Horror and comedy: screaming and laughing
Both horror and comedy provoke strong emotions, but these two seemingly disparate genres are more closely linked than you would…
ByHalloween
Halloween is a holiday celebrated each year on October 31 with its origins in the ancient Celtic festival of Samhain when people would light bonfires and wear costumes to scare away ghosts and evil spirits. In the eighth century, Pope Gregory III designated November 1 as a time to honour all saints and soon the festival of All Saints Day came to include some of the traditions of Samhain. The evening before was known as All Hallows Eve, and later Halloween. Eventually, Halloween became a day of activities like trick-or-treating, carving jack-o-lanterns out of pumpkins, festive gatherings, and wearing costumes. Find the New Statesman’s best Halloween content here.
The Back Half #34: Halloween, the Goldsmiths Prize and Orinoco Flow
The culture podcast with Tom Gatti and Kate Mossman.
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Why for some LGBT+ people, Halloween is the gay Christmas
For queer people it can be a lifeline – a rare moment where we can express ourselves freely and subvert norms…
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Return of the mask: finding new meaning in the old horror of Halloween
The bloodthirsty Michael Myers is back 40 years on from the original movie.
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The origins of “spoopy”, the internet’s favourite Halloween word
What does spoopy mean and where did it come from?
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Ghostwatch: the Halloween hoax that changed the language of television
Twenty-five years ago a one-off show, inspired by the first flickers of fake news, terrified a generation. The BBC quickly disowned…
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The top ten alternative Halloween films and TV
Forget The Exorcist, prepare to get seriously freaked out with these bone-chilling classics.
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The youth-centric horror shows coming to British TV this Halloween
Tonight, two new additions make their way to British screens: ITV’s Him and E4’s Crazyhead.
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If you’re feeling sinister: this season’s crop of Halloween horrors
Ryan Gilbey is chilled by new releases The Badabook, Annabelle and It Follows.
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This Halloween, ditch the jelly worms and eat the Wicca way
Scott Cunningham’s Encyclopedia of Wicca in the Kitchen, “a practical guide to food magic”, promises, rather thrillingly, that from now…
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Feminists, it’s time to reclaim Halloween as a night to be scary
At that moment it hit me. From puberty onwards, I had lost Halloween. It had somehow ceased to be about…
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When is it too soon to dress up for Halloween as iconic murdered black teenager Trayvon Martin?
The entire globe is affected by how the social fabric of the world’s only superpower is threaded through with the…
ByTen Halloween costumes that will save you from dressing up as Miley Cyrus
Thinking of reaching for a leotard and a suggestive foam finger so you can twerk your way through the spookiest…
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