The silhouette of a young girl pressing her face and arm to a foggy window; in one hand, she holds a meat cleaver.
• A dark tornado approaching across a grassy plain.
• A highway disappearing into a thick white fog as it curves round the edge of a thick forest.

Any (or none) of these images may initiate a story’s horror, depending upon the story’s needs and the writer’s mood.

Of course, after one selects an image or a series of images, he or she must develop a purpose for their use--an explanation, in other words, of their origin, a reason for the images' use in the narrative, and an account (eventually) of how and why they cohere or are related one to the next.

• The bloody, open mouth that screams from within the palm of a hand could be the result of a psychotic person’s hallucination.
• A streetlamp that illuminates the side of a massive building, but leaves dark everything without the circle of its light is a natural enough image to require no explanation of its origin, but what about it occasions the horror of the story and how is it related to successive incidents?
• A set of butcher’s knives hangs from a magnetic wall strip; one of the knives is missing from the lineup. Do the knives belong to a chef or a serial killer? Which knife is missing, and why? Will the blade be used to carve a chicken, a victim, or a cadaver?
• A close-up shot of a toy soldier’s face, looking eerily inhuman may not call for a paranormal or a supernatural explanation (although it could), but, again, how and why is this image the springboard of horror in the story to follow?
• The silhouette of a young girl who presses her face and arm to a foggy window as she holds a meat cleaver may be fairly normal (depending upon the greater context of the narrative), but why does she have the cleaver and what, pray tell, does she intend to do with it? And whose window is she's pressed against, trying, perhaps, to see whether a particular resident is home?
• A dark tornado’s approach across a grassy plain is, once again, a natural event, but who or what is it approaching, and what happens next?
• A highway disappearing into a thick white fog as it curves round the edge of a thick forest is not in itself unusual, but what lies around the curve, hidden by the fog, may be both terrible and horrific.

Finally, are any (all) of these seemingly disparate images in some way related? If so, how? If not, what sequence of bizarre incidents does follow, and how are the subsequent events related to the initial one and to one another?

. . . And so the story begins. . . .

The Madhouse

The Madhouse

Synopsis

Emily Coldwater was horrified to learn that her late parents’ estate was built with blood money. She is terrified to have discovered that the spirit of the place is alive and seeks vengeance for the terrible deeds of her father. Can Emily's own extraordinary powers protect her and her guardian aunt from the malevolent mansion that threatens to destroy the sole surviving link to her family--Emily herself? For readers who have graduated from R. L. Stine but aren't quite ready for Stephen King, this novel is a perfect read!

For more, visit The Madhouse



Sample

Prologue: The Body in the Cellar

Palm Acres stood amid the shade of broad oaks and towering pines, surrounded by a vast variety of other trees-mimosas, maples, hackberries, sycamores, birches, goldenrains, pears, maples, Eastern redbuds, crape myrtles, Washington hawthorns, Bechtel crabapples, and, of course-palms. There were royal palms, Pauroutis palms, pygmy date palms, cabbage palms, Chinese fan palms, Christmas palms, fishtail palms, key thatch palms, queen palms, Macarthur palms, jelly palms, sentry palms, Washington palms, windmill palms, and yellow butterfly palms.

Flowers grew in banks that divided the estate into various sections or “lawns,” which were designated by reference to the points of the compass as the north lawn, the northeast lawn, the east lawn, the southeast lawn, the south lawn, the southwest lawn, the west lawn, and the northwest lawn.

Shrubs and hedges, ponds and fountains, statues and mosaics decorated the lawns and gardens and marble walkways. Beyond the towering hedge that surrounded the magnificent Tudor mansion that stood at the heart of the estate, looking down upon its lush surroundings from its hilltop vantage point, the dark blue-green sea with its white, crashing breakers relentlessly assaulted the golden sands that comprised the estate’s private beach.

The house boasted over a hundred and twenty rooms, including the great hall, parlors, studies, bedrooms, a conservatory, a library, an indoor swimming pool, a kitchen, a pantry, and a dining room. Some were paneled in oak, others were papered in silk, and still others were plastered with ornamental effects, all under a slate roof of many chimneys, steep gables, arches, and towers behind brick, half-timbered walls and mullioned windows.

