horrificity

As for humor in horror, I'm beginning to think that it's almost necessary to make for an effective tale; speaking for myself, I've noticed that if I'm reading or watching something that's unrelentingly grim and focused too tightly on the general horribleness (horrificity? horribility?) that's going on, I tend to draw back from it, and it doesn't really GET me.

1992 October 18, mary virginia burke, “anthologies anyone?”, in alt.horror (Usenet), archived from the original on 04 Apr 2024

He attempts in vain to convey to the robbers that his nasal passages are impenetrably blocked. They duct-tape his mouth. I will not even attempt to approximate the horrificity of the death's description; I could not do it anything resembling justice. Such writing. Then there's an equally if not more horrific story of a guy who dies by shooting up Drano.

1998 June 6, Amzug [pseudonym], “The Music of Falling To Sleep With a Drippy Nose **SUGAR**”, in rec.arts.poems (Usenet), archived from the original on 04 Apr 2024

> But this whole discussion assumes that "ISO C" will solve the problems > of portability, which is not the case. A study of the Inform source will > demonstrate some of the challenges involved in writing portable C, Most notably, the horrificity[1] of allocating RAM on various platforms. […] [1] That's a word now. Perhaps. It's better than horrificality would have been, anyway.

2000 September 21, Jonadab the Unsightly One [pseudonym], “Poll: Programming language or adventure scripting language?”, in rec.arts.int-fiction (Usenet), archived from the original on 04 Apr 2024

It's very hard to suspend your disbelief. It's also very hard to suspend your disbelief when it comes to football, and further when it comes to Ligue 1, further still when it comes to these two clubs, and right until the very Nth when it comes to this fixture. But given that we're not about to change the horrificity of the world, we may as well have a shy and see if we can somehow derive ourselves some enjoyment. Go!

2013 September 22, Daniel Harris, “PSG v Monaco – as it happened”, in Alan Rusbridger, editor, The Guardian, London: Guardian News & Media, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 23 Sep 2013

It's very easy to get stuck into sportsfolk - they live our dreams, for nice money. But, although they don't fail on purpose, it's reasonable to expect them to compete with honour, zest and courage. Today, they did not; rather, they produced a signature performance of profound and unshocking horrificity.

2014 May 25, Dan Lucas, Daniel Harris, “England v Sri Lanka: second ODI – as it happened”, in Alan Rusbridger, editor, The Guardian, London: Guardian News & Media, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 26 May 2014