Crypt of Cthulhu 49 1987 Cosmic-Jukebox

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CRYPT OF
CTHULHU
A Pulp Thriller and Theological Journal
Volume 6, Number 7 Lammas 1987
CONTENTS
Editorial Shards 2
Thematic Links in Arthur Gordon Pym At the .
Mountains of Madness and Moby Dick

, 3
By Marc A. Cerasini
Call Me Wizard Whateley: Echoes of Moby Dick
in "The Dunwich Horror" 21
By Peter H. Cannon
The Blind Idiot God: Miltonic Echoes in the
Cthulhu Mythos 24
By Thomas Quale
Postcard to Charles D. Hornig 29
By H. P. Lovecraft
Commentary 29
By S. T. Joshi
"The Pool," Recommendations for Revision-
Synopsis 31
By H. P. Lovecraft
Aporia and Paradox in "The Outsider" 41
By Donald R. Burleson
At the Home of Poe 43
By Frank Belknap Long
Edgar and Helen 46
By Brett Rutherford
From the Vaults of Yoh-Vombis 48
By Lin Carter
The Keeper at the Crypt 51
By Carl T. Ford
Advice to the Lovecraft-lorn 54
R'lyeh Review 56
Mail-Call of Cthulhu 59
1
2 / Crypt of Cthulhu
DEBATABLE AND DISTURBING:

EDITORIAL SHARDS
Lovecraft, like most authors, self explain a story in a letter?
was well-read. And of course an Do we have notes or drafts? In
author's reading is going to influ- fact we do, at least sometimes.
ence his writing. Crypt of Cthu - And in this issue we are able to
lhu #49 explores both sides of present two illuminating if esoteric
HPL's literary process. pieces. David Hodson has pro-
The first to explore the literary vided copy of a hitherto unpub-
a
influences on Lovecraft and the use lished postcard from HPL to Fan -
he made of them is Marc A. Cera- tasy Fan editor Charles Hornig,
sini in "Thematic Links in Arthur congratulating him on his new job
Cordon Pym , At the Mountains of as editor of Wonder Stories As.
Madness , and Moby Dick .' 1

Espe- S. T. Joshi's brief commentary
cially noteworthy is Cerasini's re- reveals, the card's text reveals
vealing suggestion as to the pos- interesting details about the re-
sible genesis of Lovecraft's crinoid vision of "Supernatural Horror
Old Ones in an overlooked detail in Literature." The other item
of Poe's novel. The Moby Dick shows Lovecraft the revisor at
connection is traced by Peter H. work. As readers of Crypt of
Cannon into another Lovecraft tale Cthulhu #47 know, HPL offered
in "Call Me Wizard Whateley: Echoes extensive advice to Wilfred Tal-
of Moby Dick in 'The Dunwich Hor- man on his draft of a story to be
ror.'" Thomas Quale considers the called "The Pool." It was Donald
possibility of John Milton's influ- Burleson who actually incorporated
ence on Lovecraft in "The Blind Lovecraft's suggestions into a fin-
Idiot Cod: Miltonic Echoes in the ished story decades later. Having
Cthulhu Mythos." The case made presented the story in Crypt #47,
here is especially interesting in we felt you deserved a look at
light of August Derleth's claim the original notes, both to assess
that the Cthulhu Mythos is paral- the extent of Lovecraft's original
lel to the Christian Mythos, espe- and to appreciate Burleson's con-
cially the fall of Satan. siderable skill in turning the rich
It is useful to draw inferences but rather raw material into a pol-
from what HPL read to what he ished whole. Herewith, thanks to
wrote, but it is also inevitably Gerry de la Ree, "The Pool, Rec-
unverifiable (for instance, who ommendations for Revision Syn-
would not have pontificated that opsis."
"Polaris" was influenced by Dun- Finally, we present Donald Bur-
sany if we didn't know for a fact leson's study "Aporia and Paradox
that Lovecraft wrote the tale be- in 'The Outsider"' in which he
fore he ever laid eyes on a piece brings the new hermeneutical key
of Plunkett's prose?). We are on of deconstructionism to bear on
safer ground for arguing when Lovecraft's text.
we can examine Lovecraft's own
background materials; does he him- Robert M. Price, Editor
.
Lammas 1987 / 3
THEMATIC LINKS
IN ARTHUR GORDON PYM AT THE MOUNTAINS OF MADNESS
.
AND MOBY DICK
By Marc A. Cerasini
A previous issue of Crypt of with another classic of American

Cthulhu' was dedicated to one of literature, Herman Melville's Moby
IT! FT Lovecraft's finest works, Dick . Furthermore, Lovecraft's
the short novel At the Mountains of exploration of these themes places
Madness In that issue two authors,
. him squarely in the mainstream of
Peter H. Cannon and Ben P. In- classic American literature. At
dick, addressed the question as to least one of the major concepts
whether or not Madness was a "se- found in Lovecraft's novel springs
quel" to Edgar Allan Poe's only directly from Edgar Poe's tale,
complete long fiction. The Narra - and contrary to Cannon's conclu-
tive of Arthur Cordon Pym of Nan - sion, there are more than mere
tucket . "incidental" tributes to Poe in Love-
Peter Cannon concluded that craft's At the Mountains of Mad -
"At most Lovecraft took inspiration ness .
from [Poe] [Lovecraft's] main

. . . What connections can be found
concern being to do hjs version of in these three dissimilar works
an Antarctic yarn, in the process composed by three of America's
paying incidental tribute to Poe most distinctive authors with very
... and Cannon goes on to different intentions in mind?
state categorically that At the What shall be discussed in this
Mountains of Madness and Arthur article is, first, the central source
Cordon Pym are very different material that inspired, directly
stories, written for very different or indirectly, all three tales; and
reasons. second, the thematic and ironic
Ben P. Indick summarized the elements which link the three
two tales, and pointed out some novels.
of the connections between them,
Central Source Material
and he asserts: "It is interesting
that Lovecraft's novel may be con- A primary source of inspiration
sidered a sequel (but not a con - for both Moby Dick and Arthur
tinuation of Poe's novel.
) He uses Gordon Pym was Jeremiah N. Rey-
ideas and sites from the earlier nolds, a contemporary of Edgar
work, in no way inferring that Allan Poe and Herman Melville.
Arthur Cordon Pym was a real Reynolds was a controversial
person, but rather that Poe may figure, a scientist and explorer
have disguised terrifying truths who became America's foremost
he had unearthed in fiction-... exponent of the "Symmesian" theory
alized form. Indick, however, of the earth a theory orig-
hollow
is not explicit about what "ideas" inally formulated by John Cleves
Lovecraft borrowed from Poe's Symmes in his novel, Symzonia: A
novel Voyage of Discovery first pub- ,
Moreover, both writers missed lished in 1820 under the pen name
or glossed over some pertinent Adam Seaborn.
points in their examinations of these Like Pym and Madness , Symmes'
two tales, points which support novel is written in a journalistic
the existence of vital thematic and style, purporting to relate the
ironic links between the two sto- events that occurred on a voyage
ries, as well as surprising ties of exploration in the Antarctic.
In the course of the novel, Symmes to Poe and his contemporaries.

outlines his theory of a hollow The Antarctic was a vast unex-
earth, with openings to the interior plored region; who knew what was
located at the poles. Symmes pos- there? There was much scientific
tulated that there was a vast un- speculation about the possibility of
derground tunnel in the earth a hollow earth, both in the United
through which a mighty river States and Europe. This idea of
flowed, the source of this cataract the hollow earth was to endure in
located at the Antarctic. The river fantasy fiction long after the hy-
was believed to run entirely pothesis was disproved by scien-
through the earth's core to emerge tists. 5
again at the opposite end of our The exploration of this theory
globe somewhere in the Arctic. was part of Poe's design when he
While a student at Ohio Univer- conceived his tale of Arthur Cor-
sity (the present author's alma don Pym's adventure in 1838.
mater), Jeremiah Reynolds fell un- Poe composed his tale in the
der the spell of J. C. Symmes and style of the "travelogues" that
dedicated his life to proving the were so popular in his day. Though
man's theories. Reynolds, after Pym was a failure with the public
Symmes death, became the major (just as Lovecraft's At the Moun -
American supporter of the "hollow tains of Madness was a failure with
earth" theory, and he tried to in- Farnsworth Wright, who refused
terest the newly-elected Jackson to accept it for publication in Weird
administration in funding an expe- Tales ) the form remained popular,
,
dition to the south polar regions in and Herman Melville was to achieve
an attempt to locate and exploit worldwide (if shortlived) fame near-
this underground world. ly a decade later with his reminis-
In his guest to prove the earth cences of the South Sea islands
was hollow, Reynolds made several told in the very same style. 6 Of
exploratory voyages. On one trip course, Poe's stated goal was to
to the South Seas he heard a story compose a hoax for the gullible
about a strange white whale often readers of The Southern Literary
seen in those waters. The whale Messenger ,of which he was then
had over a dozen harpoons in its editor, and to offer speculations
back and was said to have killed about the Antarctic and the flora
thirty seamen. When he returned and fauna that might be found
to civilization Reynolds wrote an there.
article called, "Mocha Dick: or Lovecraft regarded Poe as his
the White Whale of the Pacific: a "god of fiction."? He enjoyed Poe's
Leaf from a Manuscript Journal." * 1
novel of the Antarctic, most espe-
This article appeared in 1839, and cially the latter chapters wherein
has been cited by various critics Pym encounters the strange crea-
as a primary (but, as we shall tures and people of the south polar
see, not the only) influence on regions. Both Poe and Lovecraft
Melville's M oby Dic k. were interested in the rush of Polar
Itwas from this same Jeremiah explorations going on during their
N. Reynolds that Edgar Allan Poe lifetimes, and both men found Ant-
first heard the theory of the Ant- arctica to be a suitable spring-
arctic tunnel and the hollow earth, board for their respective leaps
two concepts he utilized in The into the fantastic.
Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym . There however, little in his
is,
Knowledge of the Symmesian theory published correspondence to indi-
is vital to an understanding of cate that Lovecraft held any special
the climax of Poe's The Narrative fondness for Herman Melville's Moby
of Arthur Gordon Pym It.must Dick he may not have even read
also be remembered that the "hol- it. If he did, he may have read it
low earth" theories that sound ab- as a child as a "boys" book. He
surd to us were not so ridiculous probably was not aware that he
Lammas 1987 / 5
was reading one of the seminal especially the "Leatherstocking

works of modern fiction. This Tales" white men fled civilization
would not be surprising. The and, without the constraints of
recognition of Moby Dick as one female society, embraced the wil-
of the greatest American novels is derness and the unknown. As
a modern one . Melville died
. . Leslie Fiedler has pointed out,
in obscurity, most of his popular white heroes embraced the wilder-
works like T ypee and Omoo having ness in the company of nonwhites
been composed in his youth. Moby noble
savages in a nonphysical
Dick was virtually ignored when marriage of comraderie in an all-
it first appeared in 1851; most male society. In Fiedler's own
of the critical and academic recog- words this was the beginning of
nition of this novel's true worth "I the) essential Western myth of
came in the early part of our cen- male companionship triumphing over
tury. hostility between the races and
Strangely, Lovecraft does not death itself." 10 Fiedler goes on to
even cite Melville'scontribution to suggest that an element of homo-
the horror genre in his otherwise eroticism is inherent in such rela-
thorough study of "Supernatural tionships, but that will not concern
Horror in Literature." Vet Mel- us in the present study.
ville wrote several effective terror In James Fenimore Cooper's
tales, most notably the horrific "Leatherstocking Tales," the com-
short story of vampirism and en- panion of the wandering white man
slavement, "Benito Cereno." Nattie Bumppo was the Indian Chin-
gachgook; Melville's protagonists
The Theme of Whiteness
fled civilization in the company
There are many aspects of the of South Sea islanders, most nota-
theme of "whiteness" as it has been bly Queequeg, Ishmael's companion;
explored in mainstream American in Mark Twain's Hucklebury Finn
literature. These aspects range the escaped Negro Nigger
slave
from the material (the confrontation Jim becomes Huck's surrogate fa-
of the civilized white man with the ther. This theme the white
of
dusky primitive men of the wilder- man fleeing bourgeois constraints
ness) to the more spiritual (i.e., imposed by civilization (and women)
"whiteness" symbolizing the un- with the company and companionship
known, the void, death). There of nonwhites still flourishes in pop-
is a whole chapter in Moby Dick ular culture today. 11
dedicated to the discussion of the Another aspect of this pervasive

color white and what it symbolizes. image of "whiteness" is the symbol
In the 1830s, the American peo- for purity and innocence, the
ple stood on the threshold of a "Protestant virgin" of the European
vast frontier peopled only by sav- gothic novels, the essence of the
age Indians. The West was still bourgeois Sentimental Heroine.
largely untrodden and unsettled by But in American literature "white-
the white man a new field of infi- ness" came also to represent the
nite possibilities and this feeling infinity of the unexplored, the
of wonder, of questing, of explora- all-consuming void. In Arthur
tion, became an American mania. Cordon Pym the color white comes
In the fiction of the times writers to dominate descriptions of the
like Melville, James Fenimore landscape near the close of the
Cooper, and later Mark Twain and novel (natural enough in a novel
Henry James, were to make the set in the polar region), and in-
figure of the wandering American cidents involving the strange or the
the questing Yankee into a myth- unknown are often heralded by
ic symbol. "white mists," or a "white abyss"
In the pseudo-documentaries of in both Pym and in Lovecraft's
Melville works like T ypee and Omoo At the Mountains of M adness. Love-
and in the fiction of Cooper, most craft himself experienced a fleeting
glimpse of the wonder of the unex- spiritual journey a voyage of self-

plored, and expressed it in a letter discovery, a journey of descent
to Clark Ashton Smith: and rebirth, a quest for the Self.
This is also especially true of Mel-
... Istopped off at Bos-
ville's Moby Dick and, as we shall
ton for an all-day boat trip .
see, it is true of H. P. Lovecraft's
my first experience on the
.
At the Mountains of Madness .
open sea out of sight of land

was well worth the price of The Spiritual Journey
the excursion. To be on limit-
There is no need to discuss at
less water is to have the fan-
length the theme of the spiritual
tastic imagination stimulated in
journey and rebirth in Melville's
the most powerful way. The
Moby Dick it is, of course, all-
uniformly blank horizon evokes
encompassing. However, certain
all sorts of speculations as to
points should be mentioned.
what may lie beyond, so that Ishmael, retreating from his
the sensations of Odysseus,
native land, his family, and civi-
Columbus, Madoc, Arthur Cor- general, goes whaling.
lization in
don Pym, the Ancient Mariner,
He signs aboard the Pequod , cap-
6 all the other voyagers of
tained by the fanatical Ahab once
song story are rolled into
a just and rational man, who has
one E sharpened to expectant
12 since been embittered and mad-
poignancy . . .
dened by his contact with Moby
"Whiteness" came also to sym- Dick, the white whale that took
bolize death, the final white void, his leg. Ishmael's closest compan-
the ultimate unexplored (and un- ion and soulmate on his voyage is
explorable, at least by the living) Queequeg, a savage cannibal South
region. The color also became a Sea islander who tries, on first
symbol of racial purity. It was meeting Ishmael, to sell the white
the white man who enslaved the man a shrunken head.
black in the South it was the white As the voyage progresses, the
man who exterminated the nonwhite characters become further and fur-
Indian and stole his land. This ther removed from civilized con-
pervasive symbol, this "whiteness straints. Ahab forms a bond sim-
beyond white," like the white man's ilar to Ishmael's with Fedallah the
flight to the wilderness with his Farsi, another nonwhite crew mem-
nonwhite soulmate, was to dominate ber. Ahab's obsession with de-
much of the fiction produced in stroying the white whale becomes
this country. ^ This 1
theme of all-consuming. Queequeg sees a
"whiteness" is evidenced in all vision of his own death and asks
three works being discussed here. the ship's carpenter to construct a
111
Marie Bonaparte, Leslie Fied- coffin. The Pequod comes across
ler, 15 and Harold Beaver 16 all have another whaler, the Rachel and .
commented on the allusions when her captain asks Ahab to

to whiteness found in Pym Marie . help find some of her lost crewmen
Bonaparte has conjectured that who have been dragged out of sight
Pym's journey to the Antarctic was by a whale, Ahab refuses violat-
really Poe's spiritual journey in ing all civilized conventions and
search of his "pale mother" laws of the sea. The Piquod and
. the pallid, emaciated, tubercular her crew fall under a baleful doom.
mother Edgar Poe lost as a child. Finally, the crew sights the
For Leslie Fiedler, Pym's journey white whale Moby Dick and in
south symbolized Poe's spiritual the confrontation (which lasts three
return to his roots, the Antebellum days) Fedallah becomes entangled
South, with its slavery, planta- in the harpoon lines bound to Moby
tions, and white racism. In either Dick's flank. Ahab, too, is swept
case, the interpretations suggest away, entangled in the harpoon
that Pym is, first and foremost, a lines that fasten the white whale to
Lammas 1987 / 7
the whale boats. Moby Dick, en- seemed too uncannily close
raged, destroys the Pequod in to the very origin of his in-
the end, and only Ishmael spiration 1 .
survives floating on the coffin

fashioned for Queequeg. Ishmael A closer look at Poe's Narrative
finds resurrection from a watery of Arthur Gordon Pym is now in
tomb on the cannibal's coffin and order.

rescue in the arms of the whaler Pym, Ishmael,
like wishes to
Rachel which is still searching for flee civilization this he does with
her lost crewmen. his companion, Augustus. Pym
It is amazing how closely Mel- decides to run away from home
ville's novel parallels the themes and family and to stow away on
and some of the events of A rthur his friend's father's whaler . They
Cordon Pym . and Harold Beav- depart Edgartown (a nice pun on
er! 7 has suggested that there is Poe's name, also a real place in
little doubt that Melville was fa- Martha's Vineyard) after a chance
miliar with Poe's tale and borrowed encounter with Mr. Peterson, Pym's
Poe's themes as a basis for his grandfather. Pym denies his iden-
classic. Harold Beaver asserts tity to the old man three times
that Melville buried two seminal (the New Testament reference here
sources for his adventure Poe's is not to be missed; Moby Dick is
Pym and Reynolds' article on also full of biblical allusions, so
"Mocha Dick." According to Beav- many, that a solid ground-
in fact,
er, James Fenimore Cooper's novel. ing inBible is necessary for a
the
The Sea Lions set in the polar thorough understanding of Mel-
,
regions, was reviewed by Herman ville's and finally manages,

novel)
Melville in April 1849 only two with Augustus' help, to secrete
months before Poe's death. Harold himself on board the ship, en-
Beaver conjectures that this re- tombed in the vast hold, where he
view, coupled with news of Edgar remains hidden for three days until
Allan Poe's passing, may have the ship sets sail (another New
prompted Melville to look up Poe's Testament allusion, this time to
Antarctic yarn. As he points out, Christ's resurrection the entomb-
it would have been strange if Mel- ment resurrection themes are
and
ville had not known Poe. They constantly appearing and reappear-
moved in the same literary circles ing all through Pym ) After a .
in New York City. Poe even ad- long passage of time, during which
dressed a meeting of the New York Pym sleeps deeply, the young man
Society Library in 1848. At that realizes that he has not heard from
time Melville was a member of the his friend Augustus and fears him-
organization. They shared mutual self abandoned. He cannot escape
friends, most notably Every Duy- the hold, as he discovers the hatch
chinck, who was Melville's mentor has been covered by some heavy
and a constant correspondent with object.
Poe. As Beaver states, Soon Pym senses another pres-
ence with him in the confines of
Moby Dick: or. The Whale was the ship's hold after a fright, he
published in 1851. Though discovers it is his dog. Tiger,
lavish in his quotations and which Augustus had also sneaked
allusions to sources from Gen- aboard. There is a note tied to
esis to Darwin, Melville sup- the dog's neck, but Pym can only
pressed these two seminal in- make out a few lines. Just as his
fluences: Jeremiah N. Rey- sanity is giving out, and his pet
nolds and Edgar Allan Poe. turns on Pym, maddened by thirst
Both Mocha Dick: or. The White and hunger, Augustus arrives to
Whale of the Pacific (1839) and tell Pym that there has been a
The Narrative of Arthur Cor - mutiny and that the ship has been
don Pym (1838) must have divided into factions all led by
nonwhites. The most violent fac- sages on whaling that can be found
tion is headed by the black cook, throughout Moby Dick the crew of
)
a vicious brute. A more moderate the Jane Guy are betrayed and
faction isled by a misshapen dwarf killed by the Tsalalians, their ship
half-breed named Dirk Peters, who blown to bits in the struggle.
wears a bear-skin wig to cover Only Pym, Peters, and another
his bald pate. man survive, as they are acci-
A plan is worked out whereby dentally buried in a rock slide
Pym, with the help of Augustus during the confrontation. Once
and Peters, disguises himself as a more Pym emerges from entomb-
ghost of a seaman murdered by ment, this time to be greeted by
the cook's faction. The plan is to the waiting arms of his savior,
frighten the rival faction into turn- Dirk Peters, who has become a
ing over the control of the ship symbolic father to him (note that
to Peters. Pym is reborn from at the beginning of the tale Pym
entombment here for the second denied his grandfather Peterson
time in the narrative (the first in a dockside scene at Edgartown,
time being when a drunken Augus- only to find salvation and comfort
tus and Pym are involved in a boat- in the arms of Peters on the cliffs
ing accident, briefly described above the bay of Tsalal near the
in the story's opening). The plan close of the tale). On the island
works, but not for long; after Pym they find strange carvings a sort
gains his freedom the ship is of cryptogram in the rocks. They
wrecked in a storm and Augustus, are very ancient. The course of
Peters, and Pym must murder an- the story has come almost full cir-
other crewman and feed on his cle, the spiritual journey is almost
flesh or face starvation. After complete.
the grisly meal is partaken of, Pym and Peters escape Tsalal
Pym and Peters thrive, but Au- on a canoe, taking one of the
gustus, who was wounded in a blacks prisoner. They are swept
struggle, dies of gangrene. Au- into a swiftly running cataract
gustus, whose name suggests the which rushes them uncontrollably
rational and civilized, passes quiet- to a fateful rendezvous. In fear,
ly from Pym's life; his rotting the black savage dies, and as the
corpse is tossed overboard by canoe rushes on, past strange birds
Peters on the First of August (the crying "Tekeli-li! Tekeli-li!" they
date of Melville's birth). It is the confront a huge, white, human-
"savage" Dirk Peters who replaces like shrouded figure. Here the
Augustus as Pym's soulmate for narrative abruptly ends, and the
the rest of the story. whole work is closed by Poe him-
At length they are rescued by self, wearing the hat of the editor
a seal-hunting ship, the Jane Guy, of The Southern Literary Messen -
which is heading for the South ger who tells the reader that Ar-
,
Seas, by way of the Antarctic. thur Gordon Pym, who had sur-
When they arrive at the south polar vived the ordeal in the Antarctic,
regions, they find the climate mod- has died suddenly in New York,
erate, not frigid as assumed. They his narrative uncompleted. Of
discover a tribe of people living course, Poe meant to suggest that
there the Tsalalians, black men to Pym and Peters were swept into
their teeth, who worship the color the tunnel at the Antarctic and
white and fall in supplication to sucked through the hollow earth,
anything of that color (except, of to emerge at the other side again
course, the explorers whom the suggesting a voyage of self-discov-
tribe plans to murder). After ery as the characters come full
long passages about the life, the circle, both literally and figura-
economy, and the agriculture of tively.
the people of the south polar re- Poe goes on to suggest that
gions (reminiscent of the long pas- the strange carvings on the cliffs
Lammas 1987 / 9
of Tsalal are actually Egyptian, "wooden ex- whalers."

