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Friday, December 29, 2017

Table of Contents: “Collected Fiction Volume 2 (1926-1930)"




As promised, this post will continue our journey through the contents of each of the four volumes in Joshi’s new editions, with a brief synopsis from me regarding the tales which I’ve read so far. You’ll notice that the list is significantly shorter this time around – this volume only contains thirteen stories – but they are also quite a bit longer. I’ve also read a larger percentage of them, thanks mostly to the shortened list of contents, but also because we’re getting the real meat of Lovecraft at this point.


Cool Air

The Call of Cthulhu

Pickman's Model

The Silver Key

The Strange High House in the Mist

The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath

The Case of Charles Dexter Ward

The Colour Out of Space

The Descendant

History of the “Necronomicon”

Ibid

The Dunwich Horror

The Whisperer in Darkness

While I only have a passing familiarity with three of the tales I haven’t read, both “The Strange High House in the Mist” and “The Case of Charles Dexter Ward” are two of Lovecraft’s most widely-celebrated works. My failure to read them up to this point is not to be held against them, but is due to my own haphazard reading patterns. “Cool Air” is also well-recognized, to the point where it was used as the primary focus of an issue of Alan Moore’s comic Providence.* Now, rather than talk about what I haven’t read, let’s take a look at the stories I have!

*I had toyed with the idea of denoting which stories were directly referenced in Providence during these posts, but decided to hold off until I do my analysis of the comic itself.

“The Call of Cthulhu”

“Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn: In his house at R'lyeh, dead Cthulhu waits dreaming.”

While the “demonic couplet” might be as recognizable – although many who hear it may not be aware of its origin – this phrase and its associated mythos are undeniable the most enduring parts of Lovecraft’s legacy. The winged, squid-faced monstrosity Cthulhu has graced the cover of everything from books to board games. If one is so inclined – I am not, and neither is Bryant – one can even purchase beanie caps or plush dolls in the likeness of this Great Old One.

The story itself employs a style Lovecraft used a handful of times, in which the unnamed narrator relates their findings as they themselves uncover evidence in the course of an investigation. It’s hardly a style unique to Lovecraft – in truth, while reading this you get the impression he was trying to emulate others – and I vastly prefer his tales in which the events are happening directly to the protagonist. It’s also a fairly brief tale, and I remember being surprised when I read it that THE Cthulhu story turned out to be so short. I also find it interesting how unpredictable storytelling can be; we’re coming up on the 90th anniversary of “The Call of Cthulhu,” and I can’t imagine anyone at the time could have imagined its eventual reach and permanency.

“Pickman's Model”

A personal favorite of mine, this can be seen as both a weird tale and a critique of how traditional art has evolved over time, depending on how you look at it. The short version is that a young new artist is making waves with his paintings of creatures almost too hideous to behold. Everyone wants to know where he gets such horrific ideas, and our protagonist, perhaps foolishly, decides to find out. Typing that sentence, it occurs to me that this might also be Lovecraft’s rebuff / answer to that age-old question constantly posed to horror writers: “Where do you come up with this stuff?”

“The Silver Key”

I remember one thing about this story: It relates to Randolph Carter and the Dream-Quest, which is why I read it to begin with. Beyond that, this is the first case in which I absolutely have zero recollection of the tale. It’s going to stay that way too, at least until my reading brings me back to this point!

“The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath”

Meh, I don’t really have much to say about this story…

Except that, you know, it’s almost inarguably the most imaginative work Lovecraft ever wrote, and I wish like Hell it got the kind of attention the Cthulhu mythos gets. Bryant made a comparison that I had never been able to put into words, so he gets the credit: This is Lovecraft’s Silmarillion. I’ve mentioned how I feel about Tolkien in other posts, but just in case you’ve never read those, it’s a BIG DEAL for me to allow that comparison. I’ll allow it because it fits, though, and because Dream-Quest really is that good. It’s the tale of a man journeying through the dreaming world, desperately trying to find a place he can only describe from visions.

