: :::. : ____, In Memory, : :: : : |_ _; Karl Marx ,~~ : :::'istorted : `|| says: --)( : :::. :::: : || "Aufheben!" ()= : :: :igital ::. rection : [] HOOKAH! : :::' :::: : 26 February 1994 : Text File #13 Mongoloid Telecom ::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: 'THE LEGACY OF H.P. LOVECRAFT: THE INFLUENCE AND MEANING OF THE CTHULHU MYTHOS' by Az A. Thoth H.P. Lovecraft was a writer virtually unknown during his lifetime, except to a small circle of correspondents and the core readership of several pulp magazines, most importantly Weird Tales. Since the time of his death, however, the works of Lovecraft and his contemporaries have become important and influential pieces in the horror and fantasy genre. Lovecraft's works, primarily his Cthulhu Mythos, inspired many young authors with whom he corresponded. Amongst those he encouraged, inspired, and influenced, were Robert Bloch, Fritz Leiber, Frank Belknap Long, and August Derleth. He also impacted the writing styles of several already established contemporaries, most importantly Robert E. Howard and Clark Ashton Smith. In later years, Lovecraft's influence would appear in British writers J. Ramsey Campbell and Brian Lumley in 1964 and 1971 respectively. Stephen King, too, has written for several collections of Mythos stories. The Cthulhu Mythos setting has not been the only element of Lovecraft's writing that has survived the fifty-seven years since his death. His unique style and story-telling technique has resurfaced time and time again in the works of those he has inspired. It took years after his death for Lovecraft's work to gain the attention of the critics, but once it did, it began a debate that has ranged to the extremes of praise and degradation, as well as given rise to varying interpretations of Lovecraft's theme. One thing that is not argued, however, is that H.P. Lovecraft had a profound impact upon the horror genre, and the stories have never been quite the same. The works of Howard Phillips Lovecraft, more commonly referred to as HPL, are widely regarded as being amongst the most influential stories written in the horror and fantasy veins. There are those who have gone so far as to say that "in terms of imitation and inspiration, Lovecraft may well have had more influence on other writers than any contemporary except Ernest Hemingway." To discuss the influence of an author on the writings of others, one must first examine that author's own works. In the case of HPL, his most famous and influential stories were those which were included in what August Derleth has popularly termed the Cthulhu Mythos. Though it has also been called by others, perhaps more accurately, the Yog-Sothoth Cycle or Lovecraft Cycle of Myth, for the sake of continuity it will herein be referred to as the more widely recognized Cthulhu Mythos, or as simply the Mythos. The Mythos is characterized primarily by the existence of a pantheon of cosmic gods and god-like beings, of which Lovecraft created three major types: the Outer Gods, the Great Old Ones, and the Elder Gods. The Outer Gods are presented as being the distant rulers of the universe, rarely having anything to do with humanity. This is in contrast to the Great Old Ones, which are immense alien things, less supernatural than the nearly omnipotent Outer Gods, which have come to be imprisoned both on the earth and throughout the universe. The Elder Gods are the least commonly referred to, and are perhaps rivals of the Outer Gods, though usually they appear indifferent towards mankind, and weaker than the Outer Gods. In addition to the presence of these vast beings, stories of the Cthulhu Mythos almost unfailingly take place, or at least begin, within the setting of Lovecraft's own fictitious New England, where he created such towns as Arkham, Innsmouth, Dunwich, and Red Hook, and even his own college, Miskatonic University. While a definite consistency is present in all of Lovecraft's Mythos writings, it would be a mistake to assume that the Cthulhu Mythos was a planned development in Lovecraft's work. There is everything to show that he had no intentions whatsoever of evolving the Cthulhu Mythos until that pattern made itself manifest in his work... Over time, as the Mythos