David J. Skal

Illuminating the dark side of the American century, The Monster Show uncovers the surprising links between horror entertainment and the great social crises of our time, as well as horror's function as a pop analogue to surrealism and other artistic movements. With penetrating analyses and revealing anecdotes, David J. Skal chronicles one of our most popular and pervasive modes of cultural expression. He explores the disguised form in which Hollywood's classic horror movies played out the traumas of two world wars and the Depression; the nightmare visions of invasion and mind control catalyzed by the Cold War; the preoccupation with demon children that took hold as thalidomide, birth control, and abortion changed the reproductive landscape; the vogue in visceral, transformative special effects that paralleled the development of the plastic surgery industry; the link between the AIDS epidemic and the current fascination with vampires; and much more. Now with a new Afterword by the author that looks at horror's popular renaissance in the last decade, The Monster Show is a compulsively readable, thought-provoking inquiry into America's obsession with the macabre.

A Cultural History of Horror

The Monster Show

A groundbreaking biography reveals the haunted origins of the man who created Dracula and traces the psychosexual contours of late Victorian society.

The Untold Story of Bram Stoker, the Man who Wrote Dracula

Something in the Blood

From acclaimed cultural critic David J. Skal, an in-depth look at one of the most popular-and perplexing-holidays in America. Using a mix of personal anecdotes and brilliant social analysis, Skal examines the amazing phenomenon of Halloween, exploring its dark Celtic history and illuminating why it has evolved-in the course of a few short generations-from a quaint, small-scale celebration into the largest seasonal marketing event outside of Christmas. Traveling the country, Skal profiles a wide cross-section of America-hard-nosed business men who see Halloween in terms of money; fundamentalists who think it is blasphemous; practicing witches who view it as sacred; and more ordinary men and women who go to extraordinary lengths, on this one night only, to transform themselves and their surroundings into elaborate fantasies. Firmly rooted in a deeper cultural and historical analysis, these interviews seek to understand what the various rituals and traditions associated with the holiday have to say about our national psyche.

A Cultural History of Halloween

Death Makes a Holiday

The primal image of the black-caped vampire Dracula has become an indelible fixture of the modern imagination. It's recognition factor rivals, in its own perverse way, the familiarity of Santa Claus. Most of us can recite without prompting the salient characteristics of the vampire: sleeping by day in its coffin, rising at dusk to feed on the blood of the living; the ability to shapeshift into a bat, wolf, or mist; a mortal vulnerability to a wooden stake through the heart or a shaft of sunlight. In this critically acclaimed excursion through the life of a cultural icon, David Skal maps out the archetypal vampire's relentless trajectory from Victorian literary oddity to movie idol to cultural commidity, digging through the populist veneer to reveal what the prince of darkness says about us all.

The Tangled Web of Dracula from Novel to Stage to Screen

Hollywood Gothic

Turner Classic Movies presents a festival of film frights, spanning monster greats to modern and classic horror to family-friendly cinematic treats that capture the spirit of Halloween, complete with reviews, behind-the-scenes stories, and a trove of images. Halloween Favorites spotlights 31 essential Halloween-time films, their associated sequels and remakes, and recommendations to expand your seasonal repertoire based on your favorites. Featured titles: Nosferatu (1922) Phantom of the Opera (1925) Dracula (1931) Frankenstein (1931) Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde (1931) The Mummy (1933) Mystery of the Wax Museum (1933) The Wolf Man (1941) Cat People (1942) Them (1953) Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956) Creature from the Black Lagoon (1954) Curse of Frankenstein (1957) Horror of Dracula (1958) House on Haunted Hill (1959) The Birds (1963) Black Sunday (1960) Pit and the Pendulum (1961) The Haunting (1963) Night of the Living Dead (1968) Rosemary's Baby (1968) The Exorcist (1972) Young Frankenstein (1976) Halloween (1978) The Shining (1980) The Thing (1982) A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984) Beetlejuice (1988) Hocus Pocus (1993) Scream (1996) Get Out (2017)

