Horror in Classical Literature: ‘On a Profound and Elementary Principle'

By Edmund P. Cueva

No in- or out-of-print book has the same goals, content, wide range, and scholarly approach as the present study. Whether intentionally or unintentionally, previously published books have neglected ancient Graeco-Roman texts that either cause horror or may be said to belong to the horror genre. This may partly be the result of the low esteem in which any text that did not fit neatly into one of the major and traditional literary genres was held by most scholars – particularly apparent with regard to texts that dealt with the supernatural or the occult, which were often relegated to specialists in ancient religions, rituals or beliefs. This book reviews the concepts of horror (literary, psychological, and biophysical), examines the current definitions for ‘horror fiction’, evaluates the current interest in the darker side of the classical world, and suggests new ways of thinking about horror as a genre.

• Language: English
• Publisher: University of Wales Press
• Release date: Mar 15, 2024
• ISBN: 9781837720958

Book preview

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HORROR STUDIES

Series Editor

Xavier Aldana Reyes, Manchester Metropolitan University

Editorial Board

Stacey Abbott, Roehampton University

Linnie Blake, Manchester Metropolitan University

Harry M. Benshoff, University of North Texas

Fred Botting, Kingston University

Steven Bruhm, Western University

Steffen Hantke, Sogang University

Joan Hawkins, Indiana University

Alexandra Heller-Nicholas, Deakin University

Agnieszka Soltysik Monnet, University of Lausanne

Bernice M. Murphy, Trinity College Dublin

Johnny Walker, Northumbria University

Maisha Wester, Indiana University Bloomington

Preface

Horror Studies is the first book series exclusively dedicated to the study of the genre in its various manifestations – from fiction to cinema and television, magazines to comics, and extending to other forms of narrative texts such as video games and music. Horror Studies aims to raise the profile of Horror and to further its academic institutionalisation by providing a publishing home for cutting-edge research. As an exciting new venture within the established Cultural Studies and Literary Criticism programme, Horror Studies will expand the field in innovative and student-friendly ways.

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For Vecos

© Edmund P. Cueva, 2024

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any material form (including photocopying or storing it in any medium by electronic means and whether or not transiently or incidentally to some other use of this publication) without the written permission of the copyright owner except in accordance with the provisions of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act. Applications for the copyright owner’s written permission to reproduce any part of this publication should be addressed to the University of Wales Press, University Registry, King Edward VII Avenue, Cardiff, CF10 3NS.

www.uwp.co.uk

British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

ISBN 978-1-83772-093-4

eISBN 978-1-83772-095-8

The right of Edmund P. Cueva to be identified as author of this work has been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 79 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

The publisher has no responsibility for the persistence or accuracy of URLs for any external or third-party internet websites referred to in this book, and does not guarantee that any content on such websites is, or will remain, accurate or appropriate.

Cover image: Memento mori, Roman mosaic (1st century BC), coll. Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Napoli.

Contents

Acknowledgements

1. Introduction: Ancient Texts and ‘Things that go Bump in the Night’

2. A Multitude of Literary and Visual Horrors

3. Messenger-Speeches and Horror

4. Definitions with the Monsters and Witches of Classical Literature

5. The Novels

6. Conclusions and Suggestions

Notes

Bibliography

Acknowledgements

MY GRADUATE SCHOOL DAYS at the University of Florida led me to discover the wonderful world of ancient Greek and Roman novels. My teaching and research on the novels began at UF under Dr. Gareth L. Schmeling, the novelista par excellence. I use his excellent scholarly record as a model for my work. My interest in horror was sparked when I was a teenager by a late-night TV viewing of George Romero’s Night of the Living Dead (1968) while babysitting. Of course, being alone in an empty house as I watched the horror film made me think that every noise in the house was something to be feared and caused nightmares for the next few nights. Later in life, I saw the movie again, which made me wonder why it caused such horror.

