HOW LUMPY THE TURD BOY WOUND UP IN THE HOUSE OF HORROR
(OR: BLAME IT ON THE ACID, AND JOHN WATERS!)
by John Skipp
Ever since our own Elizabeth Massie – one of the hardest-punching gals in the history of horror – raised “the question”, a few days back (see her essay, POOP ON A PLATE), I’ve been hard-pressed to think of anything else.
So here’s my theory on how gross-out fiction wandered into the horror section, and stayed there.
It goes a little something like this:
Long before guys like me raised a ruckus in the ‘80’s by upping the voltage on sex, violence, and profanity in horror fiction…
…and LONG before Ed Lee and pals picked up the dung-encrusted vomit-ball and ran it all the way to the finish line for a touchdown…
…there was this little film called PINK FLAMINGOS.
Made for almost nothing, by a bunch of freaks from Baltimore, this barely-cinematic jaw-dropper oozed out into our consciousness in 1972. It was a full-frontal assault on every notion of good taste that our genteel species had ever concocted.
It was – literally – a chicken-fucking, asshole-fluttering, shit-eating extravaganza of transgressive, anti-social behavior, careening into the cultural brainscape. It was thoroughly shameless, and delirious with malformed glee, and – surprise, surprise – incredibly popular, too.
So here’s my theory:
Landing, as it did, on the same emerging “midnight movie” circuit as NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD, FRITZ THE CAT, and EL TOPO – with almost everybody stoned or tripping their ass off – it HOTWIRED OUR TRANSGRESSIVE GLANDS into a kind of cultural synthesthesia.
Suddenly, George Romero’s graphic zombie gut-munching (another big cinematic first) genetically merged with Divine’s dung-munching shenanigans, redefining shock and awe for the next generation of outlaw artists. (Meanwhile, Jodorowsky’s metaphysical grand guignol and Ralph Bakshi’s animated R. Crumb riffs on sex, violence, and culture upped the ante and voltage, as well.)
From that point on, for many of us (including myself), ALL BETS WERE OFF. Where they remain, to this day.
That’s my theory, anyway.
————
It is, of course, legit to ask: why use shock tactics at all? There are plenty of possible reasons.
If it’s part of one’s no-holds-barred arsenal in the war against complacency, stupography and pablum, that’s one thing.
If it’s just for shits ‘n’ giggles, that’s another.
And if someone’s really the kind of simp that just likes to wallow in their own filth, that is yet another.
So if the question is, “How do you get Lumpy the Turd Boy to skooch down the bench a little?” my advice is: ASK HIM NICELY.
As for the people who look at you funny, when you tell them you write horror, my advice is always: JUST STAND UP FOR WHO YOU ARE.
If someone tries to tar you with somebody else’s poop-stained brush, and that’s not what you’re about, gently inform them of that fact. Tell them who you are, what you write, and why you write it.
Be humble and proud and honest and clear.
Be, in short, the ambassador you are.
And if Lumpy the Turd Boy comes wandering up, just say, “Oh, that’s Lumpy. He rode the short bus in. But he’s pretty funny, sometimes! Just don’t let him sit in your lap.”
Know what I’m sayin’?
Seriously, you don’t want to “clean up” the image of horror. Especially for people who don’t like it in the first place. Half the POINT of horror, as I understand it, is that you can’t make life’s ugly shit go away. You have to deal with it. Make peace with it. Rise above it, if you can.
Doesn’t mean you have to shit on a dinner plate and suggest that people eat it. (At least not necessarily…)
But we’re the guys and gals who are tough enough, smart enough, wild enough, and honest enough to talk about ANYTHING.
Aren’t we?
Gahan Wilson said it beautifully, quite a number of years back. He said (and I’m paraphrasing like crazy, here):
Horror is the geek tent. It’s not on the midway, with all the nice rides and games, where all the nice families congregate. Rather, it’s down at the end – in that dark corner, off to the left – where we keep the malformed and unsightly.
