Essay Week 6: Fear Factor

Fear Factor

(Image of fear! Source)

This week’s unit on the Chinese Fairy Tales played on a lot of fears. A lot of people, especially me, are drawn to scary stories for their thrill and capability to take the mind to places only reachable through nightmares. I personally love scary stories and movies because it makes me feel better about where I am in my life; I am in no situation comparable to these people in the stories. I especially loved this week’s unit for its play on the mind with fear. In my favorite stories of The Panther, The Girl with the Horse’s Head or the Silkworm Goddess, and The Night on the Battle Field, these Chinese Fairy Tales leave a lasting impression by playing on people’s fears.

In The Panther, the fear that is used is the fear of losing a parent, especially a mother. The two daughters are left to be by themselves and their mother is killed by a panther. This leads to the second fear played upon in the story: fear of wild animals. The fears that lie in these two things are abandonment and death. The girls are all alone, they have no one anymore and the panther is likely going to kill them if they do not out smart him. It’s a huge fear. The girls just cried and cried in their sorrow and fear and did not know what to do. The merchants that helped the girls out were really good and saved them though because their fear was inhibiting.

The Girl with the Horse’s Head or the Silkworm Goddess was especially scary to because it used the idea of bestiality. That is so scary in my opinion. I don’t even want to think about that idea. The girl in the story didn’t either, that’s why her and her father killed the horse that wanted to marry her. That is how they overcame their fear; killing the source of it. Another fear that I don’t even know is a universal fear, was that the horse skin came back to life and suffocated the girl. Maybe the idea of zombies is what that refers to. I haven’t figured it out yet.

Finally, in The Night on the Battle Field, the fear of life from beyond the grave is utilized. Ghosts will always be a fear for human kind. They can’t be officially proven or falsified. The merchant in this story is literally seeing a scene from the past as if it were real life. That is absolutely terrifying. What if that is happening to us every day and we don’t realize it? He deals with his fear by running, which is a good release of extra energy if you ask me. I would have run the heck away too!

The fear factor of these stories really kept me hooked this week and I hope there are more units like this in the future. Using fear to catch attention leaves a lasting impact on everyone. The parts of life we remember are the parts that scare us the most.