Monsters in America: Our Historical Obsession with the Hideous and the Haunting Read Free

us from the incredibly assertive arrogance of the past, its lifeless yet grasping hand. If we do otherwise, we will feel that hand, cold and brutal, holding us tight and not letting us go. 6
    And so we are going to pass a long night together. If you and I make it until morning and find our way out of this dark wood, we will not see American history the same way ever again. Seeing America through its monsters offers a new perspective on old questions. It allows us to look into the shadows, to rifle through those trunks in the attic we have been warned to leave alone. Not all of our myths will make it out of here alive.
    I hope one of the first victims, by the way, is that loudmouth “American exceptionalism.” This unfortunate philosophy has it that America has always been the innocent abroad, the new nation who teaches the world democracy. This sophomoric notion of world history since 1776 presents the United States as Little Red Riding Hood, setting off on the forest path of democracy and economic liberalism. A hard look at American history raises questions about whether the American nation has been the innocent in the woods or that other, more feral figure in the forest (Oh grandma, what hairy arms you have!).
    So let our midnight ride begin. We will start by figuring out the way monster narratives work and what others have said about them, and hardly catch our breath before we plunge into colonial America’s world of witches and wonders. Creatures of scientific nightmare will haunt us in the nineteenth century as we meet Hawthorne and Poe, two old hands at navigating this eldritch wood. The twentieth century seems to open out into a new vista, but we only briefly see some sunlight, and we are back in the dark wood again, hiding from escaped mental patients and seeing strange lights in the sky. We will begin to dream of home and yet also wonder if it is all that safe a place after all before we get chased by creatures of the night eager to chew on us and suck us dry.
    I hope you have snuggled back into your favorite reading chair and assured yourself that the world, or at least your little corner of it, is a safe place. Unfortunately for you, I propose to show you that it is not. You are implicated in a violent history, a historical landscape where monsters walk. Like it or not, you are part of the story, and it is not a romantic comedy or a melodrama. You are the main character in this terror-filled little tale.
    At about this point, the Crypt Keeper would unloose a demonical laugh, both at the twisted subject matter the audience was about to read and the twisted nature of the audience who wanted to read it. Vampira would give her adolescent audience a bloodcurdling scream to announce that the grisly fun could begin. I cannot pull off that laugh, and in print no one can hear you scream. So, without further ado, let us bring on the night.

Introduction
     
THE BLOODY CHORDS OF MEMORY
     

LIST OF PHOTOGRAPHS
     
    The Hilton sisters. Photofest publicity poster. Courtesy of Photofest.
    Image of Elsa Lanchester as the Bride of Frankenstein. Courtesy of Photofest.
    Cannibal Feast. University of Illinois. Image from Theodor de Bry’s Dritte Buch Americae (Frankfurt: Theodori de Bry, 1593). Courtesy of the Rare Book & Manuscript Library, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
    Cotton Mather title page from Boston Public Library. Courtesy of the Boston Public Library, Department of Rare Books and Manuscripts.
    Sea Serpent Polka. American Memory Project, Duke University. “Sea Serpent Polka,” by Moritz Strakosch (d. 1887). Courtesy of the Rare Book, Manuscript, and Special Collections Library, Duke University.
    Hydrarchos! Sea Serpent. American Memory Project (Printed Ephemera, Portfolio 119, Folder 31). http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/index.html. Courtesy of the American Memory archive at the Library of Congress.
    The New Frankenstein: A Glimpse of the Horrible Fate in Store for Jeff Davis at the Hands of the Monster