ABSTRACT
In describing rather than defining the phenomenon, Harpham emphasizes the process of trying to classify and interpret that which we sense as grotesque:
For Harpham, the grotesque can be described according to different forms it may take and according to how these forms affect the interpretive process, but there is no essence which is the grotesque. What makes something grotesque in appearance is the fact that it somehow eludes our usual ways of classifying information. Thus grotesque forms may occupy multiple cate gories at once or fall between categories altogether, but there is always some thing familiar about these forms which is what makes them confusing or unsettling.2
