Humanity's Oldest Emotion Is Fear
Zhang Heng pointed at the half-finished manuscript in the old typewriter.
"Is this your new book?"
"No, this isn't my novel. It actually belongs to a friend of mine. I'm helping him revise and proofread it, and in return he pays me a little." Lovecraft seemed somewhat ashamed as he said this, and hurriedly added, "Normally, I do this sort of work for free. It's just that things at home have been rather difficult lately. Oh, right—you said you've read my novels. Was it in the newspapers?"
"Actually, they're practically everywhere," Zhang Heng said.
Lovecraft looked confused.
But before he could ask anything, Zhang Heng moved a chair over and placed it in front of him. "Tell me about the novels you write."
"Ah, certainly." The moment his novels were mentioned, Lovecraft shed his earlier dullness and restraint, immediately becoming animated. "The... things I write originated from the horror stories my grandfather used to tell me. They opened a door for me. Before that, I had never seen any other kind of writing that could stir human emotion so powerfully. And more interestingly, in most horror stories, the atmosphere before the monster appears is actually what makes people the most nervous. So ever since I was young, I've been wondering: what exactly are we afraid of?"
"Humanity's oldest and strongest emotion is fear, and its oldest and strongest fear is the fear of the unknown," Zhang Heng said.
"That's exactly what I wanted to say!" Lovecraft said excitedly. "Imagination—imagination is the key to all of this. In my novels, I've always devoted myself to creating an atmosphere that stimulates the imagination as much as possible, rather than directly describing the things that inspire fear. Because no matter how terrifying the thing you describe in words