Download or read book Dissertations Upon the Apparitions of Angels Daemons and Ghosts written by Augustin Calmet and published by . This book was released on 1759 with total page 416 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book The Vampire Lectures written by Laurence A. Rickels and published by U of Minnesota Press. This book was released on 1999 with total page 388 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Ghosts written by Lisa Morton and published by Reaktion Books. This book was released on 2015-09-15 with total page 210 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From that cheerful puff of smoke known as Casper to the hunkiest potter living or dead, Sam Wheat, there is probably no more iconic entity in supernatural history than the ghost. And these are just recent examples. From the earliest writings such as the Epic of Gilgamesh to today’s ghost-hunting reality TV shows, ghosts have chilled the air of nearly every era and every culture in human history. In this book, Lisa Morton uses her scholarly prowess—more powerful than any proton pack—to wrangle together history’s most enduring ghosts into an entertaining and comprehensive look at what otherwise seems to always evade our eyes. Tracing the ghost’s constantly shifting contours, Morton asks the most direct question—What exactly is a ghost?—and examines related entities such as poltergeists, wraiths, and revenants. She asks how a ghost is related to a soul, and she outlines all the different kinds of ghosts there are. To do so, she visits the spirits of the classical world, including the five-part Egyptian soul and the first haunted-house, conceived in the Roman playwright Plautus’s comedy, Mostellaria. She confronts us with the frightening phantoms of the Middle Ages—who could incinerate priests and devour children—and reminds us of the nineteenth-century rise of Spiritualism, a religion essentially devoted to ghosts. She visits with the Indian bhuta and goes to the Hungry Ghost Festival in China, and of course she spends time in Mexico, where ghosts have a particularly strong grip on belief and culture. Along the way she gathers the ectoplasmic residues seeping from books and film reels, from the Gothic novel The Castle of Otranto to the 2007 blockbuster Paranormal Activity, from the stories of Ann Radcliffe to those of Stephen King. Wide-ranging, informative, and slicked with over fifty unearthly images, Ghosts is an entertaining read of a cultural phenomenon that will delight anyone, whether they believe in ghosts or not.

Download or read book The Origins of the Literary Vampire written by Heide Crawford and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 2016-08-30 with total page 149 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The long and distinguished tradition of the literary vampire began in Germany during the Age of Enlightenment. German literature was the first to adapt the vampire figure from central European folklore and superstition and give it literary form. Despite these German origins, scholarly attention devoted to literary vampires has consistently focused on a select set of sources: British and French literature, Bram Stoker’s Dracula, and the phenomenon of the vampire superstition in general. While there have been many illuminating studies of pre-literary vampires and vampires that have already been firmly established as literary figures, the story of the crucial moment of transition from folkloric figure to literary subject has not yet been told. In The Origins of the Literary Vampire Heide Crawford redirects scholarly attention to the body of German poetry and prose where vampire folklore becomes vampire literature. This book focuses on the adaptation of the vampire superstition from central European folklore by German poets in the 18th and early 19th centuries for an audience that had become increasingly interested in superstition and occult phenomena in an Age of Enlightenment. In addition to establishing that the origins of the literary vampire in 18th and 19th century German poetry and prose were informed by the stories and reports of vampires from Central Europe, Crawford argues that the German poets who adapted this figure from superstition for their creative work immediately molded it into a metaphor for contemporary cultural anxieties and fears—a connection that would inspire horror literature in general and the traits of the literary vampire in particular for the 19th century and beyond. Contemporary culture has exhibited a marked fascination with eroticized and politicized applications of the vampire. This volume traces these erotic motifs, common political motifs and others to the first vampire poems that were written by German poets. Consequently, this book answers three central questions: What were the origins of the literary vampire; how was the vampire of folklore and superstition adapted for literature; and how did German poets contribute to the development of the vampire and Gothic horror literature? By answering these and other questions, The Origins of the Literary Vampire explains how the literary vampire became the ubiquitous horror figure it is today.

