Supernatural creatures and murderers are frequent characters in horror stories.
A story is a brief narrative of imaginary events , which presents a small group of characters and appeals to the economy of narrative resources to develop a not too complex plot.
Terror , for its part, is the most intense feeling of fear , where the individual can no longer think rationally. Terror can cause cold sweats, muscle paralysis and even death from cardiac arrest.
A horror story , therefore, is a literary story that attempts to generate feelings of fear in the reader . For this, it presents stories linked to the most frightening themes for human beings, such as death, diseases , crimes, natural disasters, spirits and supernatural beasts.
The horror story can have a moralizing purpose , that is, to scare the reader so that he or she avoids certain behaviors or acts. In other cases, the horror story is nothing more than an aesthetic exercise that seeks, like any literary work, an effect on whoever reads it.
References of the horror story
Among the greatest exponents of the horror story are the Americans Edgar Allan Poe ( 1809-1849 ), HP Lovecraft ( 1890-1937 ) and Stephen King ( 1947 ), and the Frenchman Guy de Maupassant ( 1850-1893 ).
In the case of Poe , there are many of his stories that have remained in the history of the genre . "The Black Cat" , "Ligeia" , "The Fall of the House of Usher" , "The Cask of Amontillado" , "Berenice" , "The Truth About Mr. Valdemar" , "The Tell-Tale Heart" and "The Portrait" oval» are some of his main stories.
The American Edgar Allan Poe is one of the emblems of the horror story.
Keys to this type of stories
When writing a horror story it is important to keep in mind that there are four basic elements to cause fear in the reader, they are:
* Transgress the everyday : it is necessary that a specific event takes place in the story that breaks with the daily harmony of the protagonist(s), violently modifying their existence;
* Approaching the unknown : this event must be related to something that causes a certain uncertainty, a surprise that is not pleasant and, above all, that cannot be explained by reason;
* Use supernatural elements : this fact, inexplicable through reason, must have supernatural characteristics. It will not necessarily be a ghost, it may even be related to human attitudes that are difficult to understand by a normal mind: homicides , despicable acts, etc. The story must motivate the reader to dehumanize the individual, because through their way of understanding the world they will never be able to discern its essence;
* Highlight the condition of mortals : this is one of the elements that works best in the texts; push the protagonists to the ultimate limit so that they are aware of their mortality, of their inability to survive everything, calling into question their survival in the face of the horror they must face. It is not that this entity necessarily wants to kill the protagonist, but perhaps it approaches him to warn him that he is going to die or to murder one of his loved ones or even all of humanity.
Lovecraft, the horror story and the necronomicon
Surely one of the most unquestionable names in horror literature is the American Howard P. Lovecraft , who has not only created a unique universe within the genre but has known how to renew it with a terror that tends more towards psychological traumas and hallucinations and that It prevents us from fully understanding what is real and what is the fruit of imagination.
One of Lovecraft's most impressive creations is his necronomicon , a magical book that appears in many of his writings.
According to the etymology of the word, the necronomicon is the book that contains everything related to the laws of the dead . It is a series of arcane magical knowledge that, when absorbed by a person, leads them to madness and later to death. In its pages there are tips for contacting certain supernatural entities that have great power and bringing them into the world so that they rule over it.
This book, a product of Lovecraft's literary universe, has become very famous. Not only does it appear in most of this author's stories, but it has also been used by other writers to give their works that unique ingredient of horror that Lovecraft's work has; among these writers are August Derleth and Clark Ashton Smith, who have always called themselves Lovecraftians .