Thomas Ligotti Quotes
To be sane, he held, was either to be sedated by melancholy or activated by hysteria, two responses which were 'always and equally warranted for those of sound insight'. All others were irrational, merely symptoms of imaginations left idle, of memories out of work. And above these mundane responses, the only elevation allowable, the only valid transcendence, was a sardonic one: a bliss that annihilated the universe with jeers of dark joy, a mindful ecstasy. Anything else in the way of 'mysticism' was a sign of deviation or distraction, and a heresy to the obvious. (“The Medusa”)
Ligotti, Thomas. "The Medusa." Noctuary, Carroll & Graf, 1994.
Thomas Ligotti is a contemporary American horror writer. His writings have been noted as being rooted in several literary genres – most prominently weird fiction – and have overall been described by many critics as works of philosophical horror, often formed into short stories and novellas in the tradition of gothic fiction. The worldview espoused by Ligotti in his fiction and non-fiction is pessimistic and nihilistic. The Washington Post called him "the best kept secret in contemporary horror fiction."