became apparent in Lovecraft's work, he began to encourage other writers to add to it, resulting in stories by numerous contemporaries and correspondents, including previously established authors such as Robert E. Howard and Clark Ashton Smith, along with aspiring young writers like August Derleth, Frank Belknap Long, Fritz Leiber and even a teenage Robert Bloch. Lovecraft's other works fall into two categories, those which take place in the Dreamworld, and the other, mostly early tales, consisting of more traditionally set horror stories. Some of these early tales were quasi imitative of Poe, "the Outsider perhaps most closely emulating Poe's style and subject matter." Others were ghost stories, like "The Rats in the Walls" or "In the Vault." The tales of the Dreamworld often interconnect with the tales of the Cthulhu Mythos, and contain references to members of the Mythos gods, as in The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath, wherein the hero Randolph Carter encounters "the Other Gods and their crawling chaos Nyarlathotep." It is the Cthulhu Mythos, though, that has assured Lovecraft's place as a master of the horror genre. For, as Robert Bloch states while introducing a Lovecraft volume, While imaginary worlds abound in modern fantasy, few of today's writers set their sagas in Poictesme, Perelandra, or Middle Earth. But stories and novels based on the Mythos continue to proliferate. In the decades since his death, Lovecraft has become "the object of a small but tenacious cult." He inspired many of his contemporaries to add to his Mythos, and gradually it has grown. It has been estimated that as many as hundreds of authors, amateur and professional alike, have continued to expound upon Lovecraft's concepts to date. Among those influenced by Lovecraft have been several writers who would "in turn become influential writers of fantasy and science fiction." Of these would most prominently be numbered Bloch, Long, Leiber, and Derleth. Robert Bloch, best known as the author of the novel Psycho, was the youngest member of the Lovecraft Circle. He began his professional writing career at the age of seventeen, at the encouragement of Lovecraft, with whom Bloch had been corresponding for the previous two years. The two had been in contact since Lovecraft had replied to a fan letter Bloch had written him upon reading about Lovecraft in the letters section of an issue of Weird Tales. During his long career, Bloch has written several stories in the vein of the Cthulhu Mythos, including "The Shambler From the Stars," which was in fact a pastiche on Lovecraft in which a thinly disguised HPL is eaten by an invisible creature, much as one of Lovecraft's characters, Abdul Alhazred, was devoured in public by invisible demons. This story began a series of three short stories in which the two authors took turns murdering or devouring the other. Bloch has since stated that it was Lovecraft who inspired him to write at all, with the encouragement HPL gave him through their letters. "[Lovecraft] encouraged me; to the point where I was determined that I was somehow going to do some writing myself. . . . H.P. Lovecraft was my university." Another writer influenced and encouraged by Lovecraft, who would himself become an influential writer of fantasy, was Fritz Leiber. Leiber is best known for his stories around the two characters Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser. Even in these stories, of fantasy rather than of horror, Lovecraft's influence can be seen, as in the story "The Sunken Land" which features at its end a rather "Lovecraftian creature..." or rather, race of creatures. They are remindful of Lovecraft creations in that they, like the Deep Ones of several Lovecraft stories, inhabit a sunken city which, as in the original "Call of Cthulhu," rises again for some supernatural purpose. Much like Bloch, Leiber was, as an early writer, encouraged by Lovecraft, upon HPL's reading of Leiber's first serious effort, "Adept's Gambit." Frank Belknap Long was one of the few young writers who corresponded with Lovecraft and actually met the man in person. As with the previous two authors, Lovecraft encouraged the young Long to write, and in fact helped to get several of Long's