The Semantics of Imaginary Monsters in Romanticism

Abstract

Monsters are everywhere, and always have been. These terrible and wonderful beings, since the dawn of human consciousness, have lurked at the edges and stood front and center in all our far‑flung cultures. Their ubiquity and longevity are based on their power and adaptability as symbols and metaphors for a great number of things, all centered upon anxiety. Whenever we are bothered, nervous, confused, frightened, uncertain, threatened, alienated, oppressed, repressed, confined, irrational, guilty, ill, flawed, sad, or angry monsters can appear.They are part and parcel of our condition, our imagination, our spirituality, our arts, and they won't go away ‑ ever. We need them too much, and hence we are ever finding them, creating them, carrying them with us, and surrounding ourselves with them. They are legion.Monsters come in two varieties: imaginary and real. The imaginary ones are much more common, and are visionary creations based on perversions of nature. The hybrid‑the most familiar type of monster‑confuses naturel's categories through the mixing and matching of body parts. The chimera (head of a lion, body of a goat, tail of a serpent), the mermaid (head and arms of a woman, body and tail of a fish), and Frankenstein's monster (a construction of organs from various humans) are all well­ known hybrids‑,Monsters are also creatures that display extreme physiognomic exaggeration or deformity, like the one‑eyed Cyclops and the flesh‑dripping zombie, or beings that have unnaturally multiplied body parts, like the many‑armed Shiva and the many‑headed Hydra.This paper will manipulated the theme that these monsters express more than their apparent shape can signify. They reveal the disruption of the self- motivated by various social and cultural conditions. Hybrids, Internal Demons and external Demons will be the most monsters concentrated an in this paper.