Horror, of all the genres, is the only one that can provoke an involuntary visceral reaction.
Stephen Graham JonesRead
I figure anytime you put an adjective before 'writer,' it's a way of dismissing the writer.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Adjectives preceding 'writer' often belittle their work and undermine their identity.
Stephen Graham Jones suggests that when people use adjectives to qualify a writer, they unintentionally diminish the value of the writer's work and their role as a creator. This implies that labels can reduce the respect given to an artist, and one should appreciate writers for their inherent skill rather than categorize them in limiting ways.
Themes
WriterIdentityDismissAdjectiveLabels
In practice
Example use cases
In a discussion about literary criticism, this quote can be used to advocate for recognizing a writer's work without bias.
More from Stephen Graham Jones
All quotes βWe watch a romantic comedy because we want to cry, say, or an action movie so we can participate in heroics. Horror's different. It can hit you with a moment of revulsion so hard you might want to erase the last five minutes of your life, please.
Stephen Graham JonesRead
The way humor's usually used in horror, it's as a pressure-release valve; without it, the drama would escalate out of all control almost immediately.
Stephen Graham JonesRead
Most zombie stories, the problems they solve are not the actual zombies. The problems they solve are the human interactions.
Stephen Graham JonesRead
Every time I lock my people in a spacecraft or land them on an asteroid, the blood wells up again, and I'm writing horror. Horror's my default setting. It's also where I prefer to write.
Stephen Graham JonesRead
Making people laugh is so much more difficult than making them sad. Too much fiction defaults to the somber, the tragic. This is because sad endings are easy in comparison - happy endings aren't at all simple to earn, especially when writing to an audience jaded by them.
Stephen Graham JonesRead
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