The Wasteland. World War I and the Birth of Horror

The human being has an inherent attraction to the frightening, which has deep roots in culture; however, horror began its ominous dance of death in literature and cinema as one of the consequences of World War I — a cataclysm unprecedented in human history, as shown by W. Scott Pull. The war forced an entire generation to confront death face to face: Fritz Lang survived but returned with thoughts on the nature of evil; Siegfried Sassoon saw the dead even in the hospital; Otto Dix's paintings became some of the most naturalistic and haunting visualizations of the horrors of war; Sigmund Freud wrote the timeless "Uncanny" in 1919. Horror became not a catharsis, but a repetition, not entertainment, but something like a guide to a new normalcy. Shells, bullets, gases, and other technological advancements transform bodies into shapeless shells, still material and organic, but evoking almost chthonic horror. Soldiers rise from their graves and accuse civilians of knowing nothing about the military sacrifice made. The vampire creates a space of "great death." "In every horror film, in every story in the horror genre, in every computer game of this genre, the ghosts of World War I frolic and tickle our nerves, residing at the very threshold of our consciousness."