31 Movies to Haunt Your Halloween and Beyond

Fright Favorites

The A to Z Guide to Everything Undead

V is for Vampire

Historiador del cine, guionista y productor de documentales norteamericano, David J. Skal comenzó a destacar como crítico de cine en el Ohio University Post, cuando aún era estudiante. A los treinta años funda su propia empresa, cuyo objetivo es asesorar a todo tipo de compañías de teatro, danza y música. Skal es autor de tres novelas de ciencia-ficción, pero fue su fascinación por el personaje de Drácula y su dedicación al mundo del teatro lo que le llevó a escribir su primer ensayo, Hollywood Gothic (1990), que rastrea la evolución del mito desde su creación por Bram Stoker hasta su llegada al cine. Otras obras destacadas de Skal son V is for Vampire (1995), Dark Carnival: The secret world of Tod Browning (1995) y Scream of Reason: Mad Science and Modern Culture (1997). Monster Show (1993) es la historia, llena de jugosas anécdotas, del género de terror a lo largo del siglo XX, de su influencia a través de medios de expresión, que van desde la pintura y la fotografía al teatro, la televisión o la literatura, pero, sobre todo, de su gran divulgación a través del cine. El lúcido análisis histórico de esta obra plantea la hipótesis de que la ficción de terror ha cumplido siempre la función de recrear, como una inconsciente metáfora, los principales traumas y obsesiones sociales. Así, según Skal, la evolución del género de terror corre paralela a los miedos colectivos en cada momento: la Primera Guerra Mundial y el morbo por los freaks (Tod Browning y Lon Chaney), la Gran Depresión y el éxito de películas como Frankenstein y El doctor Jekill y Mr. Hyde, la Segunda Guerra Mundial y el florecimiento del género de hombres lobo, la Guerra Fría y la obsesión por las invasiones extraterrestres, y, más recientemente, la relación entre el Sida y la renovada fascinación por los vampiros.

Una historia cultural del horror

Monster Show

From Past to Present

Romancing the Vampire

The most wide-ranging collection of vampire tales ever features two centuries of spine-tingling writing, from John Polidori to Robert Block, Alexis Tolstoy to Bram Stoker, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle to Henry Kuttner. Every page of Vampires features a column of commentary by the editor, expanding upon the stories and exploring the evolution of the vampire mystique in folklore, literature, and popular culture. More than 200 beautifully rendered black-and-white images of vintage engravings, film posters, and popular artifacts make this big book the “living end” of vampire fact, fiction, and lore.

Encounters with the Undead

Vampires

The Monster Show. Storia e cultura dell'horror

Traces the history of the mad scientist character in novels, films, and popular culture, and describes how this figure reflects anxieties about scientific and technological change

Mad Science and Modern Culture

Screams of Reason

Antibodies by David J. Skal released on Feb 22, 1989 is available now for purchase.

Antibodies

Copyright Paperback Collection (Library of Congress)

Scavengers

Lorris Murail

Natalie Zimmermann

Les Croque-morts

una historia cultural de Halloween

Halloween, la muerte sale de fiesta

Elias Savada

el mundo secreto de Tod Browning, maestro de lo macabro en el cine de Hollywood

El carnaval de las tinieblas

Algo en la sangre : la biografía secreta de Bram Stoker, el hombre que escribió Drácula

Roberto Mares

Grupo Editorial Tomo

encuentros con los no muertos

Vampiros

Jessica Rains

Late in Claude Rains's distinguished career, a reverent film journalist wrote that Rains "was as much a cinematic institution as the medium itself." In Claude Rains: An Actor's Voice, noted Hollywood historian David J. Skal draws on more than thirty hours of newly-released Rains interviews to create the first full-length biography of the actor nominated multiple times for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor. This portrait of a universally respected Hollywood legend also benefits from the insights of his daughter, Jessica Rains, who provides firsthand accounts of the enigmatic man behind her father's refined screen presence and genteel public persona. With unprecedented access to episodes from Rains's private life, Skal tells the full story of the consummate character actor of his generation.

An Actor's Voice

Claude Rains

la enmarañada historia de Drácula

Hollywood gótico

David J. Skal

Books

Your next favorite book is out there