Wasteland: The Great War and the Origins of Modern Horror

By W. Scott Poole

A historian and Bram Stoker Award nominee traces the birth of modern horror movies and literature back to World War I, exploring how the conflict influenced H.P. Lovecraft, Franz Kafka, and other artists of the genre.

From Nosferatu to Frankenstein’s monster, from Fritz Lang to James Whale, the touchstones of horror can all trace their roots to the bloodshed of the First World War.

Bram Stoker Award nominee W. Scott Poole traces the confluence of military history, technology, and art in the wake of World War I to show how overwhelming carnage gave birth to a wholly new art form: modern horror films and literature.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Random House Publishing Group
• Release date: Oct 16, 2018
• ISBN: 9781619022881

Reviews for Wasteland

[datrappert · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

There is much of interest in Poole's survey of post-WWI horror in both film and print, but he definitely overreaches, and when he starts to comment on larger matters, even when his instincts are correct, the book turns even more preachy than the tone it uses throughout. Still, this will make you take a look at Nosferatu, The Cabinet of Doctor Calagari, and a few other films you have heard of but never watched or watched once long ago before you knew what you were seeing. There are a few factual errors I noticed, but they were small. The audiobook narrator, whose tone is a bit annoying--maybe it isn't the author himself--misreads a word here and there as well. Still, recommended as a serious study of horror. And if it gets you to look at the works of artist Otto Dix online, it will have paid you back many times for your investment of time.

[gothamajp · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

This book left me somewhat conflicted. On the one hand it’s a pretty good overview of the development of the horror genre in the years between 1914 and 1939 (which led to me adding several new entries to my streaming services movie watch lists), based on a deeper dive into the careers of specific writers, artists, and film-makers. But it never really expands on its central thesis, as it spins off into a passionate, engaging, and at times emotional manuscript on the horrors we inflict on each other, the rise of fascism, and it’s echoes today. All powerful stuff, but tangential to the advertised theme.

[shannonrose4 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

A book I never really thought I would read as I don't care for horror. I flew through the pages.
This is one of the most intriguing histories of war and how it's influence has reached into every aspect of our lives to this day.
I simply could not put this book down!
Shannon Alden, Literati Bookstore

[richardderus · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I made 65 notes on this book and never wrote the review! That's terrible. A waste of note-taking not to use them for their intended purpose.I enjoyed this fluid, fluent recounting of the modern horror genre's explosion after the nightmarish experience of WWI. The rise of the film industry, its ability to offer a new take on the Gothic tale and meld it to the lived reality of millions...well, that's a tale worth telling. Poole told it well, but used a choppy technique that might be off-putting to some readers; it does feel a bit like reading someone's index cards for a high-school research paper. To me, it reinforced the currents in culture that Poole was highlighting, and allowed him to be pithy but thorough in making his points about the whys and wherefores of the evolution of Gothic stories into horror stories.At all events, it bums me out that I didn't write a real review months ago while this book's pleasures and strengths were fresh in my mind. Now I can't recapture that impetus. But I can and do say that anyone with more than a passing interest in horror storytelling would do well to read the text closely.

[shrike58 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

The problem with this work is that it feels rather scattershot in that while Poole draws interesting links between a disparate array of cultural figures, when was the last time you can remember Franz Kafka & H.P. Lovecraft being invoked at the same time, and writes with genuine passion, my sense is that this book needed another editorial pass by someone. That said, Poole makes the trenchant points that modern horror, initially, is less of an effort to seek catharsis to the atrocities of World War I than, first, an effort to drag an uncomprehending civilian population to the void and force them to peer in, followed by an expression of constant dread that modern power politics remains capable of unleashing unmitigated disaster if not reeled in. Also, Poole has a thread where he contemplates the interaction between horror and fascistic politics, as while some cultural producers used horror as a way to speak truth to power the fascist mentality tended to weaponize horror as a means of producing chaos as a way to power; Poole is quite unsympathetic to a variety of cultural producers (Lovecraft, Dali, T.S. Elliott, etc.) who tend to get a pass for their flirtations with fascist politics. From there this study fades out more than ends, as the cultural producers Poole is studying faded away; linking cultural history to the current political climate in a strong conclusion would have made for a better book.