and hints that the Tsalalians are As the expedition approaches
really "Ethiopian." The mysteri- the South Pole, they pass Ross
ous white shrouded figure is never Island, with its twin volcanic
explained except by Marie Bona- peaks. Here "one of the graduate
parte, in a deeply Freudian man- assistants a brilliant young fellow
ner she suggests that the figure named Danforth pointed out what
was Edgar Poe's lost mother. The looked like lava on the snowy
theme of self-discovery and re- slope; remarking that this moun-
birth is only reinforced by this tain, discovered in 1890, had un-
interpretation. doubtedly been the source of Poe's
We can see the similarities in image when he wrote seven years
plot and theme to be found in Pym later of
and Moby Dick the device of the
:
. . . the lavas that restlessly

white man fleeing civilization and
roll
facing the unknown with a member
Their sulphurous currents down
of another race, the allusions to
Vaanek
"whiteness" throughout both sto-
In the ultimate climes of the
ries, the biblical references, the
pole
lush descriptions of flora and
That groan as they roll down
fauna, and the livelihoods of the
Mount Yaanek
characters but most especially,
In the realms of the boreal
the archetypal spiritual journey
pole. 2 1
taken by both protagonists, cli-

maxed by a resurrection on the This first allusion to Edgar Allan
verge of what appears to be cer- Poe in Lovecraft's story is a quote
tain physical death. from Poe's poem "Ulalume" and
These situations and themes, what follows is a description of
somewhat veiled by the dry, sci- Professor Dyer's own fascination
entific prose, can also be found with Poe's Narrative of Arthur
in the pages of H. P. Lovecraft's Cordon Pym and a wry observation
At the Mountains of Madness 1 . by Dyer about his colleague: "Dan-
forth was a great reader of bi-
The Lovecraft Connection zarre material ," 22 . .
The narrative style of At the At length, the expedition

Mountains of Madness like
, Pym ,
reaches its first goal and begins
is a first-person account of an drilling for samples. After some
expedition to the Antarctic, told success, the expedition leaders de-
by Professor Dyer of Miskatonic cide to divide their effort; one
University. Dyer is telling the group, led by Lake, is to fly on
story now, seven years after the and establish a base deeper in the
events he describes, in an effort polar regions northwest of their
to warn off a newly-organized ex- encampment. This they accomplish
pedition about to depart for the with the four Dornier aeroplanes
same area. they brought along. Dyer is
Dyer, a geologist, had accom- strangely reluctant to press on
panied the Miskatonic University further with the others in the for-
expedition to the Antarctic, an ward expedition. His misgivings
expedition equipped with a new are expressed in scientific and
electric drill for recovering deep rational arguments "I still failed
rock and soil samples under the to see the good sense of Lake's de-
ancient ice. The group. Dyer, mand . . . requiring the use of
Pabodie, the drill's inventor. Lake all four planes, many men, and the
of the Biology Department, Atwood whole of the expedition's mechanical
of the Physics Department, and apparatus. decided not to accom-
I

sixteen assistants "seven graduate pany the northwestward part de-
students from Miskatonic and nine spite Lake's plea for my geological
skilled mechanics" 20 depart on two advice 2
." ^ but
. his
. decision
.
10 / Cry pi of Cthulhu
After the storm

subsides, there s i
still no contact with

the advance party.
Dyer, the student
Danforth, and sever-
al others, proceed to
the forward site with
one of the aeroplanes,
and find the first of
the horrors they will
soon encounter. The
camp is in
ruins we
later learn that some
of the humans and
dogs have been dis-

sected and the crin-
oid samples are bur-
ied under mounds
with strange, sys-
tematic dot patterns
etched on them
"Madness struck the
advance party" is the
assumption made by
Dyer, for one of the
members of Lake's
party, the student
Gedney (and one of
the dogs), is missing.
1987 by Gavin O'Keefe The only "rational"
explanation is that
Gedney killed the
not to accompany the others ulti- others and buried the crinoids un-
mately leads to his physical salva- der the mounds. Yet some of the
tion, as well as a confrontation star-headed creatures are also
with madness and horror. missing, and the conclusion again
The forward party radios a re- rational is that they were "blown
port of the discovery of a previ- away in the storm."
ously unknown mountain range that Dyer and Danforth agree to fly
"May equal Himalayas . ."20
. ancj the aeroplane toward the mountain
later, even more shocking discov- range in an attempt to locate the
eries are unearthed. Lake's party missing Gedney. They are delayed
finds a cave filled with specimens by another small wind-storm, but
of prehistoric life, some never en- depart as soon as possible. They
countered before, including huge, locate the mountain ranges de-
star-headed crinoid-like creatures. scribed to them by the now-dead
Some of these crinoids are perfect- advance party they observe the
ly preserved and, after radioing strange regularity of some of the
exact descriptions of the find to granite blocks. At length, they
Dyer's camp (these descriptions are discover a long-dead city, once
reminiscent of the long scientific the seat of a powerful prehistoric
and informative passages in both civilization of star-headed Old
Pym and M oby Dick ), Lake decides Ones, the remains of some of which
to dissect one of the more intact had been discovered by the advance
creatures. A storm is blowing party. They decided to land the
up, and radio contact is soon lost plane and explore for a while, and
between the two exploration parties. soon gain entrance to the necrop-
Lammas 1987 / 11
olis. ing the mountains, Danforth turns

Lovecraft here proved himself around and sees in the white, hov-
the master of the sublime the pas- ering mist some terrible, final rev-
sages describing the dead city are elation he neither explains to
that
awe-inspiring and wonderful. As Danforth, nor can live with and
Dyer and Danforth explore the still retain his sanity. In the end,
ruins they learn the fearful history both men agree to keep the secret
of the Old Ones; details of their of their discoveries until such time
civilization and way of life are as events (in this case, the coming
found on bas-reliefs in nearly ev- Starkweather-Moore expedition)
ery giant corridor and massive force them to reveal the facts.
chamber of the ancient site.
Lovecraft's Racial Attitudes
When the two men decide to
search for a deep tunnel that leads Let us examine the theme of
to an ancient riverbed, they come interracial male-bonding and in-
upon an unexplainable, yet all too terracial harmony as expressed in
familiar smell: gasoline. Danforth At the Mountains of Madness .
and Dyer remember that some of Lovecraft's attitudes toward

the supplies, including a petrol Negroes, and in fact toward any
heater, were missing from the ad- nonwhite, non-Aryan, non-New
vance camp. They soon discover England Yankee, have been dis-
the source of the odor, a small cussed and argued about repeated-
campsite inside the ruins, and this ly so much so that no new light
discovery leads to further horrors. can be shed on the subject here.
The two men come upon the corpses Suffice it to say that Lovecraft
of the missing student Cedney and was not the most tolerant man to-
the dog, both preserved like labo- ward individuals and peoples not
ratory specimens and strapped of his own race, class, or eco-
to a sled. The conclusion is now nomic background. He neverthe-
inescapable: the crinoid Old Ones less was able to write convincingly
had somehow survived their aeon- about members of other races when
long slumber and were responsible necessary (most notably in the
for the deaths at Lake's advance ghost-written "Medusa's Coil") but
camp. As this realization washes seldom wrote a story where the
over Dyer and Danforth the fact main characters moved in the same
is confirmed they find a corpse of circles as members of other races.
a star-headed Old One. The crea- That Lovecraft did not often em-
ture, revived after millenia of hi- ploy characters of another race
bernation by the advance party, has less to do with his personal
returned to its ancestral home only feelings than it has to do with
to die in the grip of its hereditary the society in which he lived.
enemy, one of the shoggoths, whose Lovecraft's characters, in his
existence was foretold on the bas- most-accomplished fiction, are ei-
reliefs and murals in the ruins. ther echoes or idealized versions
The two men proceed, discovering of himself. Charles Dexter Ward,
a species of hitherto unknown al- De la Poer, Francis Wayland Thur-
bino penguins and more dead Old ston, and Professor Dyer all share
Ones. Then, a fine white mist similarities with their creator. All
begins to surge out of the tunnel are men with powerful intellects,
ahead, followed by a living shog- aristocratic or New England back-

goth piping its hideous litany, grounds, and finely-honed aes-
"Tekeli-li! Tekeli-li!" A refrain thetic senses. Some are scientists
all too familiar to both Dyer and or academics, what Lovecraft might
Danforth and other readers of have become had his family pos-
Poe's Pym . sessed the financial means for him
The two men flee in horror, to attend a university.
stumbling into the aeroplane and Lovecraft never peopled his
taking off. But as they are leav- tales with shop-stewards, coal-
.
miners, janitors and the like. His larity of the names of paired char-
major characters were all cut from acters in both Lovecraft and Poe.
a different cloth. So it would not In Poe the names are "Pym" and
be logical to expect nonwhite char- "Peters," in Lovecraft "Dyer" and
acters in the tales of H. P. Love- "Danforth." The narrator of both
craft; in the 1920s and 30s non- tales possesses a "y" as the second
whites in the United States did letter of his name. Poe, of course,
not become scientists, they did substituted the "y" for the "o" in
not move in the same social circles his own name. Lovecraft would
as whites. It would not have made have had a tough time attempting
sense in the social climate of De- a similar substitution, but there
pression era America for a scientist is little doubt that HPL conceived
or academic to be portrayed as Dyer as an idealized alter ego of
nonwhite. himself (in fact, as Donald Burle-
Yet male-bonding is a very im- son has pointed out, "Dyer" was
portant ingredient in much of Love- an ancestral name of Lovecraft's). 2
craft's fiction, as it is in classic Danforth is introduced as "one
American literature, and there is of the graduate assistants." He is
even a specific incident of white/ referred to as "a brilliant young
nonwhite male-bonding in Love- fellow .
." but in almost the
.
craft's fiction. This episode oc- same breath we are told he is a

curred in Lovecraft's "collaboration" "great reader of bizarre materi-
with Zealia Bishop the short novel al." 27 The "bizarre material" with
"The Mound." The two characters which Danforth is familiar is later
were the conquistador Zamacona revealed to be the dreaded Necro-
and an American Indian who led him nomicon and other eldritch tomes,
to the entrance to the underground but here the narrator is referring
world to Edgar Allan Poe. The tone here
In a perceptive article that ap- suggests that a true "scientist"
peared several years ago in Crypt would most certainly not be a read-
of Cthulhu "Lovecraft and Classic er of this sort of thing. And
American Literature," 2 Peter H. though Lovecraft gives the reader
Cannon discussed male-bonding a first hint of the bond that will
in classic American literature and later develop between Dyer and
drew attention to this sole example Danforth, in that the Professor
of archetypal white/nonwhite male- admits that he himself is familiar
bonding in Lovecraft's entire fic- with Poe's novel, some sort of line
tional output. would like to take
I has been drawn here by Lovecraft,
Cannon's arguments a step further through his narrator's words, to
and connect them with Pym and suggest that young, inexperienced
Madness .An example of inter- Danforth is neither the academic
racial male-bonding in Poe's tale is, nor intellectual equal to Dyer.
as we have seen, self-evident. Danforth's education and back-
Male-bonding in At the Mountains ground, it is suggested by the
of Madness is also evident, but tone of the narrator, are "unortho-
this bonding does not involve dox"; he is not a full professor
blacks and whites; it does, how- like Dyer, hence not quite the
ever, involve members of higher older man's peer; yet in the pages
and lower social classes, as we that follow, Danforth's observa-
shall see. And, surprisingly, there tions are often intuitively accurate
js a note of interracial harmony and just as often in the early
present in At the Mountains of section of the novel, his ideas are
Madness though Lovecraft himself
, denigrated and dismissed by Dyer.
may have been unaware of it! It is Danforth who "drew our notice
In Madness Dyer's soulmate, the to the curious regularities of the
man with whom he experiences the higher mountain skyline" 2 when the
horrors of the expedition, is "the two men first sight the mountains
student Danforth." Note the simi- of madness. It is Danforth who
.
Lammas 1987 / 13
"thought that the slight cracks and tist together in a bond of shared
pittings of the weathering tended events and shared secrets until,
toward unusual patterns." Dyer at the story's climax, they both
suggests that Filled as he was confront the penultimate horror
with the horrors and strangenesses together. This confrontation for-
discovered at the camp, [Danforth ever bonds the two men just as it
had) hinted that the pittings transforms them. And Danforth
vaguely resembled those baffling becomes, through the events of the
groups of dots sprinkled over the story. Dyer's spiritual equal and
primeval greenish soapstones, so his soulmate. Like Queequeg, like
hideously duplicated on the . . . Dirk Peters, Danforth moves from
snowmounds above those six buried a position of social inferiority to
monstrosities. "29 Danforth is "im- equality with his fellow-protagonist.
pressionable" suggesting to the Strange as it may seem, racial
reader that Dyer is not; rather. harmony can be construed as one
Dyer is coolly scientific and ratio- of the messages in Lovecraft's tale,
nal. just as it is one of the messages
After they land the plane, Dan- in Moby Dick and Pym for, as ,
forth "was frankly jumpy, and Dyer is moved to remark of the

began making some offensively ir- newly-awakened Old Ones near the
relevant speculations about the close of the story: ". . poor .
horror at the camp. . . ."3 These Old Ones! . .

. Radiates, vegeta-
speculations, which at this point bles, monstrosities, star spawn
the logical Dyer finds "offensive." whatever they had been, they were
are later proven correct, but at men ! "33
this point in the narrative Dyer
Lovecraft's Spiritual Journey
"resented [these speculations] all
the more because [Dyer] could Arthur Cordon Pym the pro-
In
not help sharing certain conclusions tagonist wishes to have an adven-
forced upon us by many features ture. It is his motivation to go to
of this [city]." Danforth later "in- sea with his friend. Pym experi-
sisted that he saw faint traces ences the ultimate adventure prob-
of ground markings which he did ably more adventure than he wished
not like; whilst elsewhere he for. In the end, his voyage was
stopped to listen to a subtle imag - one of self-discovery, disguised
inary [emphasis mine, but expres- as a mere adventure. Ishmael
sive of Dyer's nonbeliefl sound . wanted to flee civilization and go
. .
"3 1 The young and impression- whaling his flight from the bour-
able no, "jumpy," Danforth actu- geois is more complete than he
ally experiences an auditory hallu- ever desired, for on the Pequod
cination, not the stamp of a ratio- all civilized constraints are aban-
nal, dedicated scientist. The reader doned at the behest of the fanatical
can almost visualize Lovecraft's Ahab. Dyer and his companions
alterego shaking his head! journeyed in search of scientific
Dyer begins the next paragraph knowledge truth, if you will. They
by admitting that "our scientific got more knowledge than they ever
and adventurous souls were not
."32 and
bargained foi
and a truth that
wholly dead . . the two shattered the scientific foundations
men decide to press on. From that Dyer built his life around.
this point,discarding the previ- For Dyer and Danforth, the spiri-
ous foreshadowing in the earlier tual journey, the journey to the
parts of the tale. Dyer and Dan- roots of truth and Self, ended by
forth come to increasing agreement skirting (and, in Danforth's case,
about the strange ruins they have crossing) the boundaries of mad
discovered their mutual experi- ness
ences drawing the graduate assis- The journey to the "mountains
tant/reader of "bizarre material" of madness" profoundly changed the
and the coolly rational elder scien- protagonist of the story. In Dyer's
II) / Crypt of Cthulhu
own words: and "The Oval Portrait"); and the

ever-present threat of madness,
Every incident of that four-
which is confronted by many of
and-a-half hour flight is
Poe's protagonists. In Pym we
burned into my recollection find a recurring motif of entomb-
because of its crucial position
ment and resurrection; in the dark
in my life. It marked my loss,
hold when Pym first stows away;
at the age of fifty-four, of
and later at the South Pole, when
all that peace and balance the protagonist is buried under a
which the normal mind pos-
landslide. The main character
sesses through its accustomed
goes through many burials and
conception of the external Na-
rebirths.
ture and Nature's laws.
The threat of madness is the
Thenceforward . the stu- . .
only element in Lovecraft's fiction
dent Danforth and myself which can accurately be termed
. . were to face a hideously
"obsessive." Madness is the only
amplified world of lurking hor-
consistent danger to the protago-
rors which nothing can erase
nists in his tales, and the one
from our emotions, and which
most feared. Both of Lovecraft's
we would refrain from sharing
parents died institutionalized be-
with mankind in general if we
cause of mental aberration, and
could " 31* .
he must have lived in constant fear
The voyage was, for Dyer, a of losing his own mind and this
watershed, and the parallel in Poe's fear of madness is reflected in his
tale passage would be the
to this fiction including At the Mountains
death of Pym's social equal and of Madness .
boyhood friend, Augustus. At So we can see another similarity

these points in the two tales, the between the two tales. Despite
rational, logical and ordered world the self-conscious element inherent
passes from the protagonists' con- in the composition of the two tales
sciousness, to be replaced by mad- the logic and deliberation with
ness and chaos. Like another of which Poe and Lovecraft set about
Lovecraft's masterpieces, "The composing their respective tales of
Shadow over Innsmouth," written the Antarctic neither author was
in same creative period. At
the able to dispense with the obsessive
the Mountains of Madness is a spi- fears that plagued them most of
ritual journey that changes the their lives. Those obsessive fears
protagonist forever though not are reflected in both works.
necessarily for the better. Some Those "Incidental" Tributes to Poe
have even suggested that "Inns-
mouth" is a sequel of sorts to Mad - Peter Cannon felt that Lovecraft
ness 35 . paid only incidental tribute to Poe
Though Edgar
Poe set Allan in his novel, but he did not speci-
out to deliberately perpetuate a fy what those tributes were. Let
hoax when he wrote Pym there , us look at some of these allusions
are elements in the tale that can to Poe's novel found in At the
best be termed "obsessive." In Mountains of Madness .
Poe's more personal (and less self- Poe was inspired by the polar
conscious) fiction, certain elements explorations going on in his life-
that obsessed Poe are always pres- time when he set down his "nar-
ent: the threat of premature en- rative." In 1828-29 the American
tombment (found in "The Black Antarctic Exploring Expedition led
Cat," "Premature Burial," "The by Benjamin Pendleton and Nathan-
Cask of Amontillado" and "The iel Palmer confirmed the findings
Fall of the House of Usher"); the of an earlier expedition, also led
loss of a loved one, most especial- by the American, Nathaniel Palmer,
ly the loss of a beautiful young in 1820. The first landing on Ant-
woman (as in "Ligeia," "Berenice" arctica was made by John Davis of
Lammas 1987 / 15
New Haven in February 1831. There interim between the composition of

was a federally sponsored United the tale and its publication, the
States Exploring Expedition led results of the expedition by Ad-
by Charles Wilkes that sailed from miral Byrd were made public and
Norfolk, 1831 the
Virginia, in they confirmed that the Antarctic
year Pym was published and it has was single continent.
a Lovecraft
been suggested that Poe wrote his attempted to correct this mistake
novel to capitalize on the publicity in his tale for the version that ap-
the Wilkes Expedition was generat- peared in Astounding which in
,
ing. This expedition ultimately turn led to some of the textual

proved ill-fated as Wilkes, who had problems plaguing the novel.
mapped over a thousand miles of Another guestionable theory
the Antarctic coast, was promptly employed by Lovecraft in this novel
court-martial led on his return to was the so-called Wegener Theory
America accused wrongly of falsi- of continental drift, first postulated
fying his records. in 1912 by Alfred Wegener, an
Lovecraft was also fascinated by Austrian geophysics professor.
the Antarctic expeditions that went This theory was developed inde-
on in his lifetime. The most famous pendently by Frank B. Taylor in
of these were the Scott and Amund- the United States around the same
sen expeditions of 1911 like the time. According to Wegener and
Wilkes Expedition, the results of Taylor, the continents began as a
both the Scott and Amundsen ex- single mass, which scientists call
peditions were contested, and the Pangaea, back in the Paleozoic
Scott Expedition ended in tragedy. Era. This supercontinent began
In 1929 Admiral Byrd reached the to drift apart sometime during the
South Pole by airplane, and several Mesozoic Era, until the pieces ended
years later published his findings. up in the position they now occupy
It was probably the Russian, Otto (though they are not stationary and
Schmidt, who first set foot on the are still drifting). The Hungarian
South Pole in 1936 five years after geophysicist, Egyed, calculated the
Lovecraft wrote his tale. rate of expansion at one yard ev-
Both Poe and Lovecraft utilized ery thousand years.
highly controversial theories in While some of the mechanics
their narratives. Poe, of course, have yet to be worked out, the
relied heavily on the now-discred- theory of Continental Drift itself
ited theories propagated by Rey- is sound and now scientifically
nolds, but Poe was fortunate accepted, and it provides a solu-
enough (from a writer's point of tion to other tectonic mysteries,
view!) to die before these theories such as earthguakes. In this case,
were disproved. Lovecraft had Lovecraft was fortunately correct.
more trouble. When he penned So, as with Poe, Lovecraft con-
his tale in 1931, Lovecraft relied sciously utilized the most current
on the theory that the Antarctic scientific speculation in the com-
was really two separate continents, position of his novel.
divided by a frozen sea or river. A more subtle (and perhaps
This, we now know, is untrue. guestionable) allusion to Poe's tale
According to S. T. Joshi,36 Lovecraft occurs near the climax of Madness.
wrote At the Mountains of Madness Dyer and Danforth, as they are
between February 14 and March searching for the abyss hinted at
22 of 1931. The story of its in the murals in the ancient city
rejection by Weird Tales editor of the Old Ones, discover a pre-
Wright is well known. The novel viously unknown species of albino
remained in manuscript for five penguin, over six feet tall. These
years, until it was published in a creatures are blind, having evolved
textually unsound form in Astound - in the darkness of the city's lower
ing . levels. propose that Lovecraft
I
The problem was that in the was hinting at a solution to the

:
16 / Cry/yl of Clhulhu
enigmatic ending of Pym . which the Tsalalians that we find a central

reads source of inspiration for Lovecraft's
tale.
And now we rushed into One of the activities of the Tsa-
the embraces of the cataract,
lalians is the harvesting of a marine
where a chasm threw itself creature referred to in Poe's story
open to receive us. But there
as biche de mer more commonly
.
arose in our pathway a
known as the sea cucumber. The
shrouded human figure, very sea cucumber is an echinoderm of
far larger in its proportions
the class Holothuroidea which has
than any dweller among men.
a flexible, cucumber-shaped body
And the hue of the skin of
and tentacles around the mouth.
the figure was of the perfect
Note a picture of the sea cucumber
whiteness of the snow. 3?
it has the same elongated, barrel-
What "chasm" opened to receive shape as the Old Ones. What is
them? Could Lovecraft have been
alluding to this "chasm" when he
wrote of the abyss in the lost city?
We know, of course, that Poe in-
tended the reader to believe that
Pym and Peters were nearing the
entrance to the hollow earth. Was
Lovecraft's "abyss" where the an-
cient star-headed Old Ones finally
retreated as their world waned
suggested by and analogous to the
chasm in Poe's tale? And was Love-
craft, as a sort of "throw-away," sea cucumber
solving the mystery of the
"shrouded human figure, very far
larger in its proportions than any missing is the Old Ones' five-
dweller among men . . ." when he pointed symmetry. Where did Love-
conceived the giant albino pen- get this aspect of the creatures'
guins? It looks as though he was, shape? We must remember that he
for what other purpose did the combined several echinoderm sub-
introduction of the creatures serve species in the creation of his Old
beyond furthering a sense of Ones. In an excellent article in
wonder in the reader (which at this Crypt of Cthulhu ^
Bert Atsma
point in the story is the equivalent offered "An Autopsy on the Old
to overkill ) ? Ones" in which he stated
Yet another biological entity
The creature described in
in Lovecraft's novella has its
Lake's radio report is actual-
source in Poe's story. am re- I
combination of several
ly a
ferring to the star-headed Old
echinoderm lines including the
Ones themselves. In The Narrative
of Arthur Cordon Pym
crinoids. A barrel "torso"
there are ,
that is both flexible and tough
several long, descriptive passages
is reminiscent of Class Holo-
on the flora and fauna found by
thuroidea (e.g., the sea cu-
the explorers in the South Polar
cumber), whose members have
regions. There are also some ref-
a leathery dermis and whose
erences to the livelihood of the
hollow body is shaped like a
natives living there. In both Peter
Cannon and Ben Indick's summaries stout cucumber. They do have
of Pym and in the short synopsis a structure similar to what
,
Lake describes as tentacles at
found in the article you are now
the anterior end, but they are
reading, this part of the tale was
much smaller. 39
glossed over. Yet, it is in these
descriptions of the agriculture of It is no mere coincidence that Love-
Lammas 1987 / 17
craft had barrel-shaped, crinoid the text of the tale, unexplained-

