Vault of Cock

[troo]

A quick (and hopefully easy) question: what name did the Victorians give to the horror genre?

I'm sure someone knows this

[sean]

troo said:

what name did the Victorians give to the horror genre?

Cecil.

[carolinec]

Are you giving a prize for:
a) the correct answer;
b) the silliest answer?
If so, I think Sean may be in line for the 2nd!


This is pure guesswork based on some degree of logic as, as you know Troo, history isn't my strong point. I'd say that most horror in the Victorian era would have been labelled "occult" - ie. as being the work of the Devil. I'm not sure they'd have used the term "supernatural", probably explaining anything with a supernatural flavour as the work of the Devil in any event.

Might they have used the term "macabre" too, I wonder - perhaps for the stalk-and-slash, Jack the Ripper kind of thing? Although I guess the explanation for anyone who committed crimes of that nature would probably have been possession by the Devil - ie. something connected to the occult anyway?

Like I said, this is total guesswork. There's probably somebody here who knows the answer to that far more than I do.

I do believe Steve Gallagher's novel The Kingdom of Bones was set in that era, and I've got a feeling I've seen a link somewhere to his research notes (he always does extensive research for his novels). That might contain the answer for you. If you want, if no-one else knows, let me know and I'll see if I can find that link for you.

By the way, I'm assuming this is a serious question for some research you're doing and not a joke. If it's the latter rather than the former, then you've just got me with an early April Fool's joke!

[weirdmonger]

My guess is 'Grotesque' as in Thomas Burke's 'Victorian Grotesque'.
des

[Steve]

I'd like to think that Sean has got it right.
The only thing that raises any doubt in my mind is that when I think of horror fiction in the mid to late 19th century, one of my first thoughts is the Penny Bloods or Penny Dreadfuls... and I can't ever remember hearing about any 'Penny Cecils'... (although next time I'm looking for a pseudonym, I reckon 'Cecil Dreadful' is going to take some beating)

Des's 'Grotesque' suggestion seems likely. Poe's Tales of the Grotesque and Arabesque comes to mind.

The term 'Supernatural' was certainly in use at the time. As early as the 1820s, Walter Scott had written an essay called, "On the Supernatural in Fictitious Composition", and Ann Radcliffe penned "On the Supernatural in Poetry".

Ann Radcliffe, of course, was a well known Gothic novelist. Although Gothic literature was an 18th century phenomenon, the term was still very much in use in the Victorian era. Weren't the works of Stoker, Sheridan Le Fanu and others still considered Gothic Romances?

The only other term I've heard is 'Sensation Novels' or 'Sensation Fiction', which I think was first used to describe writers of mysteries such as Wilkie Collins, but I suppose may also have been extended to horror.

[carolinec]

I think I've lost my chance of getting any prize . Those last suggestions sound much better than mine.

[Craig Herbertson]

Lurid tales also. One of the best words in the English language, 'lurid'.

I suppose there were Gothic novels/romances and the penny dreadfuls were the pulp of their day.

[coral]

Dictionary definition of "lurid" please, mr Craig, I don't own one

[Craig Herbertson]

Miss Coral

1. gruesome; horrible; revolting: the lurid details of an accident.
2. glaringly vivid or sensational; shocking: the lurid tales of pulp magazines.
3. terrible in intensity, fierce passion, or unrestraint: lurid crimes.
4. lighted or shining with an unnatural, fiery glow; wildly or garishly red: a lurid sunset.
5. wan, pallid, or ghastly in hue; livid.
[Origin: 1650–60; < L lūridus sallow, ghastly]

[troo]

Fabulous! Thank you all, kind ladies and gentlemens!

[dem bones]

Something to bear in mind about the Cecil school was that it was, of necessity, an underground phenomena, as it was considered unseemly for any correct young gentleperson to nip into 'books etc' and ask for "some of your finest hardcore Cecil, lovey". As a result, 'ghost stories' was used to cover a multitude of sins, with the more daring reader favouring the spicier 'tales of terror' or - as Steve points out - the 'sensationalist novel'. It was left to the day's guy n. smith's (notably the Salisbury Square school) to churn out the 'penny dreadful's or 'penny blood's, truly sensationalist, gory and nasty - infamous examples include 'Varney, the Vampyre or, the feast of blood' and 'the String of Pearls', a rather innocuous title for the grisly adventures of Sweeney Todd and Mrs. Lovett the pie-maker. There were even broadsheets known as 'cocks' which related lurid and improbable horrors of local flavour. but it is in the unfairly overlooked Cecils that we find the true genesis of today's smut 'n gore classics and my thanks to Sean for commemorating them on vault.

[Steve]

admin said:

...there were even broadsheets known as 'cocks' which related lurid and improbable horrors of local flavour.

There you go, you see... and I bet that if, in reply to Troo's question "what name did the Victorians give to the horror genre?", I'd given the answer, "Cocks"... nobody (apart from Dem) would've believed me... you'd all have just thought, "Hello, Steve's off again..."

Do you think we should perhaps consider changing the name of the board to 'Vault of Cecil'?

[dem bones]

steve said:

There you go, you see... and I bet that if, in reply to Troo's question "what name did the Victorians give to the horror genre?", I'd given the answer, "Cocks"... nobody (apart from Dem) would've believed me... you'd all have just thought, "Hello, Steve's off again..."

Oh, I don't know Steve: Am sure many of our undead readers recall the heady early years of Victoria's reign when top-hatted gents would greet friendly costermongers with a hearty "a penn'orth of your finest cocks, my good man" while cheeky pantry maids would saucily tease "show me yer cocks and I'll show yers me Cecils!"

In An Age In Horror, his engrossing introduction to the first in the Reign Of Terror: Great Victorian Horror Stories series (Corgi, 1976: Barnes & Noble, 1980), Michel Parry quotes from a popular cock entitled An Account of the Dreadful Apparition that appeared last night to Henry ---- in this street, of Mary ---- the Shopkeeper's Daughter round the corner, in a shroud, all covered in white.

He ventured for a moment to raise his eyes; when - my blood freezes as I relate it - before him stood the figure of Mary in a shroud - her beamless eyes fixed upon him with a vacant stare, and her bared bosom exposing a most deadly gash.

"Henry, Henry, Henry!" she repeated in a hollow tone - "Henry! I have come for thee! Thou hast often said that death with me was preferable to life without me; Come, then, and enjoy with me all the ecstasies of love these ghastly features, added to the contemplation of a charnel house, can inspire."

have consulted the boys in the legal department about the proposed name change but, apparently, in the current climate of "political correctness" gone mad, we would have to be the 'Vault of Cecilia'.

It's "political correctness" gone mad!

[weirdmonger]

admin said:

we would have to be the 'Vault of Cecilia'.

St Cecilia, Goddess of Music?
Can we now have a thread on Handel or Anton Webern?

[dem bones]

Anton Webern? I'm all for a bit of the old culture, like, but if you fink we'll be devoting valuable space to that gargoyle what wrote 'Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor® Dreamcoat' and 'Starlight Express' so he could be rich and give her out of hot gossip one, I'm afraid you've come to the wrong board, des.

Don't know about this Handel fellow. Did he write any 'when animals attack' nasties or something?