first stories published in Weird Tales, a fact Long himself acknowledges, saying "[Lovecraft]...insisted that the stories had been judged and accepted with objective impartiality. But I knew better." Long's contributions to the ever-growing Mythos included such stories as "The Hounds of Tindalos" and "The Space Eaters," the latter story having been called by Gahan Wilson "perhaps the best evocation of that particular horror of indifferent cosmic violation . . . not written by HPL himself." Lastly among those writers most dramatically influenced by Lovecraft was August Derleth. Derleth, along with Donald Wandrei, founded Arkham House Publishers after Lovecraft's death, with the initial purpose of keeping Lovecraft in print. The first book of Lovecraft stories ever was compiled, The Outsider and Others, was edited by Derleth. Later, using notes Lovecraft had left behind, Derleth completed many stories, which he published under both names as posthumous collaborations. And while many have disagreed with Derleth's attempts to create a pantheon of good gods from the previously obscure and indifferent Elder Gods, it is generally acknowledged that it was Derleth who was responsible for "keeping Lovecraft in print and available to the public in the decades following HPL's death." Lovecraft influenced many other young writers of the time, Robert Bloch saying on the subject that "some of us knew him at the time, or discovered him later, as a writer, but to all of us I think he was a very important influence." For some of these young writers, Lovecraft had a very direct influence in that he did revisions of their stories, revisions and ghostwriting having been Lovecraft's only work outside of his own writings, which alone did not allow him to make a living. Among those Lovecraft did revisions for were Hazel Heald and Zealia Bishop. In addition to the beginning writers of the day, Lovecraft also had a marked effect on several already established professional authors, most notably Clark Ashton Smith and Robert E. Howard. Both writers added stories to the body that was becoming the Cthulhu Mythos: Smith such stories as "Ubbo-Sathla" and "The Return of the Sorcerer, Howard stories including "The Black Stone." Both men were also long-time members of Lovecraft's circle of correspondents. A sort of Cthulhian revival occurred several decades after Lovecraft's death, when two British writers, first J. Ramsey Campbell and then Brian Lumley, began writing new stories for the Cthulhu Mythos, simply "transplanting the myth-pattern to the English countryside and adding milieus of their own. . . ." Even the best selling horror author of all time, Stephen King, has been influenced by Lovecraft. According to an article in Magill's Survey of Popular Fiction, "At age twelve, a young Stephen King found, amidst his father's old books, a book of short stories by H.P. Lovecraft. In a short time, horror stories became an obsession." King, too, has added to the Cthulhu Mythos, among his contributions being the short story "Crouch End." Lovecraft influenced many writers with the setting of his Cthulhu Mythos, but his influence has not been limited to merely the inclusion of cosmic gods and New England place-names. Lovecraft stated that all of his stories were based on a common theme, and that All my stories, unconnected as they may be, are based on the fundamental lore or legend that this world was inhabited at one time by another race who, in practicing black magic, lost their foothold and were expelled, yet live on outside, ever ready to take possession of this earth again. It was this theme that Lovecraft attempted to develop through the Mythos, and which has been further utilized by many other authors contributing to the Mythos. It was more than just the content of the stories Lovecraft told however, that made them unique; it was the way in which these stories were told. Lovecraft utilized setting and an historical quality in his narrative to make his stories so thoroughly believable. Among the array of occult props Lovecraft used was a veritable library of forbidden books, including the dreaded Necronomicon of Abdul Alhazred and the Unnausprechlichen Kulten of von Juntz. In his writing, Lovecraft also consistently