The huge house was more than ample for its four residents, their dog and cat, and the servants who tended the family’s every need.

Abner Coldwater had been a rogue. He had done unconscionable things to acquire the fabulous wealth that had paid for this estate. Palm Acres, despite its great beauty and tranquility, was bought, envious relatives in the extended family were fond of observing-if in whispers only, at a distance-with “blood money.” These same relatives pretended to be scandalized by Abner’s deeds, but their indignation never prevented them from attending one of the formal balls or the many dinner parties that Abner’s wife Phoebe sponsored each year.

Quite the contrary was true! These same indignant relatives practically leaped at the opportunity to make an appearance at Palm Acres. At their vilified relative’s home, the sparkling wine flowed freely, the rich food was in endless and constant supply, and luxury was everywhere at hand, both with regard to the landscaped grounds and the elegant furnishings within the lavish rooms. To Abner’s and Phoebe’s faces, they were eminent and distinguished champions of society and culture whose millions were a boon to admirable and charitable efforts to aid the less fortunate. It was only behind their backs that they were rogues and scoundrels who had amassed wealth at the expense of others’ welfare.

Preston never gave any thought whatsoever to any of his distant relatives’ gossip, slander, and abuse. To him, it meant nothing. They could say whatever they wished, in whispers behind his back, as long as, to his face, they remained fawning fools who exuded false politeness and charm. It was enough-far more than enough-that he had inherited Palm Acres from his late parents.

For Lana, the unkind remarks stung, even if she knew of them only second-hand, from those who hoped to curry favor with her by apprising her of the very things about which she would gladly have remained blissfully unaware. Like her husband, Lana took refuge in the vast luxury and deep comfort of the estate, content to have such a fabulous home, a wealthy husband, and a lovely child. Her two-year-old daughter was an angel on loan from heaven, she often told others. Little Emily had made their family complete.

Tonight’s dinner-soup and salad, homemade bread, roast squab, potatoes au gratin, spinach, and cream corn, topped off with chocolate pudding with whipped cream-had been, as always, a delicious, if late, finish to a long day. Afterward, Preston slipped into his silk pajamas, smoking jacket, and leather slippers, taking a seat in the overstuffed armchair opposite Lana’s position on the scalloped loveseat’s velvet cushions. There were a few business papers to review, and then he would retire. To help him to sleep, he would relish a glass of champagne from the family’s wine cellar.

“Damn it!”

Lana looked up from her latest Regency romance, a slight frown of concern on her lovely face.

“I wish I hadn’t given the servants the night off,” Preston complained. “I would love to have a glass of champagne just now, but--”

Lana set her book aside, closing its gilt edges upon the red ribbon bookmark to hold her place. “I’ll get a bottle,” she volunteered.

Preston smiled. “Thanks, darling, but I don’t want to bother you.”

She returned his smile. “It’s no bother, dear. I’ll be just a moment.”

He nodded, embarrassed. She knew of his childish fear of the dank, dark room in the basement. Even as an adult, he loathed the underground wine vault. It was disagreeably damp and dark even when the dim bulb was illuminated. Retreating from the sudden light, the shadows, it seemed to him, just waited for a chance to leap forth from the niches and alcoves and crevices to which they’d momentarily retreated. They bided their time, waiting to plunge the clammy room into impenetrable darkness so that whatever monsters lurked within the walls could assault him, kill him, and devour him.

Such fears were stupid and childish, he knew. Such fears were unmanly. They were also quite real to him, despite his embarrassment. Except in response to an emergency, he would not-could not-step foot into the wine cellar. It was to that dark, dank place that his father had exiled him time and again, locking him within the close, clammy space, alone and trembling in the darkness. Such was his punishment for any infraction, no matter how small, of his father’s countless rules, and such was his father’s means of ridding his son of the boy’s “foolish” fear of the dark.

