Morality of Horror

[tmwriter70]

I’m choosing to talk in this particular blog about something that might not be thought about much in the realm of horror. Morality. No, I’m not going to give a sermon about how horror fiction is immoral or how evil it is. In fact, I’m going to make a blanket statement here and maybe this isn't the best thing to say, but I believe that the horror

Comments

Male/Female

[anonymous]

I'm glad you asked this question! In my blog, I had to refer to the protag as he(she).

I had always thought of the protag as male, just because I think I've been trained to think of a main character as male, unless otherwise stated.

Don't you think, though, that Poe's tale is even more horrific if it's a woman. Think of all the implications then!

Interesting post.
-Natalie Duvall

Re: Male/Female

[tmwriter70]

I recently read that some people think of Poe's character as a woman and that got me thinking about it. I definitely think it would be more horrific if the main character were a woman.

Re: Male/Female

[narfnitsirk]

I also mulled over the fact that we don't know the gender of the narrator. You can take the story in all sorts of directions in your mind if you think of the killer as a lady. Changes the tone of the whole piece. The anonymity of the narrator is one of my favorite parts of the story. We know so little and so much about him (her? I still tend to think of it as a him.).
-
Kristin Dearborn

Re: Male/Female

[tmwriter70]

I still tend to think of the narrator as a man, but it would be fun to go through thinking that this was a woman. Maybe I'm making a gross chauvinistic statement, but some of the characters actions are almost female in their delivery. It could be the times of the story and it could be that I am thinking from the wrong point of view. I don't know.

Re: Male/Female

[dr_arnzen]

Excellent post. It's always good to question the gender of the narrator in first person, because writers (esp in horror/mystery) will play with our assumptions. I remember a book by Peter Straub, called Mr. X, that never reveals that the protagonist is African-American, yet the way characters treat the protag half-way through surprise most (white?) readers when racism starts to appear.

In this tale, I think I've always presumed the narrator was male because he lives with the old man; a wife probably wouldn't be an outsider to the bedroom the way this person is. And the police likely would have treated the killer differently when they came over. But maybe I'm wrong, and just making too many assumptions.

Your larger point about the 'moral code' is really perceptive. This manifests itself in guilt. Good work. Keep bloggin' as you read!

Re: Male/Female

[anonymous]

Outstanding blog. I had honestly never considered whether the main character in The Tell-Tale Heart was male or female. To your point, I guess, it's not critical to what Poe's doing in the story.

However, if the Protagonist stated they were a woman first, what kind of baggage would it bring to the story.

I wonder how successful it would have been over the course of time as writer's in the 1800's often idealized women (thinking of Stoker's treatment of women in Dracula). I think the story wouldn't have weathered the Victorian era so well...but who knows.

-Eric Spery