The Ashgate Encyclopedia of Literary and Cinematic Monsters

Jeffrey Andrew Weinstock

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2016
• eBook ISBN:
  9781317044253
• Topic: Media & Performing Arts
• Subtopic: Literary Criticism

From vampires and demons to ghosts and zombies, interest in monsters in literature, film, and popular culture has never been stronger. This concise Encyclopedia provides scholars and students with a comprehensive and authoritative A-Z of monsters throughout the ages. It is the first major reference book on monsters for the scholarly market. Over 200 entries written by experts in the field are accompanied by an overview introduction by the editor. Generic entries such as 'ghost' and 'vampire' are cross-listed with important specific manifestations of that monster. In addition to monsters appearing in English-language literature and film, the Encyclopedia also includes significant monsters in Spanish, French, Italian, German, Russian, Indian, Chinese, Japanese, African and Middle Eastern traditions. Alphabetically organized, the entries each feature suggestions for further reading. The Ashgate Encyclopedia of Literary and Cinematic Monsters is an invaluable resource for all students and scholars and an essential addition to library reference shelves.

A–Z: The Monsters

ABBADON—see DEMON

ABBOT, LEON—see DEMON

ACROMANTULA—see HARRY POTTER, MONSTERS IN

AEREUM—see DEMON

ALICHINO—see DEMON

ANDHAKA—see DEMON

ANGEL

Fig. 1 Angel by Anki King

Western theology and folklore conceive of angels as God’s messengers, beings of pure spirit who may appear in human form, often with wings, to interact with humans. According to Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, angels are to carry out the will of God and be extensions of that will on Earth. The three faiths also agree that the essential nature of angels is good. Still, religious and secular literature, as well as film, abounds in angels who are portrayed as evil or monstrous through their own actions, or who are perceived as such by fearful human beings.

Early Jewish and Christian texts often refer to fallen angels who tempt humans to evil. Much folklore about fallen angels, as well as a great deal of their literary and filmic portrayal, stems from a brief passage from the Book of Genesis (6:4) that refers to the “sons of God” (King James) or “sons of heaven” (New American)—often though not always interpreted as angels—who, through relations with human women, beget a race of half-angel giants, called the Nephilim. Because of the story’s place in Genesis, right before the story of Noah’s Ark, the wickedness of the Nephilim has sometimes been interpreted, especially in popular religious belief, as a cause of the Biblical flood. The Genesis account is interpreted and expanded upon in the non-Biblical First Book of Enoch (c. 167 BCE), which refers to the Watchers, 200 angels who come down from Heaven with the task of spying on human beings. Disobeying God, the Watchers, led by the angels Shemjaza and Azazel, also teach people secret and potentially dangerous lore, including weaponry, the application of make-up (for women), and the arts of prophecy and magic. The narrative of the Watchers’ interaction with humanity is also treated in the pseudoepigraphical Book of Jubilees (c. 100 BCE), and Enoch is referenced in the New Testament Epistle of Jude, in which we are warned (as in Enoch) that eternal chains await the angels who rebelled against God. A related story also appears in Islam: the Koran (see KORAN, MONSTERS IN) discusses the angels Harut and Marut whom God sent to test people by showing them how to do magic, leading those who failed the test into damnation. While the Koran makes clear that Harut and Marut are doing the divine will, in the Persian epic poem Masnavi-y Ma-navi (c. 1258), the Sufi mystic Rumi portrays Harut and Marut as prideful angels who succumb to human temptations and commit evil acts. This view is controversial among many adherents of Islam.

Fallen angels—angels punished for desiring to be like God—are discussed throughout the New Testament, especially in their capacity as followers of Satan (see DEVIL, THE). Many Christian commentators perceived Old Testament support for their understanding of the fall of Satan and his angels in a line from the Book of Isaiah: “How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning!” (King James, 14:12). While explicitly directed at the King of Babylon, many Christians interpreted the passage as referring metaphorically to Satan. In the Gospel of Luke, Satan is described as falling from Heaven like lightning and the Book of Revelation describes a “war in Heaven” (12:7) in which the good angels, led by the Archangel Michael, defeat Satan and his angelic followers, casting them down to Earth. Both the Gospel of Matthew and the Epistle of Peter refer to the punishments waiting for the rebellious fallen angels. In the Second Epistle to the Corinthians, the Apostle Paul also reminds readers that Satan’s angels can disguise themselves as righteous beings in their attempts to lead humans astray.

Fallen angels are central to the works of early and medieval Christian writers, especially Saint Augustine of Hippo (354–430), the medieval scholastic writers Saint Anselm of Canterbury (1033–1109) and Saint Thomas Aquinas (1224–74), and the Franciscan theologian Saint Bonaventure (1217–74). While maintaining the belief (shared by Jews and Muslims) that angels generally have no free will, the Christian writers believed in one exception to this idea—that the angels chose to rebel through a single instance of free will and that their choice and subsequent fall were irrevocable. These writers also believed that in their fall, the rebellious angels lost their beauty and the perfection of their wisdom, and became demons. In his Summa Theologica (1273), Aquinas asserts: “The fallen angels that beset man on earth, carry with them their own dark and punishing atmosphere, and wherever they are they endure the pains of hell” (64:4).