The effects of such callous “punishment” were to establish within Preston a lifelong dread of the wine cellar and any other small, dark places as well as bitter self-loathing and mortification toward his childish fears and senseless timidity. Even now, he had to rely, in his servants’ absence, on a woman to fetch his wine for him, and he cursed again his unmanly fear of the dark.

Lana knew the arrangement of the bottles in the racks, where the ports, sherries, and brandies were kept and where the amontillados and champagnes were stored. Selecting a dusty bottle of Dom Pérignon, she smiled, knowing how much her husband enjoyed the delicate white wine. She turned, to ascend the narrow stone stairs, and the heavy, blunt object struck her hard in the back of the head. Lana gasped in pain and surprise, falling to her knees. The Dom Pérignon crashed against the stone floor, bursting in a spray of glass and wine. Darkness engulfed her. Lana’s last sensations were the pain in her head and the fine bouquet of the world-famous champagne.

“Preston!” Lana’s attacker cried, the voice shrill and loud over the house’s intercom speakers.

Upstairs, Preston hastily extinguished his cigarette in the smoke stand’s crystal ashtray and hurried toward the elevator that would take him to the feared and hated cellar.

“Preston!” the voice cried again.

When the elevator doors parted, he sprinted from the car, down the subterranean corridors, to the dank, dark room.

Lana lay face down on the wine cellar’s stone floor, atop the broken champagne bottle and the spilled wine.

Preston’s confederate, Natalie Martin, said, “Don’t just stand there. I can’t move her by myself.”

Preston bent over his wife’s corpse. Taking Lana’s body by the wrists, he pulled, grunting, and managed to turn the cadaver onto its back. Lana’s beautiful blue eyes stared sightlessly into his own. He shuddered. The sight of her dead body was more horrible than he had imagined, especially in the close confines of this damp cellar. Together, he and Natalie wrapped the corpse in a heavy plastic bag and sealed the bag with duct tape.

“Take her ankles,” Preston instructed his partner in crime.

The lovely, dark-haired woman with the dark eyes took an ankle in each hand and, together, Preston and she were able to drag Lana’s corpse over the rough, stone floor to a niche behind one of the wine racks.

Waiting on a low table beside the niche was a trowel and a bucket of mortar. Beside the table, there was a pile of bricks.

They stood Lana’s bagged body up against the back wall of the narrow alcove. Preston’s murderess held the corpse erect while her accomplice set the bricks in place, added a layer of mortar between each successive tier, and walled up his late wife inside the alcove.

His partner rewarded his labors with a kiss. “I love you, Preston Coldwater,” she proclaimed.

“I love you, too, Natalie Martin,” he replied, returning her kiss.

She withdrew her lips, stepping back. “You mean Natalie Coldwater, don’t you?”

Preston smiled. “Of course,” he answered, “as soon as a decent interval of mourning has passed.”

“How long do you think we’ll have to wait?” she demanded.

“I think we’ll have to wait at least a year.” He glanced nervously around the damp wine cellar that had just become his late wife’s tomb.

“There’s no way I’m waiting twelve months!”

“How about six months, then?”

She nodded, the smile returning to her face. “Are you asking me to marry you?”

He grinned. “I’ve already asked, and you’ve already accepted.” He again hazarded a glance to his left, a quick look to his right, and a peek behind.

She was distracted by his furtive, darting glances. “What are you looking for?” she demanded.

He swallowed. “You know how nervous this place makes me.”

She snorted derisively. “It was your idea to entomb her body here.”

“I know, but that doesn’t mean that I have to like it.” He started toward the arched doorway.

“Wait,” Natalie said.

He stepped into the hallway outside the wine cellar. Looking into the dank, dark room, he asked, “What is it?”

“The brat,” she said, “and Lana’s sister, Cecilia. “What do we do with them?”

“What do you mean?”

“Wouldn’t it be convenient if they were to take up residence beside darling Lana?”

Preston blanched. “You mean that we should kill them?”

Natalie’s eyes swam with amusement at his discomfort. “Why not?”

“No!”