Old Ones resembling nothing so carvings discovered by Pym and
much as the lowly sea cucumber Peters, etched in the black granite
that the harvested in
Tsalalians of the ancient chambers the two
Poe's tale. And if we are
to accept men traverse on the island of the
Dyer's explanation that the Old savage Tsalalians. Pym dutifully
Ones filtered down from the stars scribbles them down (like Dyer,
to take root on earth, and later Pym is always a diligent recorder
became the source of all life on of events and observations), but
this planet, then the biche de mer neither Pym nor Peters is able to
that the savages of Tsalal har- solve the riddle. It is left to the
vested for food and clothing are editor of the magazine in which the
the de-evolved ancestors of the tale was first published (Poe him-
mightiest race ever to inhabit this self) to puzzle out the solution.
planet the star-headed Old Ones! Poe explains that the final hier-
With consummate cosmic irony oglyphs recorded by Pym suggest
Lovecraft tied these threads to- that the origins of the Tsalalians
gether not only deposing mankind are found in darkest Africa, and
from his pinnacle of earthly supe- that the writing is in Egyptian, a
riority, but hinting (through Poe's fact which challenges the precon-
story) at a similar fate for the ceived notions the characters have
Old Ones. The concept of the Old about the history of the South
Ones is central to Lovecraft's novel Polar regions.
and they spring directly from Lovecraft, as Angela Carter
Poe's tale. No mere incidental has pointed out, transformed the
tribute this! entire landscape of the South Pole
In a perceptive and beautifully into a cryptogram the solution to
written study of Lovecraft's fic- which changes the preconceived
tional landscapes, * 0 Angela
1
Carter scientific notions of the protagon-
expressed the feel of the dead city ists forever. Carter further sug-
at the mountains of madness this gests that:
way:
This is the authentic landscape
The whiteness of the snow is of interiority, of the arche-
the infiniteblankness of true typal Inner Place, the womb
mystery; the discovery of a .92
range of mountains in the sub-
Interiority, the Inner Place, the
continent reveals to the ex-
plorers gateway to a forbid-
a
Womb does this not suggest that,
like Poe's At the Mountains
novel.
den world of untrodden won-
of Madness is at heart a spiritual
der. Under a cryptic sky,
journey, a voyage to Self, a quest
the landscape itself becomes
for Self-Knowledge?
a vast cryptogram which, once
it is unravelled, reveals to Literal Sequels to Pym, Moby
man his insignificance in the Dick, and Others
cosmic scheme of things.** 1
We now see that Madness while ,
Here we see the theme of "white- not a sequel to the events

literal
ness" as Lovecraft utilized it to described Poe's Pym
in is surely ,
symbolize the infinite void of the a

thematic sequel with more than
unexplored. This is especially ap- merely incidental tributes to the
parent near the climax of Madness , source novel. It is evident that
when Danforth sees the final hor- Lovecraft instinctively grasped the
ror so unspeakable that Danforth themes of Poe's novel and turned
is unwilling to share this final rev- them to his own purposes, that
elation with Dyer. Lovecraft utilized some of the con-
There is also a strange riddle cepts (much changed) in his com-
a cryptogram, if you will in Poe's position of the novel, and that
tale. refer
I to the eerie and in Lovecraft borrowed some of the
!
events and items described by Poe against the artifact by his metal
and transformed them into his own belt buckle, which he was unable
vision. Furthermore, the central to unfasten!
creation of Lovecraft's novel the This unsatisfactory answer to
Old Ones themselves spring direct- the riddle of Pym is typical of the
ly from Poe's novel. So, as Ben sequels to Poe's novel and we can
Indick suggested in his article. see why Lovecraft's thematic sequel
Madness is not a literal sequel to is by far the most famous one!
Poe's Pym but it surely is a the- Melville's sequel of sorts to The

Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym
,
matic sequel.
There are literal sequels to The Moby
Dick spawned even more
Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym ,
sequels than Poe's original, espe-
written by various authors to at- cially among science fiction writers.
tempt a solution to this most enig- It seemed that, during the sixties
matic example of Edgar Allan Poe's and seventies, it was de rigueur
work. These sequels vary in qual- for up-and-coming science fiction
ity, the most typical being a writers (especially those that num-
straight adventure story with some bered themselves among science
sort of wild climax, which answers fiction's "New Wave") to try their
one or two of the questions left hand at creating literal and the-
unaddressed in Poe's novel. Typical matic sequels to Melville's master-
of this sort of sequel is Charles piece. Like the sequels to Pym ,
Romyn Dake's A Strange Discovery these tales vary in quality, and

written in 1899; and Jules Verne's a partial list of the better ones in-
Le Sphinx des daces written two
,
cludes Philip Jose Farmer's The
years earlier. The Verne novel is Wind Whales of Ishmael (1971) and
more accessible, as there is a mod- The Unreasoning Mask (1981); Mi-
ern abridgement currently in chael Moorcock's The Ice Schooner
print. (1969); Samuel R. Delany's Babel-17
In Verne's sequel, the strange (1966) and Nova (1968, and one of
white shrouded figure is discovered the best); and The Godwhale (1978)
to be a huge sphinx, constructed by J. J. Bass. Frank Herbert's
of a strange, supermagnetic metal. Dune (1965) and even Raymond
We learn in the course of this tale Chandler's detective novel The Big
that Arthur Gordon Pym did not Sleep (1939) owe a debt of grati-
survive the experiences at the tude to Melville's classic. The
South Polar regions. Dirk Peters, motion picture Star Trek II: The
however, did survive and assumed Wrath of Khan (1982) has many
Pym's identity. It was Peters who illusions to Moby Dick and even
wrote the Narrative and gave it to casts Captain Kirk as the white
Poe then fled with another expedi- whale
tion to the South Pole after faking There exists a superb short
Pym's death in New York because story by Steven Utley and Howard
he could not provide a climax with- Waldrop called "Black as the Pit,
out admitting that Arthur Gordon from Pole to Pole" (1977) which is
Pym was dead. In Verne's tale, a sequel to Pym ,Moby Dick Mary ,
Dirk Peters and his fellow ship- Shelley's Frankenstein Lovecraft's

,
mates find the Sphinx of the Ice- At the Mountains of Madness and
fields, and bound to the statue's even Robert EH Howard's Conan
flank by magnetic attraction, like stories a real tour de force 1)11 1
Ahab was bound to Moby Dick, is And, finally, it is worth noting that
the frozen corpse of Arthur Gordon artist Lee Brown Coye must have
Pym. We learn that it was the sensed the connection between some
magnetic attraction of the sphinx of Lovecraft's work and Moby Dick .
that sent the canoe hurtling into Take a closer look at the cover of
the cataract, and Peters survived the old Arkham House edition of
only because he wasn't wearing any Dagon isn't that Captain Ahab
metal. Poor Pym was trapped striking at the white whale, Moby
. .. ,,
Lammas 1987 / 19
Dick, from Hell's heart? even appears classics of popular

in
culture. One is reminded of the
NOTES white mist which is the background
for Scarlett O'Hara's flight to her
ICrypt of Cthulhu #32, Vol. 4,
Self and the setting for her reali-
No. 7, 1985. zation that she really does love
2 Peter Cannon, "
At the Moun - Rhett Butler this, at the climax of
tains of Madness as a Sequel to Cone With the Wind .
Arthur Cordon Pym ,"

Crypt of 4Marie Bonaparte
1 The Life and ,
Cthulhu #32, p. 33. Works of Edqar Allan Poe, London,

3 Ben P. indick, "Lovecraft's 1949.
POEIar Adventure," Crypt of Cthu- ^Fiedler, Love and Death in the
Ihu #32, p. 25. American Novel pp. 392-400. ,
4 J. N. Reynolds, "Mocha Dick: )6Harold Beaver, "Introduction"

or the White Whale of the Pacific: to The Narrative of Arthur Gordon
A Leaf from a Manuscript Journal," Pym of Nantucket, Penquin Books,
The Knickerbocker, New York 1975.
Monthly Magazine XIII (May 1839). 17 Harold Beaver, "Appendix:
,
This article is reprinted as part of 'Poe and Melville,"' The Narrative

the Appendix to Moby Dick by of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nan -
Herman Melville, Penquin Books, tucket.
1972. 3 8 bid 1
9 Most notably the Pellucidar 19S. T. Joshi (ed.). At the

series (1914 to 1942) by Edgar Rice Mountains of Madness and Other
Burroughs Novels, rev ed., Arkham House. .
^ Ty pee (1846), Omoo (1847), 20 bid 1

pp. 506.. ,
and Mardi (1849). 21 Ibid.

p. 8.
7 Letter to Rheinhardt Kleiner, 22 lbid.
February 2, 1916, Selected Letters 23 bid
1 . , p. 12.
1 . 20 - 21 .
24 bid1 . p. 13.
8 The
"Leatherstocking Tales" 29 Peter
Cannon, "Lovecraft and
by James Fenimore Cooper are, in Classic American Literature," Crypt
order of publication: The Pioneers of Cthulhu #7, Vol. 1, No. 7, 1982.
(1823), The Last of the Mohicans 26Donald R. Burleson, H. P.
(1826), The Pathfinder (1841) and Lovecraft: A Critical Study
The Deerslayer (1842). All feature ( Greenwood Press, 1983), p. 166.
the character Natty Bumppo and ^Joshi Mountains of Madness,
his Indian friend, Chingachgook. p. 8.
Some also feature another Indian 2 bid
1
. , p. 29.
companion to Natty, named Uncas. 29 lbid. p. 42.
^Leslie A. Fiedler, Love and 30 lbid p. 52.
.
Death in the American Novel rev. 31 Ibid

,
ed. (NY: Stein and Day, 1966). 32 bid1
18 Leslie A. Fiedler, The Return 33 bid 96.

1 . , p.
of the Vanishing American, 1968, 34 lbid. p. 28.
p. 132. 35Even with the solitary protag-
Êxamples of this type of male onist of Innsmouth" there is the
"1
bonding in modern popular culture element of male bonding in this

include The Lone Ranger and case it involves the dual nature of
Tonto, Sonny Crockett and Ricardo the protagonist himself. The main
Tubbs of Miami Vice Johnny , character's hidden past (his dark
La Rue and Neal Washington of side) serves to balance the human
Hill Street Blues and even Captain side of his personality and the
Kirk and Mr. Spock of Star Trek . protagonist's journey to this "dark
12 Letter to Clark Ashton Smith,
side" is a quest for Self.
September 24, 1930, Selected Let- 98 S. T. Joshi, "Textual Prob-
ters 111.168-69. lems in Lovecraft," Lovecraft S t ud -
Âgain, this theme of whiteness ies 2 (Spring 1982), pp. 28-3 1^
Êdgar Allan Poe, The Narra-

tive of Arthur Cordon Pym of Nan -
tucket , Penguin Books, 1975, p.
239.
38 Bert Atsma, "An Autopsy on
the Old Ones," Crypt of Cthulhu
#32 p. 3.
39 bid 1 p. 6.
, .
Ângela Carter, "Lovecraft and

Landscape," Appendix C of The
Necronomicon The Book of Dead :
Names George Hay (ed.), Corgi

,
Books, 1980.
91 Ibid. 180.
,
p.
4,2
Ibid. , p. 181.
83 Jules Verne, Le Sphinx des
Places (1887); an abridged transla-
tion appears as Appendix III in
TheNarrative of Arthur Cordon
Pym Penguin Books, 1975.
,
Available in Terry Carr (ed.).

Year's Finest Fantasy (New York:
Berkley Medallion Books, 1978).
new ! The Compleat Crow

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deities,
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Now all the Crow shorter fiction Is in one volume: including a NEW story,
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Lammas 1987 / 21
CALL ME WIZARD WHATELEY

ECHOES OF MOBY DICK IN THE DUNWICH HORROR"
By Peter H. Cannon
When H. P. Lovecraft visited Secondly, the Dunwich horror is

"ancient New Bedford" with Frank rather whale-like in its attributes:
Long and his parents in the sum- "bigger'n a barn ... all made of
mer of 1929, he remarked: "The squirmin' ropes," it is, except for
waterfront streets are still ineffa- the "haff face on top," basically a
bly quaint despite the decline of featureless creature (when seen).
the whaling industry, 6 the little Its very invisibility finds a coun-
Seaman's Bethel on Johnnycake Hill terpart in the whiteness of the
described in Melville's Moby Dick whale, and its "tarry stickiness"
is absolutely unchanged in every or viscousness has an analogue in
particular." 1 Further, in "Sug- the spermaceti of the whale (if
gestions for a Reading Guide," he presumably lacking any commercial
observed: "Of Herman Melville at value as lamp oil). Finally, let
least Moby Dick deserves a hear- us not forget that the horror's
ing.'^ Like any literate American mother, Lavinia Whateley, was a
during the Melville revival of the "somewhat deformed, unattractive
1920s, whether he had actually albino woman."
read it or not, HPL must have had Moby Dick and "The Dunwich
some familiarity with Moby Dick . Horror" also share a broadly similar
While I do not claim that Melville's structure. Opening with the clas-
masterpiece influenced Lovecraft, sic line "Call me Ishmael," Moby
I do think that in "The Dunwich Dick starts out, like Melville's ear-
Horror" (written a year before his lier books, as a straightforward
New Bedford visit) HPL rendered first-person narrative of nautical
what one might consider his ver- adventure. Soon after boarding
sion his own peculiar weird ver- the Pequod a hundred pages or so
sion, let us say of the "mythic later, however, Ishmael virtually
hunt" theme, (Faulkner's The drops from sight and Captain Ahab
Bear springs to mind as the other becomes the central figure in the
great example of this theme in novel. By the final chapters, after
American literature.) a lengthy buildup, Moby Dick him-
Superficial thematic resemblances self has become the dominant "char-
aside for the moment, I like to acter," as he surges up from the
imagine it reflects well on Love- bottom of the sea to wreak havoc
craft that in at least two plot de- upon the Pequod .
tails he happens to follow Mel- In "The Dunwich Horror" HPL

ville's example. First of all, Love- adopts a similar narrative strategy.
craft likewise uses a sermon early Avoiding the inconsistent shifts
on to foreshadow later dire events. between first and third person and
While the Reverend Abijah Hoadley back again (which perhaps only a
in the paragraphs quoted from Melville could get away with), Love-
"On the Close Presence of Satan craft sets the tale in the omniscent
and His Imps" may not equal the third person from the start and
rhetorical flourish of Father Map- maintains it to the end. At the
pie in his sermon on Jonah and the beginning, after the evocative
Whale, his ominous words just as opening section describing the his-
effectively, given the much smaller tory and geography of Dunwich,
scope of Lovecraft's tale, fill the Old Wizard Whateley takes center
reader with suitable forebodings. stage. Later, upon the birth and
rapid growth of his grandson Wil- crews, the horror bumps up against
bur , the younger Whateley sup- and demolishes wooden houses with
plants him. Finally, at the climax, fatal results for their inhabitants.
Wilbur's twin, the horror itself. In the end it is a trio of professors
long anticipated and just as awe- who confront the horror with their
somely foreshadowed in its way as magic, just as the three harpooners
the great white whale, bursts on to face the white whale with their
the scene with catastrophic effect. 3 less lethal, merely physical weap-
Like the whale, chased by Ahab ons.
and his men for three days, the Naturally one can take these
horror periodically emerges. if parallels only so far. Wilbur seeks
not from the waves like Moby Dick to bring in the horror so it can
or Cthulhu, 1* then from the depths "wipe off the earth," while Captain
of Cold Spring Glen. In a manner Ahab, of course, wishes to slay
reminiscent of Moby Dick's smashing the whale. Both, however, display
to pieces whale boats and their a similar single-mindedness or fa-
" :
Lammas 1987 / 23
naticism in pursuing their respec- 1971), p. 13.

tive opposite ends, and both die Âugust Derleth (ed.). The
horribly for their pains (each done Dark Brotherhood (Sauk City, Wl
in by a savage animal). On the Arkham House, 1966), p. 38.
other hand, if one accepts Donald suppose one could argue that
3|
R. Burleson's argument for the Henry Armitage represents a fourth
mythic hero archetype in "The Dun- major character indeed like Ishmael
wich Horror," 5 then the "good he serves as a sympathetic human
guys" fail in both Lovecraft and point of view through which the
Melville. On yet another hand, reader can experience the wild
assuming that the humans are in events; however, as this throws
fact the heroes of the story, one off my neat trinity, I will dismiss
can argue that, despite the thwart- it from serious consideration. To
ing of Yog-Sothoth and his minions, have had the action relayed from
"evil" or, if you prefer, the "blind the point of view of the horror at
impersonal forces of the universe" the end would have wrecked the
will ultimately prevail. suspense, besides probably being
Given that both Lovecraft and beyond even Lovecraft's consider-
Melville set out to say something able skill to pull off convincingly.
about man's trivial place in a god- 'Besides "The Call of Cthulhu,"
less universe, who then does the other major tales with South Pacific
better artistic job? Is a white backgrounds and hence Melvillean
whale or an invisible mass of wrig- overtones are "The Shadow over
gling ropes a more successful sym- Innsmouth" and "Out of the Eons."
bol of the strangeness of the cos- Too, does not Lovecraft in "The
mos? A telling difference, think,
I White Ship" (egad, that ominous
is that Moby Dick is a creature of coloi or noncoloi colour? again!)
nature who is truly impersonal. depict an allegorical voyage, if
Indifferent to man, he only strikes at far less tedious length, evoca-
back when man himself seeks to tive of that in Mardi ?
conquer him. Yog-Sothoth, on the 5 "The Mythic Hero Archetype in
other hand, poses an unambiguous 'The Dunwich Horror,"' Lovecraft
threat to humanity. The people of Studies 1, No. 9 (Spring 1981),
Dunwich can ignore this sort of pp. 3-9.
rogue land-whale only at their
peril. In such later tales as "The
Whisperer in Darkness" and At the
Mountains of Madness Lovecraft did
contrive to make his supernatural
entities less actively malign and MORE AND MORE
thus more appropriate symbols of
the universe's indifference. Akeley
DUNWICH HORRORS
may feebly contend with the Fungi
from Yuggoth who lay siege to "'The Dunwich Horror' (1970)
his farmhouse, but never again do Sandra Dee, Dean Stockwell.
any characters in Lovecraft vigor- A psychopathic young man
ously attempt to track down and plots to use a pretty co-ed
destroy his monstrous beings, the as a sacrificial victim and
mere revelation of whose existence mother to the devil's off-
leaves man devastated with the spring .
knowledge of his own cosmic insig-

nificance. The Times Herald- Record/
Week Week of March
, 22
NOTES through 28, 1987.
'August
Derleth and Donald
Wandrei (eds). Selected Letters III
(Sauk City, Wl: Arkham House,
THE BUND IDIOT GOD

MILTONIC ECHOES IN THE CTHULHU MYTHOS
By Thomas Quale
The controversial passage Au- Ones (as represented by Cthulhu

gust Derleth attributed to H. P. in one tale and the star-headed
Lovecraft goes, "All my stories, creatures of Antarctica in another),
unconnected as they may be, are were able to wing through the ether
based on the fundamental lore or between the stars like Milton's de-
legend that this world was inhab- mons and were not made entirely of
ited at one time by another race matter as we of Earth know it:
who, in practising black magic, "They had shape but that
. . .
lost their foothold and were ex- shape was not made of matter"
pelled, yet live on outside ever ("Call of Cthulhu"). Of the spawn
ready to take possession of this of one ofthese Great Old Ones,
earth again." Derleth pounds it Lovecraft wrote "Only the least
home by insisting "It is undeniably fraction was matter in any sense
evident that there exists in Love- we know. It was like its father .
craft's concept a basic similarity ." ("The Dunwich Horror"), as

to the Christian Mythos, specifi- Milton said of the demons "so soft/
cally in regard to the expulsion of And uncompounded is their Essence
Satan from Eden and the power of pure, /Not ti'd or manacl'd with
evil." 1 There is some doubt that joint or limb . ." ( Paradise Lost
.
Lovecraft ever said or wrote the I. 424-26). ^ There is an "Outside"

above passage. And the "Derleth from which both the demons of Mil -
Mythos" of a revolt of the "Old ton and the horrors of Lovecraft
Ones" of evil against the "Elder come to Earth. And Earth .? . .
Gods" of good who still seek to In Paradise Lost Milton estab-

save man, along the lines of Chris- lishes, for the first time in litera-
tian mythology, is being exploded ture, the true vastness of the cos-
insofar as it relates to Lovecraft's mos. Satan has flown from Hell,
work. But let's not throw the whose immense geography is de-
Deep One out with the bathwater: tailed for nearly sixty lines in Book
the "Christian Mythos" as filtered II, through the "dark unbottom'd
through John Milton's Paradise infinite Abyss" of Chaos through
Lost is seen in Lovecraft's work. which the demon legions fell nine
Milton laid the foundation for the days . He stands gazing and sees
horror story of space that is, the
;
story which uses as its engine of Far off Empyreal Heav'n,

th'
horror not the claustrophobia of extended wide
ignorance and the grave, but the In circuit, undetermin'd square
agoraphobia of too much knowledge or round.
and the perception of the smallness With Opal Tow'rs and Battle-
of mankind in the immensity of ments adorn'd
the universe. Of living Sapphire, once his
That H. P. Lovecraft knew of native Seat;
Milton is obvious, as Paradise Lost And fast by hanging in a golden
is specifically mentioned in one of Chain
his earliest stories, "Dagon," and This pendant world, in bigness
a "ghostly bust of Milton" appears as a Star
in "The Whisperer in Darkness." Of smallest Magnitude close by
Two of Lovecraft's alien races, the the Moon.
Mi-Go of "Whisperer" and the Old (11.1047-53, pp. 256-57)
Lammas 1987 / 25
That "pendant world" is not this African explorer who brought a

Earth, but all the created universe, wife back from Africa whom no one
and yet it is only as big as a star ever saw, through great-grand-
of the smallest magnitude compared father Sir Robert Jermyn, the an-
to the size of Heaven. This vast- thropologist who one night killed
ness is echoed by Lovecraft in his three children after learning a
"The Whisperer in Darkness," terrible secret, to his grandson,
where a devotee of an alien race Arthur's father, who escaped. Ev-
discloses "strangely organized erything about the family's past
abysses wholly beyond the utmost suggests that something is wrong
reach of any human imagination. with the family (Adam fears this
The space-time globule which we when he is shown his family history
recognize as the totality of all cos- by Michael, XI. 507-14), and Ar-
mic entity is only an atom in the thur learns at last that he is de-
genuine infinity which is theirs." scended from a strange species of
Lovecraft adds to this spatial white ape. Staggered by the rev-
immensity a temporal one which elation, Arthur, the last of his
Milton can only palely foreshadow. line, pours gasoline on himself
Both, however, use family history and sets himself on fire. (I won-
to frame certain revelations. Par - der if Lovecraft had Frankenstein's
adise Lost is, in essence, the story Monster's fate in mind when he
of three families: God's, Satan's wrote that. Adam and Eve thought
(Book II), and Adam's (Book XI- of this way out too, X. 999-1002.)
XII). In the case of Adam, his The horrors of "The Dunwich
family is mankind itself, and the Horror" and "The Shadow over
setting out of that history itself Innsmouth" are directly linked to
(as far as the Bible and Milton a given family's history: to the
could take it). When Mary Shelley Whateleys and their traffic with
came to "rewrite" Paradise Lost Yog-Sothoth and the Marshes and
as Frankenstein , she retained the their dealings with the Deep Ones,
family history structure, endowing the first on a simple domestic level
her characters with traits from and the second on a wider canvas,
each of the families in Milton's extending further in time and in-
epic. 3 In addition, Frankenstein volving numerous families. Certain
is the story of one family (the unknown quantities in both stories
Frankensteins) destroyed by one are matters of family history, such
of its members' desire to start as the identity of the horror prey-
another family (Victor's creation of ing on Dunwich, its relationship to
the monster and almost a wife, an Wilbur Whateley, and the identity
Eve, for it) whose only member is of its father. In "Innsmouth," the
taught the ways of the world by narrator uncovers not only the
spying on and overhearing the horrific family histories of the
family history of another family townsfolk, but also his own. The
(the de Laceys). narrator of "The Call of Cthulhu"
Family history is important, too, is also brought into the framework
in Lovecraft stories such as "The of horror by his initial delving into
Rats in the Walls," "Arthur Jer- family history: "My knowledge of
myn," "The Dunwich Horror" and the thing began in the winter
even less likely candidates such of 1926-27 with the death of my
as "The Shadow out of Time" and grand-uncle ..."
"The Shadow over Innsmouth," The great family history revealed
for the family history might turn at the end of Paradise Lost is one
up something nasty and unnatural. of a caring and sympathetic Creator
The most strictly family-history- who offers the hope of future sal-
structured is "Arthur Jermyn"; in vation in a universe run ultimately
it the Jermyn family history is very for the good. This could be con-
carefully laid out, from great-great- trasted to the revelation of all
grandfather Sir Wade Jermyn, the Earth's history (a large "family,"
true, but in a sense still a family) be sure.