Obedient (non-fallen) angels may also be portrayed as monstrous, or as having a terrifying appearance. In the Book of Ezekiel, the angels who appear before that prophet are beings of fire with four faces and multiple wings. In various religious texts, angels may appear monstrous when punishing sinners or enemies of the righteous. In the Second Book of Samuel, God stops his angel from laying waste to Jerusalem, while the Second Book of Kings describes an “angel of the Lord” (19:35) who slays 185,000 Assyrian invaders of Israel. The Book of Revelations (9:11) refers to Abaddon or Apollyon, the “angel of the bottomless pit” (King James) or “the angel of the abyss” (New American), who lets loose a plague of grotesque locusts to punish the ungodly. In the Koran, angels are described as pitilessly and precisely carrying out Allah’s commands of punishment on sinners, and we are told that 19 angels guard Hell.

In the New Testament, the Angel of the Lord is often called the “destroyer” (see 1 Corinthians 10:10) and has sometimes been confused or equated with the Angel of Death. Many Jewish texts—both Talmudic texts, which collect and comment on Jewish law and belief, and the Midrash, which comment on the Bible—also discuss the angel turned demon Sammael or Samael, sometimes equated with the Angel of Death and sometimes with Satan. The Koran depicts the Angel of Death as kindly to the righteous dead but as a monster to those who die in sin. The Koran refers to this angel only as the Malak al-Maut (literally “angel of death”). Traditional commentary has given him the name Izra’il or Azra’il—sometimes Azrael or Azriel—a version of which is used in many tales in the literary collection known as One Thousand and One Nights (see ARABIAN NIGHTS, MONSTERS IN THE), which dates back to at least the ninth century CE, as well as in Rumi’s Masnavi. Azrael (Azriel) as the name of the Angel of Death also appears in some Jewish Midrashic texts.

Monstrous angels appear throughout literature and film, often inspired by religious books and treatises. In his Inferno (c. 1308–21), the Italian poet Dante Alleghieri follows Augustine and Aquinas concerning fallen angels, equating them with demons and referring to the loss of their angelic beauty. Dante’s fallen angels guard the City of Dis, in which the lowest circles of Hell are found. The idea of angels tempting humans to wickedness recurs in Christopher Marlowe’s Doctor Faustus (1604) in which a good angel and an evil angel fight to influence Dr Faustus, as Lucifer offers him a deal for his soul. The so-called war in Heaven between the rebellious and obedient angels has also been the inspiration for many literary works. In John Milton’s epic poem Paradise Lost (1667), fallen angels retain the function of tempters and leaders astray, their equation with demons made clear by the fact that many carry the names of Old Testament demons or pre-Biblical gods. Aside from Lucifer, Milton’s poem features Moloch, Bellial, Mammon, and Beelzebub arguing about the best way to poison human character.

Milton’s work may be the first to portray the fallen angels sympathetically—especially Lucifer, whom Milton says was the highest and most beautiful of all God’s angels. Milton’s portrayal is alluded to and expanded upon in numerous later works, most particularly Philip Pullman’s “His Dark Materials” trilogy of novels (1995–2000), a reimagining of Paradise Lost in which the rebel angels are seen as heroes. These include Balthamos and Baruch, who protect the heroine of the series, Lyra Belacqua, and help her father—not coincidentally called Lord Asriel—establish a Republic of Heaven. In Pullman’s work, the evil angels are those who represent Christianity, here called the Magisterium. These include the Magisterium’s weakened senile leader, called the Authority, and his powerful second-in-command, Metatron, an angel known in the Babylonian Talmud (c. 600 BCE) as second in power only to God. Metatron also shows up as God’s officious representative in Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman’s novel Good Omens (1990), insisting that the Apocalypse is inevitable: “Things have to happen like this. All the choices have been made” (364). Stephen Brust’s 1984 novel To Reign in Hell provides another sympathetic portrait of the angels who rebel against God, while Memnoch, the fallen angel in Anne Rice’s Memnoch the Devil (1995), is cast out of Heaven for his sympathy for (and sexual relations with) humans. Neil Gaiman’s “Sandman” series of graphic novels (1989–94) also includes numerous fallen angels, both sympathetic and unsympathetic, while British author Storm Constantine’s novel Burying the Shadow (1992) deals with fallen angel vampires. In The Master and Margarita, novelist Mikhail Bulgakov’s 1930s satire of Soviet Russia, the companions of the disguised Satan, Professor Woland, include angelically named Azazello and Abadonna.

Many modern books and films are influenced by earlier stories of the Watchers and Nephilim. These include contemporary novels about angels falling in love with humans. Becca Fitzpatrick’s Hush Hush (2009) and its sequels detail the romance of a male fallen angel and a female human with Nephilim blood, while also recalling the theme of the war between good and evil angels. In “The Mortal Instruments” (2007–09) and “The Infernal Devices” (2010–11), two series of novels by Cassandra Clare, the Nephilim appear as the Shadowhunters and are tasked with fighting and killing demons. Danielle Trussoni’s novel Angelology (2010) tells a story of the Nephilim, described as “beautiful iridescent monsters” (85), and their infiltration into and corruption of all aspects of human society.

