― Ned Raggett (Ned), Friday, 7 February 2003 17:39 (twenty-one years ago) link
― DV (dirtyvicar), Friday, 7 February 2003 17:41 (twenty-one years ago) link
― Jeffrey (Danny), Friday, 7 February 2003 17:44 (twenty-one years ago) link
This person also stayed up all night on two occasions freaking about the implications of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre in relation to whether or not he had any of the massacrists personality traits and if it made him a terrible person. The last episode of Twin Peaks also set him off in similar fashion about "dirty" versus "clean" and various personality traits he was certain he shared with Windom Earle. So maybe the whole Cthulhu thing was relative to a bigger issue than HP Lovecraft.
In retrospect, it implies more about my sanity than his that I put up with it, but regardless it was obviously the workings of a completely unhinged mind. Monty Python quotes would've been the saving grace of nonseriousness.
― Ally (mlescaut), Friday, 7 February 2003 18:41 (twenty-one years ago) link
Occultists will, generally, believe anything they want to believe in.The Necronomicon is no more fake than any other "real" occult book of forbiden knowledge.
Ned: If Lovecraft survived, I believe he would have continued his trend of writing more science-fictiony type stuff. He became disenchanted with his more occult/magical stuff, which he refered to as "Yog-Sothothery".
― fletrejet, Friday, 7 February 2003 18:55 (twenty-one years ago) link
The stories are great, also; the best editions are the hardbacks put out by Arkham House. They also published his letters, which are often quite interesting--to the likes of R.E. Howard etc.
― Ian Johnson, Friday, 7 February 2003 19:54 (twenty-one years ago) link
Makes sense. "At the Mountains of Madness" certainly showed the way (and was plenty chilling enough without that sheer freakout at the end, a little bit of the ol' Yog there).
Yeeps, Ally.
― Ned Raggett (Ned), Friday, 7 February 2003 21:15 (twenty-one years ago) link
― DV (dirtyvicar), Friday, 7 February 2003 21:35 (twenty-one years ago) link
I know nothing of Lovecraft's works besides this, of course. He was referred to as sort of a scientist by the ex, imagine my surprise to read this thread.
― Ally (mlescaut), Saturday, 8 February 2003 02:51 (twenty-one years ago) link
Actually though, I think most of Lovecraft's stories aregood. I never read any of the novels. And I also disagreethat he was a bad/good author; sure his language wassensationalistic and overblow, but it still has a great flow to it. And he is archaic but the first books I ever read were Edgar Rice Burroughs and Lang's ColouredFairy Tale series, so I think I've always been verycomfortable with that type of language.
― Squirrel_Police (Squirrel_Police), Saturday, 8 February 2003 19:23 (twenty-one years ago) link
I understand these trends intensified as his life continued. One of his last manuscripts was destroyed except for a single page, and on that page only one sentence appears in full:
"It was with a terrible and dawning horror that I realised that something unsmurfy had taken place."
― Andrew Farrell (afarrell), Sunday, 9 March 2003 22:43 (twenty-one years ago) link
― ChristineSH (chrissie1068), Sunday, 9 March 2003 23:31 (twenty-one years ago) link
― omg, Thursday, 22 January 2004 00:55 (twenty years ago) link
― Ned Raggett (Ned), Thursday, 22 January 2004 00:59 (twenty years ago) link
― pete s, Thursday, 22 January 2004 01:31 (twenty years ago) link
95% of his horror-type writing is beyond classic, especially because the stilted writing makes it sound like it's actual lost antique blasphemies that have been hidden in Stygian tombs for eons beyond count. His Dunsany stuff is crap, "Dream Quest of Unknown Kadath" is the one thing by him I could never get thru. He has some poetry too which is awful, if you can find it. Have never read his political essays but those are probably pretty un-PC and not really worth reading unless you are ultra-completist.
― sucka (sucka), Thursday, 22 January 2004 04:44 (twenty years ago) link
― sucka (sucka), Thursday, 22 January 2004 04:46 (twenty years ago) link
― Ned Raggett (Ned), Tuesday, 15 March 2005 16:11 (nineteen years ago) link
― latebloomer: damn cheapskate satanists (latebloomer), Tuesday, 15 March 2005 16:20 (nineteen years ago) link
― Ronan (Ronan), Tuesday, 15 March 2005 17:06 (nineteen years ago) link
― Shakey Mo Collier, Tuesday, 15 March 2005 17:23 (nineteen years ago) link
"As with so much genre fiction, Lovecraft's oeuvre isn't for everyone."
'Look at him, he's too imaginative.' Fuck you, no one's OEUVRE is for everyone. Lovecraft is in a direct line from Nathaniel Hawthorne, EA Poe, and Charlotte Perkins Gilman to Thomas Pynchon, Kathy Acker, and Stephen King. But I guess the Wall Street Journal writing about literature is like the Wall Street Journal writing about music.