focused on setting over characterization. This was an important detail in the development of his theme, in that it shows mankind's insignificance in the vastness of the universe. The one aspect of his characters that Lovecraft did emphasize, however, was their motivation. "Call of Cthulhu" is a letter of warning, as is "The Statement of Randolph Carter." At the Mountains of Madness is an historical account of an Antarctic expedition by its only survivor, and serves as a warning as well. This creates an often urgent quality in the tone of the narrator, which pulls the reader along towards Lovecraft's nearly omnipresent shock ending. The shock ending was a trait very common in all Lovecraft's stories, and especially in the stories of the Mythos, as in "The Statement of Randolph Carter," where the narrator hears from the depths of a subterranean sarcophagus the exclamation of: "You fool, Warren is DEAD." This final exclamation can be found in several of the Mythos stories written by other authors as well, including Robert E. Howard's "The Black Stone," which ends with italics for emphasis: "what nameless shapes may even now lurk in the dark places of the world?" All these elements of storytelling; the occult props, the urgency of the narration, and the shock ending; combine with Lovecraft's artificial pantheon to create one of the most influential types of horror story in the genre, the Cthulhu Mythos story. Since their discovery by critics since his death, the meaning of the Mythos has been debated. Three ideas have become prominent, one of them having been stated by Lovecraft himself, another developed by Derleth, and the third relating to the analytical theories of Psychologist Carl Jung. While interpretations of the Mythos have varied, most feel, as Lovecraft himself stated, that the Mythos is meant to show the insignificance of man in the bleak universe. When in discussing his theme Lovecraft mentions the beings on the outside, these beings have no regard for humanity as anything more than an annoyance. The stories are terrifying for their stark hopelessness. There is to be no intervention of good on behalf of the hero, he is alone in his fight against evil. This situation is perfectly represented in a Dreamworld tale that at times crosses over to become a fringe member of the Mythos, The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath. In this novel, the hero, Randolph Carter, searches for his golden city, even journeying to forbidden Kadath in the cold wastes beyond Leng. He is opposed by an Outer God, Nyarlathotep, and is defenseless against the other's vast powers. No intervention comes on his behalf, though he prays to what seem to be representatives of the Elder Gods. When man is saved in a Lovecraft story, it is by blind luck, as in "The Call of Cthulhu," where Great Cthulhu's rise from sunken R'lyeh is thwarted by a powerful storm. In "The Festival," the main character is alive at the end thanks only to a "drifting spar that accident sent to save [him]. . . ." Another interpretation of the Mythos is that of August Derleth, who saw a biblical parallel, stating that "there exists in Lovecraft's concept a basic similarity to the Christian Mythos, specifically in the expulsion of Satan from Eden and the power of evil." This analysis seems to fall apart on closer examination, however, as, unlike in the Christian Mythos, the Cthulhu Mythos contains no true representatives of good, the Elder Gods being described as being indifferent towards man, at best, and more often shown as being rather weak deities, as in The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath, where they are lost in the city dreamt of by Randolph Carter. Derleth, in his own stories and the posthumous collaborations, later altered the nature of the Elder Gods to more closely fit his own variation on Lovecraft's theme. Lastly, Lovecraft's Mythos has been interpreted into the theories of Jung psychology. To outline Jung theories, The human psyche is divided into consciousness and unconsciousness. The ego is the center of consciousness, and it relates to the outside world through the persona. . . . The Unconscious . . . includes the personal unconscious, comprising forgotten and repressed material, and