“We don’t need them underfoot all the time, getting in our way.”

Preston shook his head. “I won’t do it. I won’t hear of it.” He hastened down the corridor.

Natalie hurried to catch up to him. “At least let’s talk about it. We don’t need a brat and her nanny. We don’t need anyone but ourselves.”

In the end, however, Preston was adamant. Needed or not, two-year-old Emily would be allowed to live, as would her Aunt Cecilia.

After all, if they were going to keep the child, they would need someone to mind her.

For more, visit The Madhouse

Toward a Taxonomy of Horror Fiction

copyright 2008 by Gary L. Pullman

“Taxonomy” is a fancy word for classification system--a sort of intellectual file cabinet for grouping things on the basis of their similarity to one another or their sharing of a common trait that excludes anything that lacks this trait. In biology, organisms are grouped by whether they have a backbone (vertebrates) or not (invertebrates), and animals are grouped as reptiles (scales), amphibians (able to breathe in water or on land), and mammals (ability to bear live young).

Whether horror fiction can be so classified is a debatable point. What is the single trait that is essential to literature that would be cause it to be considered horror fiction? Literary works that cause readers to feel fear, one might suggest, are specimens of horror fiction. This approach to the taxonomic problem classifies the work by its effect. Certainly, Edgar Allan Poe would subscribe to such a principle, as his essay “The Philosophy of Composition” makes clear.

Many things that one would not ordinarily, if at all, regard as horrific nevertheless disturb us: a steelworker’s accidental fall from a skyscraper, the crash landing of a jet airplane on the ocean, a house on fire, the sight of an animal’s cadaver alongside the highway. We tend to speak of such events as “tragic” or “unfortunate,” or “gross,” but, although they shock, sicken, and disturb us, they seldom actually frighten us.


For an incident or a situation to be horrifying, it must be personal: it must affect us individually and personally, directly or vicariously. Otherwise, it may be terrifying, atrocious, and sickening, but it is not horrific or horrifying.

This seems to be the first criterion for classifying a narrative as a horror story, then: it must affect us individually and personally, directly or vicariously.

If we are on board, a runaway train is terrifying, as would be a car that won’t stop, no matter how many times or how hard the brake pedal is stomped, or an airplane that takes a sudden and irreversible nosedive into the planet. However, it is not the train, the car, or the airplane itself that terrifies. Rather, it is the fact that it is on an uncontrollable course that could well result in our own injuries, deaths, and destruction. Since we are passengers aboard the train, or in the car, or aboard the airplane, the uncontrollable, headlong dash toward injury, death, and destruction makes the situation personal. It affects us directly and individually. Even if the runaway train, out-of-control car, or plummeting airplane were to be brought under control, its initial behavior would be harrowing. During the time that we were, as it were, at the mercy of the vehicle, we would experience true horror. If we analyze the cause of our horror, however, we understand that it is not the mere train, car, or airplane that horrifies but the fact that it is out of control. We can make no appeal to a machine, for it has neither ears to hear nor brain to think nor heart to feel.


This seems to be the second criterion for classifying a narrative as a horror story, then: the menace with which we are threatened must be out of control (beyond appeal). When the menace is a human being, part of what may make him or her uncontrollable, or beyond appeal, could be his or her inhumanity. A lack of the ability to experience emotions or the lack of a conscience, for example, puts a sociopath beyond appeal. Emotional pleas mean nothing, because he or she feels neither sympathy nor empathy, and moral appeals mean nothing, because he or she has no sense of right and wrong.

Although the threats with which horror fiction confronts its readers need not be human, and, therefore, may lack discernment and purpose, a third criterion, perhaps more desirable than necessary, as an ingredient of horror fiction is consciousness, or intelligence, for it seems that an out-of-control menace that threatens us personally and individually, directly or vicariously, is more horrific if it is intelligent than if it is merely a insentient force or being like a forest fire, a disease, or a runaway train. Intelligence gives the menace will and the ability to execute sophisticated plots. A madman, who is able to reason, after a fashion, and yet who lacks humanity--a sociopath, in other words--is far more horrific a threat than even a plummeting airplane, because he or she threatens us personally and individually, is out of control (beyond appeal), and is able to carry out his or her schemes relentlessly.