received by the narrator of "The Which neither his foreknowing
Shadow out of Time," Nathaniel can prevent.
Wingate Peaslee. His mind replaced And he the future evil shall
in his body by one of the Great no less
Race of Yith, and his mind inhabit- In apprehension than in sub-
ing the cone-shaped body of a stance feel
Yithite hundreds of millions of Grievous to bear . . .
years B.C., Peaslee learns of the (XI. 770-76)

fate of Earth and life in the solar
The shoggoth and Azathoth, two
system and the place of man in
others "Not ti'd or manacl'd with
space and time from the other cap-
joint or limb," hearken with "hide-
tive minds in the Yithite city:
ous suggestiveness" to entities de-
There was a mind from the scribed by Milton. In At the Moun -
planet we know as Venus, tains of Madness our heroes find
,
which would live incalculable themselves on the wrong side of a

epochs to come, and one from shoggoth:
an outer moon of Jupiter six
the nightmare, plastic column
million years in the past. Of
of fetid black iridescence oozed
earthly minds there were some
tightly onward through its
from the winged, star-headed,
fifteen-foot sinus, gathering
half-vegetable race of paleogean
unholy speed and driving be-
Antarctica; one from the rep-
fore it a spiral, rethickening
tile people of fabled Valusia;
cloud of the pallid abyss va-
three from the furry prehuman
por. It was a terrible, inde-
Hyperborean worshippers of
scribable thing vaster than any
Tsathoggua; one from the
wholly abominable Tcho-Tchos;
subway train a shapeless con-
geries of protoplasmic bubbles,
two from the Arachnid deni-
faintly self-luminous, and with
zens of earth's last age; five
myriads of temporary eyes
from the hardy Coleopterous
forming and unforming as pus-
species immediately following
tules of greenish light all over
mankind . . .
the tunnel-filling front . . .
Man Lovecraft's
in "Mythos" is
Blackly iridescent and covered
neither the only nor the most im-
with eyes, the shoggoth might al-
portant of intelligent species to
most be a demonic version of the
live on Earth, will not last forever,
chariot of paternal deity:
and certainly has no claim to spe-
cial treatment from any "God" or Flashing thick flames. Wheel
other power in the universe. The within Wheel, undrawn.
furry Hyperboreans had a god, Itself instinct with Spirit, but
but they are no less dead than the convoy'd
serpent people are or the human By four Cherubic shapes, four
race will be in the end. This kind Faces each
of end family history (extinc-
to a Had wondrous, as with Stars
tion: large-scale in "The Shadow their bodies all
out of Time," small-scale in "Ar- And Wings were set with Eyes,
thur Jermyn") is also suggested with Eyes the Wheels . . .
in Paradise Lost . Shown the race's And from about him fierce
future by the Archangel Michael, Effusion roll'd
Adam believes everyone destroyed Of smoke and bickering flame,
in the Flood: and sparkles dire . . .
(VI. 751-55, 765-66)

Let no man seek
Henceforth to be foretold what Both chariot and shoggoth give off
shall befall light, push smoke and vapor from
Him or his Children, evil he may themselves and are covered with
Lammas 1987 / 27
eyes, but while the shoggoth drives knowledge is evil and ultimately
out of an abyss, the chariot of destructive:
paternal deity drives the rebellious The thing in
most merciful
angels into an abyss. In addition,
the world, think, is the in-
I
the angels as evidenced by Satan's ability the human mind to

of
size-changing (Book I) and trans- correlate all its contents. We
formations into birds and serpents live on a placid island of ig-
are just as "plastic" as the shog- norance in the midst of black
goth. seas of infinity, and it was
The "dark unbottom'd infinite not meant that we should voy-
Abyss" of Chaos in Paradise Lost ,
age far. The sciences, each
which is alluded to directly in straining in its own direction,
"Dagon," and the court of Chaos have hitherto harmed us little;
may be the inspiration for the "vast but some day the piecing to-
unplumbed abyss of night . . .
gether of dissociated knowl-
Ultimate Chaos, at whose center edge will open up such terri-
sprawls the blind idiot god Aza- fying vistas of reality, and
thoth. Lord of All Things" in Love-
of our frightful position there-
craft. Milton's "Anarch old,"
in. that we shall either go
Chaos, dwells in
mad from the revelation or
a dark flee from the deadly light
Ocean without bound.
Illimitable
Without dimension, where
This the last link in a chain
is
length, breadth, and heighth.
begun at the Tree of Knowledge
And time and place are lost; in the Carden: the only gift
where eldest Night
knowledge brings is that the uni-
And Chaos . hold
. .
verse is larger and more malevo-
Eternal Anarchy, amidst the
lent than you had ever dreamed
noise
and because you have that knowl-
Of endless wars, and by con- edge, you no longer have any
fusion stand . . .
protection. "I do not think my
(11.891-97)
life will be long," says "The Call
True, Lovecraft's Anarch writhes of Cthulhu'"s narrator. "As my
to the noisome piping of amorphous uncle went, as poor Johansen
flute-players, not the noise of went, so shall go.
I know too I
"endless wars," but compare his much, and the cult still lives.
description of Azathoth's domain Peaslee's experiences in "The
to Milton's: "Out in the mindless Shadow out of Time" scar him be-
void the daemon bore me, /Past the cause of what he knows and which
bright clusters of dimensioned he can only bear by thinking it
space, /Till neither time nor matter false: "After twenty-two years of
stretched before me, /But only nightmare and terror, saved only
Chaos, without form or place./ by a desperate conviction of the
Here the vast Lord of All in dark- mythical source of certain impres-
ness muttered / Things he had sions, am unwilling to vouch
I
dreamed but could not understand." for the truth of that which think I
("Azathoth," Fungi from Yuqqoth ). I found in Western Australia on

The theme of the biblical story the night of July 17-18, 1935."
of the Fall, and one of Lovecraft's No one can say that H. P. Love-
favorite themes as well, is that craft accepted the mythos behind
knowledge is dangerous. In Para - Paradise Lost he didn't. But
;
dise Lost the knowledge given by John Milton is a powerful literary

the fruit of the forbidden tree re- force, and his work is well-known.
sults in the decay of Eden and the As Lovecraft wrote to J. Vernon
promised eventual death of Adam, Shea, "As for Milton don't see I
Eve, and all their progeny. In the how you can argue away
. . .
Cthulhu Mythos all the gathering of the distinctive charm of a large

. .
part of his work. He has the power tive, vulgar, aristocratic. How I
of evoking unlimited images for per- hate them! They are like spoilt
sons of active imagination, & no children crying over a broken doll.
amount of academic theory can ex- But they tell me something of the
plain that away" (SL IV, 158). eguator, something of red and gold
That Lovecraft was such a person on blue, something of naked black
of active imagination cannot be men sitting cross-legged and pen-
disputed sive under the hot tropical sun,
something of huge, waving palms
NOTES and gigantic Lianas, and something
of the turbulent, green, ever-rest-
'August Derleth, "The Cthulhu less Spanish Main, and so I tolerate
Mythos" in Tales of the Cthulhu them. And you would too, O my
Mythos Vol. I,
, August Derleth reader, because Dreams are of
(ed.) (New York: Beagle Books, more value than oriental jewels.
1971), vii But the parrakeets pass quickly.
2 H. P. Lovecraft, The Best of They dislike our cold northern
H. P. Lovecraft (New York: Bal- clime, and pine for the delights of
lantine Books, 1982), 87, 132; John the soft South. Their breasts are
Milton, Complete Poems and Major full of vague longings and inarticu-
Prose Merritt
, Y. Hughes (ed.) late, unborn desires; and in their
(New York: Odyssey Press, 1957), eyes there is a vision of other
222. All further Milton citations places, far, outlying immensities of
from this volume. land, and ocean. And so they
^Sandra M. Cilbert and Susan pass quickly.
Cuber, "Horror's Twin: Mary Shel- And then in the pale twilight of
ley's Monstrous Eve," in The Mad- an ancient November eve come
woman in the Attic: The Woman flocking the swarms of flamingoes.
Writer and the Nineteenth-Century They are pinky pale and older than
Literary Imagination (New Haven: the flood. For always have flamin-
Yale University Press, 1979), 213- goes come up from the South in the
47. Spring, and returned in the Au-
tumn; and if you have not seen
them, you are a fool. The flamin-
THE MIGRATION OF BIRDS goes are wise with the wisdom of
ages, but they are eternally young.
By Frank Belknap Long You remember that glorious fountain
of youth and gold which Ponce De
( The United Amateur , March 1922) Leon sought in the dawn of the
world? The flamingoes have found
In the Autumn of the year, when it, and every year they return to
the decay of things is imminent, bathe and gambol in its mystic
and when theface of the moon is waters. Every year they sink
as pallid and bloodless as the vis- their great, pale plumes in its gen-
age of a corpse, ofttimes sit by
I
tle waters, and arise refreshed and
a little window opening on the sum- reincarnated. But the flamingoes
mer sea and watch the migration of also long for the tropics, and for
birds. They come from all parts of the flush of dawn on peaks divine.
the world, these birds, aye, even And so they follow the parrakeets
from that ultimate dim Thule which to the warm South.
the Romans knew but dared not The geese are cold and unemo-
mention, and they bring with them tional, and arouse no visions. They
the strange, pungent odours and have always suffered from ennui,
secret essences of distant lands. and the world is little with them.
The parrakeets are the first to Perhaps in their youth they have
arrive. Their bills are black, their tasted of many pleasures, and now
plumage iridescent, and they scream suffer from the boredom of satiety,
in the moonlight. They are talka- (continued on page 47)
Lammas 1987 / 29
13 ? ^1*0-7^ *s>
7
August 7 [1933J dig up a copy to lend? (I couldn't

spare one permanently.) would I
Dear Mr. Hornig :- in such a case bring the text up

Congratulations on your appoint- to date by mentioning things pub-
ment with Wonder Stories You
! lished since it was written.
surely did walk into a surprising suggest that you have reviews
I
piece of good fortune. Wish could I of important weird books as they

call on Farnsworth Wright and come appear.
away with a regular job which By the way Knopf lately asked
heaven knows, I need badly to see some of my stuff with a
enough! I'm sure you'll find your view to book publication, though
new work eminently congenial. I don't believe anything will come
Clad to hear of the coming of it. Similar requests by Put-
change of the Fantasy Fan to the nam's and then Viking came to
weird field. I may send some ar- nothing in the past.
ticles on weird fiction for your Best wishes and renewed con-
approval. Back in 1926 wrote I gratulations.
a short history of weird fiction
which appeared in privately
a Yrs. most sincerely,
printed magazine. Would you care
to serialise such a thing if could I H. P. Lovecraft
COMMENTAR Y by S. T. Joshi
It is amazing what a few sen- evidently only asked Lovecraft to

tences can tell us. This postcard contribute random articles on "weird
from Lovecraft to Charles D. Hor- fiction"; Lovecraft felt that this
nig, editor of The Fantasy Fan , was as good a time as any to re-
shows that the idea for serializing vise his long essay.
a revisedversion of "Supernatural The subsequent history of the
Horror in Literature" came from project is well known, and is
Lovecraft, not Hornig. Hornig had spelled out in my essay, "On 'Su-
, .
pernatural Horror in Literature" 1

and Lovecraft did not seem to care
Fantasy
( Commentator Winter
. much for such things as Machen's
1985); but I'd like to augment and The Green Round (1933) or Dun-
clarify some of my remarks. Love- sany's later novels; but one would
craft, as he notes in the postcard, suppose that here, if anywhere,
sent Hornig an annotated copy of Lovecraft would be concerned to
the Recluse text; this copy proba- trace the development of these im-
bly included both corrections writ- portant contemporary fantaisistes
ten directly on the pages of the Finally, it is a little-known fact
magazine plus separate sheets for that the Fantasy Fan text of "Su-
lengthier additions. Most of the pernatural Horror in Literature"
additions took place in chapters VI embodies revisions found in no
VIII, and IX. had thought that
I other text. For example, in the
Hornig retained this copy of The section on Hawthorne, the reference
Recluse and eventually passed it on to "the modern writer D. H. Law-
to Willis Conover for his aborted rence" was altered to "the late
serialization of the essay in Sci - D. H. Lawrence," since Lawrence
ence-Fantasy Correspondent ; but died in 1930. These and other
Sam Moskowitz pointed out to me revisions from all the relevant texts
and this postcard confirms that of "Supernatural Horror in Litera-
Hornig ultimately returned the copy ture" are now embodied in my edi-
of The Recluse and that Lovecraft tion of the essay in Daqon and
then handed it to Conover in 1936. Other Macabre Tales (Arkham
It must be admitted that Love- House, 1986).
craft's revisions for The Fantasy
Fan are inadequate at best and
bungling at worst. Lovecraft had
begun to keep a list of works he
wished to mention in a revised
"Supernatural Horror in Literature" BACK ISSUES AVAILABLE
almost as soon as the Recluse text
was printed; his list of ^Weird Copies of Crypt of Cthulhu
Items to Mention" at the back of #s 10, 16, 17, 23, 25, 26, 28,
his commonplace book includes such 31, 32, 33, 34, 36, 37, 38, 39,
things as short stories from Joseph and 45 at $4.00; #s 43, 46, 47,
Lewis French's Ghosts Grim and and 48 at $4.50.
Gentle (1926), Herbert S. Gorman's Outside of USA and Canada,
The Place Called Daqon (1927), add $1.00 per booklet for post-
Leonard Cline's The Dark Chamber age. Pay in U. S. funds.
(1927), and other contemporary
works. But the additions are spo-
radic and actually damage the unity
of the work; the inclusions of these
very recent works are not made
with any sense of their historical
importance (and this, after all, is AD RATES
the focus of the entire essay), and
there is really no reason why Love- Fullpage (6 1/2"x9 1/2"). $30 .
craft should have felt the need to Half page (6 1/2"x4 3/4"
be so "up to date" in a work of or 3"x9 1/2) $16
this kind. Most remarkably, Love- Quarter page (6 1/2"x1 1/3"
craft made no additions to the one or 3"x3 3/4" $8.50
section of his work that has the Send camera ready copy, and
most critical value: the final chap- do not exceed exact dimensions
ter on the "Modern Masters," as stated above (the first fig-
Machen, Dunsany, Blackwood, and ure denotes width).
M. R. James. True, James wrote
no horror tales subsequent to 1925
. .
Lammas 1 987 / 31
THE POOL
RECOMMENDATIONS FOR REVISION - SYNOPSIS
By H. P. Lovecraft
B. For a new suggestion as to a different beginning for the tale, see top
of sheet IV. This mode of beginning can be used no matter what plot-
variant you decide to follow.
The pool in this story had better be one of the few remaining rests
betwixt the upper world of life & the fabled under world of the dead
(others elsewhere on the globe can be hinted at). Use the Graeco-Roman
conception of the world of shades cf. AEneas's descent into Hades in
the 6th bk. of the AEneid, & Ulysses' in the 11th book of the Odyssey.
It must always have existed hence it would be well to carry back the
legendry E whispers to the very earliest times Roman E Gallo-Druidical
pre-Roman, with hints of primordial Cro-Magnon Neanderthal ages behind
even these. Let it be known that buildings on this site have been
destroyed horribly inexplicably whenever persons living in them or
issuing from them have actually sought to descend into the pool plumb
its mysteries. You might hint that these destructions coincided with
attempts so determined as to have been successful for one or two
participants, though most perished in the catastrophe. This is the
legend. In order to keep the tale well motivated, do not fail to connect
all destructions of buildings, all kindred disasters, with especially
determined attempts to enter the pool. Let the carved lintel be from a
Gallo-Roman villa of (say) 100 A.D. its inscription might well be:
STVLTI . VNICI . STAGNVM. ADEVNT
NAM. IN. IMO. INTERITVM. PESTEMQUE. LATITANT.
Anglice FOOLS. ALONE. THE POOL. APPROACH.
FOR. IN. ITS ABYSM. ANNIHILATION. AND A CURSE.
LURK.
In all the old legendry there must be numerous accounts of strange per-
sons shapes who have sought to enter the pool especially strange be-
ings, as distinguished from the local inhabitants who were moved by mere
curiosity. These strangers must have displayed a desperate determina-
tion, purpose, secret knowledge wholly alien to those of the natives.
Now as to what those beings are it will not do to have them merely the
unburied dead; for if all unburied dead lingered above ground in a kind
of half-life, there would be legions of them wandering about, so that they
would be no rarity.
Indeed there would be, by this time, (considering
the vast hordes killed left on battlefields) more of these "undead" in the
world than there are living persons! Let us, then, seek to narrow the
field find a special class of person who, upon dying, is forbidden to
enter the nether world. At once it occurs to us to use the celebrated
witch-cult as a basis of selection. But how? First, though, let us ac-
count for the extraordinary precautions taken to guard the pool pre-
cautions not likely to have been taken against any small class of beings.
Here we come back to your idea of the unburied dead. Let it be, then,
that a[ unburied dead are forced to remain above ground in the for m

of spectres or wraiths not in actual bodily form that the pool is
guarded in order to exclude these shades from the nether world of the
dead
You can suggest this in hinting of the old legendry speaking of ru-
mours of vast armies of ghosts (battlefield dead) congregating about the
pool at certain times (especially Walpurgis 6 All-Hallows), but always dis-
persing in disappointment. Living beings who from curiosity attempt to
penetrate the pool are always found hideously 6 inexplicably mangled.
They never disappear Make this plain, since at the last you will want
.
to use the disappearance of the boy 6 stranger as an indication that they

have successfully passed through except in half-hinted cases of success
, .
which always involve widespread destruction for those who assist to the
destruction of all housing buildings. The peculiar strangers "undead"
who storm the pool are always beaten off with horrible suffering, largely
a psychological suffering from the sheer sight of the guardian thing (cries
heard, etc.) but are not killed or mangled because they are not living
bodies in the strictest sense. Thus we have three classes of would-be
entrants to the pool:
(a) shades of the unburied dead, always* beaten off
( b ) living beings killed mangled* (though their shades later go
through, after burial)
(c) the "undead" beaten off* with suffering but without bodily form.
*i.e., you decide to adhere to your original intention

if
of having one or both pass safely through.
And now who are these "undead"? Well here's a suggestion. It is an

actual legend indeed, probably a ceremonial fact that a member of the
loathsome mediaeval witch-cult was always buried face downward for cer-
tain occult reasons, whenever anyone knowing of his membership could
arrange to be on hand 6 see that the provision was carried out without
exciting the suspicions of survivors. Now would it not be a good idea
to have your half-dead people witch-cult members who had not been buried
face downward ? Of course, you can vary all this as you wish but you
can easily see why an unusual & restricted class is needed. This class
would naturally tend to be of just about the size you assume when you
include certain seers, magicians, etc., in it. All members would neces-
sarily have strange powers 6 properties not only because of their anoma-
lous position betwixt life death, but because of their membership in the
witch cult. It may be assumed that they still cooperate with the cult, 6
take part in its infamous Sabbats. You can find out all about this cult in
"The Witch-Cult in Western Europe," by Margaret A. Murray, which is
in the main reference department (not circulation) of the (2nd St. library.
Of the various "undead" of Central France, most know of the pool's prop-
erties, refrain from making attempts upon it. From time to time, how-
ever, bold exceptions occur; giving rise to many picturesque legends.
These may be noted with especial frequency after the battle of Poitiers
when among the slain 6 unburied soldiers were, presumably, many mem-
bers of the witch-cult. Occasionally the wandering "half-dead" seek the
aid of actual living beings in forcing an entrance to the nether world,
whilst at other times they marshal the unbodied shades in the region.
The present tale concerns an attempt of the former kind.
II.
In my opinion the tale had better be rewritten from the start, inten-
sifying the abysmal antiquity of the pool legends, 6 embodying scraps of
hinted legendry in accordance with the plot finally decided upon. The
strange archer, who intends to use the boy as a decoy in his attempt to
enter the nether world, ought to be a more definitely sinister 6 evil figure
than in the existing version. Atmospheric touches suggesting this abnor-
mal age ambiguous state should be added, E the boy should fear him at
Lammas 1987 / 33
the same time that he is fascinated by him. The stranger should play
upon the boy's plainly visible curiosity regarding the pool. Incidentally,
it ought to be made clear just why the "undead" are so anxious to get
down below when they seem to be well off enough up here. You might
have their upper-world, post-mortem existence a painful one at least at
times. Possibly they have to exist half of each year as werewolves or
something like that. Or on the other hand, it may be that their new half-
dead state gives them information of marvellous pleasures they are missing
in the nether world. Perhaps their upper-world life is one of utter bore-
dom, owing to the loss of some essential life-property corresponding to
the traditional "soul." At any rate, they want to get down very badly,
6 the old archer thinks he can use the boy as a means. If I were writ-
ing this tale, I'd have the boy hideously killed (as the inn is destroyed)
by the nameless Guardian of the Pool (or as a sacrifice to lure the thing
forth) (whose nature, as manifested by previous killings, reported
glimpses, building-destructions, trails & prints in the vegetation, etc.,
etc., may be hinted at in the early legends) whilst the "half-dead" archer
slips into the abyss. It would, though, be quite permissible to employ
some subtler decoy-stratagem 6 have the boy safely accompany the
stranger into the nether world. At any rate, make it clear that the total
disappearance of any being near the pool is a possible indication of safe
6 miraculous passage to the nether regions. Not positive, tho', in case
you wish to introduce the ironic touch of having the archer fail. One
thing you must use more subtlety in describing what the boy glimpses
when he climbs out over the pool 6 looks down. This is a superlative
high spot, 6 needs the greatest possible care in development emphasis
6 detail as well as subtlety. Remember that what the boy sees is part
of an age-old nether world, through which move the forms of those who
have entered it ever since the beginning of life on this planet .Clearly,
it is superficial unconvincing to confine a first glimpse to a group of
mediaeval horsemen. What is seen under this aperture is merely a small
area of the nether world, 6 the figures crossing this area must be
curiously mixed 6 derived from all preceding ages ape-man,
Neanderthalers, Cro-Magnons, other primitive men, animals recent 6
extinct, Mongoloids, Gauls, Romans, Franks, Frenchmen, armies of every
kind. Naturally, only a chance fraction of this subterraneous population
will cross the limited field of vision during any given short period, but
this fraction must be varied enough in race period to be representative
of the whole population. On account of recent large battles, of course,

mediaeval soldiers will be quite numerous but there have been other,
older battles, of them vast evidences must remain. Your series of
successive heavens might eliminate some warriors, but I am skeptical about
the effectiveness of this idea. Would you have this merely the first of
a series of worlds like a set of Chinese boxes, with everyone finally dying
into other inner realms? That, of course, would eliminate older
denizens but the idea looks a bit cumbrous to me. Assuming a steadily
cumulative population, local civilians would probably outnumber warriors
despite the great battles occurring in the region. But at any rate, what
the boy sees in his first, random-timed glimpse must not be any specially
appropriate pageant. It must be simply a cross-section of the ordinary
life of this part of the nether world. The sight had better be described
slowly impressively for the various objects will unfold themselves to
the watcher very gradually. The whole visible area is vague, distant,
half-veiled in obscurity. It is a kind of queerly exotic landscape, like
nothing ever seen in the upper world of the living. Finally one or two
figures move across it figures so strange that the boy gasps in surprise.
Perhaps they are Roman legionnaires perhaps a family of ancient
Gauls perhaps a knot of Aurignacian or Mousterian primitives perhaps
Gallo Roman civilians perhaps Teutonic Franks perhaps monks,

soldiers,
or other mediaeval personages. A goodly variety of different types be-
longing to widely different ages ought to float silently across the field 1-
unless. of course, you use the multiple-heaven idea. The boy. naturally,
is half-stupefied with wonder an emotion you must bring out clearly!
Finally you can have him see a knot of Poitiers warriors or whatever
type of sight is most significant in the light of the