the vast unfathomable ocean of the Collective Unconscious . . . primitive instincts and emotions . . . . Within the Unconscious are the Shadow and the Anima, or Soul Image. The Shadow is the evil of the subconscious, always threatening to obscure the morality of the ego. The Shadow makes itself known in dreams and nightmares primarily, though it occasionally breaks into the consciousness causing instances of insanity. Everyone has a Shadow, and the more it is repressed by the conscious ego, the larger and darker it becomes. Dirk W. Mosig uses the Jung theories to interpret many of Lovecraft's stories, which lend themselves well to the interpretations. Mosig outlines several Mythos stories, and how they fit into Jung. Among those he discusses is "Pickman's Model," in which the Unconscious is represented by a subterranean maze of tunnels. The Shadow is the unsuspected darkness existing in the middle of the normal, rational world, or the consciousness. The character Pickman, who is found to be a ghoulish changeling and not human at all, is therefore the Shadow personified. He returns, in the end, to the subconscious, back into the underground caverns. The narrator is terrified by the realization that the paintings of Pickman, horrible and bestial as they are, are in fact real, and ever present in man's Collective Unconscious. In addition to the varying interpretations of Lovecraft's fiction, the critical reception has also been varied. Lovecraft has been hailed as "the Copernicus of the horror story . . ." and he has been deemed a "talentless hack." In short, critical responses to Lovecraft have varied to both extremes. H.P. Lovecraft created a new kind of story, and a new way of telling it. Through his Cthulhu Mythos he influenced unknown numbers of writers, and especially many of those with whom he corresponded and encouraged. Of those writers he inspired, several went on to become major literary figures in their own right, especially Robert Bloch, Fritz Leiber, Frank Belknap Long, and August Derleth. He even influenced writers who were already well-known professionals, like Robert E. Howard and Clark Ashton Smith. As the years passed, the true range of his influence became apparent with the emergence of a second generation of Mythos story writers, including J. Ramsey Campbell, Brian Lumley, and Stephen King. They have utilized his settings, they have utilized his style, and have continued the creation of one of the largest bodies of collective fiction in existence. And while critics and scholars debate the true meaning and value of his writings, it cannot be denied that H.P. Lovecraft was one of the most influential writers of fiction of the twentieth century. ENDNOTES 1Robert Bloch, forward to The Dunwich Horror and Other Tales H.P. Lovecraft (Sauk City: Arkham House Publishers, Inc., 1989), xviii. 2Sandy Petersen and Lynn Willis, Call of Cthulhu (Oakland: Chaosium Inc., 1992), 65-66. 3August Derleth, forward to Tales of the Cthulhu Mythos H.P. Lovecraft (New York: Ballantine Books, Inc., 1969), xi. 4Petersen and Willis, Call of Cthulhu, 186. 5Ibid. 6H.P. Lovecraft, The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath (New York, N.Y.: Ballantine Books, 1990), 119. 7Bloch, forward to The Dunwich Horror, xviii. 8Ursula LeGuin, "New England Gothic," in Twentieth Century Literary Criticism, vol. 22, ed. Dennis Poupard (Detroit: Gale Research, 1981), 213. 9Petersen and Willis, Call of Cthulhu, 186. 10Sharon K. Hall, ed. Twentieth Century Literary Criticism, vol. 4, (Detroit: Gale Research, 1981), 264. 11Robert Bloch, Acceptance Speech for Lifetime Achievement, in First World Fantasy Awards, ed. Gahan Wilson (Garden City: Doubleday & Company, Inc., 1977), 49. 12Ibid., 49-50. 13Richard Gid Powers, forward to Night's Black Agents Fritz Leiber (Boston: Gregg Press, 1980), xii. 14Frank Belknap Long, The Early Long (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday & Company, Inc., 1975), xiv. 15Gahan Wilson, ed., First World Fantasy Awards (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday & Company, Inc., 1977), 10. 16Petersen and Willis, Call of Cthulhu, 186. 17Robert Bloch, Acceptance Speech for Lifetime Achievement, 47. 