Blog Assignment #6
Horror movies are without question scary, but once I have had been exposed to horror through that medium I felt as though a short story would not have the same effect. I could not be any more wrong about this, as horror stories have the potential to be scarier than movies, as evidenced through works such as Terence Taylor’s Wet Pain and Chesya Burke’s Please, Momma, the latter of which will be the focus of this post in particular. These works are both horrifying and deal with very real aspects of everyday life that many choose to even ignore or are misinformed about.
The medium of a short story offers a unique opportunity to be able to visualize something on one’s own, creating limitless possibilities and variations of the work- each one scarier than the next. Thus, our brain’s endless creations of horrors exceed the horror of something tangible and known. I feel as though movies even try to replicate this aspect of horror, by delaying showing horrific elements. For example, a film may show a door rumbling for a while before showing a monster. During the period the door is rumbling, the audience is creating a multitude of different possible horrifying creations in their heads which scares them way more than merely showing the monster right from the get go. Now, this horrifying feeling of suspense and unknown present in a film, is carried over the length of a story, allowing the audience’s mind to run wild with various interpretations.
Please, Momma is no exception to this, in my opinion, for many reasons. First and foremost, I had to reread the story multiple times as I was a bit confused on how to interpret the story, particularly the dialogue that are italicized instead of quoted. Originally I believed these phrases to be a part of the story, but upon further examination it seemed to indicate that there is no real dialogue going on that others can see. Rather these “conversations” occur as a figment of imagination, as the mother is speaking to her dead child, which she is clearly, and understandably, not over. This is rather interesting as my interpretation may differ from another person’s, as there is no clear visual indicating whether or not the conversations are actually occurring. Moreover, as evidenced by my opinions on the “conversations,” views of a story can be modified creating a longer lasting effect on the audience and allows further engagement from the part of the reader. Therefore, short stories such as Please, Momma both create a scarier sensation and also allow the reader to be more involved in the work via their imagination.