Where there is no imagination there is no horror.

The line suggests that horror is not simply a property of external events but a product of the mind’s capacity to project, anticipate, and elaborate. Without imagination, frightening stimuli remain flat facts; with imagination, they become narratives of threat—filled with unseen causes, future consequences, and symbolic meaning. The remark also implies that the most potent terror often arises from what is implied rather than shown: the mind supplies the missing details, intensifying dread. In a literary context, it points to the reader’s imaginative participation as essential to the genre’s effect, and to the writer’s craft in prompting that participation through suggestion, ambiguity, and atmosphere.