philosophy
/fɪˈlɒsəfi/
noun
1. the study of the fundamental nature of knowledge, reality, and existence, especially when considered as an academic discipline.
2. a theory or attitude that acts as a guiding principle for behaviour.
horror
/ˈhɒrə/
noun
1. an intense feeling of fear, shock, or disgust.
- a literary or film genre concerned with arousing feelings of horror.
- intense dismay.
The world is becoming an increasingly strange place. People take things and each other for granted. We live in a world where everyone is striving for material objects not worth having. Since when did the horror of living in the modern world overtake the horrors of the fictional world?
November 2015. I travelled to Newcastle Comic Con to meet Tom Burke. A couple of weeks earlier I had stumbled across a duology of books called “Tom Burke of Ours” and to this day Tom has read more of those two books than I have. The first book commences with a letter written by the titular character Tom Burke. I thought it would be fun to get actor Tom to sign the page as though he had written the letter.
Books have always formed a huge part of my life and the “Tom Burke of Ours” books were an instant ice-breaker. I asked Tom if he would recommend any interesting books he’d read (nothing wrong with expanding your reading genre.) He looked at me and asked if I ever went to dark places.
It seemed a strange thing to say, but I do love dark places, they are thought provoking. Age 13 I painted my bedroom various shades of battleship grey and marked out brickwork like an old castle with ivy and moss painted on the brickwork…my dad was not thrilled! I grew up listening to The Cure and The Sister’s of Mercy and was entranced by Tarot cards. As I nodded to Tom, I remembered the circle of people I was with. They had their own opinions about “the dark side” and they weren’t positive.
I quickly stuttered, “well, you know, just as much as most people do”…I didn't want anyone thinking I was suicidal or in a deep dark depression or the person to be avoided at all costs. As it happened Tom recommended two books to me, one being The Conspiracy Against the Human Race by Thomas Ligotti. It was an interesting book, although it made my head hurt and I needed to keep referring to the internet for further explanation. At some point, I’ll read it again, but on the back of that one book, I bought a trilogy of books by Eugene Thacker, of which Ligotti wrote:
“Thacker’s discourse on the intersection of horror and philosophy is utterly original and utterly captivating…In the Dust of This Planet is an encyclopaedic grimoire instructing us in the varieties of esoteric thought and infernal diversions that exist for the reader’s further investigation, treating to a delightful stroll down a midway of accursed attractions that alone are worth the ticket of this volume.”
In the Dust of This Planet – Horror of Philosophy Vol. 1 by Eugene Thacker.
“The world is increasingly unthinkable – a world of planetary disasters, emerging pandemics, and the looming threat of extinction. In this book, Eugene Thacker suggests that we look to the genre of supernatural horror as offering a way of thinking about the unthinkable world. To confront this idea is to confront the absolute limit of our ability to understand the world in which we live – a central motif of the horror genre.”
In the first book, Thacker uses philosophical arguments to explore our increasingly destructive world by introducing various themes such as occultism, demonology and mysticism and seeing how they manifest themselves in fiction, comic books and film. Care is taken to show the arguments are not about the philosophy of horror, but the horror of philosophy; in which he reveals the constraints and limitations in the field. He argues that one of the biggest problems we face today is trying to comprehend a world in which we live both a human and non-human existence.
