If you think back to your experience of reading and watching horror, I’m sure it won’t take terribly long to conjure up some visuals that frighten you. These can go all the way back to childhood – for me it was the skull-spider creature from TV’s Knightmare – or include far more recent instances, such as me lying in bed genuinely wondering if my room was expanding after reading House of Leaves.
The visual is often our most acute – and because of being most used – sense where it comes to horror fiction, but let’s not forget that we do have a number of others that we can employ to try and truly terrify our audiences. Imagery will always be important, but to reach the pinnacle of fear we need to do more – and in this article we’re going to explore how!
So prick up your ears, follow your nose and prepare your taste buds for the journey as we explore horror and the five senses.