I was lucky enough to have the University of Wales Press allow me to combine my interest in the ancient novel with my fascination with all things horror. Tremendous gratitude is owed to Sarah Lewis, Head of Commissioning at UWP, who was so kind to put up with me and the medical issues caused by Covid-19. Tremendous gratitude is owed to the anonymous reviewer that helped me rethink and rewrite this book, and I must also thank the amazing UWP team – Chris Richards, Adam Burns, Jade Jenkinson, Elin Williams, Georgia Winstone and Dafydd Jones. I couldn’t have written this book without their wonderful help and support. Thank you all so much!

At the intersection of horror and ancient Greek and Roman texts and the accompanying scholarly work, I would like to thank Debbie Felton and Nadia Scippacercola, whom I have met and collaborated with, and Xavier Aldana Reyes and Mathias Clasen, whom I have not met but upon whose I work I tried to expand my knowledge of horror, for inspiring me.

The University of Houston-Downtown has been very supportive of this project: the University Faculty Leave Program granted me a fully funded semester to work on this book. I am very thankful to Jerry Johnson and Brandi Smith-Irving of the university’s Office of Research and Sponsored Programs for making the leave possible (Jerry is a horror fan). Eric Link gave provostal support for this endeavour (and many other projects). Akif Uzman, another horror fan, shared his friendship by allowing me to pester him with emails and texts that sometimes contained weird ideas and suggestions. The chair of the university’s Department of History, Humanities, and Languages in the College of Humanities and Social Sciences, Jeffrey Jackson, was among the first to approve financial and release time. The associate dean at that time, David Ryden, always encouraged me. I cannot express how helpful the W. I. Dykes Library staff were in preparing the manuscript: Anne Zwicky, Yesenia Sanchez, and Charis Vieira for the unbelievably speedy acquisition of interlibrary loan materials, and Steve Bonario for purchasing books that I needed. Gratitude is also owed to Krista Gehring for enjoying horror as much as I do and taking over the Faculty Senate’s presidency when my term ended. Darlene Hodge helped me cope with the year I was president, allowing me to spend more time writing. Last but not least are Crystal Guillory and Alfred Saenz. Two great people that kept me compos mentis.

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Introduction

Ancient Texts and ‘Things that go Bump in the Night’

IT WOULD NOT be too far a reach or too controversial a suggestion to offer the possibility that individuals have liked to share stories that frightened each other or caused anxiety, fear, terror, or horror since the beginning of the human race.1 These stories might have been enjoyable. These stories might have been willingly or voluntarily heard. Whatever the stories were, it would not be too controversial a statement or an idea to posit that these stories were shared to induce a change in emotion or mental status: to evoke or create horror. Whatever the purpose for sharing these stories was, whether it be to amuse the listener or the audience, frighten or scare the listener or the audience, or even undergo some ritual that will cause a change, the purpose is complicated by the reality that we do not and can never have eyewitness testimonies that can tell us exactly what went on when these horrific stories were first transmitted. One can only refer to written examples of these narratives, such as the ancient Greek epic. Homer will be the starting point for examining narratives that cause a change in mental or emotional status. Since there were texts from other cultures that predated the Homeric epics, it is also part of my task to look at an example from these non-Homeric texts to try to pinpoint, or at least offer, a very early example of this type of narrative.

This book aims to review some elements in classical Greek and Roman literature that could be classified as belonging to the modern horror genre. Although the narratives, texts, or stories in this book’s first four chapters were not explicitly created to induce a change in mental status or emotion on their own or as works separate from a larger whole, they unquestionably generate horror. However, it should be kept in mind that these narratives, texts, or stories were created as part of more extensive myths, oral and literary narratives, texts, or stories. In the chapters that follow, we shall examine what are, for the most part, non-novelistic texts and compositions that belong to larger structures. For example, in Homer, one might read or listen to a passage that causes a change in emotion or mental state, but it belongs to the epic and is located within the epic or the larger oral tradition. Even if it is not highly relevant to the story’s development, it may be included for symbolic, historical, formulaic, or explanatory purposes.

