Genres as Rohrschach blots

[nancylebov]

Here's an article arguing that survival horror is a reaction to Reaganomics--the vast majority of survival horror is about being tough enough to dispose of people who can't help.

Aside from that I'm not familiar with the genre and I'd like a timeline to see if it really fits that well with Reagan, there's something dramatic which has been happening more recently: the rise of the paranormal romance.

As far as I can tell Laurel Hamilton kicked off the genre, even though Anne Rice was a clear predecessor.

Survival fiction about the threat that must be fought. Paranormal romance isn't just about falling in love with vampires, werewolves, or whatever--it's generally about integrating human and alien/occult/monstrous societies.

I'm not sure where to do with this except to say that it's suddenly become quite a popular genre and if you can read the tea leaves about survival fiction, then there's another thing going on, too. 9/11 didn't slow paranormal romance down, and now that I think about it, it may have mostly been post 9/11.

On the other hand, I have no idea why pirates, zombies, and ninjas have suddenly become so popular. Are pirates and ninjas mostly a fannish thing? Is faerie waiting in the wings?

Diskworld and Mieville's (1998) are interesting non-romance examples of integration between human and fantasy creature societies. You may not have heard of King Rat--it's a combination of gross-out horror and carefully worked out life with monsters and as a semi-human monster who remains connected to both societies.

Comments

[dr-zrfq.livejournal.com]

If one wants to run with the whole idea, then Night of the Living Dead could be construed as a reaction to Johnsonism, Vietnam, and the riots of '67 (which continued into '68). In the same vein, Survivors would then be about the economic pit of despair that was Great Britain in the early 1970's... though I'm not certain how one would explain Psychomania (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0067630/), if it's relevant...