18August Derleth, forward to Tales of the Cthulhu Mythos, xi. 19Thomas C. Schunk, "Stephen King," in Magill's Survey of American Literature, vol. 3, ed. Frank N. Magill (North Bellmore: Marshall Cavendish Corporation, 1986), 1067. 20H.P. Lovecraft, "Notes on the Writing of Weird Fiction," in Short Story Criticism, vol. 3, ed. Sheila Fitzgerald (Detroit: Gale Research, 1989), 257. 21H.P. Lovecraft, At the Mountains of Madness (New York, N.Y.: Ballantine Books, 1990), 184. 22Robert E. Howard, "The Black Stone," in Tales of the Cthulhu Mythos, ed. August Derleth (New York: Ballantine Books, 1969), 82. 23H.P. Lovecraft, The Tomb and Other Tales (New York, N.Y.: Ballantine Books, 1992), 26. 24August Derleth, forward to Tales of the Cthulhu Mythos, vii. 25H.P. Lovecraft, The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath, 135. 26Dirk W. Mosig, "Toward a Greater Appreciation of H.P. Lovecraft: The Analytical Approach," in First World Fantasy Awards, ed. Gahan Wilson (Garden City: Doubleday & Company, Inc., 1977), 290. 27Ibid., 291. 28Ibid., 293. 29Fritz Leiber, "A Literary Copernicus," in Short Story Criticism, vol. 3, ed. Sheila Fitzgerald (Detroit: Gale Research, 1989), 257. 30Edmund Wilson, "Tales of the Marvelous and the Ridiculous," in Twentieth Century Literary Criticism, vol. 4, ed. Sharon K. Hall (Detroit: Gale Research, 1981), 268. SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY Bloch, Robert. Acceptance Speech for Lifetime Achievement. In First World Fantasy Awards, ed. Gahan Wilson, 46-52. Garden City: Doubleday & Company, Inc., 1977. ________. Forward to The Dunwich Horror and Others, H.P. Lovecraft. Sauk City: Arkham House Publishers, 1979. Derleth, August. Forward to Tales of the Cthulhu Mythos, H.P. Lovecraft. New York: Ballantine Books, 1969. Hall, Sharon K., ed. Twentieth Century Literary Criticism, vol. 4, 265-267. Detroit: Gale Research, 1981. Howard, Robert E. "The Black Stone." In Tales of the Cthulhu Mythos, ed. August Derleth, 63-82. New York: Ballantine Books, 1969. LeGuin, Ursula. "Cult of Cthulhu." In Twentieth Century Literary Criticism, vol. 22, ed. Dennis Poupard, 213. Detroit: Gale Research, 1981. Leiber, Fritz. "A Literary Copernicus." In Short Story Criticism, vol. 3, ed. Shiela Fitzgerald, 257-60. Detroit: Gale Research, 1989. Long, Frank Belknap. The Early Long. Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday & Company, Inc., 1975. Lovecraft, H.P. The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath. New York, N.Y.: Ballantine Books, 1966. ________. Tales of the Cthulhu Mythos. New York, N.Y.: Ballantine Books, 1969. ________. "Notes on the Writing of Weird Fiction." In Short Story Criticism, vol. 3, ed. Sheila Fitzgerald, 257. Detroit: Gale Research, 1989. ________. At the Mountains of Madness and Other Tales. New York, N.Y.: Ballantine Books, 1990. ________. The Tomb and Other Tales. New York, N.Y.: Ballantine Books, 1992. Mosig, Dirk W. "Toward a Greater Appreciation of H.P. Lovecraft." In First World Fantasy Awards, ed. Gahan Wilson, 290-298. Garden City: Doubleday & Company, Inc., 1977. Petersen, Sandy and Lynn Willis. Call of Cthulhu. Oakland: Chaosium Inc., 1992. Powers, Richard Gid. Forward to Night's Black Agents, Fritz Leiber. Boston: Gregg Press, 1980. Schunk, Thomas C. "Stephen King." In Magill's Survey of American Literature, vol. 3, ed. Frank N. Magill, 1067-1081. North Bellmore: Marshall Cavendish Corporation, 1982. Wilson, Edmund. "Tales of the Marvelous and the Ridiculous." In Twentieth Century Literary Criticism, vol. 4, ed. Sharon K. Hall, 268-69. Detroit: Gale Research, 1981. Wilson, Gahan, ed. First World Fantasy Awards. Garden City: Doubleday & Company, Inc., 1977. `'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`' Distorted Digital Erection February 1994 Text File #13 DDE is fully supported on the Necropolis BBS 216.966.8970 - subterranean telecom - All TEXT! vaginal yeast infections are worse, much worse.. Submissions are accepted. Send your t-file submission to Sorc, on the Necropolis. If using a new account, (I)nclude the file with the New User Application. CHECK for MORE Distorted Digital Erection in the NEAR future! TCC in CHECK! ... and assorted tales of erect rodentia!... `'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`' -eof-