Another example is the messenger-speech of tragedy, which, in itself, often causes this change in emotion or mental state. Many of these messenger-speeches contain some of the most horrific and terrifying passages from all Graeco-Roman literature. Consider, for example, the messenger-speech from Euripides’ Medea, which tells of the gruesome deaths of the king and his daughter. It would be hard to find a comparably disturbing text in Graeco-Roman literature and modern texts. However, messenger-speeches are intrinsic elements of the tragic plot and convey vital information to the characters and the audience. The supernatural in the ancient epic may have given momentary shudders to the reading or listening audience, but, as Julia Briggs observes, these stories do not materialise until the prose of late Greek or Silver Age Latin, such as Lucian or Pliny. In later Graeco-Roman texts, such as the novels, some narratives seem explicitly developed to horrify.

Closer to the modern form of horror are the inset ghost stories in Petronius and Apuleius, both of whom set out to deliberately scare a sophisticated, perhaps even a slightly sceptical audience, just as, within the Satyricon itself, Niceros tries to frighten the satiated guests at Trimalchio’s dinner with his tale of the werewolf. The stories of Socrates’ horridly animated corpse and the return of the dead Tlepolemus in The Golden Ass are quite as coolly horrifying as any modern ghost story. In general, these insert tales seem closer in mood to our own day than anything else written before the nineteenth century.2

The Epic of Gilgamesh, Humbaba, Between-Beings

Let us look at one of the earliest non-Graeco-Roman texts that may cause a change in emotion or mental state through its inclusion of horrific components: The Epic of Gilgamesh. The ancient epic, the genre to which Gilgamesh belongs, includes myth, humans, non-humans, monsters, marvels and struggles. Ancient epic teems with violent battles and clashes between humans and supernatural monsters and meetings with the dead that are fundamental elements in the ‘Babylonian epic, Gilgamesh, through Homeric poetry and the Old Testament, to Icelandic eddas and our own Beowulf’.3 Regarding the epic, Wheeler Winston Dixon comments that before the popular genre of horror films existed, there were written, oral, or dramatic examples of performances meant to horrify:

The origin of the horror story may be traced to the beginning of narrative itself […] as far back as the Babylonian Epic of Gilgamesh (circa 2000 B.C.) and Homer’s Odyssey (circa 800 B.C.), both of which involve a variety of contests between mortals and monsters with a strong otherworldly flavor, in which man is but a tool, or pawn, of the gods.4

It is important to note, Dixon writes, that the origin of the horror story ‘may be traced’ to the beginning of narrative itself (my emphasis). In other words, it perhaps can never be proven that there is any direct literary or conceptual lineage from the stories told at the beginning of literary history to horror fiction, as currently understood.

S. T. Joshi suggests that horror, or ‘supernaturalism’ as he expresses it, was present at the ‘very dawn of literary history’ because there was no distinction then, as there is now, ‘between what is understood to be natural and what is supernatural’ and that this problematises any evaluation of the supernatural fiction genre’s precursors or prototypes.5 Although Joshi characterises Gilgamesh as having ‘such staples of later weird fiction as a descent to the underworld, prophetic dreams, and ghosts and monsters of various sorts’,6 and despite the supernatural being present in the ancient Mesopotamian epic, for Joshi, ‘it was the writers of classical antiquity, especially the Greeks, who, with their prodigal creation of gods and monsters, definitively infused terror and strangeness into literature’.7

Gilgamesh inscribes and interrogates cultural beliefs and societal customs, focuses on the fear of death8 and includes horror-inducing passages, especially when monsters (e.g., Humbaba) are mentioned. Humbaba, possibly the most famous Mesopotamian monster, is the first opponent of Gilgamesh and Enkidu in the epic; Humbaba is known for having a strange appearance, breathing fire, having an abnormal face and being ‘armored with the terrifying radiance of the gods’.9 It is visually represented as anthropomorphic, with a face that ‘resembles a grotesque mass of intestines’ and with ‘leonine claws and whiskers’.10

After Enkidu and Gilgamesh fight and become friends, they go on an expedition to the Forest of the Cedars to fell timber. The reader learns that Gilgamesh does this, accompanied by Enkidu, because he wants to do something more with his life than what would be expected in his home city. The journey’s outcome is the monster’s death at the hands of Gilgamesh, but not before the beast pleads for mercy to no avail since Enkidu persuades Gilgamesh to kill Humbaba. In some versions of the story, Enkidu kills Humbaba by cutting off its head.

