Where Angels Fear to Hover : Between the Gothic Disease and the "Meat"aphysics of Horror

The objective of the "Literary and Cultural Theory" series is to publish works, collections of articles, and conference proceedings in the field of Humanities and Literature. The series aims at transgressing boundaries of single disciplines and at creating common space within which themes and methodologies of those single disciplines merge and contribute to the production of a novel approach to culture, literature, and philosophy.

Gothic and Horror have been perceived as intertwined ever since their coming into existence. Although initially emerging as clearly delineated literary genres, in the late 20th century we can speak of their transition into more open cultural categories. Gothic and Horror influences, previously limited to books and films, predominate in contemporary art, fashion, theatrical and performance art, video and multimedia installations, music, video and computer games. Gothic and Horror have invaded the language of politics and resulted in the formation of a number of subcultures styling their lives accordingly. The awareness of the above makes us realise that the insistence on the treatment of Gothic and Horror as separate genres is at least limiting, if not unacceptable. An alternative offered by this book, resulting from a thorough examination of the presence of Gothic and Horror conventions in contemporary culture, calls for an introduction of two new classificatory units, referred to in the book as Gothic and Horror syndromes, which can be brought down to the representations of disease and meat respectively.