HP Lovecraft - Classic Or Dud?

i wish you'd said something.

I was waiting for the shop owner to issue me store credit for two boxes of books that I'd brought in and didn't want to jeopardize my chance at $20.

lol i remember seeing a 'necronomicon' in a book store in nyc last time i was there (it was just some kind of humanitarian joke book though)

was inspired by this thread to look at some cthulhu mythos websites and oh god this is golden

http://www.mythostomes.com/content/view/85/1/

highlights:

The Book of Old Ones,” by “Scorpio,” is a small, sixty-seven page grimoire which utilizes the Cthulhu Mythos of H. P. Lovecraft. The book treats the Old Ones, horrifying god-monsters from beyond reality, as helpful house-elves. The thrust of the book is that Mythos abominations can be invoked easily to conveniently solve all sorts of common, every-day problems. For those of you expecting a sanity-shattering book of evil, this is not it

The tome begins with a brief introduction explaining the Mythos, and Scorpio's system of magic. This introduction makes it clear that Scorpio did not do his homework when it comes to the Mythos he bases his belief system upon. He links the Old Ones to the four elements as Derleth did, something Lovecraft never would have done. He also attributes the discredited “black magic” quote to Lovecraft.

The book then describes “the ritual of the Old Ones,” which will help you “align yourself with the magical power of the Old Ones.” This seems like a really bad idea. Why would any sane person want to get closer to what Lovecraft called “abysms of shrieking and immemorial lunacy?”

I'm not sure if this book is supposed to be taken seriously. It reads like a parody in places. I mean, “The Deep Ones Helped Kevin N. Regain His Lost Virility?” "How the Byakhee can bring love into your life?" Can this be serious? Channeling servitors of Nyarlathotep to write a self-help book? The end result would be something like "The Book of Old Ones."

When I feel stressed out, I call on my spirit animal, the black goat with 1000 young.

did you try amazon?

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Necronomicon-Weird-Fiction-Lovecraft-Gollancz/dp/0575081562

(and hammersmith whsmith has a copy.)

http://chud.com/articles/articles/24627/1/DEL-TORO-TO-FINALLY-CLIMB-THE-MOUNTAINS-OF-MADNESS/Page1.html

would watch

Yup

a much better use of his talents than this new Haunted Mansion movie. looking forward to it.

http://muzski.darkfolio.com/gallery/470268

Thanks, those are great!

ho ho, blocked as potential nudity by my work overlords.

No nudity, only shadows out of time.

Also, The Monsters of H.P. Lovecraft's Cthulhu Mythos, As Drawn By Children: http://www.comicsalliance.com/2010/11/16/children-draw-h-p-lovecraft-cthulhu/

if ilx had avatars

http://i52.tinypic.com/keuesy.png

http://www.wired.com/beyond_the_beyond/2011/07/h-p-lovecrafts-commonplace-book/

i found some of those obscurely moving e.g. Man with unnatural face—oddity of speaking—found to be a mask—Revelation.

148 Vampire dog.

haha

H.P. Lovecraft's advice column

Dear Howie,

My girlfriend has metamorphosed into a kind of polyhedron with many pairs of feelers, membraneous wings, and fanged orifices on stalks. Should I talk to her about this, or keep hoping it’s just a phase? Snapshot enclosed.

Amateur Photographer

Dear Amateur Photographer: –

I do not know long it was before I dared to inspect your snapshot. Once I did, I immediately fell wholly to the floor. How much time passed after that, do not ask me to guess, but a momentary fragment of memory shows me racing dementedly past a long stone colonnade towards a curious hummock. After that, mercifully, all is blackness. My aunts discovered me beside a nearby megalith, with my faculties paralyzed, a mark on my forehead bespeaking all too vividly the ravages of some snail-like marsupial. It was months before I regained the ability to talk any language but proto-Algonquian. Now my senses have somewhat cleared, I recommend you break things off with your fiancée as tactfully as possible, not letting her suspect you have noticed any change or blemish. Hers is such an image as — but I cannot go on. I have barricaded myself indoors, and hope never to look at another photograph, or touch any variety of leafy vegetable. Even Dalgaard’s worst prophesies fell short of the unspeakable reality! A rank odor now pervades everything, the hills resonate with sustained prehuman howling, and I keep losing my place in the Unrecommended Codex of Naarg,

Yrs Strkly. Trrfd., – HPL.

202 A monstrous derelict—found and boarded by a castaway or shipwreck survivor.

it wasn't a predator ship!

Can we just have an Oblique Strategies-like thread with one of those commonplace book entries a day, please.

where should i start if i've never read any lovecraft?

Start with the three-volume Penguin set (or the equivalent Arkham House editions if you can find them at a library). Go forThe Call of Cthulhu (Penguin) or The Dunwixh Horror (Arkham House) first.

Or if you mean an individual story, try The Call of Cthulhu, The Colour Out of Space or The Whisperer in Darkness.

individual stories won't really do it tho. you kinda have to immerse.

telephone thing otm

lmao the whisperer in darkness is fucking hilarious

he does a lot of different styles and i agree w/ rogermexico about immerse

which is probably why the best anthologies front load w/ a ton of short pieces

the shorter pieces tend toward more fantastic and the longer ones tend toward straightlaced w/ a twist at the end

i think starting with the more overtly weird stories helps you suspend disbelief when you read the long investigative ones (mountains of madness, call of cthulhu, dunwich horror, shadow out of innsmouth, etc)

Barnes & Noble has the complete stories of H.P. Lovecraft for like 13 bucks in their store. If you have a Kindle, it's public domain, so you can find all of it in the e-reader format for free.

Here you go: http://cthulhuchick.com/free-complete-lovecraft-ebook-nook-kindle/

Via Gotham City Comics:

https://sphotos-a.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ash4/251640_4279510598751_771978851_n.jpg

brilliant

post on FB so i can share it

that's terrific

xpost -- Already did! Check earlier in my timeline today.

http://arxiv.org/abs/1210.8144

Fuck, he was right!

http://www.wired.com/images_blogs/rawfile/2013/03/Seal-660x933.jpg

:D

VINDICATED

classic. fucking obsessed with this stuff right now.

Like Poe in that, assuming you're a certain kind of child, you go from taking the stories (and sensibility) overly seriously during early adolescence, perhaps dismissing it when you reach young adulthood, and then coming back to it and finding it's still possible to really enjoy and even take seriously these strange American authors.

An impossibly ancient city of lizard-things hidden under the desert, imagined in obsessive detail = immune to satire.

Also, everyday life in Arizona AMIRITE

My new roommate is a fellow appreciator so if you ever hear about us being killed by squamous things you know what to blame.

good interview with pre-eminent Lovecraft scholar S.T. Joshi
http://heathenharvest.org/2014/01/12/gods-of-the-godless-a-discussion-on-h-p-lovecraft-with-s-t-joshi/

thanks for linking that!

he looks like a badass

What if HP Lovecraft was Cornish?

http://cthrnwall.blogspot.co.uk/

thinking about reading some of the lovecraft i never read - what editions do you guys have? as a kid i had this one and it did the job: http://www.amazon.co.uk/H-P-Lovecraft-Omnibus-Mountains/dp/0586063226/ref=sr_1_5?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1445677683&sr=1-5&keywords=hp+lovecraft

there are tonnes on amazon. does it even matter?

I have the Barnes and Noble edition of his complete fiction. It's a chronological compilation of the Joshi editions, it's a hardcover, it's cheap, and it's everything in one volume.

as a kid I had the Ballantine paperbacks with John Holmes covers, those paintings still creep me out

arkham house editions for meeee