Wednesday, 12 June 2019 at 7:30 pm – Wednesday, 12 June 2019 at 9:30 pm

Detecting Pessimism: True Detective Monologues screening

Part of our Detecting Pessimism Thomas Ligotti Symposium. This screening is in partnership with Pilot Light TV Festival

Date: Wednesday 12th June 2019

Time: 7.30pm - 9.30pm

Location: 70 Oxford St, Manchester Metropolitan University

Tickets: Free – Available on Eventbrite

Upon airing in 2014, True Detective blew audiences away with its bleak, stylised telling of a southern gothic detective story. One of the biggest draws of the show was main character Rust Cohle’s sprawling, dark philosophical monologues throughout the 8 episodes. Whilst there is still a debate simmering about whether creator Nic Pizzolatto was simply paying homage or plagiarising horror writer Thomas Ligotti, there is absolutely no doubt that the neo-lovecrafitan writer's DNA is across the show. In this event we will be screening the monologues that are highly influenced by Ligotti's The Conspiracy Against the Human Race, which lives in the spirit of Rust Cohle, through his ideals of philosophical pessimism, speculation, scepticism, and nihilism.

With talks and discussion by Dr Sorcha Ní Fhlainn and Dr Morag Rose on the monologues in True Detective to discuss their drawing on Gothic influence, and to examine how the stylistic rendering of these monologues play with star convention, the Southern Gothic style of the series, and the bleak outlook conveyed in the series as a whole. These elements in turn are perfectly in tune with Ligotti's philosophy and pessimism.

Sorcha Ní Fhlainn is Senior Lecturer in English Literature and Film at Manchester Metropolitan and a founder member of the Manchester Centre for Gothic Studies. She is the author of Postmodern Vampires in Film, Fiction and Popular Culture (2019) and the editor of Our Monstrous (S)kin (2010) and Clive Barker: Dark Imaginer (2017).

Morag Rose is Lecturer in Geography and Planning at the University of Liverpool. Morag is the founder of The LRM (Loiterers Resistance Movement), a Manchester based collective of artists, activists and wanderers interested in psychogeography and the hidden stories of the city, a member of The Walking Artists Network and winner of the 2017 Living Streets Charles Mayer award.

This screening will finish up our day-symposium Detecting Pessimism: Thomas Ligotti and The Weird in an Age of Post-Truth. Tickets for the symposium are free and can be booked from here.

Thanks to ongoing work, No. 70 spaces are considered accessible to visitors with additional access requirements once again. Please contact lucy.simpson@mmu.ac.uk or ring 0161 247 6740 if you have any additional access requirements and would like any more information.