ensuing narrative.
Don't fail to emphasize the unusual conditions of vision the
vertical per-
spective whereby the watcher is looking down on the heads of the
nether-
world denizens. If you like, you can have this slightly modified
by some
queer refractive property of the waters-for of course they are no ordi-
nary waters, since they remain thus suspended betwixt two realms.
You
might barely suggest the disquieting presence of yawning black
gulfs ex-
tending laterally into the earth from the submerged walls of
the pool the
presumable abode of the Guardian of the Gate. Pile on plenty of colour
6 wonder, 6 let the astonishing nature of the
spectacle be reflected in
the boy's reaction to it.
III.
This brings us to the point where your ms. leaves off. Now let us see
if we can form a good synopsis of events to follow.
Obviously, the boy's curiosity is whetted to a supreme degree
he
overwhelms the stranger with questions. The stranger, answering
these,
( here you have a chance to tell more about
the nether world 6 the con-
ditions of entering it) sees in the boy a good
means of effecting an en-
trance; hence leads him on to the greatest possible
extent. The story
he tells is something which was barely hinted at in the
ancient legendry,
(you can insert some glancing allusion to it earlier in the tale,
when first
discussing the legends, if you wish) which concerns the
very very
few persons or shades or "undead" who actually
did penetratF success-
fully to the nether world These cases of success were invariably ac-
.
compamed by the destruction of all living human beings who aided, of

all buildings even trees other vegetation near the pool;
but the
stranger does not tell the boy of these drawbacks .You can hint them,
though, so that the reader can understand the final
climactic cataitrophe
without subsequent explanations. It is well to end a tale on a high note,
without the dragged-out piecing-together of threads
which always sug-
gests anticlimax. On general outline, the stranger's plan can well be
lust as you proposed i.e. to have the Nameless Thing lured out of the
,
pool so that one or more beings can enter the nether

world unscathed
before It returns to Its guardianship. And your idea of having a sacri-
fice the lure is likewise a good one. Now what about details the exact
nature of the sacrificial lure, etc.? Well-let us see what
would naturally
appeal most to a hideous titanic Elemental bound
to a stern guardian-
ship under the earth. This being may be presumed to be of the sort
habituaHy frequenting the awful Sabbats on the lonely
hills at Walpurgis
Hallowmass Yet It is perpetually denied
m these Sabbats, because of the necessity oftheguarding
privilege of participating
.
the gate durinq

such events. Indeed, the guarding has to be all the more
riqorous at
Sabbat time as compared with other times, for there
are then stirring
the greatest possible numbers of uncanny beings
who would jump at the
.chance of entering the nether world in the absence
of a sentry. All the
old legends speak of the increased presence
of monstrous shades around
the pool at Walpurgis Hallowmass. The Nameless Thing, then is avid
for unmentionable Sabbat-rites which It is
habitually denied ... a cir-
cumstance which the strange archer fully realizes, of which
with the
boy s help he is determined to take advantage. In developing a plan
he is cautious in what he tells the boy. A human sacrifice is really
Lammas 1987 / 35
needed, but he tells the boy a goat is what must be offered. This seems
simple, since there are many fine goats among the varied livestock around
the inn. Roughly summarized, the stranger's plan is to assemble the
ghosts 6 undead of all the neighbouring countryside at some time other
than Hallowmass or Walpurqis , when the Thing will be off its guard 6
free from the inhibitions which keep its half-brain alert at such seasons.
Its attention is to be aroused by a celebration of the most shocking S
hideous pseudo-Sabbat ever held in France ... a pseudo-Sabbat in which
there will not be one living participant except the boy destined for the
sacrifice. The way to tell all this since there will be no principal
survivors left above ground may be difficult, but there are methods of
circumventing the obstacle. For one thing, you might boldly break the
"classical" rule of transmission 6 let the reader share the literary
omniscience of the author, as Poe does in the "Masque of the Red
Death" of which there are no survivors. Better, though, to leave a
human link. Of course the stranger has told the boy to reveal the plan
to no one, but you might have the command broken in the case of a
particularly discreet playmate who, in addition to his discretion, is too
frightened to repeat the tale until after the catastrophe. If you use this
device, you can speak of his fright how he shunned his little friend of
the inn after hearing the monstrous tale, S how his fright (having been
noticed 6 connected with the catastrophe) led to his being later questioned
6 forced to divulge what he knew. But there is a third alternative, also.
Of course the ghosts 6 undead summoned to this hellish pseudo-Sabbat
(you can call it an "Estbat," which was the actual name applied to
irregular convocations of the witch-cult. Sabbats ,
in the true sense,
occurred only at Walpurgis 6 Hallowmass. Estbats were largely business
meetings, but there were also rites so you can safely use the name) would
naturally expect to share the archer's entrance to the nether world this
being indeed the inducement which brought most of them. (The reason
they had not tried this very method oftener was that it had seldom
occurred to them. Also, the human sacrifice had to be voluntary ,
or
at least not resistant . It would not do to sacrifice a captured mortal.
Victims, to be effective, must be voluntary or else, as in the present
1
case, secured by trickery . Still more perhaps the method js sometimes

tried, but frustrated because of the Thing's wariness. It has not much
brain or memory, but just enough to retain a few impressions
occasionally.) However, it would be natural for the deceived Monster
to see through the trick 6 get back to Its post before al_l_ of so vast a
throng of ghosts and undead could pass into the pool. Thus we may
assume a certain number of Estbat-participants to have been left
disconsolate in the upper world shut out at the last moment 6 to have
told their tale later on to certain mortals whom they met by night in lonely
taverns.
It would be a fine 6 supremely ironic touch to have the old archer himself
instigator of the whole business among the "undead" ones left out.
IV.
If you use this third method, or indeed in any case you might have
the begin rather differently letting the whole subject be brought up
tale
in a conversation between a mysterious stranger 6 yourself in some lonely
French inn at the present time The stranger is one of the old undead
.
participants in that bygone Estbat, perhaps ironically the archer himself

who has not yet succeeded in getting into the nether world. You might
begin the tale by having yourself seated as a traveller, in the very inn
concerned that is, one of the later inns built on its site. You notice
the old lintel from the ancient Gallo-Roman villa, which seems, somehow
6
to be miraculously preserved through all calamities, wonder whether it

is really a Roman survival, idly translate the inscription, 6 feel curious
about the pool described. You ask the landlord, but he crosses himself
6 says little.
that the pool lies beyond. At this the landlord stops you, 6 tells you

Then you try to go through the dooi having gathered
a jumble of hideous legends dating from the earliest times to the present.
He does not go into details, nor need you set down anything save the
general hints suggested at the beginning of this outline. [However if
you use the playmate method of telling the boy's story, you can have
this case come up very impressively. The landlord selects this to tell
in full, because the boy dwelt in this very place, 6 was one of his col-
lateral ancestors. You can easily devise a start for this sub-narrative.
The landlord can say, "Yes, Monsieur, 6 more there was, in the old time,
one from this very inn ...
or the inn that was here . . . who tried to
go into the pool, but men never saw him again. There were rumours
people shivered at what he had told one of his little playmates. In the
end there came a night when the inn was full of strange guests from un-
known places 6 the next morning there was no inn, nor any who had
slept there, nor any of the trees 6 growing things that had stood nearby
only a heap 6 tangle of crushed things without life." With this start,
the landlord the tale as far as the revelation of the archer's plan
tells
to sacrifice a goat
6 slip with the boy into the nether world as far, that
is, as the boy had told his playmate. The landlord adds the common re-
port of the destruction, 6 how the playmate was questioned; supplying
certain conclusions of his own. Don't try to use his own words, for
pseudomediaevalism is hard work. Say "The tale told by the landlord
was a strange one indeed, 6 listened raptly as the dim candles of that
I
ancient tap-room guttered in disquieting blasts of night-wind. The way

to the pool, he said, led from the back door of the inn out into the humid
greenery of the forest etc., etc., etc." When the landlord is through,
6 goes away to attend to various tasks, a mysterious stranger sidles up
to you 6 says he has overheard the tale. He can tell you more. He is
a man of bizarre 6 disquieting aspect so much so that you had noticed
him before in the dimly lighted inn. He seems to know an abnormal
amount about bygone times. He begins abruptly "There was more than
most people know. It was no goat that was sacrificed. Do you think
a goat would have drawn the Thing forth, or that all the wraiths of the
countryside would have come for the mere killing of a goat? have heard
I
things repeated from very strange sources listen. Monsieur!" He supplies

what the landlord has been unable to tell, 6 only at the very end (cf.
Dunsany's "Poor Old Bill" in "A Dreamer's Tales") do you suspect, by
elimination, that he must be one of the "undead" Estbat-participants
himself. All this digressive material within these brackets implies your
use of the second or playmate device of narration, supplemented by the
Estbat-survivor device. Forget it if you intend to use the third device
alone.] If you do intend to use the third device alone, have the
landlord's information stop with frightened E whispered generalities.
There is no more for him to tell unless he has heard from some special
source of the boy's wish to enter the pool, of the real significance of
the archer. Lacking such information, this particular calamity would not
seem greatly different, in public retrospect, from others. Of course,
undead survivors of the hellish Estbat might have told others long ago,
6 thus divulged the inside tale to general knowledge, but think it would
I
be more effective E dramatic to have it otherwise. In this case, let the

stranger overhear your colloquy with the landlord, approach you after
the latter departs. He strikes up a conversation displaying uncanny
acquaintance with the remote past. "Why," he says, "there was a boy
from this very inn or the inn that was here who tried to go into the
Lammas 1987 / 37
pool, but men never saw him again. There were rumours but I can tell
you more! I've never told anyone before but I know. You are very
interested in these old things are you not? Then listen."
As in the case of the landlord if you had him tell the tale don't try
to use the stranger's own words. Use the same device you would use
with the landlord saying: "The tale told by the queer stranger was a
bizarre 6 frightful one indeed, 6 I listened raptly as the dim candles gut-
tered, etc., etc., etc." Have the ending climactic, 6 (as in the brack-
eted alternative) do not have the nature of the unwholesome narrator di-
vulged except by elimination at the very end. Of course, you don't have
to use this device of having the tale told to you by landlord or stranger
or both but I think it greatly increases the effectiveness of the whole
business. Likewise, you don't have to have the boy sacrificed. You
could manage to let the goat do, or use some drugged human being other
than the boy. But all the same think the boy is the logical victim,

I
I think it would be a neat bit of cosmic irony if his sacrificei the old
plotting archer himself, were among the left-behind the final narrator
of the story. Your idea, of course, has hitherto been to have the archer
a less malign character than I envisage him but you miist remember Mon-
tague Rhodes James's warning ( Blackwood's occasional pathetic examples)
as to the feebleness of benignly supernatural stories. If this is a horror-
story, make it so! If not, you'll have to follow the Barrie tradition
abide by the results! Some like E. M. Forster in "The Celestial Omnibus"
can get away with such wild whimsicality without being too utterly
namby-pamby, but all that stuff is outside any province of mine.
Well, let's see where we are now. We have discussed the main probable
trend of the plot, the best ways of getting this to the reader. Now
let us see how we can develop the final climactic episode the hideous
Estbat the entrance of the monstrous celebrants to the nether world;
preferably with the old archer ironically left behind to tell the tale in
later centuries.
The archer has asked the boy to help under the impression that a
goat is to be sacrificed. On the day preceding the appointed night the
inn fills up with mysterious strangers who impress the local people as
oddly as the archer himself did, who are long afterward talked about.
Never before has the inn been so full but some of the strangers tell a
tale of a great religious pilgrimage. However, the alien, unholy, un-
earthly aspect of the pseudopilgrims is not lost upon the local people.
is remembered by them in their gossip after the inn all its tenants have
disappeared. That evening, at the direction of the archer, the boy drugs
(harmlessly, he is assured) the food of his parents indeed of all the
living human tenants of the inn, so that the night may be free for the
celebrants of the awful pseudo-Sabbat or Estbat rites. The rites them-
selves are held in the woods, betwixt the pool the inn, are begun
at midnight after all the people are drugged asleep. A huge rock has
been rolled to the top of a woodland knoll to serve as an altar, E the
fattest he-goat from the inn's farmyard has been brought as a sacrifice.
The aspect of the strange "undead" as they issue from the inn's rear
door or troop from other parts of the forest is monstrous panic-breeding
in the extreme still more hellish are the shapes of unbodied ghosts
nameless Sabbat-elementals that answer the occult summons of the archer
materialize out of the circumambient air. It is all the archer can do
to keep the boy from screaming aloud, but he finally succeeds. In de-
scribing the nameless beings rites of the Sabbat you can use your own
imagination pieced out by descriptions in the previously mentioned Mur-
ray book, or by the descriptions illustrations in Lewis Spence's "Ency-
clopaedia of Occultism" which you can find on the open shelves of the
South Hall (western wall) at the 42nd St. library. Co the limit do in
prose what Clark Ashton Smith does in water-colours. Probably you know
as well as anybody else how to suggest half-amorphous, tentacled things
with rugose heads, semi-proboscises, miscellaneous bulging eyes at various
anatomical points, 6 other choice nightmare characteristics. You might
include our old friends Alabad, Chinn, 6 Aratza. Let Spence or Murray
suggest the Estbat or pseudo-Sabbat ritual, 6 be sure to include a chant
designed to tempt the Pool Thing forth. Let the goat be sacrificed with
much ceremony the odour of fresh blood envoking hordes of bat-winged
elementals from the black woods. At this point the boy expects to see

the Pool-Thing but the archer knows that the right kind of blood-smell
has not yet appeared. Use your judgment about the sacrifice of the boy
about the most effective amount of horror-increasing reticence to use.
When that is over, the actual climactic moment comes. A sickening bub-
bling in the pool which makes even the ghosts 6 ghouls 6 undead & ob-
scene morbidities stop aghast in their chanting, 6 huddle behind the trees
as far as possible from the altar 6 the dripping things upon it a ...
wheezy snorting ...
a pushing upward of the earth as the present silt-
coated banks meet the passage of a shape too vast for their compass . .
. and then ... 6 then . . . great Sathanas! Samael have mercy . . .
I T . T . . I . . . what is jt? . . .
Some of the monstrous celebrants flee insanely into the haunted night
at the very sight of IT throwing away their chances of nether-world . . .
entrance rather than risk the madness which another look would bring.
Dark Abaddon, what an Entity! Not quite matter, not quite gas, not
quite fire, not quite aether jellyfish, worm, octopus, lizard, bat . . .
. . brother of Great Cthulhu, Cousin of Chaugnar Faugn

. Elephant . . .
or Cyclops? Gorcjon or Hydra? And vaster than St. Peter's Cathedral

in Poitiers la! Shub-Niggurath!
. The Goat with a Thousand Young!
. .
The Black Coat of the Woods With a Thousand Young! N'ghaa S'habb! . .
Yrrr hha . H'na . gggll [The next day, appalled by that

. . . . . . .
scene of devastation, people told of the hideous sounds which had dis-
turbed their dreams, notwithstanding the remoteness of the spot.) There
was a rending 6 crashing of great trees, 6 a floundering as nameless
nostrils sought blasphemous blood. But It never spoke,
VI.
for It had no voice. Hideous 6 unmentionable urges seemed to fight with

implanted destructive commands within Its hazy half-brain. It floundered
betwixt the altar 6 the near-by inn, 6 wiped out the latter 6 all its oc-
cupants with a blow from one of Its gelatinous brown tentacles. Then
the great descent began & all the ghouls ghosts undead abnor-
malities which had not fled in fright began to crowd into the pool in a
turbulent stream. They would leap in, seemingly plunge downward
through the water for an infinite space, finally floating out into the air
of the nether world landing safely on the mystic soil. All the entities
fought desperately for a place in the mad exodus, but at last they saw
The Thing turn about flounder back toward the pool with a new air
of determination. The chance was gone. Only a few more reached the
beckoning water before the sniffing wheezing floundering drew peril-
ously near. The rest, disappointed, fled precipitately into the depths
of the black oak forest (including, if you adopt a new ironic touch, the
old archer who had planned the whole thing. But do not reveal this until
the final climactic moment. He was so busy directing his scheme that
he was left behind.)
That was all. The next day local people found the inn all its inhab-
itants gone, all the neighbouring vegetation monstrously mangled and
Lammas 1987 / 39
devastated. It was not merely crushed but seemed to be eaten, burnt,

,
or dissolved to a semi-pulp by some unknown 6 inexplicable corrosive

agent. No one who had slept in the inn was ever seen again. Landlord,
boy, archer, guests, pilgrims all vanished. Though (the strange nar-
rator hinted as the candles flickered near their sockets) among the "un-
dead" there are rumours of those who, in later centuries, climbed out
over the pool on the branches of new trees that had grown to antiquity
there, 6 saw within its depths an alluring nether world [whose denizens
including one strangely like the bygone archer they had known, unless
(as hope) you adopt the ironic touch of having the archer himself left
I
out making him the present stranger-narrator).
Well that'll do for one session! suppose the foregoing is rather con-
I
fusing, but don't see how it can be otherwise when we've not yet de-
I
cided on just which plot-variant to use. You can regard all this as mere
conversation touching on the general theme 6 turning up fresh ideas at
random, from among which you are at liberty to select a quota to suit
yourself arranging developing them as you choose. Personally, I
favour the most horrible version with the sacrifice of the boy, telling
of the whole tale to yourself by the undead stranger (if not the old archer
himself, a friend of the old archer, to whom the latter had given all par-
ticulars when inviting him to the Estbat) in the uncanny, candle-lighted
inn where the ominous blackened lintel towers with its ancient Roman
warning. When the tale is over you can have the stranger glide out
through the forbidde n rear door under the ominous lintel. As he qlides,
you add a bewildered query as to how he knows all this to which he
replies in some subtle climactic way which clearly shows him to be the
old archer himself. To atone for the chaos of the foregoing, I will
prepare a synopsis of the version I prefer. You can substitute modify,
etc., at will, if you like. I'll discuss the matter further. In case of
such discussion, please return this comment in order to refresh my
memory.
N.B. It may be assumed that the archer did not return to the region of
the pool for long centuries. Perhaps he is just back about to make
another attempt to enter!
THE POOL
Author travelling
near old Poitiers puts up at strange old rural inn which
takes his fancy.
Notices ancient Latin lintel inscription asks landlord
about it. Landlord is frightened evasive hints old legends fate of the
curious, etc. (here tell as many as possible prepare the background)
tells of successive destructions of many inns, stops author when he
attempts to go through door. Author returns to his table. For some
time he has noticed a stranger of peculiar disquieting aspect, whose
talk of old times with various guests holds an element of abnormal
famil-
iarity. Stranger, having overheard colloquy with landlord, approaches
6 begins to tell story of boy inn E archer pool to author.
The story of the boy, inn, archer, pool, told (as begun in original
ms.) by stranger, with uncanny evidences of "inside knowledge (due to
fact that he is really the old archer himself). Boy, long ago, longs to
plumb secrets of the pool, which is entrance to nether world [give details
of guardianship describe undead!). Archer, longing to reach nether
world, plans to use boy's curiosity as a tool. Arranges hellish Estbat
or pseudo-Sabbat to lure guardian Monster forth, summoning
ghosts
undead, telling boy to drug everyone in the inn on the appointed night.
Intends to sacrifice boy, but tells latter a goat is the victim. Undead
arrive as pilgrims, living humans are drugged, Sabbat-rites are started
betwixt inn pool. Coat sacrificed. Boy sacrificed. IT flounders forth
& wreaks devastation. Many of the hellish celebrants succeed in entering
pool, but some are left behind 6 flee into forest. Among these, it ap-
pears impossible to deny, is the stranger now telling the tale, but he
does not at this moment admit that he is the old archer who planned it
all sacrificed the boy. Indeed, he only darkly implies (6 that as late
as possible) that he is an "undead"-cult member at all. (He has tried all
along to convey the idea that [words missing].)
Aftermath remarks by stranger-narrator, perhaps elicited by puzzled ques-

tions of author. What the local people found the morning after the hor-
ror-inn gone forest, etc., crushed all persons with the inn missing.
Also remarks about possible later glimpses (by undead or others) into
nether world. Author still bewildered by curiously "inside" nature of
tale, as stranger rises glides to the ominous door under the lintel.
(Landlord others busy elsewhere not looking. Anyway, taproom is
virtually deserted because of late hour. Stranger unlatches (or
unbars evidences of fear precaution on part of inn-builders desirable)
rear door stands on threshold as author, following him across the room,
presses final insistent questions as to how he knows so much Then as .
a climax stranger gives hints unmistakably implying that he is the archer

(use great care cleverness devising ways to hint (words missing])
glides out into the haunted night, shutting latching the door after him.
Author does not follow. Use your judgment about suggesting possible
future attempts of archer to enter nether world.
NOTE: Be very adroit in describing witch-cult phenomena do not

refer to cult like modern anthropologist for remember that the stranger
who tells the secret is a member anxious to conceal as much as possible.
Have facts contained in elliptical half-hints "They who gather on the hills"
"They who sacrifice to the goat" "They who follow the Black Man."
Use "they," because the stranger in speaking tries not to admit that he
is one of them.
Lammas 1987 / 41
APORIA AND PARADOX

IN "THE OUTSIDER"
By Donald R. Burleson, Ph.D.
H. P. Lovecraft's "The Out- self-discovery. The Outsider, upon

sider" carries as its central the- touching the mirror, comes to an
matic content the notion of self- understanding of his own nature;
awareness, the mythic heroic quest it is significant that he is the only
for self-understanding. Whether figure present to find such under-
viewed as an allegorical figure mak- standing no doubt every person in
ing the journey through the Jung- the hall has looked in the mirror
ian psyche to find wholeness (see and known the face staring back
Dirk Mosig's "The Four Faces of to be his or her own, yet the rev-
the Outsider," in Darrell Schweit- elers, by this act, learn nothing of
zer (ed.) Essays Lovecraftian , importance about themselves. They
1976) or as the embodiment of some have not climbed the frightful stone
other critical precept, the narrator, tower into the moonlight; they have
the Outsider himself, clearly quests not earned self-knowledge. The
for self-knowledge in his perilous Outsider's experience is one of
climb up the "black ruined tower," learning; the revelers, who be-
his sojourn across open country- come "a herd of delirious fugi-
side to the "venerable ivied castle," tives," have no mental experience
and his apocalyptic moment at the at all except primal reactions out
mirror. But in terms of a decon- of fear. And yet we may ask
structionist reading of the logic of whether each of these characteriza-
the tale, he opens, in discovering tions is not alloyed with aspects
his nature, a Pandora's box of antithetical to itself.
interwoven paradox. The Outsider, though reaching
Superficially,the text draws a a new self-awareness, a "single and
strong contrast between the Out- fleeting avalanche of soul-annihilat-
sider and the revelers in the cas- ing memory," does so only to lose
tle. The "merry company" con- it the next moment; "I forgot what
sists of normal, living people whose had horrified me, and the burst of
contrast with the carrion horror black memory vanished in a chaos
that the Outsider finds in the mir- of echoing images." He is still
ror could scarcely be more pro- sufficiently in possession of his
nounced. Yet it is a common cir- former mentality to return to his
cumstance in the self-deconstruct- trap-door and try to open it, to
ing function of texts that such return to his customary life, and it
apparently bipolar differences must is only upon finding this return
become dismantled by other, more impossible that he adopts his "new
subtle, less dismantlable differ- wildness and freedom." In his
ences, differences not between the actions subsequent to the revelation
two sides of the bipolarity, but at the mirror, the text self-sub-
ways in which each side of the verts its theme of the Outsider's
biopolarity differs problematically acquisition of self-understanding,
with itself; indeed, in such analy- and proceeds to self-subvert even
sis, superficial differences can the self-subversion in portraying
continue to appear to be real only the Outsider's adoption of his new
by suppression of those more in- life, albeit under duress. The
ternal differences by whose uncov- partygoers, on the other hand, who
ering they are dismantled. Such learn nothing from the mirror,
is the case with the Outsider and perhaps do learn something from
his "merry company." the experience on another level;
A primary source of contrast they must have seen in the Out-
resides in the very question of sider what he has seen in himself:
an "abhorrent travesty on the hu- plexities arising from the way in

man shape" and at least at some which the Outsider differs from
unconscious level they must know himself, and the way in which the
that the Outsider is what they revelers differ from themselves,
themselves will become in the dis- in mutually complementing hetero-
solution of the grave; they find geneity.
thus a species of self-knowing to But further questions arise in
which they can respond only by terms of whether the Outsider js,
fleeing, fleeing in effect from them- or whether he remains, an out-
selves. Thus one finds ambiguities sider. On a level too symbolically
on each side that complement ambi- significant to be dismissed as mere-
guities on the other. To the ex- ly the level of word-play, it is not
tent that the Outsider learns less without importance that after the
of himself than might be supposed Outsider's appearance in the great
and the revelers lack self-discov- hall, it is he who remains inside
ery, the Outsider resembles the and the revelers who are outside.
revelers; to the extent that the To the extent that the Outsider
Outsider does, after a fashion, has, after a fashion, achieved self-
find self-understanding while at awareness, the suggestion is that
least some implied self-understand- he has become an "insider," as it
ing must filter through to the rev- were; and to the extent that the
elers, the Outsider again resembles "merry company" has failed to
the revelers. The difference be- achieve any new self-awareness,
tween the two is imbued with com- they have become outsiders, still
.
Lammas 1987 / 43
unfamiliar with the selves they AT THE HOME OF POE

might have come to know, separated
from themselves, banished from the By Frank Belknap Long
lighted arena of knowledge. Again,
the text has essentially subverted ( The United Amateur , May 1922)
itself in this special symbolism,
suggesting a reversal of roles or The home of Poe! It is like a
characterizations. Yet these am- fairy dwelling, a gnomic palace built
biguities interweave with those pre- of the aether of dreams. It is tiny
viously mentioned, in that there is and delicate and lovely, and replete
still a question as to whether either with memories of the sere leaves
the Outsider or the partygoers does in November and of lilies in April.
attain self-knowledge. It is a castle of vanished hopes, of
In considering these matters, dimly-remembered dreams, of sad
one finds one's discernments drawn memories older than the deluge.
into aporia, or irresolvable alterna- The dead years circle slowly and
tion the heterogeneities of reading solemnly around its low white walls,
oscillate against one another in and clothe it in a mystic veil of un-
logical loops of vibration that are seen tears. And many marvellous
set ringing by the touching finger stories this quaint little old
could
at the mirror. But it is important house many weird and cryptic
tell,
to realize that such paradoxical stories him of the Raven hair,
of
content, far from detracting from and high,
pallid brow, and sad,
the "value" of the text, stands as sweet face, and melancholy mien;
necessary to its functioning. The and of the beloved Virginia, that
denouement of "The Outsider" would sweet child of a thousand magic
be a wholly different text, one not visions, child of the lonesome,
so rich in interpretative potential, pale-gray latter years, child of the
without the fabric of paradox woven soft and happy South. And how
in. The reader is as embroiled in the dreamer of the spheres must
aporia as is the Outsider himself; have loved this strange little
indeed, in a sense, the reader be- house. Every night the hollow
comes the Outsider by reading the boards of its porch must have ech-
tale. The whole content of the oed to his footfall, and every morn
Outsider's experience at the mirror the great rising sun must have
is no more or less uncertain than sent its rays through the little win-
is the question of our knowing our- dow, and bathed the lovely tresses
selves with any completeness. It of the dream-child in mystical yel-
is the nature of indwelling paradox low. And perhaps there was laugh-
that whole knowledge and certainty ter within the walls of that house,
are not to be. One suspects that, laughter and merriment and sing-
like the Outsider, we all of us ing. But we know that the Evil
oscillate continually between self- One came at last, the grim hu-
knowledge and darkness and that mourless spectre who loves not
at some points of this oscillation, beauty, and is not of this world.
darkness and self-knowledge are And we know that the house of
one and the same. youth and of love became a house
of death, and that memories bitter
as the tears of a beautiful woman
assailed the dreamer within. And
at last he himself left that house of
COMING SOON mourning and sought solace among
the stars. But the house remains
a vision out of a magical book; a
Revelations from Yuggoth #1
thing seen darkly as in a looking-
glass; but lovely beyond the
dreams of mortals, and ineffably
sad
, ,
4*) / Crypt of Cthulhu
Hi, I'm Dauid Hodson and I sell books', li/e English take
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Lammas 1987 / 45
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EDGAR AND HELEN