Literary and cinematic depictions of the Angel of Death include George Gordon Lord Byron’s poem “The Destruction of Sennecharib” (1813) in which the poet describes the Angel of the Lord from First Kings as the Angel of Death with wings outspread, breathing into the faces of the Assyrians. Sometimes the Angel of Death is portrayed as a sympathetic and merciful figure: in Hellboy II: The Golden Army (Guillermo del Toro, 2008), the angel brings a mortally wounded Hellboy back to life. Andrew, the Angel of Death character in the television series Touched by an Angel (created by John Masius, 1994–2003) is also portrayed in a positive light, as are Sammael and Samiel, the two handsome black-clad angels of death who appear in episodes of the television series Millennium (created by Chris Carter, 1996–99).

In many modern films and books, angels who are conventionally seen as “good” may behave monstrously, often out of pride or impatience with human frailty. Some recent films give us an evil version of the Archangel Gabriel, revered in Christianity for announcing the birth of Jesus to Mary. In the film Constantine (Francis Lawrence, 2005), Gabriel envies human beings, God’s favorites, and seeks to punish them by bringing Hell to Earth. In The Prophecy (Gregory Widen, 1995), Gabriel tries to steal a human soul as a means to overthrow Heaven. The film Legion (Scott Charles Stewart, 2009) shows Gabriel leading hosts of angels to destroy sinful humankind, this time at God’s behest. Gabriel (Shane Abbess) is also a 2007 Australian film in which the angel resumes his position as hero with the Archangel Michael—traditionally humanity’s defender—as rebel. The television series Supernatural (created by Eric Kripke, 2005–present) included a story arc in which angels and demons move ruthlessly towards the Apocalypse, at the expense of human survival. While the series portrays some angel characters such as Gabriel and Castiel as by turns destructive and sympathetic, the callous and often murderous behavior of the traditionally righteous Michael and Raphael prompts series hero Dean Winchester (Jensen Ackles) to declare that “angels are dicks.” In Neil Gaiman’s Neverwhere, which appeared as both a television mini-series (Dewi Humphreys, 1996) and a novel (1996), the deceptively beautiful Angel Islington (for whom the London tube station is named) orchestrates a brutal murder. A character remarks of him: “When angels go bad … they go worse than anyone. Remember, Lucifer used to be an angel” (303). In Michael Moorcock’s novel, The War Amongst the Angels (1998), the war must be averted by humans.

Literature also gives us more ambiguous characters, those who seem monstrous at first but who may be angels in disguise. In Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s “A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings” (1955), the title character becomes both a sideshow attraction and the subject of theological debate. It is never clear whether the old man is an angel or a freak, though his arrival coincides with the healing of a sick child. David Almond’s novel Skellig (1998) concerns a young man who finds a strange, weakened creature in his garage—who turns out to have both wings and healing powers. John Travolta’s Michael (Nora Ephron, 1996) concerns a vacationing angel who drinks and carries on with women. The angel Gibreel, the Islamic form of the name Gabriel, is central to Salman Rushdie’s novel The Satanic Verses (1988), in which plane crash survivor Gibreel Farishta believes himself to be reincarnated as an angel. This belief, attributed possibly to schizophrenia, may cause him to commit murder and other bad acts. Also, in a dream sequence from the book, a supposed vision of the angel Gibreel prompts a young woman to lead her fellow villagers to drown in the Arabian Sea. In Tony Kushner’s play Angels in America: A Gay Fantasia on National Themes (1993), the HIV positive character Prior Walter metaphorically wrestles with an angel as Jacob did in the Bible. Like many writers and filmmakers, Rushdie and Kushner employ scriptural themes to remind their audience of the potential monstrousness of angels.

Regina Hansen

References and Suggested Reading

Fowkes, Kate. Giving Up the Ghost: Spirits, Ghosts, and Angels in Mainstream Comedy Films. Michigan: Wayne State University Press, 1998.

Gaiman, Neil. Neverwhere. New York: Harper Perennial, 2003. Reprint. 1996.

Gaiman, Neil and Terry Pratchett. Good Omens. New York: Workman Publishing. 1990.

Giorgievski, Sandra. Face to Face with Angels: Images in Medieval Art and in Film. Jefferson, NC: McFarland and Company, 2010.

Reed, Annette Yoshiko. Fallen Angels and the History of Judaism and Christianity. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2005.

Sullivan, Kevin P. Wrestling with Angels: A Study of the Relationship between Angels and Humans in Ancient Jewish Literature and the New Testament. Leiden, Netherlands: Brill, 2004.

Trussoni, Danielle. Angelology. New York: Penguin Books, 2010.

ANIMALS, MONSTROUS

Animals bec...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• Acknowledgments
• List of Illustrations
• List of Entries
• Introduction
• A–Z: The Monsters