Mazes of the Serpent - by Roger B Salomon (Hardcover)

About the Book

In a compact, readable, and accessible book, Roger B. Salomon explores the nature of horror in literature and in life. Rather than minimizing horror by narrowly associating it with psychological drives, persecution, or extremism, he approaches horror...

Book Synopsis

In a compact, readable, and accessible book, Roger B. Salomon explores the nature of horror in literature and in life. Rather than minimizing horror by narrowly associating it with psychological drives, persecution, or extremism, he approaches horror through the medium of narrative as a significant and enduring physical and metaphysical reality. Salomon focuses on fictions of horror, including eighteenth-century Gothic and nineteenth-century ghost stories. He does not, however, isolate literary examples from more general human issues, including religious belief. Mazes of the Serpent takes up examples of horror from historical and personal narratives--including battle memoirs and Holocaust testimonies--as Salomon identifies certain common themes and qualities that cross the boundary between fiction and actual human experience.

Review Quotes

Salomon (Case Western Reserve Univ.) layers the text with dense references to gothic fiction, to writers of every stripe, and to influential literary critics.... The result is a provocative, measured exploration of the elements that define horror narrative, both as literary genre and as real-life stories.... Summing up: Highly recommended.

About the Author

Roger B. Salomon is Oviatt Professor of English, Emeritus, at Case Western Reserve University. He is the author of Twain and the Image of History and Desperate Storytelling: Post-Romantic Elaborations of the Mock-Heroic Mode.