Why I Write Horror: A Rumination

[rdansky]

It’s Halloween, and I’m more-or-less a horror writer, which means that ‘tis the season I get questions like “What horror novels should I read?” (Answer: Mine, of course) and “What’s the scariest thing you’ve ever read?” (Besides a royalty statement?) and, of course, “Why do you write this stuff

Comments

[jedwardtremlett]

"Because the stories I submitted to Annie Dillard’s writing class at Wesleyan came back with the words “We have nothing to say to each other” on them."

I have a similar story involving a writing professor at OU. She started our meeting with "I'm not letting you into my class. Can you wait here while I get coffee?" and it went downhill from there. "I don't like genre, at all," she sniffed.

I eventually got in with a teacher who did, and that made all the difference. But that one still gets me.

[rdansky]

The genre fans in the English department slowly revealed themselves after one professor agreed to sponsor my thesis.