The fearsome clash between the heroes and the monsters must have elicited an emotional reaction from the audience in the Royal Courts. This is especially so because those listening to the epic would have been familiar with the images of the monster commonly depicted as misshapen11 and known for being ‘physically grotesque, undeniably evil, and a threat to civilization’.12 Additionally, Humbaba was perceived as a monster that crossed the boundary between civilisation (Gilgamesh and Enkidu) and the wilderness (the Forest of Cedars) – a mixed being, not only in physical appearance but also in an abstract sense.

The idea of a being composed of many different elements is alarming and even repulsive. Yet, it often serves as the basis for the types of monsters that populate ancient myth and modern horror fiction (e.g., centaurs, sirens, gryphons, chimaeras, werewolves, Mary Shelley’s Monster, William Blatty’s Regan MacNeil, John Carpenter’s The Thing, H. R. Giger’s Alien). For the Mesopotamians, monsters like Humbaba were unearthly and appeared in written texts with textual indications of divinity. Ryan S. Higgins offers Pazuzu as a ‘banner example’ of this type of monster,

whose claws, wings, and canine face compose such a fearsome image that he appears as the ultimate demonic movie monster: the possessive spirit in The Exorcist. Like modern monsters, those from Mesopotamia are more than physically mixed; they are between-beings that threaten the boundary dividing order from chaos.13

Monsters belong to experiences that arouse uncanny feelings in the reader or spectator. In his 1919 essay Das Unheimliche,14 Sigmund Freud explores how there are instances of people, places, things and occurrences humans experience uncannily. The uncanny often appears when we, for example, encounter items or objects that are inanimate but appear alive, artefacts and images or natural formations that look human but are not. It may also be provoked by the repetition and return of something new or alien yet familiar, such as ghosts that are not real but supposedly experienced.15 The uncanny experienced often blurs the boundaries between the imagined and the real or the remembered, which is why horror fiction16 so effectively produces the uncanny: it creates an imaginative and creative space where encounters with monsters occur. The uncanny may even recall dangerous ancestral environments that gave rise to today’s horror stories.17 Furthermore, uncanny stories and encounters allow the listener or reader to ‘pretend to experience extreme mental and physical states by identifying with characters who undergo such experiences’.18

These uncanny monsters bring chaos to civilisation and threaten the well-being of those who live in civilised societies. In The Exorcist (1973),19 for example, we have a being that straddles both the human and the demonic in the person of Regan MacNeil. The demon Pazuzu attempts to crush the human existence of Regan and her soul and tries to put in jeopardy the faith of the priests brought in to exorcise the demon. The demon wants to break the bond between mother and daughter and disrupt the domestic sphere. Another example is Giger’s Alien from the film of the same name (1979), which is a creature that is composed of many different elements – an uncanny being. We learn in the original movie and its prequels and sequels that the Alien is a xenomorph – a strange form – composed of human parts and extraterrestrial components.

On the planet in the original movie, humans encounter alien life forms that eventually become the Alien.20 It is unknown if alien life existed before the Engineers arrived on LV–223, one of three known moons in the Zeta Reticuli system. What is known is that these xenomorphs are focused on destruction and chaos. Thus, in both movies, we see monsters confront human heroes. In The Exorcist, Pazuzu challenges both Jesuit priests with the result that Father Merrin dies but Father Karras wins out in the end even though it means his death. All comes back to normal when Pazuzu is expelled from the bodies of Regan and Fr. Karras, as is evidenced when Regan calls out for her mother. The threatened civilised bond between mother and child is restored. In Alien,21 the xenomorph and Warrant Officer Ripley clash in a struggle from which only one can emerge victoriously. The xenomorph is destructive and chaotic, while Ripley is the product of a civilised society. The xenomorph’s death restores some balance to Ripley’s life – perhaps symbolised by the cryosleep chambers that appear at the beginning of the film and once again at the end when Ripley and her cat Jonesy go back into suspended animation in the stasis chamber.

