SKU:319

TERRIFYING TRANSFORMATIONS: ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON’S "THE STRANGE CASE OF DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE," FRANZ KAFKA’S "THE METAMORPHOSIS," AND STEPHEN KING’S "THINNER" (1984)

TERRIFYING TRANSFORMATIONS: ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON’S "THE STRANGE CASE OF DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE," FRANZ KAFKA’S "THE METAMORPHOSIS," AND STEPHEN KING’S "THINNER" (1984)

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This in-person course, which serves as an introduction to Professor Fahy’s October “Frick Fright Fest,” will focus on the theme of transformation in horror fiction. Whether one turns into a wolf, a vampire, or some other creature, transformation often gets used as a metaphor for the human capacity for evil and harm. Through Robert Louis Stevenson’s novella The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1886), Franz Kafka’s masterful short story The Metamorphosis (1915), and Stephen King’s Thinner (1984), we will explore the role of disability, food, and sexuality in horror. How do these works use the changing body to comment on our anxieties? What warnings do they offer about the dangers of unchecked desires and appetites? What do these excesses say about Western culture in particular? And how do these narratives comment on cultural prejudices about disability and fatness?
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About the lecturer(s)

Thomas Fahy

Thomas Fahy, a nonfiction writer, novelist, and professor of literature and creative writing, has published 19 books. His most recent, The Life of the Author: F. Scott Fitzgerald, was released in November of 2025. He has also published essays on everything from Paris Hilton and 1980s vampire films to contemporary television and theater. His works have been translated into several languages, and he has been interviewed by the Associated Press, Salon, and other publications, as well as radio hosts in the United States, Britain, Canada, Australia, Ireland, and Malaysia. He was recently featured in a documentary about Truman Capote’s In Cold Blood for Arte Television and on the BBC radio program “Literary Pursuits.”


When he is not writing, Dr. Fahy performs regularly as a classical pianist with the New York Piano Society and has appeared in recent concerts at Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, Merkin Concert Hall, and other venues in New York City. He has a degree in music from the University of California, Davis, and he served as an adjunct professor of piano at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill for several years before moving to New York. He is a fascinating and dynamic teacher who is able to bring his wide interdisciplinary knowledge to whatever the subject.

Lecture Details

Sessions

4 lecture(s)
Day & Time

Thursday, 10:00am - 12:00pm
Date(s)

Oct 12, 2023
Oct 19, 2023
Oct 26, 2023
Nov 02, 2023