An Imaginary Romance
By Brett Rutherford
1 tears,
They walk the sunlit avenue, the his wild-eyed deafness to her final
parasol refusal
concealing her face as she says, "Friend always
"How grand will I be, in the chastest manner.
you have come all this distance to No more,
see me." yet no less than a sister can be I
She wears a dress imported from to you."

France, He rages at the insults of Helen's
confounds him with a hauty roseate mother,
scent. how Helen were better dead than
"I will not permit you, of course, married
to fall in love with me." to a godless drinker of the Plutonian
He grips lees,
the black valise. His hands turn chills at the echo of her sister's
white chatter,
as sheafs of poems tumble out the gossips and slanderers anony-
under the feet of Sunday crowds. mous,
"Alas," he says, picking them up, who wrote the warning letters to
searching her eyes as she stoops to Helen-
help, damn them all who would thwart his
"If such were possible, then happiness!
Then it is already too late .
11
She wears her heavy cloak against

By chance she finds the poem the cold,
inscribed to her on top of that a black, superfluous
1 saw thee once once only shawl,
as if to italicize her widowhood.
She reads it and averts her gaze, "I love you,
pretending to favor a floral display. Helen, as I have never loved before.
The suitor knows he has pleased Our poems speak the truths you
her. would deny."
In the strange rooming house he "Do not torment me with vows of

broods love"
as unrelenting opiates of memory
draw moonlight houris in Helen's "You torment me," he stabs, "with
form. beauty,
He thinks of how he can win her, with scintillant brilliance of eye and
sway her will with his eloquence, mind,
his life and poems at her feet, with promises a suitor cannot mis-
merge with her gentle bookish life, take,
take her back to his humble cottage nor chaste propinquity requite."
or stay in this love-charmed Provi-
dence. He takes her frail, cool hand, cups
He dreams of the thousand ways it in his.
he will love her.
Her profile is cold as Athena, her
2 eyes
Moon and the tallow flames of can- turned inward in agony, in thought
died glass of the aged mother, the invalid
conceal her features but reflect his sister.
.
Lammas 1987 / 97
the imminence of her uncertain south, to court a darker mistress,

health. a veiled widow who refuses no one,
"Neither by word nor glance, nor and whom no one ever leaves.
yet by deed,"
she answers him, withdrawing her
palm
from the heat of his impetuous THE MIGRATION OF BIRDS
grasp, (continued from page 28)
"must you ever show that you love
me. But they cast not a glance at my
I cannot be torn from my place and little window, but with inflated
time. pinions and half-closed, sleepy
We are poets. Our words have eyes pass quietly over the laugh-
loved, ing waters.
but we are separately doomed to The last to arrive are the birds
solitude. of ebony. The moonlight pllys
I cannot bear your loving glances." sadly upon
their black plumage,
and is seen
reflected in their
Coffined in his sleepless rooms, great, pale yellow eyes. How
he poisons himself with laudanum. strange the moonlight looks when
He thinks of the thousand ways he seen in their sad, watery, yellow
will kill her. eyes. They are birds of ill-omen
He sees her ravaged on a river- forever croaking Nevermore . And
bank, it is a fitting end. Let us pull
imprints on her breasts of a legion down the heavy black shade, and
of rapists. retire from the window. The migra-
He sends a gibbering orangutan tions are over, and the cold sere
to stuff her corpse up the nearest winter is at hand. Let us light a
chimney. little fire, and dream by the fire-
He bricks her in with her poetry. side. Let us dream of the equator,
He puts her mother beneath the of the warm South, of the sunny,
pendulum of the happy South. Yes, let us
(the more she talks, the faster it dream.
falls)
He sets her sister adrift in a raft,
circling the Maelstrom ominously. BRIEFLY NOTED
A raven persists on her window Grue Magazine #9 (Hell's
ledge. Kitchen Productions, P. O. Box
The Red Death comes to Benefit 370, Times Square Station, NY,
Street. NY 10108), $9.00 (checks pay-
able to Peggy Nadramia).
At vision's height he dresses and
walks This latest fine-looking issue
the darkened brick alleys of Provi- of one of the new small press
dence. horror magazines features a
He climbs the steep hill to her
number of interesting items,
corner, including stories by Wayne
spies the darkened windows above. Allen who recently had
Sallee,
He will stand here till dawn, a story Year's Best Horror
in
deceived by the rustle of curtain, XV and Wilum Pugmire, who
,
the imagined flickerings of candles, recently had a story in Cutting

the creak of floorboards and stairs, Edge There are poems by
.
the glint of moonlight on door knob. Denise Dumars and Joseph

The clean sunrise will banish him, Payne Brennan, and art by
burning away his ardent love, Crypt regulars Lance Brown,
his ineffectual revenge, Allen Koszowski, Peter H.
leaving him an empty vessel again, Gilmore, Jim Garrison, Chris
drifting from this friendless seaport. Pelletiere, and others.
.
FROM THE VAULTS OF YOH VOMBIS

By Lin Carter
Materials Towards a Theory that COINCIDENCE is

either a Powerful Force of Nature Hitherto .
Unrecognized as Such or the Interactions with

,
Human History of a Mischievous and Demiurgic

Intelligence of Superhuman Power
Fourteen years before the Ti- to fall victim to the Nazis when
tanic on its maiden voyage, struck
. Hitler took Paris some years be-
an iceberg on an April night and fore.
sank, with the loss of some fifteen Perhaps Goethe knew what he
hundred lives, a minor American was talking about.
science-fiction writer named Morgan * * *
Robertson published (in 1898) a The school exercise-books of the

story in which a super-liner on its young Napoleon are preserved. The
maiden voyage struck an iceberg very last of them ends with this
one night in April and sank, with unfinished note: "Saint Helena, a
the loss of fifteen hundred lives. small island"
Robertson's invented super-liner It was in guarded exile on that
displaced 70,000 tons, was 800 feet small island that Napoleon ended
long, carried three thousand pas- his days.
sengers, and was powered by three * * *
propellers (sheer fantasy, at the Dante, in the Divine Comedy ,
time of writing ) gave an exact description of the

Fourteen years later. Titanic Southern Cross, a constellation that
was launched. It displaced 66,000 is invisible Europe (for that
in
tons, was 828 1 /2 feet long, carried matter, in the entire northern hem-
two thousand, two hundred and isphere), and a constellation which
twenty-seven passengers and crew, no traveller in Dante's time could
and was powered by three pro - ever possibly have seen.
pellers . * * *
Titanic sank with the loss of M. P. Shiel published a story in

1522 lives. which an organization of military
Robertson's imaginary liner sank structure, composed of monstrous
with the loss of 1500 lives. and sadistic criminals, ravished a
He called his ship Titan. future Europe of his imagination,
* * *
purging it of those of "inferior
"
Coming events cast their shad- blood." His story was entitled
ows before." Goethe. "The S.S."
* * *
It was published in 1896.
Atthe first hour of the Libera- * * *
tion of Paris near the end of the Marxism was first implanted, and
Second World War, the first Allied flourished mightily, in the soil of
tank entered Paris through the Russia the one country which Karl
famous Porte d'Orleans. Marx himself predicted would prove
It was through that gate that impervious to his theories.
the victorious Napoleon had entered * * *
Paris at the head of his conguering An irregularity of three seconds
army a century or more before. in the orbit of Mercury sufficed to
The driver of that very first destroy Newton's theory and to
Allied tank was M. Henri Rathenau. justify Einstein's.
His uncle, Walther Rathenau, As Newton had predicted.
had been the first citizen of Paris * * *
Lammas 1987 / 49
Swift, "Voyage to Laputa"

in his Venus de Milo, to a child, is ugly,
published on October 28, 1726, de- for it lacks a head and arms. When
scribed the sizes, the distances we adjust to her completeness . . .
from their primary, and the periods she is beautiful. More, she is
of rotation of the two moons of Beauty."
Mars with such incredible accuracy, Charles Fort
that when the twin moons were * * *
actually discovered one hundred "If I make a mistake, I conclude
and fifty-one years later, in 1877, that, after all, exist: for only he
I
by Asaph Hall, the astronomer, that does not exist cannot ever
realizing the fact of this incredible make a mistake."
coincidence (his phrase), was
St. Augustine
seized with utter panic (again, * * *
his phrase), and impulsively named "Lavoisier proved meteorites can-
the moons Phobos and Deimos . not exist by stating: 'It is impos-
. . Fear and Terror . sible for stones to fall from the sky
One cannot quite imagine Hall's because there are no stones in
emotions, on later computations, the sky.'
realizing that the periods of rota- Simon Newcomb proved that it
tion of the Martian moons, which would be impossible for airplanes
Swift predicted , are not only un- to fly since an airship heavier than
known in astronomy, but contrary air was an impossibility.
to ballistic theory . He also is re- So it goes on."
ported to have been alarmed to
Pauwels Bergier,
realize that the moons seemed to The Morning of the Magicians
have appeared "quite suddenly"
* * *
they were somehow not visible on
the very night before he discovered "The nomads in the desert have
them, at least not to observation by seventeen different words for sand,
a telescope much more powerful and every one a curse."
than the one with which, a night
Sir Richard Francis Burton
later, he saw them. * * *
Many
years later, Robert S. Bright isthe ring of words
Richardson of the Mount Palomar When the right man rings them.
Observatory remarked on this, Fair is the fall of songs
perhaps whimsically, that "maybe When the singer sings them.
they just weren't there the night ,
Still they are carolled and said.
before Asaph Hall saw them."
* * * On wings they are carried
After the singer is dead
THINGS TO THINK ABOUT TODAY And the maker buried.
"Truth never prevails in histo-
Robert Louis Stevenson
ry; but her adversaries always * * *
perish in the end." "It's a question of energies,

Max Karl Ernst Planck really. Where do creative energies
* * *
come from? If one has them, how
"We are living at a time when does one best use them? When they
history is holding its breath, and run down, how does one recharge
the present is detaching itself from them? joyous
It's a problem. It's
the past like an iceberg that has also responsibility,
a you see, all
broken away from its icy moorings by itself. guess, a primary re-
I
to sail
across the boundless ocean." sponsibility. And one just can't be

Arthur C. Clarke
*
totally responsible for everything.
* *
Few master chefs take out the gar-
"By 'Beauty' mean that which
I
bage. The day just isn't that long.
seems complete. Obversely, that No one's energies are that great."
the
the
incomplete,
ugly.
the mutilated, is
Gregory Mcdonald,
But this is untrue. The Fletch's Moxie (1982)
. !
"Moxie, do you think there are vidson, George Macdonald Fraser,

different rules for creative people?" Fritz Leiber, John D. MacDonald,
"Sure. There have to be special Dr. Seuss,* Jack Vance, P. G.
rules for being that alone." Wodehouse.
Ibid. . . . I was about to type up the
* * *
list for my column, when I realized
(GOOD epigraph for a work of that a few of the writers listed
horror fiction): above had died since first put I
Every night and every morn this list together. Then relaxed; I
Some misery
and smiled, knowing that it really
to are born.
didn't matter. At any given mo-
Every morn and every night
Some are born to Sweet Delight. ment in history, 99.9 percent of
the best writers are dead ones.
Some are born to Sweet Delight. * * *
Some are born to Endless Night.
Into my heart an air that kills
--William Blake
Auguries of Innocence From yon far country blows:
What are those blue, remembered
* * *
hills.
If ever should write an auto-
I What spires, what farms, are those?
biography (which certainly never I
That is the land of lost content,

will, writers' autobiographies de-
I see itshining plain.
generating as they do into simple
matters of "and then wrote"), I
The happy highways where I went
should call it All Could See
And will not come again.
I
From Where Stood A marvelous

I .
I
A.* E. Houseman
* *
title for something of an autobio-
graphical nature it comes ... lieve
"I don't
in
believe
Unemployment,
in hell.
but
I be-
don't
from a remarkable poem by Edna I
believe in hell."
St. Vincent Millay, a poem of which
I have long been perhaps inordi- Tootsie (the film)
* * *
nately fond
"No man can ever say that his
All could see from where
I stood I has been a successful life."
Was three tall mountains, and a T. H. White
wood. * A A
I turned and looked the other way. "It is the thing we don't expect
And saw three islands in a bay. that usually happens."
The world sloped off to either side L. Frank Baum
No wider than the heart is wide. The Emerald City of Oz
And up above me stretched the
sky.
*Eyebrows will lift and skeptics will
opine that the Guru is losing his
No higher than the soul is high .
marbles, listing a "children's writ-
er" Dr. Seuss on his list of favor-
Vet all I saw from where I stood ite living writers. But Dr. Seuss
Was three tallmountains, and a is the finest living Nonsense poet,
wood with the death of Walt Kelly, and
* * *
has mastered Surrealism in pop il-
Some years ago I compiled a lustration to a degree we have not
list of my favorite living writers. seen since George Herriman drew
The ran as follows: Georg Luis
list "Krazy Kat and long may he
Borges, Leigh Brackett, Italo Cal- wave
vino, Agatha Christie, Avram Da- Lin Carter
. . Moxie, do you think there are different rules for
.
creative people?
. . Sure. There have to be special rules for being that
.
alone.
And some are born for Endless Night .
Lammas 1987 / 51
THE KEEPER AT THE CRYPT

By Carl T. Ford
back to the dark and

Welcome since.
dreadful dimensions of the Love- The game began with a series of
craftian gaming world. It has been investigations into the background
suggested that this column should of David Lynse at various libraries
attempt to do a little more than in the area. We managed to uncover
merely inform readers of new Call a few vital facts which were to later
of Cthulhu releases, and, perhaps, help us with our enquiries. Lynse
try to pull the attentions of those had for several years been a popu-
ghouls who don't usually devour lar compiler of tomes concerning
the gaming side of the Lovecraftian witchcraft and the black arts; some
league. of these works had been originally
Many Lovecraftians remain, sad- written in England and spanned the
ly, a stuck in the swamps of
little past twenty years. Obviously,
serious study and have been known Lynse was quite an authority on
to sneer their fangs at those the subject. Looking up a volume
amongst us who gather in black of Who's Who , we were surprised
catacombs, around a candlelit table- to learn that Lynse had left Britain
top and play out a series of adven- amid controversy concerning a se-
tures based on Lovecraftian lore. ries of "blasphemous" scenes in-
However, once they too have volving "devil worship" where it
dabbled their tentacles into the was claimed several members of his
rulebooks, such Cthulhoids have cult were never found again. Hmm,
been known to change their stand I thought, they've been murdered
on the matter. Cahan Wilson once by Lynse and perhaps used as sac-
gave Call of Cthulhu a splendid rifices. A little more investigation
write-up in a Twilight Zone article, led us to the home of Lynse.
and so did reviewers of the game From the moment we arrived at
in past editions of Nyctalops and the Manor, nothing seemed to go
our very own Crypt of Cthulhu . as planned. The Keeper running
So, in an attempt to preach to the game constantly kept us on
the unconverted, I'd like to give our toes giving us a scare a min-
readers a brief synopsis of the ute. In the gardens, we spied a
very first Cthulhu scenario which tall, gaunt-looking butler in the
I had the misfortune to investigate. act of burying a large shaggy,
The adventure was entitled "Brim- black dog. The house seemed to
stone at the Club of the Black be filled with guests, well versed
Arts," a short plot written by a in occult lore obviously, as far as
pal of mine, on a grey winter day I was concerned, none were to be
a few years back. trusted. Lynse, we were told,
The plot went something like was away on business. We were
this . . My character, a full-time
. led to our rooms, along cobweb-
journalist for The New York Times shrouded corridors and had to
was called upon to investigate the share a bathroom which played
recent disappearance of a fellow home for a couple of black rats.
writer, who was engaged in helping Lynse's library housed a num-
a certain author compile a book on ber of arcane tomes, none of which
dubious cults. She was last seen meant anything to my inexperienced
visiting the author, David Lynse, investigator. Traces of dog hair
at his home in the shadowed dis- were uncovered here and there,
trict of Arkham two weeks previ- which led to me enquiring about
ously and had failed to contact the the hound we had witnessed being
Times or her family and friends buried in the yard. "A family
pet" we were informed "which had about to ring true yet again.
sadly been shot" following a severe Further incidents over dinner
case of distemper. That didn't and a mysterious occurrence over-
surprise me: anyone spending a heard in a room down the corridor
few nights in this place was bound led us to search a guest's room,
to go crazy after a while. where we discovered a secret panel
That night spent the evening
I
leading to a stairway to the cellars.
watching the shadows in my room, The next two hours of play man-
not daring to close my eyes, lest aged to unravel the mystery. But
someone creep in during the night no, the Butler didn't do it.
and stick a rat down my pyjamas. Lynse
wasn't dead and neither was my
Unfortunately, it had been a long journalist pal. It turned out that
day and fell asleep counting black
I
he was a lycanthrope in the Lon
shaggy greyhounds jumping over Chaney, Jr., mould. Once we be-
hurdles. gan to piece together the shreds,
The next
morning discovered
I
the clues all fit into a perfect puz-
that message had been pushed
a zle. The dead dog had in fact
under my door during the night, been a werewolf. A closer inspec-
requesting a secret rendezvous at tion of its body would have re-
an inn five miles away. The strange vealed a shot wound caused by the
scribbler informed me that he had good old silver bullet. Earlier
some "information" which might books written by Lynse on the sub-
help me with my enquiries. Could jects of Lycanthropy had failed to
it be Lynse? Surely, the butler register strongly. We had been
had seemed a little too helpful to- more interested in searching for
wards my plight of wishing to meet clues connecting the whole thing
Lynse. Maybe Lynse wasn't re- to the workings of Cthulhu and
sponsible for my associate's disap- co.
pearance after all. And there cer- only blinked at the details
I've
tainly seemed no evidence linking of the whole plot. Needless to say,
the author to black magic rituals, the likes of Cthulhu didn't pop up
from the evidence uncovered follow- in the whole game, despite several
ing two rather daring searches of "side-plots" thrown in to confound
the house that later ensued. us. The game remained a very
I arrived at the proposed ren- scary experience, though
dezvous and recognized a man from must I
admit to not being able to convert

the house, who told me that Lynse my fear onto paper very well, in
had invited a number of leading such a small account of the sce-
writers with a vast knowledge of nario.
occult lore to help him prepare his
What have done,
I
hope, is let I
new volume. This man had also readers know that Call of Cthulhu
noticed the disappearance of several isn't just monster bashing. During
guests recently, and he had also that whole game, none of the char-
seen one of Lynse's jackets, cov- acters carried guns, and it wasn't
ered in bloodstains, being disposed a "Cthulhu monsters vs. investi-
of by the butler on a bonfire, just
gators" scenario.
the day before the man had an-
Next time someone says Call of
nounced that Lynse was away on Cthulhu is a silly game where Love-
business. craft's creations are described in
The scenario had taken on a pin-point detail with statistics, and
different track of investigation. where a Great Old One pops up in
Lynse, was certain, was now a
I
every game to frighten the life out
victim of the macabre plot. be- I of the players, you'll know better.
lieved he was dead and that the The game, its at
best, is about
old cliche "The Butler did it" was
investigation and deduction.
Lammas 1987 / 53
NO IU 111
I'
MIK Kl M)IKS
Wltl'l tORMH
fit I III (
( II
I
I
III III! M\IHOS
l>l < till I III
DAGON
T.E.D. KLEIN
Special
Articles Include
A Developing Series of Generic Forms bv
Ramsey Campbell The Events at Poroth
Farm and the Literature of Horror by S. T. Joshi
Kleins God by Peter Cannon Lovecrafts
Influence on T.E.D. Klein by Robert M. Price
Exclusive Interview Biography

Complete Bibliography.
Plus first publication of a chapter cut from the
authors novel The Ceremonies and Well-
Connected horror fiction by T.E.D. Klein.
Illustrated by Dave Carson, Allen Koszowski,
Martin McKenna and Gahan Wilson.
from CARL FORD,
Double issue special - $6 (incl. P&P)
11 Warwick Road, Twickenham,
U.S. dollars cash only - no cheques
Middlesex TW2 6SW England.
DAGON PRESS HAUNTERS

Is pleased to announce the
special publications series.
first release in its OF THE DARK
by Dave Carson
HAUNTERS
<>i nu A beautifully produced portfolio illustrating
Lovecraftian nightmares by the
DARK masters of the mythos.
\\l> HI 111 K Signed and limited to 450 copies.
IO\U K\l II \\ HORRORS
6 Black & White Plates
illustrating
THE WHISPERER IN DARKNESS
THE GABLE WINDOW
THE TOMB HERD
THE SHAMBLER FROM THE STARS
THE BURROWERS BENEATH
THE HOUND
Presented in a lavish fold-out cover
with a foreword by Ramsey Campbell.
S12 (incl. Post < Packing)

U.S. dollars cash only
Available from Carl Ford, 11 Warwick Road,
Twickenham, Middlesex TW2 6SW England
ADVICE TO THE MAIL=CALL OF CTHULHU

