I have wanted to read some of HP Lovecraft's stories for some time. Last year I noticed several different collections from different publishers appearing on the shelves in TK Maxx. I didn't buy any of them, but I did add this collection to my wish-list and received it as a Christmas present.
This collection is by Oxford University Press, published in their 'World Classics' series. There are nine stories included along with an introduction and detailed footnotes for each tale. All nine stories have been selected for their connection with the 'Cthulhu mythos', the wider world constructed across multiple stories relating to ancient creatures and races that live in more remote parts of the world.
The term 'Cthulhu mythos' was coined after Lovecraft's death and takes its name from The Call of Cthulhu, wherein various people around the world dream of a horrific ancient entity called Cthulhu that 'sleeps' at the bottom of the ocean in a drowned city. It is probably the most famous of Lovecraft's creations with role-playing games and other activities drawing on the character.
But Cthulhu isn't the only lurking evil being in these stories, nor is it the most powerful or sinister. In fact, across the stories there are three or four different races, some older than Cthulhu, some at war with Cthulhu's kin. All of them come from other planets, galaxies or even universes, and all are much, much older than the human race.
The introduction begins with a warning that is contains spoilers, so I skipped it and read the stories first before going back to it. (Does that make it an outroduction?) I didn't look up all the footnotes as I read the stories because doing that was time-consuming. However, I did read many of them and learned plenty of interesting details.
Two big things about Lovecraft's writing relate to his use of 'sources'. He frequently lists obscure books full or arcane and occult lore, and name-checks those books created by contemporary authors of 'weird fiction' in their stories. At other times his protagonists consult lists of actual, real books, which are usually just a list of key writings that were listed in his encyclopaedia. Meanwhile, some of his stories were inspired by events that were happening at the time - the discovery of Pluto, for example, which becomes a home for one of his alien races.
I found the stories a bit of a mixed bag. They all follow a similar formula, with a build up by the protagonist who tells you that he has witnessed a terrible horror, so terrible he's not sure if he can tell you anything about it, but he may as well tell you because it's so horribly terrible and terribly horrible you won't believe him anyway. Then the story starts and sometimes it rattles along to a conclusion and sometimes it doesn't. The Dunwich Horror has a spectacularly poor non-ending.
But there are a couple of stories that do end well. The Whisperer in Darkness made me go 'ugh' and shudder at the end. The Shadow Over Innsmouth took an unexpected turn and ended in a way I really didn't expect. Shadow also included a tense escape for the protagonist, which was one of the few scenes that properly drew me in to the story.
Another formulaic aspect is the way characters always seem to luckily find a talkative shop clerk or town drunk, or crazy coot from up in the hills, who will reel off several pages of exposition. Or someone will write a letter outlining several important plot points. Or, in the most contrived sequence, the Great Old Ones themselves will leave behind a series of gigantic wall friezes that provide a full history of their culture and the life-cycle of the abandoned city the characters are exploring.
Locations vary with action taking place Antarctica and Australia, as well as places Lovecraft knew well on the east coast of the USA. Several stories take place in Massachusetts, with the fictional town of Arkham, loosely based on Salem, featuring prominently. Lovecraft paints Massachusetts as an antiquarian place, steeped in history and secrets.
Another feature of Lovecraft's stories is his love of adjectives. Almost every description of what the protagonists are discovering is weighed down by adjectives, and he uses the same ones repeatedly. He really loved the word 'Cyclopean' to describe the temples and cities his characters discover; large dressed stones are 'Cyclopean blocks' in every story where there is a ruin.
While Lovecraft was good at building tension and describing mysterious events with a suitable amount of dread, I've already mentioned how he often failed to stick the landing. Several of his stories end with mere hints of monsters sort of off-screen. In the introduction there is a funny comment by a critic who was very dismissive of Lovecraft's stories, saying that after wading through all the adjectives, you wanted something better than people running away from "an invisible whistling octopus". It's a fair comment and it really made me laugh.
Overall, reading this collection made me realise why HP Lovecraft is considered so important as one of the pioneers of the genre of 'weird fiction'. His Cthulhu mythos has taken on a life of its own, elevating his status as a writer and ensuring he has left a mark on popular culture. It's a huge legacy. Cyclopean, even.
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