08 Wednesday Sep 2010
Posted in Historical context, Scholarly works
Two recent academic theses, published online in full-text form:
Geographies of the Underworld : the poetics of chthonic embodiment and game worlds (2008).
William Hope Hodgson’s borderlands : monstrosity, other worlds, and the future at the fin-de-siecle (2009).
07 Tuesday Sep 2010
Posted in Lovecraftian arts
A preview of the fine cover for the forthcoming Historical Lovecraft anthology (2011), which has been open for submissions for a few days now. Not to be confused with the Lovecraft Classic Horror Anthology.
06 Monday Sep 2010
Posted in Lovecraftian arts
Some strange things turn up on Etsy: how about a 6,000 year-old meteorite, carved into Loveraftian shapes, and placed under glass as a paperweight? Unfortunately the maker has also added some hippy-dippy crystals, but the basic concept is sound…
“Made with Hardened PVC, actual 4000 to 6000 year old Meteorite, fine Magnifying Glass Dome, Swarovski crystals, wood and felt base. Tiny Pink areas slightly fluoresce with Black Light. In with the Meteorite is a complex setting. Is it an Alien, Cthonian life form, Volcanic formations or, something even more terrifying…”
05 Sunday Sep 2010
Posted in Lovecraftian arts, Odd scratchings
The prestigious and beautifully-produced book series Library of America series is shortly to issue a slip-cased edition of Lynd Ward, Lynd Ward: Six Novels in Woodcuts
At least one of his novels, Gods’ Man : A Novel in Woodcuts is in the public domain, although it appears that the estate of Lynd Ward still makes claims (possibly spurious, since its copyright was not renewed) upon it.
04 Saturday Sep 2010
Posted in Lovecraftian arts, Odd scratchings
Viktor Wynd’s Little Shop of Horrors, London…
“The shop is perhaps best seen as an attempt to recreate or reinterpret with twenty first century sensibilities a 17th century Kunstkamera, a collection of objects assembled on a whim on the basis of their aesthetic or historical appeal, there is no attempt at creating or explaining any metanarratives or educating anyone, merely a display of naturalia and artificialia designed to give pleasure to the creators of the museum, who hope that you too will enjoy it.”
“Surprising numbers of our visitors wish to spend their time in trying to work out what is real and what is not. A distinction that we do not see, nor understand. Up until the Nineteenth century to call something original was to insult it, for if no one has done something before there’s probably a good reason, and so many people have done so much since then, and much of it to be regretted, that to be original or to claim to have something that is original can only really be seen as unlikely and extremely pretentious.”
03 Friday Sep 2010
Posted in Lovecraftian arts
The first issue of Salon Futura magazine is now online, sporting a 3D-rendering of Cthulhu’s watery abode. The free magazine is aiming for monthly publication, and is…
“a new and hopefully somewhat different magazine devoted to the discussion of science fiction, fantasy and other forms of speculative literature.”
02 Thursday Sep 2010
Posted in Lovecraftian arts
A substantial new Alan Moore interview in The Skinny today, which has chunky sections on Lovecraft and Moore’s new graphic novel Neonomicon, which is set in Moore’s modern-day version of Lovecraft’s Red Hook…
“I wanted to do a story that modernised Lovecraft [ and via a blending with a police procedural approach ] actually put back some of the objectionable elements that Lovecraft himself censored, or that people since Lovecraft, who have been writing pastiches, have decided to leave out. Like the racism, the anti-Semitism, the sexism, the sexual phobias […] It is one of the most unpleasant stories I have ever written. It certainly wasn’t intended as my farewell to comics, but that is perhaps how it has ended up. It is one of the blackest, most misanthropic pieces that I’ve ever done. I was in a very, very bad mood.”
“why is Cthulhu […] humanoid? This is one of the questions we answer in the course of Neonomicon. And we do tell, I believe, a credible modern Lovecraft story”
Creative Commons portrait of Alan Moore by Javier Moreno, touched up by me and made B&W.
01 Wednesday Sep 2010
Posted in Scholarly works
The first issue (2010) of the academic journal Studies in Gothic Fiction is available. It’s an open-access full-text ejournal, so the contents are free.