A huge component of the story’s success is the protagonist Randolph Carter, who for once is a Lovecraft character capable of facing the challenges and horrors placed in his path.* That’s not to say I don’t like his other protagonists, or that none of them display any courage or grit. Carter is on an entirely different level, though, and I can’t help but wonder what had changed in Lovecraft that he suddenly felt compelled to write such an extensive piece like this. I do know that he was best friends with Robert E. Howard – I have their collected letters to read eventually – and so perhaps the pulp heroics of Solomon Kane had a hand in it?

Whatever the reasons, this story is like a breath of fresh air, a shaft of brilliant sunset light cutting through the mist and gloom of his other tales. There is vibrancy to his prose that simply doesn’t exist in the rest of his canon; that’s not to say the other stories are less well-written, just vastly different in execution. Dream-Quest was (sadly, inexcusably, unbelievably!) never published while Lovecraft was alive, and one has to wonder what his remaining lifetime and career might have been like otherwise.

*In case you’ve read Edgar Rice Burroughs’ stories about John Carter’s adventures on Mars and were wondering, the answer is “Yes.” Lovecraft does indeed include references which make John – and, by extension, Edgar Rice Burroughs – relatives of Randolph Carter. If you haven’t read the John Carter stories, I cannot recommend them highly enough if you enjoy pulp, sci-fi, and good old-fashioned adventuring.

“The Colour Out of Space”

There are a couple of other stories on the list – the next two, in point of fact – that would have been a more drastic change of pace from the last tale, but this one comes pretty close. Cosmic horror through-and-through, this tale involves a family farm where a meteorite lands in the well one ill-fated night. As the days pass, they begin to notice that things are a bit off, the most noticeable change being that their plants are beginning to display colors which don’t exist in the known spectrum. I won’t spoil anything, but let’s just say that some oddly-colored tomatoes are the least of their troubles. This is another personal favorite, and I’m excited to read it again.

I forgot to mention it with “The Call of Cthulhu” – so I’m fixing that oversight now – but there are actual a handful of Lovecraft tales for which I’ve seen direct film adaptations. This is one of them, and the end result was actually fairly entertaining. The filmmakers wisely avoided the issue of trying to show “colors which don’t exist in the known spectrum” in a movie by shooting it in black-and-white. Instead, they show the plants begin to grow overly large and misshapen, and have the characters reference the odd colors in conversation.

“The Dunwich Horror”

For my money, you don’t get more sheer weirdness and horror in a Lovecraft tale than “The Dunwich Horror.” Without giving too much away, it involves incest, an invisible monster, offspring of unholy unions, occult rituals, and thunderstorms. I personally quite like thunderstorms, except in the context of all those other things, which is what you get here. Don’t get me wrong, I love this story, but it makes my skin crawl terribly just thinking about it. Of course, if you’ve been paying attention, you know that this is neither my favorite Lovecraft story, nor the one I find to be the most horrifying. Just let that simmer for a minute.

“The Whisperer in Darkness”

My buddy Adam hasn’t gotten enough credit up to this point, so let me rectify that now: Hi, Adam! He had a huge hand in getting me into Lovecraft, and when he found out I had finally started reading the stories, implored me to read “The Whisperer in Darkness” at my first opportunity.* I took him up on that, and then as soon as I finished the story either called or texted him to chastise him for trying to keep me from sleeping ever again. Make no mistake: This story is terrifying. It’s not gory, or creepy, and it’s not going to make you jump, but you will never see a chair sitting in the corner of a room the same again.

*I haven’t mentioned it yet, but after “At the Mountains of Madness,” the next three Lovecraft works I read were “Whisperer,” “Dunwich,” and “Colour,” in that order. 
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This brings us to the end of the second volume, and also to (nearly) the end of this post. While it’s true that I’ve already read most of the significant stories in this particular collection, my excitement over getting to this point in the journey is no less diminished. For the most part, Lovecraft’s works are the kind which offer up new treasures each time you dig into them. It bothers me that I can’t recall them all as well as I’d like, and deeply worries me that I can recall nothing of “The Silver Key.” Even worse, in going through some notes from the past few years, it seems that I have actually read “Beyond the Wall of Sleep,” a story included in the first volume.

