Living in Fear: A History of Horror in the Mass Media Quality Paperbacks Horror Book Review

A superb treatise on horror as developed in all of the artistic media of Western civilization from remotest antiquity to the “Creature Features” of 50’s and 60’s TV and the Satan craze in films of the 70’s. Daniels in a sense updates H.P.Lovecraft’s excellent essay “Supernatural Horror in Literature”, although he addresses film, radio programs (like “Inner Sanctum”), psychedelic rock music, TV, and comic books with equal erudition (HPL, unfortunately, did not live long enough to witness the flowering of these media forms). The book was originally published in 1975, and I can’t help but wonder if Mr.Daniels has any plans to update this remarkable work (it would be interesting to see his take on the “slasher films” of the 80’s and the “death metal” scene in rock, among other subjects). All in all, a very well done survey of the manifestations of a society’s anxieties via its diverse media throughout the ages.