#9 Ghosts & Goblins

Ghosts & Gob­lins is my Hal­loween edi­tion for 2011. You can click on the image to see a larg­er ver­sion, but Amper­Art sub­scribers are treat­ed to high-​resolution files for print­ing beau­ti­ful poster prints (see exam­ples here).

Ghosts & Gob­lins: Amper­Art #9

Do you know the dif­fer­ence between ghosts, gob­lins and ghouls?

Ghosts are thought to be souls of the dead. They are dis­em­bod­ied spir­its seen as vague or translu­cent shapes, which the white sheet cos­tume rep­re­sents. “Ghost” comes from the Old Eng­lish “gast,” refer­ring to the soul, spir­it, life and breath.

Gob­lins are mis­chie­vous and even mali­cious, char­ac­ter­ized as a grotesque  form of elf. “Gob­lin” comes from the Ger­man word kobold,a mis­chie­vous house­hold spir­it which is some­times nice and sings to chil­dren, but also acts like a mean lit­tle kid hid­ing stuff around the house, kick­ing peo­ple and throw­ing tantrums. (Guess my par­ents would con­sid­er me a goblin.)

Then there are ghouls, quite dis­gust­ing crea­tures that feast on corpses and chil­dren. “Ghoul” goes back to the Ara­bic lan­guage, where “gha­la” means “he seized.”

Hap­py Halloween.