(continued from page 68)
LOVECRAFTLORN Iagree strongly with Mr. Lotus'
LETTERS TO LIBIDIA comments on Mythos fiction in the
"Mail-Call" of #48, and would wish
to see an issue of Crypt of Cthulhu
Dear Libidia, devoted to fan Mythos fiction only
am a mite confused. if edited with the utmost ruthless-
I
Out here
in rural North Central Massachu- ness, i.e., no stories printed be-
setts, a girl like me don't get to cause they were "pretty good" fan
meet many eligible
beaus, young Mythos stories or "pretty good"
so my kindly
old paw has arranged fan Mythos stories. If a story is
a blind
date for me. He sez this not worth printing simply because
it is a good fan Mythos story no
feller not from around these
is ,
parts "but between them" (paw's amount of equivocation, no attempt

a great kidder). to qualify its inclusion simply on
know beggars I
can't be choosers, but I'm a trifle the grounds of its source or inten-
worried. Suppose he gits fresh on tions should be allowed. By the
the first date? What should do? I
same token, no story, no matter
how well written, should be pub-
Lavinia W. lished that simply paraphrases one
Dunwich, MA already in the canon. Enough of
this benevolent parasitism has been
Dear Lavinia, tolerated already. A shoggoth by
any other name would smell as foul.
Well, it certainly is refreshing Please help me twist Harry O.
to see that old-fashioned morals Morris' arm until he releases a
aren't a thing of the past! But, hardbound expanded edition of
Lavinia, let me suggest that you the excellent Songs of a Dead
trust your old dad. "Father knows Dreamer by Thomas Ligotti. have I
best," you know! You may think been afraid to enjoy my copy too
of this as a simple date, but you much for fear it would disintegrate
never know what might come of it. within a few years, and of what
I think you'll find that after this value would a limited edition rag
night on the town, the old adage be? Besides this, the book de-
"Every date is a potential mate" served wider circulation than 300
has taken on a whole new meaning. copies could possibly have given it.
And one more thing, sweetheart,
forget all that stuff on TV about

James Rockhill
South Bend, IN
condoms: the condom hasn't been
made that could do much good here. No. 48 of Crypt was another
Trust me on this one. excellent issue.'* especially en-
I
Libidia Gillman
joyed the Thomas Ligotti story.
Let's see soma: more of his work
in the future, ''cj
Thomas R. Hall III

Durham, NC
Subs CRYPT t ions
One
year's subscription (8
issues) costs $36 in the USA
COMING SOON
and Canada, $44 in Western
Europe, and $47 in Australia. Cromlech: The Journal
Pay in U. S. funds, and
of Robert E. Howard
indicate first issue.
Criticism #2
Lammas 1987 / 55
SOFT BOOKS
89 Marion Street, Toronto, Ontario,

Canada, M6R 1E6
We buy and sell Arkham, Berkley, Cape, Dobson, Doubleday,

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We have also published selected works by H. P. Lovecraft,

plus Lovecraft criticism and bibliographies. At The Root, Cats
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F orthcoming items include: William Hope Hodgson: A

Bibliography and Periodical Appearances.
of Books Clark
Ashton Smith: The Books. Les Bibliotheques, etc., etc., etc
Send For Free Catalogue

Rlyeh Review
Robert Bloch, Through Time and psychoanalysts that line up a little
Space with Lefty Feep Creatures . more one way or the other along
at Large (P. O. Box 687, Pacifica, the bias. "Picture" and "The
CA 94044), paper, 258 p. $12.95. Spoiled Wife" are played strictly for
Robert laughs, dealing respectively with
Bloch, Midnight Plea -
sures NY, Doubleday, he, 177 p.
.
why you should always take the
$12.95. devil at his word and Robert Bloch
titles literally. "The Rubber Room"
(Reviewed by Stefan Dziemianowicz) and "Nocturne" are plunges into
psyches that could use a little
Some of Robert Bloch's dark fan- housecleaning. The most interest-
tasies bear a striking resemblance ing story is "The Totem Pole," a
to his lighter ones. In terms of 1939 Weird Tales piece that is nei-
their delivery they set you up, ther great nor terrible. It has
throw a curve or two and knock been reprinted only once before, as
you over with a punchline. You one of four stories in Sea-Kissed ,
certainly wouldn't mistake the hor- a British paperback that beat The
ror of stories like "Catnip" or "The Opener of the Way into print.
Beasts of Barsac" for humor, but Of course there are Robert Bloch
their ironic conclusions are as stories that defy you to take them
amusing as they are gruesome. seriously, none more so than the
This is such a recognizable trade- Lefty Feep series. Their titles
mark that Bloch used it on himself alone "Son of A Witch," "Jerk the
in "The Closer of the Way," a 1977 Giant Killer," "Time Wounds All
story that appropriates elements Heels" warn you that Bloch is
from "The Feast in the Abbey" to going for something a little lower
lampoon, among other things, his than the throat: the rib.
weakness for strong last lines. Bloch's hapless (and luckless)
A number of stories in this vein gambler, whose taste in business
can be found in Midnight Pleasures , associates is as bad as his taste in
a potpourri collection of Bloch's clothing and who is such a happen-
contributions mostly to magazines ing guy that he never speaks in a
and original anthologies of the last verb tense staler than the present,
decade. On the darker side of first appeared in the April 1942
irony, you have "The Night Before Fantastic Adventures. This was
Christmas" and "Everybody Needs followed by sixteen consecutive en-
a Little Love." The latter, a story cores, seven return engagements
about a man and his manneguin, and a late '50s booking in a fan
even begins with the narrator as- magazine. After nearly thirty years
suming what's happening is a joke, of silence, it was beginning to look
only to end up more serious than like Lefty had gotten the hook for
anyone could imagine more ambig- good, but no such luck. Los t in
uous, too, since, for once, the Time and Space with Lefty Feep
clincher complicates more things collects the first seven Feep fan-
than it clears up. For lighter tasies and adds a new one written
fare, Bloch takes serious subjects especially for the book. Its long
like the violence-obsessed world of introductory interview is informa-
"Die-Nasty" and the self-absorbed tive both with regard to the series
society of "But First These Words" and Bloch's writing for the pulps
for a joy ride around the lunatic in general.
fringe. The stories have a formula no
The rest of the stories are a one can seem to lose the recipe for:
roundup of Bloch's usual suspects Bob, the narrator, is trying to
fading movie types, valueless kids. survive a typically toxic meal at
Lammas 1987 / 57
Jack's Shack when in straggles by Richard Rothstein, starring Bud

Lefty Feep, "the biggest liar in Cort. (NBC TV-movie, broadcast
seven states." Feep proceeds to July 5, 1987)
serve up his own Bull-Plate Specials
(what might be best described as (Reviewed by Robert M. Price)
ham with corn, smothered in Run- "Bloch must be talking to his
yon), in which he consorts with lawyers right now," said my wife
witches, wizards and weirdos about about forty minutes into this trav-
as effortlessly as he does with esty. Bloch spoke prophetically
bookies. last year, after the release of
Feep's adventures turn pre- Psycho III , when he mused that
existing tall tales into taller tales eventually we would see Abbott and
Rip Van Winkle in "Time Wounds Costello Meet Norman Bates On .
All Heels" and "Gather Round the July 5, they met him. To Psycho
Flowing Bowler," the Pied Piper in fans, even fans of the Psycho se-
"The Pied Piper Meets the Gesta- quels like me. Bates Motel has only
po," Jack and the Beanstalk in the mild interest of. say, that old
"Jerk the Giant Killer," the Midas Saturday Night Live skit "The Nor-
touch in "Lefty Feep's Golden Op- man Bates School of Motel Manage-
portunity," flying carpets in "Son ment," only this skit is nearly two
of a Witch." There's really little hours long and doesn't feature
plot to them. They're more a show- Anthony Perkins. It is strictly
case for period slang, Bloch's ad Psycho marginalia.
copy wit and more groaners than Bates Motel is a direct sequel
you can shake a schtick at. The to Psycho ignoring Psycho II and
,
most unforgivable thing about them III .though features from both
is that in every one Bloch takes films are silently stolen. The intro
you right up to the brink and sequence with dawn coming up
leaves you hanging there just long behind the Bates house is right out
enough to scream for the end. Then of the intro of Psycho II as is the ,
he uncorks a mordant pun, as Meg Tilly analogue. The averted

though to say "You asked for it!" suicide in the bathtub and the
The best of the batch is "The visiting party crowd come from last
Weird Doom of Floyd Scrilch," prob- summer's Psycho III .
ably because it's the one with the Norman Bates appears briefly in
most original idea: Did you ever the film in a flashback sequence,
wonder why those trusses, hair played by someone who looks pass-
restorers and gewgaws advertised ably like the young Perkins. Twen-
at the back of magazines never ty-five years later he dies with no
work for you? It's because they're explanation, having left the house
made for- the average American, and motel to an abused patricide he
which neither you nor Iare. Floyd befriended in the asylum, who like
Scrilch, on the other hand, is so Norman himself in Psycho II is re- .
average, that once they begin to leased and reopens the Bates Motel.
work for him, he can't get them The movie makes other, point-
to stop. less, changes in the Psycho
But you really can't single out mythos. Fairvale becomes Fairville,
one Lefty Feep story. They have a and Norma Bates becomes Gloria;
cumulative effect on you that makes the motel is loathsomely updated in
them hard to put down. Sort of a California hacienda-style.
like eating a bag of potato chips at To befair, the movie has a de-
one sitting: you know it's prob- cent plot-germ, though hardly an
ably not good for you, but just original one. Alex West, Norman's
try and stop. Those with re- heir, gets a loan from a banker
stricted tastes, take heed two who obviously drools over the de-
more collections are planned. velopment possibilities of the land,
opportunities Alex is sacrificing by
Bates Motel, written and directed not tearing down the motel and
)
building condos instead. Said

greedy banker floats the rumor that
old Mrs. Bates haunts the place, SHEET LIGHTNING
then proceeds to fake killings (no
one actually dies in this would-be poems by Denise Dumars
Psycho IV ) and at the last even
! ,
masquerades as Mother. It's all a

The long-awaited first chap-
classic weird-menace strategem.
book by Ms. Dumars is now
But even this passable plot gets
available($4.00 each). Make
swamped by the show's innumerable
cheques payable to Todd Meck-
weaknesses.
lem. Mail your order to:
The humor doesn't fit; it would
be painful to detail any of it. Three Terata Publications
quarters of the way into it, a new P. O. Box 810
subplot emerges, the attempted Hawthorne, CA 90251
suicide, and gobbles up the show.
At first this seems utterly unex-
plainable until you realize Bates
Motel is a failed TV series pilot!
(You are never told this on TV; I
only found out from TV Guide .
Suddenly it all falls into place: OTHER CRYPTIC PUBLICATIONS

first we have to establish the frame
for all the rest of the programs, Shudder Stories #1 $4.00
the functioning of the motel under Shudder Stories #2 $4.00
new and benign management, then Shudder Stories #3 $4.00
we have to squeeze in a sample epi- Shudder Stories #4 $4.00
sode. In it a beautiful aerobics Shudder Stories #6 $4.50
instructor (what else in a network Risque Stories #1 $4.00
TV production?) is rescued from Risque Stories #2 $4.00
suicide by a bunch of prom kids Risque Stories #3 $4.00
who turn out to be ghosts of sui- Risque Stories #5 $4.50
cides themselves. Thus the series Two-Fisted Detective Stories
Bates Motel would have been a kind by Robert E. Howard . . $4.50
of cross between Fantasy Island The Adventures of Lai Singh
and Amazing Stories Like the plot . by Robert E. Howard . . $3.00
itself, this is blunderingly ill-con- Pay Day by Robert E.
ceived. A series set in Norman's Howard $3.50
stomping grounds just might have Lewd Tales by Robert E.
worked as an 80s version of the Howard $4.00
Addams Family: outright macabre Lurid Confessions #1 . . . . $4.00
comedy, not the typically hesitant, Tales of Lovecraftian
neither fish nor fowl, half-baked Horror $4.00
product of the nitwit networks. Cromlech: The Journal of
But don't kid yourself that the Robert E. Howard Criti -
professional incompetents in net- cism $3.50
work TV would've been able to Verses Dedicatory by
pull that off decently either. Other Lord Dunsany, Lin
unmistakable marks of the TV genre Carter (ed. ) $2.00
include an unbearable typical History 6 Chronology of
smart-mouth girlfriend character the Book of Eibon by
whom kept hoping someone would
I Lin Carter $1.00
stab.
Ican only hope that if Anthony Outside of USA and Canada,
Perkins gets the itch to make add $1.00 per booklet for
Psycho V he won't let this piece
I postage. Pay in U. S. funds.
of junk stop him and that he won't
get Richard Rothstein to write it.
"
Lammas 1987 / 59
MAIL-CALL OF CTHULHU
The last several issues of Crypt I have already commented upon in
have been a delight, particularly a previous letter, but should I
the Kuttner issue. In regards to state that much of it, despite my

letters regarding the sad lack of a complaints, is enjoyable and sev-
collection of Kuttner's best macabre eral stories were excellent.
tales, hope that James Turner of
I In Lin Carter's description of
Arkham House realizes such a book Great Tales of Terror and the Su -
is long overdue, and that Arkham pernatural in his review of Alberto
is perhaps the only publisher who Manguel's Black Water he says:
could do it justice. ". Great Tales was a superb
. .
There are a couple of writers compilation of classic horror, in-

who seem (thus far) to be over- cluding absolutely every famous
looked by your scribes, Donald and weird gem you ever heard of (from
Howard Wandrei. Howard Wandrei, 'The Yellow Wallpaper' to 'The Yel-
in addition to writing a number of low Sign,' and not excluding Love-
very fine stories both under his craft) ..." Although the use
own name and the name of H. W. of two "Yellow" classics as a frame
Guernsey, was a remarkably skilled to establish inclusiveness is strik-
artist who Lovecraft thought highly ingly effective. Great Tales con-
of; Wandrei seemed at the
Donald tains neither tale. The phrase
end of the 30s to be the heir to thus becomes ludicrous, unless Mr.
Lovecraft, Smith, and Howard as Carter has in his possession a rare
far as the readership of Weird Tales variant edition of this classic an-
was concerned. thology. By Wise and Fraser's
Early catalogues from Arkham rather strict standards, "The Yel-
list a number of projects from the low Sign" would probably have
bros. Wandrei, including "Time been relegated to the category of
Burial" and "Orson is Here" by many hundreds read, "many of
Howard, and "Colossus" by Donald, them commonplace, many of them
along with two collections of the unfortunately sheer trash" men-
art of Howard Wandrei. Perhaps tioned in the "Introduction to the
these works still exist in the files Notes.
of Arkham House, or perhaps the Mr. Carter, your "Adult Fantasy
manuscripts have passed into the Series" for Ballantine has to have
hands of private collectors. It is been the greatest effort ever made
hoped that these have not, like the to successfully bring quality fan-
ms. of Smith's "Infernal Star," tasy before the public at large. I
vanished forever . . . reread and treasure every volume

John Pelan I could find, despite the fact that
Seattle, WA I have found other editions of the
same works. Thank you for call-
Crypt is grand reading material, ing attention to many works we may
the real Weird Tales of the otherwise have missed, but please
eighties! research such items as the quite
Shawn Ramsey acceptable older alternation of "i"
Anderson, IN for "j" and "u" for "v" used par-
ticularly in the Romance languages,
have found the reading of your
I before ridiculing the source of
magazine delightful and addictive. the pen name, Voltaire, as you did
The essays and several of the let- in Dragons, Elves and Heroes .
ters in each issue prove stimulat- James Rockhill

ing. especially appreciate seeing
I South Bend, IN
discussion of the essays in the
"Mail-Call of Cthulhu." The fiction, I found Crypt of Cthulhu a week
ago in London by chance. I'm a fortune to contact them. It is this

long-time-admirer of H. P. Love- element of humankind's ignorance
craft and his works and interested which I tried to strongly communi-
in all related material. Your mag- cate in "IG" and which, by
azine fascinated and amused me at readers' estimates, was at least
I
the same time. found it a de- I moderately successful.

lightful lecture and want to see Ibelieve, also, that the Mythos
more of it. cannot be so qualified that anyone

Robert N. Bloch can say just what it "should" be or
Giessen, West Germany do. The Mythos, like every arena
of belief or expression, is plainly
I picked up Crypt #47 in For- open to as many interpretations as
bidden Planet. read the Crypt I there are interpreters, and the in-
on the train home, and almost stillation of cosmic fear at the utter
flipped my lid upon reading Peter inconsequence and ultimate power-
Cannon's "Bookshop" tale! When I lessness of the human race is only
got to the part where the cat flips one of the many legitimate objects
the pages. laughed out loud (no
I of a Mythos tale.
doubt drawing strange looks from Ivery much appreciate readers'
the other passengers). defense of the "IG" story, as well

Scott Briggs as Mr. Dziemianowicz's thoughtful
Levittown, NY consideration of their opinions.
Henry J. Vester III
My purpose for the
principal Windsor, CA
penning of this
pernicious palimp-
sest is to reply
Stefan Dziemia-to
nowicz's "Innsmouth Gold Revis- Thanks for Crypt #48. On page
ited," which appeared in the Rood- 29, Carter derives "Thomyris,
mas issue of Crypt of Cthulhu . Queen of Scythia," from a forgotten
Although Mr. Dziemianowicz's poem by Swinburne. The original
estimation of my tale does not seem Tomyris (Herodotos, I, 205-14) was
to be shared by those readers a Queen of the Massagetai, nomadic
whose opinions I've heard, find I steppe-dwellers like the Scythians
that cannot wholly disagree with
I
but living east of them, in what
his major complaint: that the story would now be the Kazak and Turk-
did not "take us to a realm beyond men Soviet Republics.
human ken, one of approximations When Cyrus, the founder of the
and fearsome descriptions that are Persian Empire, had conquered
all the more horrifying because Iran, Mesopotamia, Syria, and Ana-
they cannot be totally understood tolia, he undertook to conquer the
from a human frame of reference." land of the Massagetai also. Tomy-
He's right, in that regard. And, ris promised him that, if he insisted
to that extent, feel that his criti-
I on invading her steppe, she would
cism of "IG" is justified. think, I give him his fill of blood to drink.
however, that my perspective of Cyrus captured part of the Mas-
an effective Mythos tale is somewhat sagetan army by a ruse, but in
broader than Mr. Dziemianowicz's. the end the nomads wiped out the
For me, the Mythos derives a great Persian army. Tomyris fulfilled
deal of its effectiveness from the her promise by dunking Cyrus'
idea that the human race is, for head in a vat of blood.
the most part, completely unaware According to Herodotos, the
that it shares its planet (indeed Massagetai, lacking iron, used
the very cosmos) with a great vari- weapons of bronze. They held
ety of extremely secretive nonhu- their wives in common and, when
man beings, many of whom possess their parents aged, respectfully
perspectives and attributes which sacrificed and ate them.
seem to be positively godlike to L. Sprague de Camp
those humans who have the mis- Villanova, PA
Lammas 1987 / 61
Lin Carter had some interesting fected the publication of Lovecraft's

thoughts on the origins of Irem in stories have much bearing on
Lovecraft's stories. The direct Joshi's or Arkham House's success
source for Irem is entry 47 in in publishing Lovecraft's corrected
Lovecraft's "Commonplace Book," texts. Imerely wished to point out
obtained from
the "Arabia" entry that the editorial hand of August
in his copy of the Encyclopaedia Derleth continues to exert rather
Britannica The legend of the de-
.
strong influence over publication of
struction of the tribes of 'Ad and Lovecraft's work.
Thamood for their sins, obtained
from the same encyclopedia entry,

David E. Schultz
Milwaukee, Wl
was Lovecraft's source for entry 48
in his notebook. After reading the very different
Idon't know why S. T. Joshi reviews of From Beyond by Messrs.
thinks that "familiarity" with the Hoffman and Dziemianowicz, was I
titles of the Arkham House Love- sufficiently intrigued to see the

craft books might not be a factor film, having hitherto been satisfied
in purchase of the books. Let's with Lovecraft's original prose ver-
say that had purchased The Dun-
I
sion. A viewing of the cassette
wich Horror and At the Mountains plus a couple of re-readings of the
of Madness in the last printings text produced a few observations I
of the first editions. And let's would like to share with fellow
say was not especially inter-
I
Crypt readers.
ested in having corrected texts of First, must now agree with
I
Lovecraft's stories; just wanted I

what Ifirst thought to be Hoffman's
to have each Lovecraft story in rationalization that the film's sex-
some form or another. If Arkham perversion aspect was faithful in
House had redistributed the stories spirit to Lovecraft's portrait of the
into different collections arranged mad scientist. Though Lovecraft
chronologically, for example, I never would have thought of it,
might find that couldn't acquire I
this quest along forbidden paths
the Lovecraft stories did not I
for every possible sensation is com-
yet have by buying a single book. pletely true to the character. am I
I could conceivably have to buy only sorry there was no mention of

three new books to obtain the few experiments with hallucinogenic
stories was missing, and having
I
drugs, as this, too, seems natural.
to duplicate the contents of the two Second, though of course Dzie-
volumes already owned.I
There mianowicz is correct that the film is
seems to be a good reason to re- largely a supplement to Lovecraft's
issue the books as the last of the meager episode, really just begin-
old editions went out of print, at ning where "From Beyond" left off,
least from the point of view of the I think have spotted unintended
I
publisher. signals in the text which may have

Regardless of whether there are inspired, in a kind of free-associa-
legal problems with the Lovecraft tional way, the film's expansions.
copyright, it is difficult to conceive As to the horrible transfiguration
how the contents of Dagon could be of Pretorious and his assumption
sequentially altered legally but the into the "beyond" dimension, con-
contents of The Dunwich Horror sider how Lovecraft's narrator de-
ar, d At the Mountains of Madness scribes Tillinghast (the film's Pre-
could not. In any case, my review torious) as "so suddenly metamor-
served to point out that there are phosed to a shivering gargoyle,"
still some irregularities in the Love-
"this shaking parody on man" (p.
craft reprints which have not been,
92, new Arkham edition). Of course
or rather could not be rectified in , Lovecraft only means the mad sci-
the light of recent scholarly discov-
entist has been wasted by his ma-
eries. don't think the factors,
I
nia, but perhaps the scriptwriter
beginning in the 1940s, that af- was inspired by these phrases to
make Pretorious into the shape- the Third Crusade late 12th cen-
l
shifting monster we see in the film. tury A.D.), over four centuries in
Lovecraft actually does at one point his future Surely that must have
.
intimate there is a malignant

that impressed you as curious, Mr.
"beyond" version of the scientist, Editor, to say the least? And ter -
when the narrator beholds "shin- tius that no such passage occurs
ing, revolving spheres" which in m^ use-proven and time- honored
"formed a constellation or galaxy" copy of the Necronomicon .
in the shape of "the distorted face The careful scholar must reject
of Crawford Tillinghast" (p. 95). the whole narrative of the Black
But surely the Barbara Cramp- Lotus out of hand, not merely be-
ton character is totally gratuitous? cause of (obvious) apocryphal ele-
Well, yes, but think I see her I ments, but because there merely
toehold in Lovecraft's text as well. seems to be no reason to accept it.
Our scriptwriter may have run
Joseph Curwen
across these words and taken them
rather wickedly in an unintended Ican't say enough about the
sexual sense: "That Crawford quality of your magazine which
Tillinghast should ever have studied seems only to get better. It has
science and philosophy was a mis- filled up the holes in my reading
take. These things should be left over the last year; besides we
to the frigid and impersonal inves - "outsiders" have to stick together.
tigator . ." (p. 91).
. Voila: Ms.
Shawn Small
Crampton "investigates" the case Sioux City, IA
and goes from horn-rimmed to
horny, thanks to the "vibrator." In his "Notes" on ye translation
So perhaps the film From of Dee's Necronomicon Carter
,
Beyond while not exactly faithful

, writes how members of ye Lovecraft
to Lovecraft's original tale, may Circle ". . obviously had access
.
actually have been inspired by a to a copy of Dee's Necronomicon

detailed reading of the text to a . . ." How can this be so? al- I
greater extent than reviewers have ways understood that one copy of
yet noticed. this translation existed, and was

Phinas Kornegay given to Wilbur Whateley by his
Stump Swamp, NC grandfather. If so, how could
those other gents have access to
fear that you and your equally
I it? If it never was translated, how
illustrious readers have been the did Lin Carter get ahold of it? Did
victim of an hoax: to wit, the he steal it from ye Whateley Farm-
purported passage from the Necro - house? Did Wilbur have it with him
nomicon presented by a certain at ye scene of his death, and did
Mr. Carter in the 98th number of someone get it then and, by means
your amusing journal. My reasons unknown. Carter discovered this
for recognizing the Falseness of it and obtained it? want some an-
I
are these: Primus that the writer