Perhaps we can classify any story, in print or on film, that meets these two criteria as being an instance of horror fiction:

1. The threat must affect the reader or audience individually and personally, whether directly or vicariously.
2. The menace with which the reader or audience is threatened must be out of control (beyond appeal).

These two elements, we may say, are essential characteristics of the horror story. To them, we can add a nice-to-have element, which, like a good seasoning, spices the plot:

3. The menace with which the reader or audience is threatened should be conscious, or intelligent, if possible.

The adoption of these criteria leaves ample room for the most monstrous monster, but it also allows us to include such stories as Psycho, Jaws, Cujo, and The Island of Dr. Moreau in our taxonomy, and most horror writers, fans, and critics would agree that these stories, involving a mad, transvestite killer; a shark; a rabid dog; and quasi-intelligent human-animal hybrids, respectively, should be accorded room on the genre’s specimen boards.

Of course, a taxonomy usually also includes subtypes. Perhaps they shall be the topic of a future post.

Charles Baudelaire’s “Carrion”

copyright 2008 by Gary L. Pullman

In a previous post, we shared several relatively short poems that express horrific themes. In this post, we share Charles Baudelier’s “Carrion,” a strange rhyme, indeed, and appalling.


First, the poem; then, the commentary:

Remember, my soul, the thing we saw
that lovely summer day?
On a pile of stones where the path turned off
the hideous carrion--

legs in the air, like a whore--displayed
indifferent to the last,
a belly slick with lethal sweat
and swollen with foul gas.

the sun lit up that rottenness
as though to roast it through,
restoring to Nature a hundredfold
what she had here made one.

And heaven watched the splendid corpse
like a flower open wide--
you nearly fainted dead away
at the perfume it gave off.

Flies kept humming over the guts
from which a gleaming clot
of maggots poured to finish off
what scraps of flesh remained.

The tide of trembling vermin sank,
then bubbled up afresh
as if the carcass, drawing breath,
by their lives lived again

and made a curious music there--
like running water, or wind,
or the rattle of chaff the winnower
loosens in his fan.

Shapeless--nothing was left but a dream
the artist had sketched in,
forgotten, and only later on
finished from memory.

Behind the rocks an anxious bitch
eyed us reproachfully, waiting for
the chance to resume
her interrupted feast.

--Yet you will come to this offence,
this horrible decay, you, the
light of my life, the sun
and moon and stars of my love!

Yes, you will come to this, my queen,
after the sacraments,
when you rot underground among
the bones already there.

But as their kisses eat you up,
my Beauty, tell the worms
I've kept the sacred essence, saved
the form of my rotted loves!

Some time after the incident (“the thing we saw/ that lovely summer day”), still haunted, it appears, by the sight, the speaker of the poem recalls having seen, while walking with his lover, the dead and bloated carcass of a maggot-infested beast. In describing the animal’s “corpse” as he reminisces about the sight to his girlfriend, thus keeping alive in his memory the appalling sight, he mixes distasteful images and adjectives that bespeak unpleasant qualities and states with images and adjectives that express agreeable and pleasant characteristics and conditions:

“thing,” “carrion,” “whore,” “sweat,” “gas,” “rottenness,” “corpse,” “flower,” “perfume,” “flies,” “guts,” “maggots,” “scraps of flesh,” “vermin,” “carcass,” “music,” “water,” “wind,” “fan,” “bitch,” “feast,” “offence,” “decay,” “queen,” “sacraments,” “kisses,” “Beauty,” “worms.”

The negative images and descriptive words and phrases suggest his disgust, but, strangely, it is a disgust that merges with attraction. He is fascinated, it seems, with what he considers the beauty of death as it is represented in the concrete and vivid spectacle of an animal’s decomposing carcass. The rotting nature of the body seems to show life’s dirty little secret, as it were: the reality (death, or nothingness) that is hidden at the center of existence.

