The Reading Room

What We Talk About When We Talk About Horror


I recently had the chance to get on a Zoom call with Reading Room blogger and literature professor Garth Bond and with horror movie writer , director, and producer Adam Simon. We decided to get together to talk about horror from the ancient world on up to today.
The conversation was spurred by the recent film of Macbeth, a story is--in many ways-- a horror story, and a horror story that has lasted for centuries. We began by talking about why horror lasts so well, while [most] comedy dissolves almost as soon as it is created. But from there we ranged into the Old Testament, Greek drama, the gothic novel, contemporary film and TV, a little neurobiology, and ended with a lightning round on what movie moment scared us the most.Watch on YouTube