feeling, however fleeting, that you might not
make it around the next corner?
“This year is very different,” says David J. Skal,
who chronicles the American fascination with
horror and is the author of “Death Makes a
Holiday: A Cultural History of Halloween.”
“We have to process all this unpleasant cultural
stuff. But it’s easier to do when you’re not
looking at it too directly,” Skal says. “I hope there
is some kind of catharsis that comes out of
Halloween this year.”
Yet with so many Americans affected by the
events of this year, is that the kind of release
people seek?
Image: Aaron Doster