Splatterpunk - what is it, you say?

Splatterpunk: "First Appeared in Tabula Rasa#6, 1995

Why should not a writer be permitted to make use of the levers of fear, terror and horror because some feeble soul here and there finds it more than it can bear? Shall there be no strong meat at table because there happen to be some guests there whose stomachs are weak, or who have spoiled their own digestions?
The Serapion Brethren
ETA Hoffmann, 1821

The word splatterpunk is a product of the mid-eighties, coined by David J Schow at the World Fantasy Convention in Providence. The term splatter movies had already been brought into prominence by John McCarty in one of his various film companions, though it had apparently been previously used by George Romero. There was much debate in horror circles in the late Eighties over the term, the 'quiet versus explicit horror' argument, and in 1990 Paul M Sammon edited an anthology called Splatterpunks: Extreme Horror."

Wikipedia.org defines it as:

Splatterpunk is a neologism coined to describe a subgenre of horror fiction distiguished by its graphic depiction of violence. Clive Barker is often cited as the best known writer of the style, although the actual genre was named by author David Schow, who is considered an innovator and exemplary within the Splatterpunk school of horror writing, as well as the bestselling team of John Skipp & Craig Spector, whose modern vampire classic The Light At The End (1986) is considered a seminal work.

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