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They are always there, spectres, even if they do not exist, even if they are no longer, even if they are not yet. –Jacques Derrida 1 We will coup whoever we want! Deal with it. –Elon Musk, discussing access to Bolivian lithium 2 Over recent decades, the coastal regions of North Carolina have become home to an ecologically unique expanse of forest. Despite its protected status, much of the coastline has been transformed to a ghost landscape, haunted by the
We saw in the previous chapter how images of spectrality in Henry James’s Anglo-American Gothic encode images of national identity. How ghosts can be discussed in a colonial context helps to illuminate the complex relationship which existed in the period between the colonial gaze and the apparently subaltern subject. This chapter proposes a reading of spectrality which
1 Ghost estates: spaces and spectres of Ireland after NAMA Cian O’Callaghan We spotted it from the road before we saw the signs. The building site faced the oncoming traffic showing a hill of scraped dirt, husks of houses and forgotten foundations. We were driving around County Cork, looking at points on a map, finding the route and keeping our eyes open for the billboards, signs and other markings of what were then beginning to be called ghost estates. As we approached the entrance of the estate, billboards advertising the development in illustrious terms stood
representations of the uncanny and, more generally, their basic narrative structures. This chapter discusses the effects of globalisation on the changing cinematic representation of the central local figure of fear, the spirit of the violently dead, or phii tai hong , and examines the potential of contemporary Thai horror film to redefine its supernatural characters as ‘global ghosts’. My primary
British television drama in the 1970s had a special interest in the genre of horror. Examples of horror television included works with a supernatural theme, such as the BBC’s A Ghost Story for Christmas series (1971-78), most familiarly featuring adaptations of the short stories of M. R. James, but also works by Nigel Kneale for both the BBC (The Stone Tape [1972]) and ITV (Beasts [1976]). Of
This book explores the relationship between allusion and the uncanny in literature. An unexpected echo or quotation in a new text can be compared to the sudden appearance of a ghost or mysterious double, the reanimation of a corpse or the discovery of an ancient ruin hidden in a modern city. This study identifies moments where this affinity between allusion and the uncanny is used by writers to generate a particular textual charge, where uncanny elements are used to flag patterns of allusion and to point to the haunting presence of an earlier work. The book traces the subtle patterns of connection between texts centuries, even millennia apart, from Greek tragedy and Latin epic, through the plays of Shakespeare and the Victorian novel, to contemporary film, fiction and poetry. Each chapter takes a different uncanny motif as its focus: doubles, ruins, reanimation, ghosts and journeys to the underworld.
I always wanted to make a ghost story against a historical background. I truly believe that the best ghost story is a ghost story that is set against a war, which leaves shit-loads of ghosts behind. 1 Guillermo del Toro In the previous chapter I examined the possibility, or otherwise, of representing the Spanish Civil War as a comedy; this chapter explores what happens to the conflict when it is represented in the horror genre, specifically, the ghost story. The focus here is on El espinazo del Diablo/The Devil’s Backbone 2 (del Toro, Spain
In Spectres of Marx , Jacques Derrida quotes the famous opening of the Communist Manifesto : ‘A spectre is haunting Europe, the spectre of Communism.’ Derrida explores the intergenerational slippage at work between the production of Marx’s text and its reception, demonstrating how communism, described by Marx as a ghost from some unknown future, has been transformed into
the world. For this is not an isolated house. It is part of a ghost estate : a term coined by Irish economist and broadcaster David McWilliams in his prescient blog entry ‘A warning from deserted ghost estates’ (McWilliams, 2006 ). Reynolds chose this small ghost estate in a Leitrim village quite deliberately as the site for her project. This site is one of twenty-one such estates in the county