Fear Itself

<p> This book demonstrates how horror films of the 1930s and 1940s reflected specific events and personalities of the era most notably the Great Depression and World War II. Beginning with <I>Dracula</I> and <I>Frankenstein</I> (1931) it relates the many ways that horror films and society intersected: Franklin D. Roosevelt's skepticism toward conventional wisdom and the public's distrust of experts was mirrored in <I>Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde</I> and <I>Murders in the Rue Morgue</I>; the freaks in Tod Browning's 1932 film of the same name revolted against the powerful people of the circus much like the Bonus Army protested the sufferings of the Depression; King Kong's rampage on New York personified the anti-New York sentiment in the nation at large; Lon Chaney Jr.'s <I>Wolf Man</I> symbolized the experience of his creator Curt Siodmak as a Jewish refugee from Nazi Germany.</p>