The Other

Most horror fans understand The Other; that aspect of themselves which is not accepted, or oftentimes, even shunned by society. Horror lore is steeped in images and stories dedicated to The Other. In fact, our history in this country is built upon the perception as a necessary fact in order to retain some aspect of control.
The Other in fiction can be traced back to antiquity, however it took a nineteen-year old girl named Mary Shelly (1797-1851) to make this a reality for Victorian readers, and eventually, the world. When this wunderkind wrote Frankenstein (1818) the narrative of The Other was solidified and encoded for generations to come. But, why do horror fans gravitate to this motif time and again?

As a young African American boy growing up in the seventies, I was an oddity. Too Black for my White friends, and not Black enough for my Black friends. Into R&B, Rock, Pop, and classical music, reading comic books, serious literary novels, and devouring horror and science fiction stories; I was both independent and outside most circles…The Other. As I matured, I began to embrace these oddities within myself. I consumed horror movies from a very early age, and saw something of myself in the monsters, entities, and other-worldly and supernatural creatures. Not that I considered myself evil; no. I knew in my bones that I was also
The Other, just like them.

One of the ultimate others is the werewolf, a creature cursed to transform from human to savage beast, capable of rending humans to shreds with the single swipe of a claw. The werewolf exists outside civilized society, serving as a metaphor for what happens to us when we lose control. We are fated to live a savage, nihilistic existence. If you stray too far from the expectations of society, you become… The Other. The vampire is
The Other who although different, can blend into society by camouflaging his or her true nature. Bram Stoker’s Dracula (1897) is a great example of The Other. Once a man, now cursed to satiate an unquenchable thirst for human blood in his immortal lifetime.

Do horror fans see themselves as The Other?

Horror fans are a broad umbrella of individuals. Go to any convention and you will witness a myriad of people from various races, ethnicities, genders, and ages all enjoying the communal experience of media relating to horror. This eclectic mixture would seem quite strange to those outside the confines of the horror segment. However, these disparate individuals identify with those creatures, entities, ghosts, goblins, serial killers, demons, apparitions, and monsters (human and otherwise) who make up the canon of horror. Thus, we as horror fans see ourselves as The Other.

Guillermo Del Toro’s, 2017 Academy Award-winning film, The Shape of Water, provided audiences with a protagonist that we not only identified with, but rooted for; the Amphibian Man, played by the incomparable Doug Jones. The real monster of the piece, Michael Shannon’s character Richard Strickland, attempted to do everything in his power to humiliate, control, and ultimately, destroy The Other because of one driving motivation; fear. Most people fear what they don’t understand, so anyone who represents The Other is to be feared, rejected, hunted, and destroyed.

Which brings me full circle back to Mary Shelly and Frankenstein. The scientist Frankenstein was the monster. The creature, although fully utilized as The Other, was the tragic hero of the novel. 

And, perhaps horror fans understand that our true nature is to revel in the difference, the singularity, the Otherness of our beautiful obsession. 

To bask in our collective love of all things Horror.

— Kevin L. Williams