Review - H.P. Lovecraft
Lovecraft.
Even the name makes us think of certain things, if you're at all familiar with the traditional horror genre. Even if you've never heard of him before, odds are you're familiar with Cthulhu or some other iteration of his work, like the Call of Cthulhu roleplaying game, the Arkham Horror and Eldritch Horror games from Fantasy Flight Games... (all of which are awesome.)
Lovecraft evokes a certain... cosmological horror in his books—a philosophy where humans are an insignificant blip on the map of a vast universe where older and more malevolent things live. We humans were either created by accident or as a joke. If that doesn't drag your worldview down a little bit, just read on.
The most widely known story of Lovecraft's is probably The Call of Cthulhu, in which the narrator connects a series of clues to uncover a cult dedicated to Cthulhu, an ancient beast with the head of an octopus, the wings of a dragon, and a vaguely human body, standing "miles high." The terrain is described in a creepy way, including stone that seems covered in a sort of slime (my interpretation), and weird, non-Euclidian geometry.
When taken into context, The Call of Cthulhu probably isn't his best work, nor is it the one that a beginner to the Lovecraftian style should begin with. I'd recommend the story The Rats in the Walls. All the stories are in the public domain, so you can find several readings of each one on Youtube or wherever you want to look. There's also an Android app (sorry, iPhone people. I don't know if you can get it) called Cthuloid, that provides you with every story Lovecraft wrote.
Now, just to be clear: there are two types of stories that he wrote. Those that are part of the overall mythos, and those that aren't. It's best to go with ones like The Rats in the Walls or The Colour Out of Space (Lovecraft's proclaimed favorite) before you delve into Dagon, The Call of Cthulhu, Azathoth, The Shadow over Innsmouth, At the Mountains of Madness, and others.
What's more, Lovecraft encouraged people to play around in his universe. He left everything open-ended even before his premature death. To this day, people are still writing stories about the Old Ones and the malevolent forces beyond human's comprehension that would make us go insane if it didn't devour us outright.
DISCLAIMER: Lovecraft was VERY racist. If you decide to follow my advice and listen to The Rats in the Walls, you'll notice right away. The name of the main character's cat is "Nigger Man." In The Call of Cthulhu, he refers to cultists who practice a sort of voodoo as "degenerates," and he also refers to his uncle dying after being "jostled by a nautical-looking negro."
If you can't tell, I'm a huge fan of Lovecraft's work. Despite his overt racism and bigotry (perhaps it was the norm in the 1920s...), I feel like Lovecraft was the father of modern horror. Sure, it may feel like a lot of pages of info-dumping, but each word is used to evoke feelings of strangeness that comes together to bring out the overall horror of the human condition.
I give Lovecraft's work 5/5
Thanks for wreading!
Jeff
Even the name makes us think of certain things, if you're at all familiar with the traditional horror genre. Even if you've never heard of him before, odds are you're familiar with Cthulhu or some other iteration of his work, like the Call of Cthulhu roleplaying game, the Arkham Horror and Eldritch Horror games from Fantasy Flight Games... (all of which are awesome.)
Lovecraft evokes a certain... cosmological horror in his books—a philosophy where humans are an insignificant blip on the map of a vast universe where older and more malevolent things live. We humans were either created by accident or as a joke. If that doesn't drag your worldview down a little bit, just read on.
The most widely known story of Lovecraft's is probably The Call of Cthulhu, in which the narrator connects a series of clues to uncover a cult dedicated to Cthulhu, an ancient beast with the head of an octopus, the wings of a dragon, and a vaguely human body, standing "miles high." The terrain is described in a creepy way, including stone that seems covered in a sort of slime (my interpretation), and weird, non-Euclidian geometry.
When taken into context, The Call of Cthulhu probably isn't his best work, nor is it the one that a beginner to the Lovecraftian style should begin with. I'd recommend the story The Rats in the Walls. All the stories are in the public domain, so you can find several readings of each one on Youtube or wherever you want to look. There's also an Android app (sorry, iPhone people. I don't know if you can get it) called Cthuloid, that provides you with every story Lovecraft wrote.
Now, just to be clear: there are two types of stories that he wrote. Those that are part of the overall mythos, and those that aren't. It's best to go with ones like The Rats in the Walls or The Colour Out of Space (Lovecraft's proclaimed favorite) before you delve into Dagon, The Call of Cthulhu, Azathoth, The Shadow over Innsmouth, At the Mountains of Madness, and others.
What's more, Lovecraft encouraged people to play around in his universe. He left everything open-ended even before his premature death. To this day, people are still writing stories about the Old Ones and the malevolent forces beyond human's comprehension that would make us go insane if it didn't devour us outright.
DISCLAIMER: Lovecraft was VERY racist. If you decide to follow my advice and listen to The Rats in the Walls, you'll notice right away. The name of the main character's cat is "Nigger Man." In The Call of Cthulhu, he refers to cultists who practice a sort of voodoo as "degenerates," and he also refers to his uncle dying after being "jostled by a nautical-looking negro."
If you can't tell, I'm a huge fan of Lovecraft's work. Despite his overt racism and bigotry (perhaps it was the norm in the 1920s...), I feel like Lovecraft was the father of modern horror. Sure, it may feel like a lot of pages of info-dumping, but each word is used to evoke feelings of strangeness that comes together to bring out the overall horror of the human condition.
I give Lovecraft's work 5/5
Thanks for wreading!
Jeff
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