tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4841866593898210279.post1190728529552897940..comments2023-10-31T03:54:17.210-05:00Comments on Thus Blogged Anderson: The Shadow over LovecraftAndersonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02325205512110155291noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4841866593898210279.post-39919108545863621182009-09-29T10:26:19.789-05:002009-09-29T10:26:19.789-05:00Buhallin, I think Francis's reading has as muc...Buhallin, I think Francis's reading has as much to do w/ his own racism as w/ HPL's.<br /><br />NMC, I read "The Dunwich Horror," one of the short-list HPL classics, aloud to my wife, and winced at not being able to skim over the worst patches of writing.<br /><br />HPL is one of those 2d-tier writers whose imagination exceeded his technical ability to accomplish what he envisioned. I would say the same of Ezra Pound.<br /><br />"The Shadow over Innsmouth," "The Call of Cthulhu," and "At the Mountains of Madness" might be other short-list ones.<br /><br />If you really want to try to like HPL and don't care much about his "Cthulhu mythos," then "The Colour out of Space," which nicely anticipates radiation sickness, is worth a look too.Andersonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02325205512110155291noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4841866593898210279.post-30642326275620902662009-09-28T14:57:04.345-05:002009-09-28T14:57:04.345-05:00To the extent that these issues may have made thei...To the extent that these issues may have made their way into Lovecraft's writing, I'm not sure I find Francis' interpretation convincing.<br /><br />Many of the Lovecraftian villains are primitives - cults, cannibals, throwbacks, degenerates... I think that racial elements (and to be fair, it's not something that ever occurred to me so I'm not sure they're really present) have more to do with the traditional racist view/presentation of others as inferiors. I suppose you could interpret the inevitable victory of those villains as saying something about the direction of society, but IMHO it's a pretty big stretch. Lovecraft (to my knowledge) never wrote true apocalyptic stuff - outside his stories and the dire consequences for the characters, life went on. Even bringing the Old Ones into it, they always end up still asleep or off somewhere. Given the aforementioned dire consequences for the "protagonists" in his stories, I tend to think that any societal impact would have been equally dire if he had intended them to be.Buhallinnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4841866593898210279.post-67924245380491314442009-09-28T12:07:47.814-05:002009-09-28T12:07:47.814-05:00I liked Lovecraft as a teenager for particular sto...I liked Lovecraft as a teenager for particular stories-- "Rats in the Walls," and one about a guy who runs a funeral home / cemetery and cuts corners by doing things like cutting corpses' legs off at the ankles to fit them in smaller coffins. He is in upper New England and doesn't do burials in the winter, and gets trapped in the building where he stores coffins late one day and <i>bad things happen.</i><br /><br />The creepiness level of these stories really impressed me. But as an adult, I've not been able to find my way into any of his stories. I'm not sure whether I've tried the wrong ones (I haven't seen "Rats in the Walls" anthologized) or not given it enough of a chance. What I have tried, I've found unreadable. This includes a selection Joyce Carol Oates had some role in making.<br /><br />My memory of him from when I was reading a lot of the pulp science fiction and fantasy stuff in collections was good. The actual fact of him didn't compare.<br /><br />All that said, it doesn't surprise me that his views were pretty grossly unenlightened. It would fit how dark a view of everything about the world Lovecraft presents in his stories...nmisscommentorhttp://nmisscommentor.comnoreply@blogger.com