The modern audience or reader of horror fiction thus has a close connection with the royal audience that listened to Gilgamesh. In both cases, an uncanny monster of a chaotic hybrid nature threatens the established and civilised order. In both cases, it would not be too improbable to suggest that the audience experiences some shudder, fright, anxiety, change of emotion or mental state. The most significant difference between these examples is that there is no specific attempt here to relate the story of the monster’s challenge merely as a separate self-contained story in the ancient text. In other words, the story of Humbaba belongs to the greater epic matrix and myth in which it is located. It was not explicitly created to induce horror. In the case of both films, there is no doubt that the people involved in the development and creation of the films wanted the audience to experience a change in emotion or mental state. It might be true that more significant conceptual issues might be at play in these two movies, but those issues are secondary to the true nature of the intent: to cause horror.

The Homeric Epics, the Xenomorph Cannibal, and the Living Dead

The Homeric epics contain passages that, like Gilgamesh, may provoke changes in emotion or the state of mind caused by what may be called horror. Here are some examples from The Odyssey. The first is from the ninth book of the epic:

So I spoke, but he in pitiless spirit answered

nothing, but sprang up and reached for my companions,

caught up two together and slapped them, like killing puppies,

against the ground, and the brains ran all over the floor, soaking

the ground. Then he cut them up limb by limb and got supper ready,

and like a lion reared in the hills, without leaving anything,

ate them, entrails, flesh and the marrow bones alike.

…

…

But when the Cyclops had filled his enormous stomach, feeding

on human flesh and drinking down milk unmixed with water,

he lay down to sleep in the cave sprawled out through his sheep22

(Odyssey, Book 9.287–98)

This section from book nine relates the gruesome encounter between Odysseus, his men and the cannibalistic Polyphemus. Just imagine what the listener of the epic must have experienced when this passage was recited or read. Here we have a monster, uncanny because it looks human but is not, that proceeds to slaughter Odysseus’ men like they were tiny puppies. He picks them up and slaps them against the ground so forcefully that the brains splatter and soak the earth; he cuts them up, cooks them and leaves nothing behind – this horrific monster completely consumes the men. But this is not all Homer has to share with his audience, for Polyphemus continues in his cannibalistic ways on the following day. Homer is even horrific in describing Polyphemus being tricked into becoming drunk, toppling over, falling asleep and vomiting up wine and pieces of human flesh in that drunken state.

The connection between the description of cannibalistic Polyphemus and his eating of Odysseus’ men and the horror of the passage has not gone unnoticed. For example, the English essayist and poet Charles Lamb wrote a letter to William Godwin in 1808, clarifying the connection.

To William Godwin

March 11, 1808

Letter CLVI

Dear Godwin – the giants’ vomit was perfectly nauseous, and I am glad that you pointed it out. I have removed the objection. To the other passages I can find no other objection but what you may bring to numberless passages besides, such as of Scylla snatching up the six men, etc. – that is to say, they are lively images of shocking things. If you want a book, which is not occasionally to shock, you should not have thought of a tale which was so full of anthropophagi and wonders. I cannot alter these things without enervating the Book, and I will not alter them if the penalty should be that you and all the London booksellers should refuse it. But speaking as author to author, I must say that I think that the terrible in those two passages seems to me so much to preponderate over the nauseous, as to make them rather fine than disgusting. Who is to read them, I don’t know: who is it that reads Tales of Terror and Mysteries of Udolpho? Such things sell. I only say that I will not consent to alter such passages, which I know to be some of the best in the book. As an author, I say to you, an author: touch not my work. As to a bookseller I say, take the work such as it is, or refuse it. You are as free to refuse it as when we first talked of it. As to a friend I say, Don’t play yourself and me with nonsensical objections. I assure you I will not alter one more word.23

In one of his first drafts of his translation of The Odyssey, published in 1808 as The Adventures of Ulysses, he had included the vomit composed of wine and bits and pieces of men in nauseous detail. Since the inclusion of the graphic description did not sit well with his publisher, he then removed the description. However, he would not budge on other passages that might have been considered ‘shocking’. He tells his publisher that he should have thought about the nature of The Odyssey and its content. More importantly, Lamb does not consider the passage disgusting but rather exemplary. He places the Homeric epics in the same category as such works as Matthew Gregory Lewis’s Tales of Terror (1801) and Ann Radcliffe’s The Mysteries of Udolpho (1794).

