Body Horror/Literature: Difference between revisions

* ''[[The Witches]]'' by [[Roald Dahl]]: In the chapter "Metamorphosis", {{spoiler|the witches hold down the boy protagonist and feed him Mouse-Maker, which transforms him into a mouse ''permanently and painfully''. The transformation isn't permanent in [[The Film of the Book]], but the visuals make it even more disturbing}}.

** They did the same thing to his friend, at least in the film, which he gets to watch in horror.

* ''[[The War Against the Chtorr]]''. In ''A Rage for Revenge'', the leader of a cult that worships the alien invaders removes his clothes to reveal that his body is covered in 'worm fur', the neural symbionts that act as sense organs for the Chtorran worms. And in ''A Season for Slaughter'', {{spoiler|an expedition discovers that Chtorran cities are somehow capable of transforming the lifeforms within them-- including captive humans.}}

* "Metamorphosis" by [[Franz Kafka]]. Average Guy {{spoiler|wakes up as an unknown human-sized insect, unable to perform many of the actions, natural for human.}} It gets even worse when {{spoiler|his father throws some apples at him in anger and second one penetrates his body armor and stuck, rotting and eventually causing his death}}.

** Not all. {{spoiler|Other Father was turned into a grotesquely misshapen and blind creature, left to crawl around the basement}}, while {{spoiler|Other Spink and Forcible's fates were similar, only they were trapped inside a cocoon}}. And let's not talk about what happens to them in the movie...

* ''[[Parasite Eve]]'' {{spoiler|Kiyomi's Mitochondria eventually control her, while her mind is still active. Yes, her MITOCHONDRIA. Her husband has the brilliant idea to keep her mitochondria alive (to be fair, he didn't know they were evil) and they end up possesing people, setting people on fire, and turning into what is basically described as Kiyomi, sans skin and with the ability to reform herself. And to top it all off, Eve rapes Toshiaki and impregnantes a young girl with the "baby" and the young girl goes through nine months of Pregnancy in what can't be more then a half an hour}} (Shuddder) made worse by the novel taking time to explain concepts behind the science and Mitochondria really do have their own DNA.

* Jonathan Shriek in Jeff VanderMeer's ''[[Ambergris|Shriek: An Afterword]]'' allows himself to be infected by a fungus to infiltrate the secret tunnels of the Graycaps. What starts out as bit of mould under his fingernails ends up in a state where he looks like an overweight middle-aged man as long as he concentrates, but if he allows the fungus to emerge, tendrils are involved. And occasionally he'll mention a bodypart like his ear, and comments that he actually lost it ages ago; it's just fungus mimicing the original form.

** The following book, ''[[Ambergris|Finch]]'', features Partials, kind of fungus-cyborgs that go through a similar process as Jonathan, but specifically allow a fungus eat out one of their eyes, and replace it with a spore-based camera.