, swers.
seems to think that one achieves "Vastarien," literally, is a
an "archaic" effect by using the haunting tale. Ligotti is superb.
wrong word "bestride"
. when His prose is beautiful, and his
"astride" is meant, "didst" in the imagination unique. When read I
first person, etc. Both Dr. Dee something this wonderful, want to I
and Alhazred (who was a poet of think and work with all my might
repute before he turned to the to, hopefully, produce a tale half
Elder Mysteries) were better, not as good.
to mention more grammatical writers was amazed at Charles Hoff-
I
than that. Secundus that when , man's suggestion that "The House
the Yemenite (c. 750 A.D.) par- in the Oaks" should have been in-
takes of the Black Lotus and views cluded in Baen Books' Cthulhu but ;
the panorama of the Past he sees , then thought that perhaps a Der-
I
)
Lammas 1987 / 63
leth pastiche in a Howard book Say, that Lovecraft fella is not

called Cthulhu wouldn't be so un- only alive, but quick on the draw.
suitable. Such nonsense! In Crypt #85 he not only spots a
The issue reads very well, and typo but ends up in the letter col-
I enjoyed ye diversity. I was umn in the same issue in which the
thrilled to see yet another article typo appears. Impressive.
on "The Hound," one of my favorite You continue to amaze me with
HPL tales. also enjoyed the large
I your fine covers: Brown's un-
number of letters published this earthly mail-men (#86) and Eck-
time. hardt's bizarre pool-thing (#87)
Wilum Pugmire, Seattle, WA were excellent, not to mention Otto
Bumberger's brooding view of the
Crypt Cthulhu continues to
of room in the steeple of the Church
be a marvel. Surely it will be of Starry Wisdom (#88). Wow.
looked back upon as one of the The fiction in issue #87 had
truly great Lovecraftian fanzines. some nice little tidbits in it, most
But, for the present, another notably the tales by Bloch and
charming issue: Cannon. As others have pointed
read
I David Schultzs article out, "The Pool" telegraphed its
on the "Black Magic" quote with ending well in advance. Lin Car-
great interest particularly since it ter's "Behind the Mask" once again
means I'm going to rewrite part of doles out the usual needless catalog
the editorial of the new Weird of Mythos data, much to its detri-
Tales , which mentions the older ment. Turning to Richard Tier-
theory that the black magic quote ney's Simon of Gitta tale, found I
is merely a misremembering (or one brief passage oddly familiar;

deliberate distortion) of the Old on page 32, the mad priest Ar-
Cent's letter to Farnsworth Wright, gonius rants "He'll die before these
5 July 1927 (#9 in Uncollected Let - eyes, and he'll know he'll know
ters ) . hope we've finally tracked
I that it is I, Valerius Argonius, who
this elusive letter to its lair and has brought him to his doom!" Now
staked it through the heart, once compare Baron Harkonnen's raving
and for all. But Farnese's selec- speech from the movie Dune "The :
tive memory seems to fully account Duke will die before these eyes,
for everything, even more than and they'll know they'll know that
Derleth's selective memory. This it is I, Baron Vladimir Harkonnen,
is truly the most widely-travelled who encompasses Dune!" Interest-
misquotation since well, maybe . . . ing parallel, right down to the
the famous last words of the Old final rhyme ("doom" and "Dune").
Guard at Waterloo. ("The Guard I got a kick out of it, anyway.
dies, but it does not surrender." And let's just assume for a mo-
What they actually said was ment that Peter Cannon's story may
"Merde! " have been true. Okay, we'll accept
ToPeter Jeffrey, offer m^ I for the moment that such "impossi-
reading of "The Hound," which is ble" titles as The House of the
what call the Unified Fiend The-
I
Worm and Shaqgai and Others ex-
ory that the two graverobbers ist. But a new collection of T.E.D.
disturbed the grave of this sor- Klein's stories? Get real! The guy
cerer (the skeleton) and that all only writes fiction during the light
subsequent manifestations are mere- of a full moon (or so it seems), so
ly forms or avatars of that sor- how could he possibly come up with
cerer. Bats, hound, everything. "a dozen tales" in the relatively
All of them are but projections of near future say the next three or
his magic/mind. ought to Which four years (about the time it would
teach folks not to steal from graves take for the Campbell/King collabo-
of sinister repute. Great for con- ration to appear)? And the story
trolling juvenile delinquents too. further loses credibility when the
Darrell Schweitzer, Strafford, PA narrator refuses to pay a measly
A
$11.95 for this book! Any Klein a unique talent, though the tale
book is a bargain at twice that! itself brought to mind echoes of
(Just kiddin ,1
all concerned. Chambers, Lovecraft, and Camp-
Cannon's story was very entertain- bell. Very good.
ing, and I'm sure that not a few From the looks of the R'lyeh Re-
fans were drooling over some of the views it appears I'm going to have
imaginary titles on those shelves. to do some hunting again. dis- I
Uh, Pete, just in case the story is agree somewhat with Charles Hoff-
true, you wouldn't be interested in man's review of the REH Cthulhu
xeroxing Shaqgai would you?)
, collection. There js a strong sense
One of the more heartening of "otherworldliness" in "Old Car-
pieces in Crypt #48 was Eileen field's Heart," if not "Pigeons from
McNamara's article on the Lovecraft Hell." The inhuman heart of the
graveside memorial. was pleased
I Indians' "god of the hills," and the
to see that HPL's beloved home- power drives it both hint at
that
town recognized his passing on the something far beyond the ken of
50th anniversary of his death. I man. also I disagree with Hoff-
was quite skeptical at first of Peter man's suggestion about including
Jeffery's exhumation of "The "The Black Bear Bites"; it has
Hound," as I had always thought it practically nothing to do with the
a pretty straightforward tale the occult, let alone the Cthulhu Mythos
hound, the skeleton, and the bats the smugglers are merely using
were three independent entities. these trappings to hide their activi-
The hound killed St. John and re- ties and thus is wisely omitted
turned the amulet to the skeleton, from this collection. On the other
accompanied throughout by the hand, "The Dwellers in the Tombs"
bats. On rereading the tale though, and "The House in the Oaks" are
it seems likely that the hound and conspicuous by their absence. And
the skeleton are somehow very finally, agree with Richard Tier-
I
closely related. Hmm... Schultz's ney's assessment of Fred Chappell's

expose on the probable origin of Daqon :despite a promising start
the infamous "black magic quote" the book seems to trail off about
was enlightening, to say the least. the time Leland kills his wife. En-
I think Don Herron (and/or Dick thralling? Maybe. Cthulhu Mythos?
Tierney) may have been reaching No.
just a bit with the "Ubbo-Sathla is Kevin A. Ross
us " business. (Of course, we "are" Boone, I
Ubbo-Sathla, but the initials are

just a coincidence.) And think
I Personally, would prefer to
I
I've figured out why the Necro - see most fiction, except possibly
nomicon is such a fearsome tome for such things as your special
(James Rockhili take note): if Lin Campbell and Kuttner issues, in a
Carter's "translations" are any in- title such as the Tales publication
dication, the Necronomicon is filled and Crypt left for nonfiction. do I
with utterly abominable, horrible, enjoy much of the fiction, but, at

ghastly fiction. In the end-notes the same time, miss the articles
I
Carter has the gall to claim that when you have an all-fiction issue.
this passage inspired stories by As to the derivation of Dagon,
Lovecraft, Howard, Smith, etc. I suspect that such folk etymologies
Not bloody likely. And here we go as Dagon from dag (fish) tend to
again with this abhorrent genealogi- have a greater validity in Semitic
cal garbage "the Cugs serve the languages than elsewhere, but that
Nameless Mist, son of Googolplex, may be merely a hangover from
late of the planet Ysxgythl, in the reading The Sufis by Idries Shah,
dimension ..." Aaaaargh! Read- wherein much is made of the mean-
ing Thomas Ligotti's fine "Vas- ingful relationships of words from
tarien" after the Carter tale was a the same roots in Arabic.
jarring experience. His is indeed Then there's also the influence
.
Lammas 1987 / 65
of the word-conscious cabalistic published

tradition,even in biblical times (for Lin Carter's "Dreams of the
example, Jachin and Boaz both Black Lotus," on the other hand,
enumerate to 79, whatever that may was merely a good, craftsmanlike
signify), but that subject is best story. Interesting concept, but I
avoided by those of us who nourish think Conan would disagree with

some faint hope of future sanity. Alhazred over where black lotuses
If the name Dagon did not derive really grow, and what they thrive
from dag and denote a fish-god, on . .swamp mud and the green-
.
the average cabalist would be houses of certain semideserted cities

obliged to say that it did. He seem to do just as well as the slime
might cite as further "proof" the of the proto-shoggoths. Carter's
fact that Dagon and dagim nostalgic evocation of The Wind in
("fishes") both enumerate to 57, the Willows in his "Vaults of Yoh-
although that may be stretching it Vombis" column was easily superior,
even for a cabalist. as was his bit on fictional kings
If you want to follow the line of and his compilation of Lilliputian
"reasoning" about dag , there's also words and phrases (who'd want to
the factthat dagah means "to in- go to Lilliput, however? It's inter-
crease or multiply"; that is, it has esting to read about, but certain- I
to do with fertility. The connec- ly wouldn't want to visit an island

tion here is a little closer, since full of nasty, sneaky, three inch
dagah is also used to mean "fish." tallrunts).
Then there's dagan "corn, grain, , A close second to "Vastarien"
bread, nourishment," again con- was Peter F. Jeffery's "Who Killed
nected to the idea of (agricultural) St. John?." Exactly what the mon-
fertility. (It is inconvenient to ster in "The Hound" was was al-
have to mention that degel with , ways a bit hazy; Jeffery at least
the same DG root, if it is a root, explores every possibility, and
means "flag or banner.") In any does it in a very entertaining way.
event, must admit the probability
I
Don Herron's "The Unbegotten
that the name Dagon had origins is Unforgotten" was also a piece
unrelated to the Hebrew language. which really deserved publication.
David F. Godwin One of Derleth's more unpalatable
Dallas, TX additions to the Mythos was his in-
cluding the real origin of the Old
So far, of what I've read of Ones. Herron at least disproves
Crypt #98, my favorite piece has Derleth's frankly disappointing
been Ligotti's "Vastarien." It was theory.
very like a darker version of
Charles Garofalo
Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath , Wayne, NJ
with a less sympathetic protagonist
than Randolph Carter. Like the am
I especially pleased
to see
Sunset City, Vastarien is obviously David E. Schultz's article
on the
a world he created which yet some-
"Black Magic" quote. It is good to
how existed outside of his mind, a see hoary matter finally traced
this
reflection of his memories of life to its source. No doubt this will
(notably claustrophobic and self- be the last word on the subject,
centered) just as Carter's Sunset and about time too! No wonder
City was a development of his poor old August Derleth grew angry
childhood memories. Hard to say when it was suggested that he'd
whether the incident in the book- made the thing up. He must have
store was what really happened or known that he hadn't and yet, no
just Kerion's latest version of why doubt, was unable to trace its
he killed the dream-eater. A very source. imagine him searching
I
good, spooky tale, easily a candi- through HPL's letters for the quote
date for The Best of Crypt of but in vain. He knew the accu-
Cthulhu if such a book is ever sation was false, but could produce
no rebuttal. Now Lovecraft is and atmosphere. Ligotti also ap-

vindicated, in that the nonsense peared in two subsequent numbers
about black magic attributed to him of Harry Morris' magazine. Unfor-
is shown to be the work of another. tunately, there have been no new
Derleth is also vindicated, in that issues of Nyctalops in the past
it is now clear that he perpetuated three or four years, and won- I
no deliberate deception on the pub- dered where (if at all) Ligotti would
lic. have long found it hard to
I
resurface. Last year Silver Scarab's
imagine Derleth stooping to such a Songs of a Dead Dreamer This .
thing, and yet have felt that

I
year . Thanks, Bob.
. . Only
black magic was not in Lovecraft's Lovecraft, Hodgson and M. R.
line. It is exceptionally gratifying James affect me as Ligotti does
to see very gut feelings on the (perhaps, he's been sipping from
matter justified by this excellent the "six and three-quarter quarts"
piece of research. R. Alain Everts mentions in his
am surprised to see an appre-
I
recent monograph).
ciation of The Wind in the Willows As to the argument concerning
(one of my very favourite books) in "potpourri" versus "theme" issues
Crypt of Cthulhu Lin Carter's
.
of Crypt of Cthulhu prefer both. , I
phrase "one of the best books in I'm not all that big on the all-fic-
the whole world" is entirely just. tion but
issues; did enjoy the
I
I do not mind admitting that the CAS, Robert Bloch and Ramsey
"Piper at the Cates of Dawn" chap- Campbell specials. My advice is
ter has repeatedly moved me to to continue as you have been. It's
tears on numerous rereadings. If seen you through forty-eight
Mr. Carter's appreciation leads Crypt s, so far, hasn't it?
some of your readers to widen their Darwin Chismar
literary horizons to include this Anderson, IN
masterpiece, this alone would amply
justify this issue of your magazine. My favorite out of Crypt #48 was
A word of caution to your reader- Thomas Ligotti's "Vastarien." That's
ship may be in order, though. The the first thing of his I've read,
text has now passed out of copy- and it lived up to all the praise
right, but not the illustrations. you and Ramsey Campbell have
Re-illustrated editions therefore heaped on him. Dave Schultz was
abound, but it is well worth seek- admirably meticulous in "The Origin
ing out a copy with the original of Lovecraft's 'Black Magic' Quote."
E. H. Shepard illustrations, which I would like to think that Derleth
delightfully complement the text. didn't accept Farnese's word as
Some of the new illustrated versions gospel out of malice, but that he
are, frankly, a mess. Alas! The was so happy to find something
illustrator's art is no longer invari- that supported his idea of what the
ably what it was in 1908, when The "Cthulhu Mythos" was all about that
Wind in the Willows first appeared. he didn't even think to question it.
One other point that occurs to But dammit, you don't set up the
me is that hope that Mr. Carter
I
interpretive foundation of another
does not intend to subject this book author's works on hearsay! He
to one of his ingenious pastiches. should have checked his facts. In

Peter F. Jeffery his book The Anxiety of Influence ,
Leicester, England Harold Bloom theorizes that poets
and authors distance themselves
Ialways take pleasure in read- from their mentors by unconscious-
ing Crypt of Cthulhu but the in- , ly misreading them. Articles like
clusion of a new Ligotti story con- Schultz's, and Dave Herron's "The
siderably intensified my enjoyment Unbegotten is Unforgotten" make it
of #48. Since reading Ligotti's seem like Derleth had enough anxi-
"The Chymist" in Nictalops 16, I ety of influence for two men.
have admired his command of mood Stefan Dziemianowicz
Lammas 1987 / 67
I have been an ardent reader I'm interested to note your new

and collector of weird fiction for fiction orientation for Crypt A
many years and I am specially in- somewhat risky step but I'm sure
terested in the fiction of H. P. you can manage it properly. The
Lovecraft, Clark Ashton Smith and Thomas Ligotti piece is a great
other Weird Tales authors. "kickoff" item: Lovecraftian in a
Fortunately obtained a copy of
I
broad sense. think HPL would
I
Crypt of Cthulhu #46 from a book have had high praise for Ligotti.
dealer in London. It was the first Also, like Lin Carter's "Yoh-
I
issue of your journal that have I Vombis" column. Please continue

ever read. Iappreciated highly it.
the unpublished letters of Love- Michael J .Lotus
craft to Vincent Starrett and Adol- Chicago, IL
pho de Castro and the articles
of S. T. Joshi and Will Murray A couple of comments on Crypt
("Imaginative Allusions in Love- #45, which upholds your customary
craft's Letters"). was delighted
I high standard of quality.
and stimulated to read more of Will Murray mentions (p. 15) a
Crypt of Cthulhu . reading of "The Rats in the Walls"
Kalju Kirde on "an early, unnamed TV show" by
Goettingen, West Germany (continued on page 68)
A SPECIAL OFFER FOR
CRYPT READERS
This cover portrait of H.PL. is available as a high
issues
quality, 2 color silk screen print. A limited edition of 100
prints, each signed and numbered is available for $8.00
postpaid. Printed on high quality paper, image size is
15 by 20 with black letters against turquoise background.
Contained in the portrait are the complete texts of

The Outsider and Polaris.
To Order Send check or money order to:
Lance Brown
Shipped U.RS. 2424 S.Conant Rd.
with home address. Spencerville, Ohio 45887
.
"apparently no less than Orson best tributes to HPL have ever I
Welles." don't know about Welles,

I read and the best argument so far
but do remember hearing a read-
I presented for devoting greater
ing of "Rats" on a Chicago TV sta- attention to the letters.
tion in 1953. The station (don't Mr. Murray's article, "The Man
remember which one) carried a very Who Edited Lovecraft" (in #98)
odd program called "Faces in the filled me with frustration. How
Window," the brainchild of Ken interesting and delightful it would
Nordine, later an announcer for the be to read Lovecraft's comments
Chicago Symphony broadcasts. The and tirades against those who had
program came on after the late adulterated his texts. How much
movie on Saturday, and consisted may we have learned directly from
of a reading by Nordine of a weird Lovecraft's own hand about his
story. remember Balzac's "A
I concern for structural and atmos-
Passion in the Desert" and Melville's pheric integrity? How explicit
"The Lightning-Rod Man," and of would he have been concerning
course HPL's "The Rats in the textual variants? Alas, we will
Walls." You never saw Nordine or probably never know this case in
a studio set or anything identifi- beyond what he had written to
able; the visual accompaniment to other correspondents. This brief
the reading was a shifting pattern article in #98 made me wish again
of shadows and abstract shapes. that you would devote more issues
Far from "destroy ing ] the intended [ to the letters.
mood," the swirling shapes had a Thank you for publishing two
hypnotic effect that intensified the perceptive articles devoted to "The
impact of the story. Hound." The tale may be over-
In the Notes to "The Lurking wrought, but succeeds by an auda-
Beans," Jim Cort mentions a book cious of one horrific detail
piling
called Human and Inhuman Stories , upon another. It reads as though
edited by Dorothy L. Sayers, and Lovecraft, thumb poised not far
published by Harcourt, Brace and from his nose, were trying to outdo
World in 1931. There was no such Poe by ringing the changes on as
book. In fact, in 1931 there was many Continental horror motifs as
no such publishing house as Har- one talecould hold without slipping
court, Brace and World. The 1977 into direct parody. Lovecraft's
Manor Books paperback of that title phraseology, as has been mentioned
was simply a reprint of the final by others, even echoes Poe's in
section of Sayers' classic anthology several places. Mr. Jeffery's anal-
The Omnibus of Crime (1929). ysis [in #98] of the ambiguous in-
There have been several fictional terrelationship of the tale's many
treatments of the Sawney Bean supernatural elements and Mr. Mari-
story, including the novel The conda's treatment [in #38] of the
Flesheaters by L. A. Morsel I tale's debt to the French decadent
Warner Books paperback (December movement help explain why this
1979) which has become moderately among the dozens of minor tales
collectible because of its Frazetta haunts the memory after many more
cover. polished tales have faded into ob-
I've especially enjoyed your re- livion. "The Hound" and another
vivals of early Kuttner stories, oft-abused Lovecraft tale, "The
and hope for more of the same. Statement of Randolph Carter" seem
Thanks for a consistently fascinat- to take place in the same horror-
ing magazine. locked world of the unconscious as

R. E. Briney "The Outsider." No amount of
Salem, MA reference to the real world can
disperse the darkness or terror of
Welcome back to Libidia Cillman! a mind trapped forever in its own
Crypt #96, devoted to Love- nightmares
craft's letters was one of the very (continued on page 59)
NEXT TIME . . .
We honestly thought we had brought you all of Ramsey

Campbell's juvenile Cthulhu Mythos fiction in Crypt of Cthulhu
#i)3 The Tomb Herd ).
( That issue contained all the stories
written in the first flush of enthusiasm after Ramsey had read
Lovecraft's Cry Horror! While attending the 1986 World Fantasy
Convention in Providence, however, we heard Ramsey read
some side-splitting sentences from an even earlie r tale in which
he had mentioned shoggoths. Before Ramsey read Lovecraft?
You see, he had stumbled across an anthology containing
Robert Bloch's "Notebook Found in a Deserted House," so he
discovered, and wrote, Cthulhu Mythos fiction before he read
HPL!
You can guess the rest: first we asked permission to
publish the shoggoth story, but it turned out to be just one
of a whole group of early stories (the others not Mythos,
though). Then we managed to wrangle permission to bring you
the whole thing. So rejoice, Campbell completists! Our
historic fiftieth issue is the very first Ramsey Campbell story
collection, hitherto unpublished: Ghostly Tales .
CRYPT OF CTHULHU
Editor
Robert M. Price
Fiction Editor and Reviewer
Stefan R. Dziemianowicz
Contributing Editors
S. T. Joshi Will Murray
.
Columnists
Lin Carter . Carl T. Ford
Copyright O 1987
Cryptic Publications
Robert M. Price, Editor
107 East James Street
Mount Olive, North Carolina 28365
Cover by Lance Brown
Art on pp. 10 and 82 by Gavin O'Keefe
Art on page 20 by L. L. McAdams
Art on page 22 by Allen Koszowski

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$ 4.

Volume 6, Number 7 Lammas 1987

Thematic Links in Arthur Gordon Pym At the .

Mountains of Madness and Moby Dick

DEBATABLE AND DISTURBING:

Madness , and Moby Dick .' 1

AND MOBY DICK

A previous issue of Crypt of with another classic of American

from [Poe] [Lovecraft's] main

In the course of the novel, Symmes to Poe and his contemporaries.

was reading one of the seminal especially the "Leatherstocking

dedicated to the discussion of the Another aspect of this pervasive

glimpse of the wonder of the unex- spiritual journey a voyage of self-

open sea out of sight of land

commented on the allusions when her captain asks Ahab to

survives floating on the coffin

tomb on the cannibal's coffin and order.

regions, was reviewed by Herman ville's and finally manages,

of Tsalal are actually Egyptian, "wooden ex- whalers."

. . . the lavas that restlessly

taken by both protagonists, cli-

The narrative style of At the At length, the expedition

After the storm

still no contact with

olis. ing the mountains, Danforth turns

and Dyer remember that some of Lovecraft's attitudes toward

craft's fiction. This episode oc- same breath we are told he is a

forth "was frankly jumpy, and Dyer is moved to remark of the

horror at the camp. . . ."3 These Old Ones! . .

own words: and "The Oval Portrait"); and the

boyhood friend, Augustus. At So we can see another similarity

New Haven in February 1831. There interim between the composition of

ing. This expedition ultimately turn led to some of the textual

The problem was that in the was hinting at a solution to the

enigmatic ending of Pym . which the Tsalalians that we find a central

craft had barrel-shaped, crinoid the text of the tale, unexplained-

Here we see the theme of "white- not a sequel to the events

symbolize the infinite void of the a

Poe's Pym but it surely is a the- Melville's sequel of sorts to The

Romyn Dake's A Strange Discovery these tales vary in quality, and

Dirk Peters and his fellow ship- Shelley's Frankenstein Lovecraft's

Dick, from Hell's heart? even appears classics of popular

Arthur Cordon Pym ,"

Cthulhu #32, p. 33. Works of Edqar Allan Poe, London,

4 J. N. Reynolds, "Mocha Dick: )6Harold Beaver, "Introduction"

This article is reprinted as part of 'Poe and Melville,"' The Narrative

9 Most notably the Pellucidar 19S. T. Joshi (ed.). At the

^ Ty pee (1846), Omoo (1847), 20 bid 1

and Mardi (1849). 21 Ibid.

Death in the American Novel rev. 31 Ibid

ed. (NY: Stein and Day, 1966). 32 bid1

18 Leslie A. Fiedler, The Return 33 bid 96.

bonding in modern popular culture element of male bonding in this

^Edgar Allan Poe, The Narra-

^Angela Carter, "Lovecraft and

Names George Hay (ed.), Corgi

Available in Terry Carr (ed.).

new ! The Compleat Crow

CALL ME WIZARD WHATELEY

When H. P. Lovecraft visited Secondly, the Dunwich horror is

tails he happens to follow Mel- In "The Dunwich Horror" HPL

naticism in pursuing their respec- 1971), p. 13.

knowledge of his own cosmic insig-

THE BUND IDIOT GOD