Only in the dark do the monsters and misfits feel safe enough to show themselves.
And only there do we feel safe enough to look them in the eye, and see ourselves reflected there.
In other words: Lumpy’s in the geek tent because that’s the only place that would have him.
That’s where he belongs.
Do you belong there, too?
These are tough questions. And I think they’re worth asking, from time to time.
Because honestly? I think that if you want to write horror, but don’t want to be lumped in with the unsavory elements of life, you may just have chosen the WRONG LINE OF WORK.
Horror can be elegant, yes. And beautiful. And ennobling. Thought-provoking, without being provocational. Addressing the damage, without wallowing shamelessly.
And if that’s your mission, I’m behind you all the way.
In that case, use the quality of your work to distinguish yourself – not merely from the low end of the horror food chain – but from all the cluckers and smeckers who sneer down their snoots at that nasty old “horror”.
If they still don’t get you, after you explain yourself clearly, then you don’t really want ‘em at the party, after all.
I bet John Waters wouldn’t!
And I hear his parties are great.
————
One closing note, about gross-out contests:
You know why they’re so popular? Because THEY’RE SO MUCH FUN! It’s like watching the movie THE ARISTOCRATS, where dozens and dozens of great comedians work overtime to blow each other’s minds with the craziest shit you’ve ever heard.
I judged the contest at World Horror, in ’05. It was my first, and it was stunning. These guys weren’t just floppin’ around in the filth. They were doing PIROUETTES in the filth. Somersaults. Backflips. Highly acrobatic tightwire feats of unmistakable derring doo-doo!
When writers of genuine genius like Cody Goodfellow go to town on this stuff, it ain’t like he just craps in his hand and flings it at ya. He sculpts mountains of mayhem, airlifts you up there with his words, and then drops you face-first down the rotten volcano. All in less than six minutes.
We’re talkin’ HILARIOUS, here!
Two-time winner Colin Bunn? HILARIOUS! Jeff Strand? Mark McLaughlin? HILARIOUS! Actor Bill Mosely, reading Ed Lee’s shit out loud? UNBELIEVABLY HILARIOUS!
The vibe is one of revelry, and delirious delight.
Much like watching one of the great early John Waters films (my personal faves are DESPERATE LIVING and FEMALE TROUBLE).
And it’s no coincidence, methinks, that these contests take place at midnight…
OOPS! There’s the bell! See you next month! CLASS DISMISSED!
Love,
Skipp
Related posts:
- DEFINING HORROR: Nine Musings on The Nature of Horror
- BECAUSE THESE ARE HORROR TIMES
- THE FIRST “WHAT’S THE POINT OF VICARIOUS HORROR?” HARD WAY QUESTIONNAIRE
- The House Upon My Shelf
- Happy Horror Month….. Booooooo……
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Comments
Totally enjoyed your essay, Skipp. I can see your point as to how the gross out for gross out sake (GOFGOS) and the horror got mingled up together some young and impressionable psyches back in the early 1970’s. Damn, never heard of Pink Flamingos. Makes my head spin just contemplating the…uh…wonder of it all. 
In response to your comment:
“I think that if you want to write horror, but don’t want to be lumped in with the unsavory elements of life, you may just have chosen the WRONG LINE OF WORK.” I didn’t say I don’t want to be lumped in with unsavory elements, ’cause Lord knows I’ve played with them myself in my own fiction. I’m finely cool with the graphic, the gritty, the unsavory, if it is part of a horror story. I’m hardly shrinking back due to anyone’s raised eyebrow, and am proud of what I write. My itty bitty point in my itty bitty essay was that if the gross out isn’t horror, as in the content of the story/poem/vignette is meant only to gross out instead of scare, then it shouldn’t be classified as horror. Just like a science fiction story should have something of science fiction in it. The GOFGOS can have it’s own little geek tent, too. With nice, racing-striped benches all their own. 
