H.P. Lovecraft's Favorite Words

xp ululating for me

Really like "squamous" but have to ponder a bit.

I could say 'antediluvian' all day.

As soon as i saw the thread title I thought 'Squamous', so I have to vote that--disappointed to find that he only used it once!
Ululating a close 2nd. Use that in real life more than I should, but it's lovely to say.

eldritch by a non-euclidean mile

"Rugose" not on list?

That said, for me it has to be "squamous"

cyclopean always one of my favorites. + 47 times too!

I figured nacreous would make the list.

I think these are the lyrics of the first Carcass album.

"eldritch". that word gives me the creeps.

Nacreous and gibbous are good Pynchon words.

nameless captures the essence of hp imo...these things that are so bad and alien and just incomprehensible to our tiny mortal minds.

i think this poll missed Gambrel

haha yah every roof is a gambrel roof leering

I wonder if they were consciously avoiding HPL's less savory ideations by not tabulating word count for 'mongrel' etc.

unutterable & unnameable are great too in the same sense of nameless.

I wonder if they were consciously avoiding HPL's less savory ideations by not tabulating word count for 'mongrel' etc.

Swarthy's kind of dubious, isn't it? Which is a shame, as as a word it is most satisfying.

Tempted to go with squamous, but charnel, effulgence, gibbous and ululating are all great too. And eldritch. Too tough to choose.

Kind of weird that only ONE of these words appears in the title of a Fall album...

xpost you're right I missed swarthy!

Nameless.

It's the word which I've noticed (more than any of these others) cropping up all the time. Also it's fun to use in everyday use: "what's that nameless mess in the kitchen sink". etc.

Nameless sounds awesome when in context, but it's not as fun to say or as pretty to look at as many of the other words on its own. 'Unutterable' is a contender, though.

(Too much time on ilx: skimming the list at first I conflated stygian and swarthy into Swygart)

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tough one, went with Gibbous over Squamous.

I always think eldritch when I think of words specific to H.P.Lovecraft.

I also think shortass when thinking of Leeds' ex Oxford Chinese scholar.
Probably easier to carry off that look if you're tall.
Is that why he went B-boy?

Yeah, if he'd been Patricia Morrison's height he have looked a lot better. Don't think Dave Vanian's much taller is he?

prob belongs more on the board game thread but we played Arkham Horror last week and the most fun in the game was reading the descriptions of what happened "an unspeakably horrific breakfast has been laid out for you"

this doesn't belong here either but did anyone see that odd modernized pacific-northwest-set gay-subtext-augmented movie of the shadow over innsmouth? because i wanted to but then literally every time i saw anyone say or write anything about it it was really negative.

it was of course just called CTHULU

decadent vs iridescence

why is OPULENT not on this list

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