Nature does not discriminate in its destructiveness to accord with human perceptions and prejudices of good and evil, beauty and ugliness, and value and insignificance, but kills and dismantles all. In doing so, it feeds upon itself, life deriving sustenance from the effects of death, as the flies feed upon the carcass and lay eggs that, as “maggots,” can later “finish off/ what scraps of flesh” remain, the crumbs, as it were, of the flies and dogs’ “feast.”

The speaker next personalizes death by applying the lesson he has learned from having seen the dead animal to the eventual fate of his girlfriend, observing that she, too, “will come to this offence,/ this horrible decay,” despite her religious faith, as indicated by the “sacraments,” and “rot underground among/ the bodies already there.” Death will not spare her, any more than it has spared others of her faith or, for that matter, those of no faith. Again, death is indiscriminate in its destructiveness, and neither faith nor disbelief avails against one's demise.

He ends his reminiscence and commentary upon the experience of having come across the dead animal’s rotten and bloated body by foreseeing, as it were, an ironic future situation, asking his lover to imagine herself, conscious despite her death and being devoured by “worms” whose “kisses eat” her, that he, in having survived her (for a time, at least), has “kept the sacred essence” and “saved/ the form of” his “rotted loves.” Moreover, he makes her, his “queen,” an embodiment of “Beauty,” addressing her as such.

This appellation may refer to the last lines of John Keats' “Ode on a Grecian Urn.” “Beauty is truth, truth beauty,--that is all/ Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know,” Keats wrote. Regardless of what these closing lines of Keats’ poem may mean (critics continue to debate the issue), it is truly chilling to suppose, as Baudelaire’s speaker seems to imagine, that the truth, concerning “Beauty,” is that it must, like a lovely woman, end in death, in nothingness, and in absurdity, just as love itself must end.

In such a poem, there is no hope, nor is there any reason to suggest that the repulsive and the beautiful, in the final analysis, signify any difference. If death and destruction are the end of life, of beauty, and of love, death, ugliness, and apathy are no better or worse than one another, and good and evil themselves become but moot and meaningless points.

Everyday Horrors: Forensic Etomology and Putrefaction

copyright 2008 by Gary L. Pullman

In the movie Ed Gein, the protagonist (one can’t really call Ed a “hero”) disgusts everyone else at the table of the family who’s invited him to dinner by explaining the phenomenon known as slippage, which is, basically, the flaking or sloughing off of skin from the cadaver as a result of the unimpeded activity of bacteria on the skin.

Scientists don't generally have the same sort of first-hand experience as Ed had, so, to investigate the rate of decomposition under various circumstances, they operate body farms in a number of states. On such farms, corpses are buried in different types of soil or half buried or left fully exposed to the elements so as to demonstrate the time that it takes for various states of decay to occur. Insect infestation of the corpse (known as the “colonization” of the body) is also studied (a field, should you or your children or grandchildren be interested in joining its ranks) which is known as forensic etomology.

According to the experts in this discipline, blowflies are the first to take an interest in the remains, arriving “within minutes of death.” Opportunists, these flies deposit their eggs in wounds and body orifices and cavities, including the dearly departed one’s eyes, nose, and mouth. Within three days, these eggs hatch into maggots, which feed upon the body’s banquet of “soft tissues.” Forensic etomologists use these insects as timepieces to determine the time of death, as “Forensic Etomology” points out:

Since each Calliphorid species has a characteristic temperature-dependent growth rate, the larvae can be regarded as a biological stopwatch that starts ticking shortly after the victim dies. Forensic entomologists learn to read this stopwatch by determining which insect species are present and how far they have progressed toward adulthood. With good records of ambient temperature, the post-mortem interval (time elapsed since death) can be calculated to within a few hours, even when death may have occurred 2-3 weeks previously.