Yeah, yeah, like I said earlier, dream on, Massie. But hey, ’tis a fun topic to tackle and ya done tackled good here.
Beth
Yeah, I see my mistake, I see that glaring “it’s” that should be “its.” What the hell kind of writer am I, anyway? A hack, I tell you, a slovenly, worthless hack!
I shall now slide down on the bench.
Okay, bye.
Beth said: “…if the gross out isn’t horror, as in the content of the story/poem/vignette is meant only to gross out instead of scare, then it shouldn’t be classified as horror.”
That’s exactly the point. A toilet is as a toilet does and
each to his own is fine; sculpting poop is fine, if that’s your schtick. But what is it other than smelly? Anal? Joyce Carol Oates’ ZOMBIE. That is dark fiction or HORROR, so is my trilogy, the point being that the stench is there in support of the narrative.
At least that’s what I think, which certainly leads me to conclude that lumping (so to speak) the turds in there with actual books is misleading readers seeking stories of a dark nature.
Janet
Yeah, but how do you feel about it, John?
I was laughin’ at this one before I started reading, but only because I knew your personal voltage was going to put the rest of the field in a brown-out, so to speak. And the laughter is done without derision or offense. You will never find me guilty of denying anyone else’s tastes. Different strokes…live and let…all that. I’m too busy being my own kind of maverick to claim a throne for the primacy of my interests.
But that’s just it, for me, we’re talking thrones here. The one that has Horror embroidered on its antimacassar is just too broadly labeled, it seems, to seat what it is currently seating. Yeah, you address that. A little. There is room for all, you say, and you obviously respect that. But even though you’re talking about the status quo, in a way you are evangelizing. Anachronistically. You cite dates when things came into being – changed – and they post-date the term “Horror” considerably, so it’s fair to say that a reaction to those changes is permissible, however latent. That’s what we’re seeing, isn’t it? People reacting to change who want change in turn, because the rules have shifted for them.
I know that’s all it is for me. Not an issue of revulsion or pseudo-morality. It’s a marketing question. My logic is this: I don’t write a certain slant that I know sends the readers I am writing to into a stampede for the exits, so may I attempt to define myself so that they can find me?
I’m not telling you that all writers keep that cool about it, and I’m sure everyone who writes horror with an attitude has to smile when they see the reactions go ballistic, but the valid argument is still simply marketing.
Hey, this is good, right? Controversy. And an old controversy at that: What is horror? I stand pat on my first essay. “What’s in a name?”
– Sully (Thomas Sullivan)
Whie I celebrate the rights of all to write as they feel is right, so to speak…I still don’t see the correlation between this essay and Beth’s…other than that JC seems in perfect accord with her.
Slop for Slop’s sake and horror aren’t the same thing.
Rather than go on at length here, though, I was spurred to write about the subject myself.. over at The Deep Blue Journal
DNW
I think THE EXORCIST (book or film) is a great test case for this issue. It’s horror all the way through… demons and nightmares… yet it’s also outrageously foul… and it was outrageously successful, financially and culturally, too.
And then people who don’t read started imitating it and films like it. They had hollywood as a platform for ‘defining’ the genre to those who aren’t already educated in it.
Can’t blame them for making bad movies and miring the genre in juvenalia. Nightmares are often more visual and childish than verbal and adultified. The genre of nightmare has to make room for gore for this reason.
But that doesn’t mean writers should lower their standards. That’s why communal dialogues like this blog are a helluva good thing. Keep it coming, you guys. Great, thoughtful stuff! — Mike Arnzen
Yeah, great, thoughtful stuff all right. If it’s purely gross-out stuff, it ain’t horror. Thanks for re-emphasizing that, Beth. But a possessed, innocent girl spewing green vomit in THE EXORCIST is. An important distinction.
But the Skipper is right. We don’t want to clean up horror and make it respectable. Personally, I’d just like to see all of horror’s diverse potential recognized and appreciated more fully, both by writers and readers.
