Celebrating the Shadows – a feast of imagination

29 March 2013 by Davide Mana 8 Comments

Because horror, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder.

Peter Cushing was born on the 26th of May (1913).
Vincent Price was born on the 27th of May (1911).
Christopher Lee was born on the 27th of May (1922).
(*)

Three actors, three multi-talented artists, three men of sharp wit and vivid, ample culture, three great human beings.
Three persons that spared no opportunity to champion the dignity and the intellectual significance of horror and fantasy fiction.

Now, consider how the literature and art of the imagination – call it fantasy, horror, weird or any other way you please – often suffers from bad press and serious snubs.
And yet, it is in fantasies that all that is high and low in our culture – or across cultures – can mingle, cross-breed and grow.
Science can investigate only what the human mind can imagine.

But imagination is often seen as childish, silly, improper.
Stop dreaming and grow up.

Now, Italian author and critic Franco Pezzini and movie director Max Ferro are suggesting we make the 26th and 27th of may – or, why not, the night in-between – the Feast of Long Shadows.
A celebration of the creative strength and cultural import of the arts of imagination, of horror and wonder.

The web is not new at this sort of initiative – from the deadly serious (the Earth Day) to the highly frivolous (the Talk like a Pirate Day), the web has seen many similar initiatives.
The Feast of Long Shadow will debut on the 26th and 27th of May 2013.

If you feel like supporting the plan – be it by posting on your blog about the dignity of fantasy fiction, by setting up a screening of some old horror with some friends, or by giving a learned lecture in a library – welcome in the fold!
At the moment there’s just a reference page (in Italian) and a simple logo/badge.
More stuff will follow.
Watch this space for news.

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* Incidentally, yes, I was born on the 29th of May (1967).
No, ok, I know, just a statistical glitch.