Moreover, although neither blowflies nor their maggoty offspring are likely to have graduated from the Harvard School of Medicine, they can also tell scientists a thing or two about wounds and toxicology and offer even detectives a clue or two about whether the body was ambulatory--hopefully not under its own power--after its demise:

In addition to post-mortem interval, fly larvae can also reveal other important information about a crime:

1. Wounds--blow fly larvae cannot penetrate undamaged skin. An infestation inside the chest or abdomen would suggest the possibility of a bullet hole or a stab wound.
2. Movement--Since local conditions (e.g. sun or shade, urban or rural) affect which species will colonize a corpse, it may be possible to determine whether or not a body has been moved since its death.
3. Toxicology--drugs or toxins from a corpse may be detectable in fly larvae even after the body tissues are too decomposed for standard toxicological tests (“Forensic Etomology”).

(Those who, in the interest of countering the problem of evil, take note: some insects, at least, maybe were put here as a result of intelligent design, serving a useful purpose.)

As the body continues to decompose, it puts on a spread for other insects with different, if not more discerning palates: “As a body continues to decay, it goes through successive stages of decomposition. Each stage is associated with a distinctive type of insect fauna.”

The body bloats from the gases that build up inside it as a result of the bacteria that are feasting upon its “moribund tissues,” until the maggots, penetrating “body cavities. . . release the gas,” in three to five days, after which “maggots, flies, ants, and carrion beetles are abundant.” Once they have stripped most of the flesh from the bones, slippage is no longer a problem, as decay really sets in, and, although “the insect fauna becomes fewer in number but there is greater species diversity: carpet beetles, ants, skipper flies, and mites are common,” at least until the body dries and “becomes skeleton zed,” after which only “ants an mites” remain as tenants, residing in the bones for another two to three years.

Other factors, such as temperature, weather, humidity, and quicklime (if it happens to be present) speed or slow the rate of decay, but, in general, on the average, for those of you who are writing a horror story or a detective story, here’s a handy, of not dandy, timeline chronicling the stages (fresh, putrefaction, black putrefaction, butyric fermentation, and skeletonization) and time intervals of decay (“Decomposition“):

1. Fresh: the body cools to room temperature, allowing bacteria to digest carbohydrates, proteins, and lipids. Insects are first attracted to the remains
   (“Decomposition”). Within a few hours of death, rigor mortis sets in, lasting about four days (Bellows).(First few days after death) “Decomposition”).
2. Putrefaction: the body turns green as bacteria break down hemoglobin. Gases expel urine, other liquids, and feces from the body, and the mouth, lips, and tongue swell (Decomposition”). The abdomen and groin also swell (Bellows). The veins marbleize, red streaks along the vessels being succeeded by green streaks as bacteria cause the blood to hemolyze (“Decomposition”). Slippage occurs, and “over several days the spongy brain will liquefy and leak from the ears and mouth, while blisters form on the skin which eventually evolve into large, peeling sheets. Often the skin from the hand will slough off in one piece, an effect known as gloving” (Bellows). The green color darkens to brown. (First 10 days after death) (“Decomposition”).
3. Black putrefaction: if “post-mortem flatulence” isn’t sufficient to release the gases inside the cadaver, the body cavity ruptures, releasing pent-up gases, and the corpse darkens further. Insects colonize the corpse (Bellows). This stage ends when the bones become apparent. (10 to 20 days after death) (“Decomposition”).
4. Butyric fermentation: the body mummifies, drying out and loses its odor as adipocerous, or “grave wax,” a cheesy substance forms on the body. Insect activity has disposed of the internal organs (“Decomposition”).
5. Skeletalization: this final period of decomposition may last years (“Decomposition”).

Sources cited:

Bellows, Allan. "The Remains of Doctor Bass." Damn Interesting 290102007 260042008 http://www.damninteresting.com/?p=924.

"Decomposition." Wikipedia. 2008. Wikipedia Foundation, Inc.. 26 Apr 2008.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decomposition

Meyer, John R.. "Forensic Entomology." General Entomology. 210012007. North Carolina State University. 26 Apr 2008 http://www.cals.ncsu.edu/course/ent425/text01/forensic.html.

“Everyday Horrors: Forensic Etomology and Putrefaction” is part of the 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.