BTW, did anyone read David Searcy’s ORDINARY HORROR? No vomit bags or blood and guts there. Subtle, slow, and seemingly uneventful. Is it horror? Is it GOOD horror? Or is that going too far in the other direction?
Just wondering.
Dear Beth –
If you left the horror genre, we would be HURTIN’ FOR CERTAIN, cuz you’re one of my favorite ones!
And you know, of course, that I wasn’t suggesting that at all.
Over at Shocklines, there was a 10-day conversation about what’s appropriate or not, vis a vis explicit imagery. When I made a Microsoft Word copy of it — so the words wouldn’t be lost forever, it wound up taking 273 PAGES!
In it, there were a couple of folks about whom I found myself wondering, “Are you SURE horror is the genre that you really want to be in?”
Also in that conversation, Nick Mamatas made a wonderful point about the types of visual and verbal signifiers that publishers use on covers, to help us distinguish between serial killer novels and spooky ghost stories.
Which is to say: it’s NOT that hard for a reader to figure out what kind of book they’re getting, unless they just grab blindly off the rack.
I don’t know about you guys, but I always read the first paragraph of the book. If I’m not hooked by the language or action or tone, I am out the fucking door.
Dear everyone — THANKS FOR SMARTNESS.
And remember: I’m not saying how I think things oughtta be. I’m just noting some things I’ve observed, and passin’ along a bit o’ philosophy.
And finally: I don’t think I’ve ever read a professionally published novel that WASN’T written by Ed Lee, in which the gross-outs were just there to mess with ya.
And the Lee book — THE BIGHEAD — was so absolutely yucky that it made me look like Heidi.
I laughed and laughed and laughed. It was pretty well-written, too!
Love,
Skipp
Just a quick afterthought, out of curiosity:
How many of you write your own back-cover copy, and provide your own tag-lines?
I ALWAYS DO, on every single book.
And publishers — big or small — almost always use it.
The reason is that I spent a lot of time figuring out how to explain — very briefly — what each book is trying to do.
It’s marketing aimed straight at the marketing people, so they don’t have to do ANYTHING but run with the sonofabitch.
I strongly advise that you look at marketing examples that you like, and sculpt your own campaigns accordingly.
If that doesn’t help differentiate you from the books that you hope to distance yourself from, I don’t know what will.
It’s part of the extra work that’s required if you want your books to stand out from the crowd.
But if you want them to be noticed — AND YOU KNOW YOU DO — then it’s incumbent upon you to figure out how.
The marketing people will thank you, too!
Nobody knows your book as well as you.
Yer pal,
Skipp
Couple of interesting postscript points you make, John. Covers do fine-tune the product, and so does the blurb copy. What I see as the most biased resistance in the labeling process, however, is more generalized than that. John Rosenman called it a “ghetto,” and I don’t know if he meant that literally, but that’s kind of what it is. The reader who won’t read horror isn’t likely to get to the point where they pick up a book in that section of a bookstore and thus the cover and the blurb are moot. The 10-foot pole distance seems to apply. And it’s more even than being in the store. The bias extends through reviews, the Internet, book clubs, discussions, academia — anywhere books are marketed or enter the reader arena. I imagine it’s the same for other genres too, e.g., “Oh, I don’t like westerns,” from someone who once read a Max Brand or Luke Short and deems Cormac McCarthy and Annie Proulx to be the same.
My objections to labeling are across the board, and I don’t know that there’s an answer. But I’ve thrown a few ideas into the mix in my columns, and I think horror in particular suffers from reader perceptions. A root piece of evidence for me was when I had occasion twice in the last year to receive hundreds of fan emails in a matter of days. Each was brought about by columns and samples of my work appearing in a forum of avid general readers. I would say that fully eighty percent of what I received contained this demographic: they were from women, they read daily and thought they knew the marketplace well, and as they waxed enthusiastic about my work inevitably they wrote some version of, “I dont usually read this type of book, but…” or “I never read horror, but this one…” There is nothing special in my books that isn’t special about all of us.