Much like “The Silver Key,” though, I can recall nothing about it*; mental gaps like this are a large part of what is spurring me to read these stories and get these posts written. Well, that and a desire to go back to school and earn my PhD, either on this subject or one very close to it. I want to read these stories, and either remember them, or at least record my thoughts about them. In a way it goes back to the entire discussion about collectioning, and why I buy books in the first place. I love being surrounded by them, but there’s a yearning that goes with that, an understanding that I haven’t used them to their full potential.

*I started to go back and amend the post about Volume 1, then decided it’s not worth the effort. I’ve mentioned it here, so my failure is recorded for posterity.

---Warning: Big off-topic tangent incoming. If you’d rather just read about Lovecraft, feel free to step off here. No one at Blackout will be offended---

For anyone who’s read the Dark Tower, I can best compare it to the singing Jake hears from the Rose, and I think books having a similar effect on certain people fits well within that mythos. Of course, that comment might’ve made a few people’s eyebrows go up. Don’t worry, the nice young man whose books sing to him won’t get anywhere near your children. Now, if they go sneaking off to the house on Dutch Hill, well, that’s not fault of mine.

Anyways, my original point was that I want to stick with this project and really get the most out of it, while constantly fighting what corporate project managers call “scope creep.” That is to say, I have to keep curtailing or redirecting my desire to follow other threads, or else I’ll never actually get anywhere. Hell, this is the fourth post in the series, and all I’ve done so far is talk about Lovecraft in a general sense, show you some pictures of my books, and yammer about two tables of contents. I still need to actually read each story in turn, give my analysis, write a couple of posts that track different threads within the stories, do a post about all of the books I have connected to Lovecraft in some way, and repeat the process for those.

Forgoing any discussion about when I will eat, sleep, work, and have a life, I feel the urge to do this same thing every time I look at my Dark Tower books, or my Flash comics, or my Miyazaki films. I have three entire shelves overflowing with even books by and about Tolkien to rival even my Lovecraft archive. I actually started a series of posts like this about Daredevil once upon a time; I posted the first one ON THIS BLOG on August 30, 2011. The DD quest my dad and I have undertaken in the years since is probably worth a series of posts in its own right, without even involving actually reading the comics.


If it sounds like I’m bemoaning my situation, know only that I’m bemoaning the lack of hours in any given day which can be readily given over to reading and writing. That’s not to say I begrudge other leisure activities the time given over to them, especially when that time is spent with loved ones. Far from feeling burdened by the thought of all these potential projects, what I really feel is a kind of nervous energy. My literary switch has been flipped fully back into the “On” position, and there’s a part of me that wants to stay up into the wee hours each morning either reading or typing. For now, I’m going to see if I can direct that energy toward reading, and bring this rambling postscript to a close. If you stuck it out, I say thank you, and I’ll see you next time.


4 comments:

Bryant Burnette said...

(1) "The Case of Charles Dexter Ward" is boss.

(2) One of my great ambitions in life is to someday have just cause to slap somebody who is wearing something with a cute version of Cthulhu on it.

(3) Among the many things I have done which has brought disgrace to my clan, I continue to have not read a single John Carter novel. And I think I've read only the first Tarzan. But I'm going to eventually read all of both series.

(4) "Die Farbe" really is a solid movie. Not by any means perfect, but it does its best to get at the heart of what makes the story work, and is so honorable an attempt that I'd give it a thumbs-up even if I hadn't enjoyed it. But I did, so it gets two thumbs-upses.

(5) Wilmarth...!

(6) "That is to say, I have to keep curtailing or redirecting my desire to follow other threads, or else I’ll never actually get anywhere." -- This sounds very familiar...

(7) "If it sounds like I’m bemoaning my situation, know only that I’m bemoaning the lack of hours in any given day which can be readily given over to reading and writing." -- If it makes you feel any better, McMolo and I have commiserations like this on a near-clockwork-regular basis. It frustrates me at times, because after all, time really is a precious resource, and any occasion that finds me wasting it -- especially in some manner not of my own choosing -- really chaps my ass. But the flip side of that coin for me is that I look at my mental list of Things I'd Like To Accomplish as a blogger, and I get that same sort of jolt of energy you describe. Because what it means is that I need never be bored again for a single second.

Well, at least until Snake Plissken sets off the EMPs and takes us off the electrical grid. But shit, maybe even then! I can write longhand!

B McMolo said...

