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Dining with Madmen
Fat, Food, and the Environment in 1980s Horror
by Thomas Fahy
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Book Presentation:
In Dining with Madmen: Fat, Food, and the Environment in 1980s Horror, author Thomas Fahy explores America’s preoccupation with body weight, processed foods, and pollution through the lens of horror. Conspicuous consumption may have communicated success in the eighties, but only if it did not become visible on the body. American society had come to view fatness as a horrifying transformation—it exposed the potential harm of junk food, gave life to the promises of workout and diet culture, and represented the country’s worst consumer impulses, inviting questions about the personal and environmental consequences of excess.
While changing into a vampire or a zombie often represented widespread fears about addiction and overeating, it also played into concerns about pollution. Ozone depletion, acid rain, and toxic waste already demonstrated the irrevocable harm being done to the planet. The horror genre—from A Nightmare on Elm Street to American Psycho—responded by presenting this damage as an urgent problem, and, through the sudden violence of killers, vampires, and zombies, it depicted the consequences of inaction as terrifying.
Whether through Hannibal Lecter’s cannibalism, a vampire’s thirst for blood in The Queen of the Damned and The Lost Boys, or an overwhelming number of zombies in George Romero’s Day of the Dead, 1980s horror uses out-of-control hunger to capture deep-seated concerns about the physical and material consequences of unchecked consumption. Its presentation of American appetites resonated powerfully for audiences preoccupied with body size, food choices, and pollution. And its use of bodily change, alongside the bloodlust of killers and the desolate landscapes of apocalyptic fiction, demanded a recognition of the potentially horrifying impact of consumerism on nature, society, and the self.
About the Author:
Thomas Fahy is professor of English and director of graduate studies at Long Island University Post. He has authored numerous books, including The Writing Dead: Talking Terror with TV's Top Horror Writers, published by University Press of Mississippi. He has also edited collections on Alan Ball, Aaron Sorkin, and David Chase.
Press Reviews:
"In Dining with Madmen, Thomas Fahy aptly illustrates just how ‘conspicuous’ our consumption can be. Fahy explores the staples of 1980s horror with considerable insight, offering an analysis of the disturbing appetites, addictions, and attitudes that menace society, on-screen and off. This volume is an essential read, not only for horror scholars and fans, but for those working in areas such as body image and food studies, as well. "
- Cynthia J. Miller, editor of What's Eating You: Food and Horror on Screen
See the publisher website: University Press of Mississippi
> From the same author:
Considering Alan Ball (2006)
Essays on Sexuality, Death and America in the Television and Film Writings
Dir. Thomas Fahy
Subject: Others persons > Alan Ball
Considering Aaron Sorkin (2005)
Essays on the Politics, Poetics and Sleight of Hand in the Films and Television Series
Dir. Thomas Fahy
Subject: Director > Aaron Sorkin
> On a related topic:
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American Culture and Politics in the Cold War and After Through the Projector Lens
Queer for Fear (2024)
Horror Film and the Queer Spectator
The Exorcist Effect (2023)
Horror, Religion, and Demonic Belief
by Joseph P. Laycock and Eric Harrelson
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