9781451667981

This eye-opening tour through history's legendary monsters and the science and culture that spawned them, provides new insight into the creatures that have terrified us for centuries. We all know "there's no such thing as monsters," but our imaginations may hold a different opinion. Matt Kaplan, a noted science journalist and enthusiast of both the hard facts of science and the fantastic fictions of myth, employs an entertaining mix of cutting-edge research and a love of lore to explain why monsters have held us in such thrall for millennia. Ranging across history, Medusa's Gaze and Vampire's Bitetackles the questions that arise on the frontier between reality and fantasy. What caused ancient Minoans to create the tale of the Minotaur that was imprisoned in a subterranean maze? Did dragons really exist? What inspired the creation of vampires and werewolves, and why have they endured as figures of horror? Kaplan also brings readers to the forefront of scientific discoveries that potentially verify some of the monsters we have always taken for granted. Does the legendary Kraken, a squid of epic proportions, really roam the deep? Are we close to actually replicating a dinosaur from DNA taken from fossilized amber as Jurassic Parkpostulates? As society's fears have changed, monsters have evolved, and the author charts the rise of a new beast, humans.

TERM	PRICE	DUE
SEMESTER	$16.73	Aug 02
QUARTER	$15.90	Jul 15
SHORT TERM	$15.06	Jun 07

Acknowledgments	p. ix
Introduction	p. 1
Giant Animals-Nemean Lion, Calydonian Boar, Rukh, King Kong	p. 7
Beastly Blends-Chimera, Griffon, Cockatrice, Sphinx	p. 33
It Came from the Earth-Minotaur, Medusa	p. 51
The Mysterious Fathoms-Charybdis, Leviathan, Giant Squid, Jaws	p. 79
Of Flame and Claw-Dragons	p. 99
Hauntings--Demons, Ghosts, Spirits	p. 120
Cursed by a Bite-Vampires, Zombies, Werewolves	p. 136
The Created-The Golem, Frankenstein, HAL 9000, Terminator	p. 164
Terror Resurrected-Dinosaurs	p. 182
Extraterrestrial ThreatùAliens	p. 198
Conclusion	p. 213
Sources	p. 221
Index	p. 235
Table of Contents provided by Ingram. All Rights Reserved.

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Introduction

In the darkness it came. There was no way out. Cornered and helpless, all who found themselves in this dreaded place knew their fate. Relentlessly, the half-human, half-bull fiend found its quarry and tore them to pieces. Scrambling and searching for an exit was pointless. Even if any did miraculously find a way out, the natives of the island were against them. They would simply throw escapees back into the blackness of the depths. Whether their deaths were quick or drawn out remains a mystery, for in the labyrinth of legend on the island of Crete, none of those forced in were ever heard from again.

To those who feel the Minotaur is too ancient to be relevant anymore, consider the fate of the mining vesselNostromoin Ridley Scott’sAlien.Stalked relentlessly by a carnivorous beast, one by one the crew are ripped apart and consumed. It is impossible to find on the shadowy ship, and it makes its attacks almost entirely unseen. Computers, bullets, and flamethrowers are useless. The alien sprays acidic blood when cut that disintegrates armor, burns flesh, and melts bone. There is no escape and no rescue on the way, because “in space, no one can hear you scream.”

Defined as horrible to behold and a threat to all who cross them, monsters are creatures we run from and beasts we warn our children about. Yet something about them is enticing, mesmerizing, and addictive. Terrible as they might be, we cannot help looking ever closer, parting the fingers that are covering our eyes. There is no getting around it: Something deep inside monsters fascinates us.

What it is about monsters that is so alluring is hard to say. Seeing them makes the heart pump faster, hairs stand on end, and sweat pour down our faces. All of these are signs of stress and are often experienced over and over again through nightmares. Even so, children clamor for ghost stories around the campfire and adults line up in droves to see films featuring vampires and werewolves. They terrify, yet we cannot get enough of them.

And this is nothing new. The Minotaur, Sphinx, and Medusa were created long ago, and based upon their representation in myths, poems, art, and plays, it seems that they drew attention from ancient audiences that was very much like the attention drawn by modern monsters. This hints that monsters have been with us for quite a long time and raises a perplexing question: Why have monster stories, which have the effect of scaring people, persisted so relentlessly throughout the ages?

The masochism tango

As bizarre as it sounds, one answer to this question lies with research on why people like spicy foods. Dishes from Mexico and India are tongue-searingly hot. They make your eyes burn and can soak you with sweat. A lot of people avoid them, but many love them precisely because they are so fiery.

It defies logic that food responsible for such a seemingly painful experience should be so popular, but recent work is beginning to provide an explanation. Fascinated and befuddled by the common human desire to eat mouth-burning foods, psychologist Paul Rozin and a team of colleagues at the University of Pennsylvania wondered whether it was the negative experience of being burned that spicy-food lovers liked or if it was their body’s physiological reactions to these foods that they were enjoying.

The team asked 135 female and 108 male university students to rate on a scale of 0 to 100 how much they liked different things, with 0 indicating “not liking at all” and 100 indicating “considerable liking.” When the students were asked, among other things, how much they liked spicy foods, the average score was 55.5, which runs roughly along with the perception that around half of the population enjoys this sort of cuisine. However, far more interesting was that when the participants were asked to rate how much they enjoyed mouth burns, sweating, and tearing eyes, those who rated their love of spicy food at over 50 also tended to rate these typically unpleasant experiences more highly. This suggested they were actually enjoying their body’s own negative response to the food.

The reason for this masochism is not known, but Rozin, along with many others in his field, have a theory that there is pleasure for the mind in watching the body react negatively while knowing perfectly well that nothing bad is actually going to happen. The enjoyment, they suggest, comes from a sense of mental mastery over the body that is responding in a knee-jerk reaction.

Rozin’s study did not limit itself to an exploration of spicy cuisine. It also asked participants to rate how much they enjoyed thrill rides, frightening movies, gory movies, and even a pounding heart. Again, a connection was found. Those who enjoyed getting the crap scared out of them in movies also tended to like gore, thrill rides, and a pounding heart. Mental mastery might be behind this too.