I love a bit of eldritch Lovecraft once in a while

H. P. Lovecraft lived a brief life (1890-1937) and died virtually unknown. Today he is considered to be one of the most significant writers of supernatural horror fiction. Cthulhu Mythos, anyone!?

If Cthulhu doesn’t mean anything to you - well then I’d say grab yourself a bit of time and dive into H. P. Lovecraft’s world. His works have inspired countless other tales and comics and films and music. Was H. R. Giger (he who created the Alien look) inspired by Lovecraft? You bet. The movie Alien itself is considered Lovecraftian horror. Sam Raimi, John Carpenter, Frank Darabont, Ridley Scott, Gore Verbinski, Panos Cosmatos and, of course Guillermo del Toro - just a few of the filmmakers also greatly inspired by Lovecraft’s works - and when you watch those movies and you know your Lovecraft lore, it’s always immediately obvious.

Lovecraft’s world building delivered a cosmic horror with entities beyond time that are just a shadow away from us. It is a mystical world of evil beyond evil, of witchcraft beyond time, of creatures too far removed from our reality to be able to even describe them. The world wild webs are filled with Lovecraft and, in particular, his Cthulhu Mythos. Here’s a good starter - and when you pick up a few of his short stories, start with Dagon.

But wait - I have no intention of writing about Cthulhu (Gesundheit!) - because I just revisited another one of Lovecraft’s tales - The Case of Charles Dexter Ward. It recounts the story of the eponymous hero, a studious young man, who becomes fascinated with an ancestor who just may have been a warlock. He dives into research, discovers the old family home and therein a painting of his ancestor - they looked near identical. From there the story of the warlock is told in flashbacks, through letters and notes - and Ward himself eventually manages to resurrect his ancestor - with dire disastrous consequences.

This tale is twisted, gruesome and sweeping. It travels across the globe and deals with supernatural beings, vampirism, grave-robbing and ever so much more and - you know what? - I love it. I’m considered to have an exceedingly sunny disposition (one that my wife claims borders on annoying occasionally) - so why the fascination with something as dark as the worlds conjured up by the curious mind of H. P. Lovecraft? I don’t think it’s the darkness, the horror, or the fear of the unknown that draws me in, I think it’s the creativity.

For me, Lovecraft’s worlds open doors with majestic WHAT IFs left and right. Same as Algernon Black, same as Lord Dunsany - I love those supernatural tales because they are - if you let them be - mind expanding.

Oh, by the way, what a cool name, right? Lovecraft. The craft of love (something Lovecraft wasn’t particularly good at according to his biography), makes you wonder where that name comes from, right? A quick Google gander suggests that the name has nothing to do with love, but is derived from a location - namely Leacroft in the parish of Cannock, Staffordshire. Kind of a letdown, right? I was hoping for something, you know, supernaturally Lovecraftian!

But back to Charles Dexter Ward. Did you know that there’s a connection between that novel and Ridley Scott’s Alien? Dan O’Bannon, who rote the screenplay for Alien in the late seventies (more about that awesome bit of movie history here), directed a very few times, and one of those efforts was The Resurrected, with was - you guessed it - based on Lovecraft’s The Case of Charles Dexter Ward. I’ve just watched it for the first time and it’s a bit heavy on the cringe factor as were many early nineties film with the hairstyles and the clothes and the music and the dialogue … but the Lovecraftian elements are actually quite good!

And Chris Sarandon, man, he’s outstanding in the dual role of both Ward and his ancestor. This was, by the way, four years after his forever brilliant portrayal of Prince Humperdinck in The Princess Bride. Clearly that role hadn’t been ruthless enough, with The Resurrected he got push the evil-character joys to another level!

So, read yourself some Lovecraft, why don’t you? By now there are also a great many films, of course. Lovecraft’s cosmic horror doesn’t easily lend itself to the medium of film, however, more often than not you’ll end up with fairly cheesy fare such as The Resurrected. The 2019 film The Color out of Space (starring Nicolas Cage) did an excellent job - surprisingly so! Think about it - even the idea of making a movie about a color from outer space, a color that is beyond description - seems a quite a challenge, right?

You know, this whole Lovecraftian excursion’s quite a wide-ranging ramble, right? So why not add another Lovecraftian element - bear with me if you so feel inclined! Did you know that there’s a connection between Conan The Barbarian and H. P. Lovecraft? Yes, this tale’s getting weirder and weirder.

Robert E. Howard, the creator of Conan, was a Lovecraft contemporary. He loved Lovecraft’s tales (even if most of the world didn’t know or care about them at the time. Howard expressed his fandom and Lovecraft heard about it. They became friends and would correspond (and even write together) for the rest of Howard’s life. Howard himself is definitely material for another article at some point - he wrote a great deal in the brief thirty years he had before he committed suicide. Before his death, however, there was the friendship with Lovecraft - and created Conan, Solomon Kane, Kull and, for something humorous and entirely different, Costigan the brawling boxer sailor.

I could go on with connections and tangents that are as far-reaching and tangled and twisted as are Lovecraft’s world and monsters. I mean, there’s Annihilation, Underwater, Hellboy - even The Cabin in the Woods - all Lovecraft-inspired tales. Enjoy!

Cheers,

D