grotesquerie

noun

Etymology: From French grotesquerie, from grotesque (“farcical, grotesque”) + -erie (“-ery”), from Italian grottesco, from grotta (“cave, grotto”) + -esco (“-esque, -ish”). Equivalent to grotesque + -erie.

1. An instance of grotesqueness, a grotesque thing.
2. Grotesque things collectively.
3. Grotesqueness, the quality of being grotesque or macabre.

   “She wakened in sharp panic, bewildered by the grotesquerie of some half-remembered dream in contrast with the harshness of inclement fact, drowsily realizing that since she had fallen asleep it had come on to rain smartly out of a shrouded sky.”

   “The tone is brittle and morbid, emphasizing the eerie grotesquerie of Albert Giraud's poems.”

4. A genre of horror literature that was popular in the early 20th century, and practiced by writers such as Ambrose Bierce and Fritz Leiber.