This is not unlike how we continually create and consume images of violence and horror, whether in writing or films. Much like the vampire—monster incarnate, death itself—creating more death by feeding on the living, we as human beings, have an unbearable need to witness the suffering of others as a way of affirming our very existence. To put it another way, we feed on images of death and suffering in order to feel alive. Looking deeper, we can differentiate between two distinct ways in which fear directly affects action. If we know why we're scared we can subsequently articulate that fear to others . . . In this sense, fear drives us to seek company. Other times, however, fear exists as nothing more than vague dread or anxiety. The threat isn't so much perceived as it is lurking in the periphery. This sort of fear is isolating and drives us deeper within the self.

Like [Georges] Bataille and his image of a bullfighter's eyeball, the horror image—the image of trauma—haunts the darkest corners of our memory. That which has been seen cannot be unseen, and that which remains unseen remains limited to the realm of speculation. If, as Lovecraft said in his essay "Supernatural Horror In Literature," fear is the "oldest and strongest emotion of mankind," then can we not assume that the prisoners in Plato's cave spent a great deal of their time haunted by the shapes of the shadows on the wall? How often must the fingers of those flickering shadows have appeared as slithering serpents? If these prisoners truly had no understanding of life beyond their imprisonment—or perhaps even no conception of their imprisonment—then we can only imagine what those fears were, what strange stories unfolded beneath the hiss and crackle of those blackening flames. This is not unlike how we continually create and consume images of violence and horror, whether in writing or films. Much like the vampire—monster incarnate, death itself—creating more death by feeding on the living, we, as human beings, have an unbearable need to witness the suffering of others as a way of affirming our very existence. To put it another way, we feed on images of death and suffering in order to feel alive. Fear, after all, is a product of our senses, a warning induced by perceived threat. It is a necessary aspect for the survival of our—and perhaps all—species. Looking deeper, we can differentiate between two distinct ways in which fear directly affects action. If we know why we're scared we can subsequently articulate that fear to others. Hopefully they'll understand our situation and offer to help in some way. In this sense, fear drives us to seek company. Other times, however, fear exists as nothing more than vague dread or anxiety. The threat isn't so much perceived as it is lurking in the periphery. This sort of fear is isolating and drives us deeper within the self.

jester and shadowman reminiscing on their band + maybe one of them found an old guitar? that they can play

Of the five senses, the visual sense is the most closely related to narrative, or the idea that, as Bergson explains, once our senses are exposed to images, our imagination will automatically envision the future of those images. In this way, image is central to the creation of narrative, by which I mean that, when generating language for the purpose of communication, image comes first, language second. This is an important concept in the creation of rhetoric—specifically in the narrative of horror—which is ultimately rooted in the consciousness of body and the body's relation to both perceived and unperceived images, or the imagining of how reality may be acted upon by the worst to come . . . "The objects which surround my body reflect its possible action upon them." It is impossible to separate our corporeal reality from the way in which we perceive images. All perception, in some way, relates to the consciousness of the body.

The fundamental problem of human existence is rooted in an inherent inability to communicate. That's not to say that people are unable to talk to one another. In fact, people say a great deal to one another throughout any given day, much of it meaningless and instantly forgotten. It's only when the meaning of our words—the desperation of being understood by another—is made the locus of our communication, that the problems inherent to communication become impossible to ignore. [...] This is the dilemma of being human: believing that something needs to be communicated—a feeling, a thought, an urgent message—and not being able to communicate it; or, having made an attempt at communication and ultimately failing, causing irreparable harm.

Nietzsche ultimately attempted to explain that our lives are governed by unseen forces beyond our comprehension, that there is a world of inner motives hidden behind a veil we are oblivious to. Our valiant struggle to imagine the workings of the universe—our universe—is ultimately pointless; we will never be able to acknowledge the underlying truths of existence. All truth is beyond comprehension—and all comprehension is nothing more than skimming the surface of oceanic depths . . . Therefore, it is our fate, as humans, to accept a reality composed entirely of illusions.

An "other" is nothing more than a negative projection of the self, something outside of the inside. In order to understand the self, we must look within—collapse the internal into the external—in order to see beyond. In other words, dissolve the self into something bigger, something infinite and without thought. This is what we mean when we refer to the spectacle of the void. After all, to exist is to be both imprisoned in a limited comprehension of the universe and "privileged" with the burden of consciousness. To exist is to collapse the internal into the external, to come face to face with horror.