#trauma didnt make me funny. it did give me an immediate intuitive understanding of what was going on in htn

[commander-minkowski]

I really really love the way mental illness and supernatural horror are intertwined in harrow the ninth.

in fiction generally, this is something that needs to balance on a razor’s edge -- too far one way, and the mental illness becomes too conflated with the horror, giving rise to some unfortunate, and often dehumanizing, implications. or, and this is the safer and thus more common option, the mental illness and the horror are so compartmentalized from each other (so as the send the “right” message about mentally ill people to a neurotypical audience) that the story becomes flat and safe, and, frequently as a result of this safeness, boring.

in the case of harrow the ninth, the title character’s madness and the supernatural forces at work are like a parasite and its host -- feeding off each other in a tightly wound, toxic way. the result is not only a story that humanizes harrow a great deal without subjecting her to too much misery porn (!), but also a sensitive, accurate portrayal of what it’s like to be in the head of someone experiencing psychosis.

and this is why I find that debates about whether [x plot detail] was a result of harrow’s illness or wake’s revenant miss the mark a little. because, in my opinion, it doesn’t matter. harrow had subjective experiences that no one else around her could perceive, for reasons that no one, including herself, could understand, and it was confusing and complicated and left everyone, including the reader, feeling frustratingly ambivalent. that’s psychosis, baby!!

#my ramblings #trauma didnt make me funny. it did give me an immediate intuitive understanding of what was going on in htn #locked tomb #locked tomb meta #harrow the ninth #harrow the ninth spoilers #tlt #harrowhark nonagesimus #htn spoilers #psychosis mention #ask to tag #not to dunk on anyone who wants to speculate abt whether x was hallucination or haunting #youre welcome to your fun! #100 #thank you for your very kind and thoughtful tags guys!!i appreciate it #200 #300 #500