Why are towers so... so... creepy?
Jan. 11th, 2013 05:08 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
cairistionaI was reading about the towers that may have inspired Tolkien to create Orthanc, and I started to wonder: what is it about towers that are so creepy?
I grew up in St. Louis, and in a neighborhood not far from me there rose a big, imposing tower, which was part of a Catholic seminary. As you drove down the road, you'd see it rising above the trees, and though it looks like this in reality:
This is how my mind's eye saw it, especially if we drove by at night (thank you, photobucket editing tools):
I'm sure it's a perfectly lovely place, probably where the seminarians go to pray, or maybe it houses great bells that chime out across the hillside on joyful occasions. But... but... to me, it will always feel haunted. So I do not doubt at all that Tolkien was inspired to create a far more creepy version of the towers he saw in his own daily life.
It just seems to be what towers do to a person's imagination.
*shivers*
Do any of you get creeped out by towers or is this just my own weird idiosyncrasy? Is there a certain type of building or style of architecture that raises your neck hairs when you see it?
I grew up in St. Louis, and in a neighborhood not far from me there rose a big, imposing tower, which was part of a Catholic seminary. As you drove down the road, you'd see it rising above the trees, and though it looks like this in reality:
This is how my mind's eye saw it, especially if we drove by at night (thank you, photobucket editing tools):
I'm sure it's a perfectly lovely place, probably where the seminarians go to pray, or maybe it houses great bells that chime out across the hillside on joyful occasions. But... but... to me, it will always feel haunted. So I do not doubt at all that Tolkien was inspired to create a far more creepy version of the towers he saw in his own daily life.
It just seems to be what towers do to a person's imagination.
*shivers*
Do any of you get creeped out by towers or is this just my own weird idiosyncrasy? Is there a certain type of building or style of architecture that raises your neck hairs when you see it?
