Gavin F. Hurley
I was a teenager when I first watched The Exorcist. It terrified me. Later, in my twenties, I read Blatty’s novel. It still terrified me. But its complexity began to seep in. While the story was entertaining and the style was easy to read, the novel was also intellectual and spiritually engaging. Energized by the horror genre, this balance intrigued me—and sparked my interest in Catholic horror literature.
As many of us know, horror fiction can motivate meaningful inquiry. We ponder imagination when reading Ann Radcliffe’s The Mysteries of Udolpho. We think about the nature of desire when reading Clive Barker’s The Hellbound Heart. We contemplate the cosmic expanse when reading H.P. Lovecraft’s The Colour Out of Space. But I realized years ago that Blatty’s novel motivates inquiry in a distinctive way. Not only is The Exorcist unapologetically Catholic, but it is also fueled by a classical approach. This is not too surprising. Catholicism has had a long partnership with the classical liberal arts tradition: one where theology reigns as regina scientiarum (queen of the sciences) with philosophy enlisted as her handmaiden. The Exorcist operates in a similar fashion. It is informed by both theology and philosophy. While it is written for popular audiences, many of its dialogues resemble Plato’s: they are fueled by Socratic Method. Moreover, both Chris MacNeil and Father Damien Karras wrestle with various tensions: between theism and atheism, religion and science, faith and reason, life and death, innocence and guilt, and hope and despair. This is the domain of the liberal arts. Meanwhile, the inciting incident—Regan MacNeil’s possession— stirs all these tensions into potent cocktail. Readers drink it down and become intoxicated by the horror of it all.
Years after analyzing The Exorcist, I sought out more Catholic horror fiction to read. I needed to figure out what was so powerful about Catholic horror stories. During this time, I read Robert Hugh Benson’s supernatural tales, Russell Kirk’s ghost stories, J-K. Huysmans’ 1891 novel Là-Bas, Georges Bernanos’s 1926 novel Under the Sun of Satan, and several translations of Dante’s Inferno. They all expressed similar gravitas as The Exorcist (even more so, because they don’t offer characters such as Detective Kinderman as comic relief)—and a similar commitment to the classical liberal arts. After reading them, it was official. I was inspired to write Catholic Horror and Rhetorical Dialectics (Lehigh University Press, 2024): a book in which I analyze Benson’s The Light Invisible (1903) and A Mirror of Shallot (1907), Huysmans’ Là-Bas, and Blatty’s The Exorcist.
Upon starting the project, I had to broadly consider what counted as Catholic horror. After all, many works of horror literature—from vampire stories to possession narratives—refer to Roman Catholic characters, rites, and traditions. Although this is true, only a small amount of horror stories communicates the wider Catholic philosophical and theological outlook on reality. For example, Stephen King’s ‘Salem’s Lot certainly offers Catholic characters and traditions. While these elements contribute to the spectacle within the story, the novel itself does not holistically communicate Catholic cosmology and ontology.
So, ultimately, Catholic horror literature moves beyond the Catholic spectacle. Rather, it more fully enacts what Aristotle calls dianoia, that is, thought or theme. In the case of Catholic horror, the thought or theme must be distinctively Catholic. The Catholicity does not only dazzle the senses, but it additionally engages the head and heart. While characters, plots, and suspense stimulate audiences’ imaginations, they also escort audiences toward certain truth-seeking philosophical and spiritual orientations.
Catholic horror’s dialogue uniquely invites readers into these orientations. After all, the subgenre has an uncanny knack for making philosophical conversations especially terrifying. Unlike typical dialogue, the dialogue reads as if Plato and Augustine teamed up to write dark fiction—wherein reasonable characters argue with devious devils. Ultimately, the conversations resemble Christ’s temptations in the desert found in Matthew’s Gospel. We see these high stakes discussions throughout the subgenre, such as when Blatty’s Father Karras converses with the demon Pazuzu in The Exorcist, Huysmans’ Durtel argues with possible succubus Mme. Chantelouve in Là-Bas, and Bernanos’ Father Donissan dialogues with the devil while traveling down a country road in Under the Sun of Satan. It is one of the most distinctive characteristics of Catholic horror literature.
Readers bear witness to these conversations with demons and devils—not as interactions with fantastic characters—but, in the Catholic framework, as fictional representations of real threats, temptations, and agents of evil. Regardless of readers’ religious beliefs, they are also invited to enter into the dialogues. Here, readers inevitably engage their intellect and, perhaps, faith. And, from the conversational solemnity, they can feel the gravity of certain philosophical and spiritual issues, even if it’s just for the duration of the read.
Unlike other popular forms of Christian fiction, Catholic horror is not a saccharine genre. Stories are not fully resolved as happily-ever-after. They do not end with broadband conversions to Christianity or overflowing joy. Instead, plots can leave readers with more questions than answers. Evoking pity, fear, and humility, the stories wear their tragic elements with confidence. In The Exorcist, Father Karras jumps to his death from a window. In Là-Bas, Durtel attends a Black Mass in Paris. In Under the Sun of Satan, a young girl, Mouchette, shoots a man in the face at close range. In short, Catholic horror literature can offer grisly and solemn representations. Consequently, readers take seriously the storytelling. And, by extension, readers take seriously the accompanying Catholic philosophies and theologies.
Dante Alighieri’s Inferno from the Original by Dante Alighieri and Illustrated with the Designs of Gustave Doré (New York: Cassell Publishing Company, 1890.) https://theworldofdante.org
But unlike the cosmic pessimism of H.P. Lovecraft or Thomas Ligotti, Catholic horror does not overwhelm readers with such negative attitudes. After all, Christianity is not nihilistic or fatalistic. Purposefully, the displayed lack of goodness can reverse readers toward its positive counter: goodness itself. By suffering through the emptiness found in representations of evil, protagonists and readers can recognize the presence found in God. Ultimately, representations of darkness accentuate the light.
In this way, Dante’s Inferno, the first third of his Divine Comedy, acts as a vivid representation of Catholic horror’s rhetorical dialectics. Like Dante’s Virgil, Catholic horror authors guide reader-pilgrims across dark terrains that brim with anxious atmosphere, debauched characters, and gory spectacles. And after suffering, they safely emerge from hell with fresh cosmic and moral perspective. As Dante’s last lines of Inferno read: “We emerged to see the stars again.” When readers finish engaging with Catholic horror fiction, they similarly emerge to behold the stars again. They can recognize the light with renewed appreciation. To this end, readers don’t have to be Catholic to appreciate these journeys. Works of Catholic horror literature provide a complex subgenre of fiction that engages the senses, heads, and hearts of various audiences. They invite us all into spaces of meaningful contemplation as we traverse the darkness in search of goodness and virtue.
Gavin F. Hurley, Ph.D., is an Associate Professor of Communication & Literature at Ave Maria University (USA). His scholarship on rhetoric has appeared in academic journals such as Journal for the History of Rhetoric, Horror Studies, Journal of Communication and Religion, and Metal Music Studies. He has published essays on the rhetoric of horror fiction for essay collections, including Re-imagining the Victim in Post-1970s Horror Media (Amsterdam University Press, 2024), Bloodstained Narratives: The Giallo Film in National Context and Abroad (University Press of Mississippi, 2022), and Horror Literature from Gothic to Post-Modern (McFarland, 2020). His book Catholic Horror and Rhetorical Dialectics was published by Lehigh University Press in 2024.
You can find him at https://gavinfhurley.com or Twitter/X (@Gavin_F_Hurley).