Download or read book Supernatural Encounters written by Stephen Gordon and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2019-12-06 with total page 179 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The belief in the reality of demons and the restless dead formed a central facet of the medieval worldview. Whether a pestilent-spreading corpse mobilised by the devil, a purgatorial spirit returning to earth to ask for suffrage, or a shape-shifting demon intent on crushing its victims as they slept, encounters with supernatural entities were often met with consternation and fear. Chroniclers, hagiographers, sermon writers, satirists, poets, and even medical practitioners utilised the cultural ‘text’ of the supernatural encounter in many different ways, showcasing the multiplicity of contemporary attitudes to death, disease, and the afterlife. In this volume, Stephen Gordon explores the ways in which conflicting ideas about the intention and agency of supernatural entities were understood and articulated in different social and literary contexts. Focusing primarily on material from medieval England, c.1050–1450, Gordon discusses how writers such as William of Malmesbury, William of Newburgh, Walter Map, John Mirk, and Geoffrey Chaucer utilised the belief in demons, nightmares, and walking corpses for pointed critical effect. Ultimately, this monograph provides new insights into the ways in which the broad ontological category of the ‘revenant’ was conceptualised in the medieval world.

Download or read book Witchcraft Magic and Superstition in England 1640 70 written by Frederick Valletta and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2017-03-02 with total page 188 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This study examines the relationship between élite and popular beliefs in witchcraft, magic and superstition in England, analyzing such beliefs against the background of political, religious and social upheaval characteristic of the Civil War, Interregnum and Restoration periods. Belief in witchcraft received new impulses because of the general ferment of religious ideas and the tendency of participants in the Civil Wars to resort to imagery drawn from beliefs about the devil and witches; or to use portents to argue for the wrongs of their opponents. Throughout the work, the author stresses that deeply held superstitions were fundamental to belief in witches, the devil, ghosts, apparitions and supernatural healing. Despite the fact that popular superstitions were often condemned, it was recognized that their propaganda value was too useful to ignore. A host of pamphlets and treatises were published during this period which unashamedly incorporated such beliefs. Valletta here explores the manner in which political and religious authorities somewhat cynically used demonic imagery and language to discredit their opponents and to manipulate popular opinion.

Download or read book Historical Dictionary of Horror Literature written by Mark A. Fabrizi and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 2023-12-06 with total page 371 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Stories of vampires, werewolves, zombies, witches, goblins, mummies, and other supernatural creatures have existed for time immemorial, and scary stories are among the earliest types of fiction ever recorded. Historical Dictionary of Horror Literature is an invaluable aid in studying horror literature, including influential authors, texts, terms, subgenres, and literary movements. This book contains a chronology, an introduction, and an extensive bibliography. The dictionary section has more than 400 cross-referenced entries covering authors, subgenres, tropes, awards, organizations, and important terms related to horror. Historical Dictionary of Horror Literature is an excellent resource for students, researchers, and anyone wanting to know more about horror literature.

Download or read book The Vampire written by Thomas M. Bohn and published by Berghahn Books. This book was released on 2019-09-01 with total page 304 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Even before Bram Stoker immortalized Transylvania as the homeland of his fictional Count Dracula, the figure of the vampire was inextricably tied to Eastern Europe in the popular imagination. Drawing on a wealth of previously neglected sources, this book offers a fascinating account of how vampires—whose various incarnations originally emerged from folk traditions from all over the world—became so strongly identified with Eastern Europe. It demonstrates that the modern conception of the vampire was born in the crucible of the Enlightenment, embodying a mysterious, Eastern otherness that stood opposed to Western rationality. From the Prologue: From Original Sin to Eternal Life For a broad contemporary public, the vampire has become a star, a media sensation from Hollywood. Bestselling authors such as Bram Stoker, Anne Rice and Stephenie Meyer continue to fire the imaginations of young and old alike, and bloodsuckers have achieved immortality through films like Dracula, Interview with a Vampireand Twilight. It is no wonder that, in the teenage bedrooms of our globalized world, vampires even steal the show from Harry Potter. They have long since been assigned individual personalities and treated with sympathy. They may possess superhuman powers, but they are also burdened by their immortality and have to learn to come to terms with their craving for blood. Whereas the Southeast European vampire, discovered in the 1730s, underwent an Americanization and domestication in the media landscape of the twentieth century, the creole zombies that first became known through the cheap novels and horror films of the 1920s still continue to serve as brainless horror figures. Do bloodsuckers really exist and should we really be afraid of the dead? These are the questions that I seek to tackle, following the wishes of my daughter, who was ten when I started this project.

Download or read book Book Auction Records written by Frank Karslake and published by . This book was released on 1908 with total page 824 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A priced and annotated annual record of international book auctions.