― Carl Solomon, Tuesday, 15 March 2005 17:53 (nineteen years ago) link
― Shakey Mo Collier, Tuesday, 15 March 2005 17:56 (nineteen years ago) link
― milozauckerman (miloaukerman), Friday, 20 May 2005 00:01 (eighteen years ago) link
― Elvis Telecom (Chris Barrus), Thursday, 12 October 2006 23:58 (seventeen years ago) link
― Thomas Tallis (Tommy), Friday, 13 October 2006 00:38 (seventeen years ago) link
― kingfish prætor (kingfish 2.0), Friday, 13 October 2006 02:27 (seventeen years ago) link
― a portal to squee heaven (Jody Beth Rosen), Friday, 13 October 2006 02:31 (seventeen years ago) link
My two fave Lovecraft stories are The Colour Out of Space, which reminds me(or it should be the other way around, I think) of Brian Aldiss' The Saliva Tree and
― Stone Monkey (Stone Monkey), Friday, 13 October 2006 11:48 (seventeen years ago) link
― chap who would dare to contain two ingredients. Tea and bags. (chap), Friday, 13 October 2006 12:29 (seventeen years ago) link
Favorite section of any of the CoC roleplaying books: the sidebar in Cthulhu Now! that finally addresses the question of "What happens when you drop a nuclear bomb on Cthulhu?"
A. Cthulhu blows apart but then reassembles back together. Only now he's radioactive.
― Elvis Telecom (Chris Barrus), Friday, 13 October 2006 15:19 (seventeen years ago) link
This may be the dorkiest thread on ILE.
― Edward III (edward iii), Friday, 13 October 2006 16:37 (seventeen years ago) link
― Edward III (edward iii), Friday, 13 October 2006 16:38 (seventeen years ago) link
― Ned Raggett (Ned), Friday, 13 October 2006 16:45 (seventeen years ago) link
-- Edward III (ehonaue...), October 13th, 2006.
hardly!
― latebloomer (latebloomer), Friday, 13 October 2006 16:46 (seventeen years ago) link
According to the epitaph on his grave, he *is* Providence.
― elmo argonaut (allocryptic), Friday, 13 October 2006 16:48 (seventeen years ago) link
Examples?
― Edward III (edward iii), Friday, 13 October 2006 16:52 (seventeen years ago) link
― elmo argonaut (allocryptic), Friday, 13 October 2006 16:53 (seventeen years ago) link
Ned, I assume nobody took you there during Terrastock 6?
― Edward III (edward iii), Friday, 13 October 2006 16:55 (seventeen years ago) link
― latebloomer (latebloomer), Friday, 13 October 2006 17:23 (seventeen years ago) link
Ed -- alas no! We wuz too busy with the rock and roll, I guess.
― Ned Raggett (Ned), Friday, 13 October 2006 17:27 (seventeen years ago) link
I've been there too. Even picked up the $$ "Lovecraft's Providence" at the Brown bookstore.
― Elvis Telecom (Chris Barrus), Friday, 13 October 2006 17:28 (seventeen years ago) link
http://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e66/LimitedLiabilityGirl/hellocthulhu.gif
― Laurel (Laurel), Friday, 13 October 2006 17:29 (seventeen years ago) link
He was also frightened of invertebrates, marine life in general, temperatures below freezing, fat people, people of other races, race-mixing, slums, percussion instruments, caves, cellars, old age, great expanses of time, monumental architecture, non-Euclidean geometry, deserts, oceans, rats, dogs, the New England countryside, New York City, fungi and molds, viscous substances, medical experiments, dreams, brittle textures, gelatinous textures, the color gray, plant life of diverse sorts, memory lapses, old books, heredity, mists, gases, whistling, whispering
― geoff (gcannon), Friday, 13 October 2006 18:44 (seventeen years ago) link
― Edward III (edward iii), Friday, 13 October 2006 20:00 (seventeen years ago) link
Or trying to find breakfast...
― Edward III (edward iii), Friday, 13 October 2006 20:02 (seventeen years ago) link
Tsathoggua was created by Clark Ashton Smith, not Lovecraft. I hope this Luc Sante moron gets fired for that.
― wostyntje (wostyntje), Friday, 13 October 2006 21:39 (seventeen years ago) link
― Andrew Farrell (afarrell), Friday, 13 October 2006 21:49 (seventeen years ago) link
― GOD PUNCH TO HAWKWIND (yournullfame), Friday, 13 October 2006 22:30 (seventeen years ago) link
― shieldforyoureyes (shieldforyoureyes), Saturday, 14 October 2006 06:11 (seventeen years ago) link