Representation of the world as other’s play in the cosmic horror literature

Abstract

Cosmic horror is a type of horror literature concerning itself with anthropocentrism rejection and depicting the universe as unknowable, indifferent and epistemologically anomalous. In the context of cosmic horror, man is often described as a plaything of unknown forces, which may seem a contradiction: the concept of play in itself is arguably all-to-human; moreover, a playful attitude is by no means indifferent and thus not exactly compatible with cosmic horror. Nevertheless, according to evolutionary biology, the evidence of play behaviour is not restricted to humans – accordingly, such behaviour is hypothetically an appropriate attribute of transcendent superhuman entities as well. One thus may logically conclude that a non-anthropocentric world still allows depiction in terms of play. Such a depiction is not necessarily equal with conspiratorial one – they differ in perceived motivation and, in some cases, in scope – yet the-world-as-the-other’s-play and conspiracy theories are closely related worldviews and, as such, can over-lap. Demonstrating the importance of the existential in question in the works by H.P. Lovecraft, the key author in the field, the study proceeds to examine the fiction by T. Ligotti, L. Barron, M. Podlewski, and D. Wong (J. Pargin), showing the variety of representations of the-world-as-the-other’s-play in the cosmic horror literature.