Download or read book Book auction Records written by and published by . This book was released on 1907 with total page 1562 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Gothic Crossings written by Ming-Tsang Yang(楊明蒼)、Wesley Xi(奚永慧)、She-Ru Kao(高瑟濡)、Pao-Hsiang Wang(王寶祥)、Ya-feng Wu(吳雅鳳)、Min-tser Lin(林明澤)、Eva Yin-I Chen(陳音頤)、Su-ching Huang(黃素卿)、Iping Liang(梁一萍)、Han-yu Huang(黃涵榆)(Introduction by David Punter) and published by 國立臺灣大學出版中心. This book was released on 2011-01-01 with total page 450 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book The Palgrave Handbook of the Vampire written by Simon Bacon and published by Springer Nature. This book was released on with total page 1746 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Catalogue written by Maggs Bros and published by . This book was released on 1925 with total page 336 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Witchcraft and Magic in Europe Volume 5 written by Bengt Ankarloo and published by University of Pennsylvania Press. This book was released on 1999-10-14 with total page 360 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Topics include the decline of the witchcraft trials and the role of witchcraft and magic in enlightenment, romantic, and liberal thought.

Download or read book Guillermo del Toro written by Ian Nathan and published by White Lion Publishing. This book was released on 2021-11-09 with total page 183 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Guillermo del Toro is a complete and intimate study of the life and work of one of modern cinema's most truly unique directors, whose distinct aesthetic and imagination are unmatched in contemporary film. Widely regarded as one of the most imaginative directors working in cinema today, Guillermo del Toro has built up a body of work that has enthralled movie fans with its dark beauty and edge-of-the-seat set pieces. In this book, acclaimed author Ian Nathan charts the progression of a career that has produced some of contemporary cinema’s most revered scenes and idiosyncratic characters. This detailed examination looks at how the strands of del Toro’s career have woven together to create one of modern cinema’s most ground-breaking bodies of work. Delving deep into del Toro's psyche, the book starts by examining his beginnings in Mexico, the creative but isolated child surrounded by ornate catholicism and monster magazines, filming stop motion battles between his toys on a Super-8 film camera. It follows him to film school, where we learn of his influences, from Kafka to Bunuel, and explores his 1993 debut Cronos, the independent horror debut which draws on the religious and occult themes which would recur throughout del Toro's work. It goes on to cover his development as a director with 1997's Mimic, his blockbuster success with the Hellboy films and goes on to study the films which have cemented his status as a legendary auteur, Oscar award winners Pan's Labrynth and The Shape of Water, as well as his sci-fi masterpiece Pacific Rim, as well as looking at his exciting upcoming projects Nightmare Alley and Pinocchio. An enlightening look into the mind of an auteur blessed with a singular creative vision, Guillermo del Toro analyses the processes, themes and narratives that have come to be recognised as distinctly del Toro, from practical effects to an obsession with folklore and paganism. It looks into the narrative techniques, stylistic flourishes and creative decisions which have made him a true master of modern cinema. Presented in a slipcase with 8-page gatefold section, with scores of illuminating photographs of the director at work on set as well as iconic stills from his films and examples of his influences, this stunning package will delight all Guillermo del Toro devotees and movie lovers in general. Unauthorised and Unofficial.

Download or read book English Literature Printing from the 15th to the 18th Century written by Maggs Bros and published by . This book was released on 1926 with total page 932 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Colonial Complexions written by Sharon Block and published by University of Pennsylvania Press. This book was released on 2018-03-13 with total page 228 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In Colonial Complexions, historian Sharon Block examines how Anglo-Americans built racial ideologies out of descriptions of physical appearance. By analyzing more than 4,000 advertisements for fugitive servants and slaves in colonial newspapers alongside scores of transatlantic sources, she reveals how colonists transformed observable characteristics into racist reality. Building on her expertise in digital humanities, Block repurposes these well-known historical sources to newly highlight how daily language called race and identity into being before the rise of scientific racism. In the eighteenth century, a multitude of characteristics beyond skin color factored into racial assumptions, and complexion did not have a stable or singular meaning. Colonists justified a race-based slave labor system not by opposing black and white but by accumulating differences in the bodies they described: racism was made real by marking variation from a norm on some bodies, and variation as the norm on others. Such subtle systemizations of racism naturalized enslavement into bodily description, erased Native American heritage, and privileged life history as a crucial marker of free status only for people of European-based identities. Colonial Complexions suggests alternative possibilities to modern formulations of racial identities and offers a precise historical analysis of the beliefs behind evolving notions of race-based differences in North American history.