We are individuals with something to offer, and I’m trying to find a way for that to get over the hardened expectations that have turned labeling into caricatures of a few plot elements in the marketplace. Those plot elements that couple what’s been called “gross-out” fiction with more traditional “horror” seems to be what we’re arguing about in this column, but the debate is much broader, methinks….
– Sully (Thomas Sullivan)
Dear Sully –
That’s always the question, isn’t it? WHO AM I WRITING FOR? Followed by HOW WILL I LET THEM KNOW?
Horror has been a ghetto for at least as long as I’ve been in it. Like Gahan said: it’s the tent in the corner, in the dark, off the midway.
But people always know how to get there, if they want to.
Past that, it’s a question of outreach.
The one statement you just made which I find absolutely CRAZY is: “There is nothing special in my books that isn’t special about all of us.” Cuz if that were true, there wouldn’t be any shitty writers; and it wouldn’t matter WHOSE book you read, because they’d ALL be great!
Hee hee!
But if you’re really saying that people are extraordinary — and that you’re simply trying to tap into what’s extraordinary about us all — then I would not only agree with you wholeheartedly, but suggest that I feel the exact same way.
You know who I write for? I write for the spark in every single human being. The spark that wants to know, that NEEDS to know, and is excited about the adventure.
I write for the spark that is smarter than it thinks it is. The spark that loves, the spark that cares, and has not yet been entirely beaten down or extinguished.
I write to fan that fucking spark, so that more people find themselves lighting up from the inside.
I write to fan that spark in me.
And I write horror because it’s a haunted world, and I’m a haunted man; but a light that goes off in the darkness is twice as bright, and ten times as sorely needed.
You know the good ol’ yin-yang symbol, from the Tao? One half light, with the little seed of darkness. And one half dark, with the little seed of light.
I always wanted to be that little seed of light in the darkness. Sheddling light, no matter HOW dark it gets. Reminding both sides that we’re still part of the circle.
I don’t know why, but that’s the job I’ve always wanted, ever since I was a haunted child.
I guess that’s why I don’t care HOW MUCH UGLY SHIT YOU PILE AROUND ME. I just go, “Yep. There’s some more, alrightee,” and then get back to what I was doin’.
In conclusion: I hope to God that I never use the word “I” this many times in one statement, again!
Yer pal,
Skipp
Yin and yang, light and dark — good way to put it, you ol’ applecart upsetter, you. In my novel BORN BURNING I have a father who stands at the wall switch of his strange son’s nursery and keeps flipping it on and off. The kid won’t cry in the dark but bursts out wailing in the light. And the old man just keeps saying, “That’s amazing…” As writers I think we all want to keep flipping that switch to produce different reactions. I get the rebel in you who hates phoniness, who wants to prod it out of haunting or anger or amusement or whatever feels honest at the moment. Sometimes I get on that stage and move the props around to suit me too, but generally I’m moving through other possibilities when I throw that switch. It isn’t all light and dark for me; it’s shades of gray. I like to mix the dark with afterghosts of light that persist in my vision. But damn, if someone doesn’t pay the utility bill, nothing is going to happen when we throw that switch. Cheers.
– Sully (Thomas Sullivan)
Dear Sully –
I love that crazy kid, and his dad with the light switch! That really IS, in fact, amazing.
And you know what I like even more than a billion shades of gray? COLORS!
All the colors of the world.
Always a pleasure, sir!
Yer pal,
Skipp
Dear kids –
One additional thought.
You know what it all sort of comes down to, for me?
ACCEPTING THE WORST, AS THE PRICE OF THE BEST, IS HOW WE MEASURE THE ACTUAL COST OF FREEDOM.
Without the freedom to express ourselves, our best work will never happen.
But in order for us to have that freedom, people who choose to piss it away get to have that freedom, too.
That’s the price we pay for the good stuff.
And that’s just the way it is. Ya know?