Soberlicious:
We might add to the list of literary figures obsessed with beast like influences and behavior: Dostoevsky, the Marquis de Sade, Edgar Allen Poe, and countless others obsessed with morbidity. In a philosophical vein there is Schopenhauer, who constructed an entire metaphysic based on it, resulting in a kind of cosmic paranoia. Also, consider the ancient Greeks, with their obsession with cruel and relentless fate, Dionysian frenzies, etc.
W.