What is the theme in Powers of Horror: An Essay on Abjection by Julia Kristeva?

Political and religious history is a theme. In the final chapter of the book, Kristeva raises the question which the reader likely has been wondering throughout the book. The abject is constantly presented as horrible and terrifying—why, then, should one want to experience it? What is the point of literature like Celine's which attempts to disgust the reader into giving up his psychological defenses and embrace the abject horrors that lurk in his soul? It does not even seem like a worthwhile academic enterprise given the consequences. Kristeva certainly is not going to argue the horrifying nature of the abject, but she argues that it must be confronted because it is the primal foundation upon which all political and religious power is built.