Lamb knew what he was doing when he labelled The Odyssey as horror since, after all, he was writing to the author of Things as They Are; or the Adventures of Caleb Williams (1794) – this was a most controversial book that caused a tremendous conservative reaction to horror literature because ‘it showed that the popularity of horror literature could be exploited to smuggle incendiary ideas into the sitting rooms of the nation’.24 This categorisation is important because it aligns with Radcliffe’s The Mysteries of Udolpho.

Radcliffe’s famous novel plays a ‘crucial part in gothic literature and art’.25 Along with Horace Walpole’s The Castle of Otranto (1764), generally considered the ‘first horror novel’,26 Radcliffe’s work set the parameters for any attempt to trace the development and definition of horror fiction.27 For example, in her posthumously published essay ‘On the Supernatural in Poetry’, she writes about the difference between horror and terror:

Terror and horror are so far opposite, that the first expands the soul, and awakens the faculties to a high degree of life; the other contracts, freezes, and nearly annihilates them […] and where lies the great difference between horror and terror, but in the uncertainty and obscurity, that accompany the first, respecting the dreaded evil?28

In the eleventh book of The Odyssey, two passages may contract, freeze, and annihilate one’s senses. The first passage is found in lines 37–50, and the second is in lines 576–628. Indeed, these two passages come from the book that perhaps provokes the most horror in the epic. Homer supplies a gruesome and sad description of the land of the dead as a particularly unpleasant place that is dark, terrifying and full of gloom. Odysseus arrives at the land of the dead once he has performed the sacrifices that Circe had instructed him to do to get the attention of the souls of the dead. The sacrifices involved digging a pit and pouring around it a libation for all the dead; the liquid was a mixture of milk and honey, followed by sweet wine and water. After he sprinkled white barley meal, Odysseus called upon the dead promising even more sacrifices when he returned home to Ithaca. Lastly, he took the sheep and cut their throats over the pit. The blood that was spilt was the substance that drew the dead.

A vast crowd, Odysseus says, came out to see him, and the fear that seized him was so great that Odysseus drew his sword to keep the dead at a distance from the sheep blood until he had spoken with the dead Tiresias. Odysseus then lists the dead who came to see him; the first to go to him was his comrade Elpenor. It is a rather sad listing of those who now dwell in the underworld: brides, youths that have not married, men who had a rather tough life, maidens that had never loved, and warriors that died in battle.

The second passage comes after Tiresias has departed and Odysseus sees some glorious individuals in the underworld, namely Minos and Orion. He then encounters four characters that had committed unforgivable atrocities while alive. The first is Tityos, who, because he had attempted violence on Leto, is now tortured by having vultures tear apart his liver and pierce his intestines. He was powerless against these birds. Next is Tantalus, who stands in a pool of water, and when water comes up to his chin, he attempts to drink, but the water draws back from him, and, thus, he remains thirsty. He is also constantly suffering hunger even though there are pears, pomegranates and apples above him – when he attempts to reach for these fruits, the wind casts them away from his outstretched hand. The third individual is Sisyphus, who must roll that monstrous stone up towards the crest of a hill, but, as we all know, the weight of the rock would roll it back down, and he would have to attempt once again to roll it back up to the top. The last individual is Heracles, accompanied by a fearsome noise generated by the dead. He is described as dark as the night, glaring terribly and ready to shoot with his bow and arrow. Heracles addresses Odysseus directly and asks him if he also committed an evil that brought him to the underworld.

Odysseus hoped that he would be able to see more individuals like Heracles, who had been famous while alive but who were now dead and part of the underworld. However, Odysseus could not do so because he was seized by fear when the numerous tribes of the dead rushed toward him with a terrifying cry. Besides, he did not want Persephone, the queen of the dead, to send forth the dreaded Gorgon.

It is essential to consider the genuine possibility that when the listener or reader of this book came to these scenes from the underworld, there would have been a change of mental state or emotion that would approximate what is encountered when reading modern horror fiction. The Greek epic poet gives his audience an account of those that had