(3) Me neither re: John Carter! (See also (7)

Can't wait to read these damn things. Of these descriptions, "Dunwich Horror" and "Dreamquest of Unknown Kadath" sound intriguing. (Well, they all do.)

Xann Black said...

Bryant – (1) I honestly don’t know why I’ve never gotten around to it, only that I’ve intended to read it like a half-dozen times, and then get sidetracked. I’m looking forward to finally tackling it!

(2) So, in the course of writing and sharing these posts / general Lovecraft knowledge, Emily has become aware of “Cathulhu” and thinks it’s adorable. I have expressed that I find it “disrespectful” to the One who Lies Dreaming… but yeah, pretty sure I’m going to have to buy some Cathulhu stuff at some point.

Bryant & McMolo – (3) The John Carter stories are the first Pirates of the Caribbean movie in book form, which of course makes it even more tragically ironic that Disney failed so hard with the JCoM movie.* I mean, the plot is literally “A former Confederate captain from Virginia gets transported to Mars where he has adventures and falls in love with a princess.”

*For the record, I really like that movie! It’s a bit bloated with extraneous plots, and the pacing is off at times, but all of the leads are perfectly cast, and it’s just FUN. Shame Disney had no idea how to convey that with their marketing.

(7) “Because what it means is that I need never be bored again for a single second.” I cannot describe the grin this brings to my face, nor the accuracy with which it represents why I decided to finally scratch my blogging itch in earnest.
While I know the momentum will take effort to maintain, already I find myself in this thought loop:

Do I want to work on the blog? If yes, I decide if I want to read, write, or do research. I’ve taken a page out of at least Bryant’s book – and probably McMolo’s too – and started working on posts as I feel like it. There are three or four drafts in various stages of completion saved to my Blogger dashboard right now. I was getting burned out on the Table of Contents posts, so I switched over and finished up my second post about my Lovecraft collection.

If the answer is no, then I do something else, of which there is plenty to do. As you’ve both reiterated to me, I do have to find a balance, and switch off blogging mode at appropriate times. For instance, Emily and I are going to watch all of the Marvel Cinematic Universe movies between now and Infinity War. Does part of me really want to blog about that? You bet your ass it does. I may even end up writing a piece at some point, just to collect my thoughts. It most assuredly is NOT a new blog project, though; it’s me watching the Marvel movies with my girlfriend.

Going back to what Bryant said about being bored, though: When I find myself just listlessly milling about, or about to fall into the hole of pointlessly browsing the web, I find that instead I’m sitting down to do something blog-related. Even if it’s just doing outlines for future posts, it feels so much better to have something accomplished out of that free time.

On a final, more fun note, Bryant’s comment about longhand made me smile, because that’s EXACTLY how all of this used to be done! Lovecraft was constantly writing to his contemporaries and friends such as Howard, Bloch, Derleth, et al. (He also wrote nasty letters to publishers, which probably cost him success in his lifetime.) Before message boards existed, people wrote letters to fan magazines when they wanted to share their opinions, good or bad. Hell, quite a few comics publishers still have fan mail sections in the back of each single!

“Fanzines” were / are basically blogs in longhand that the writers then distribute physical copies of; you could easily take, say, y’all’s Springsteen posts, print them up twice a month, and mail them to folks. Anyway, my point – if I had one – is that we’re continuing a long tradition, which dates back basically to the advent of the written word, and the ability for humans to share their thoughts in that fashion.

Bryant Burnette said...

(2) Oh. Oh no. Well, I'll grandfather her in somehow. By which I mean I'll just pretend she's my grandfather any time the subject comes up.

(7) It's all about allocation of resources. The only way -- and I do mean the ONLY way -- I was able to pull off that Guided Tour thing I just finished at my own blog was that it was conducive to being written in tiny chunks. If I came home from work and felt like I could only spare ten minutes, I'd sit down and write one section; if I felt like I had seven hours, I might cover an entire year.

The next time I'm working on something that is a more sustained piece, I'll go at ti differently. If I feel like I need several hours, I'll probably only work on it on days off.

And so forth.

Speaking of fanzines, I'm trying to think if I own any. I don't think I do. Seems like I ought to have at least one somewhere in my various collections, doesn't it?