Another quick trawl for recent Lovecraft scholarship published in out-of-the-way places…

* Micheal Gentry. “Parser at the Threshold: Lovecraftian horror in interactive fiction“. In the book: IF Theory Reader, March 2011. (Online, free.)

Also related to IF (interactive fiction), an English summary of a talk given at the Storyworlds Across Media conference (Johannes Gutenberg-Universitat Mainz, 30th June — 2nd July 2011)…

“In a talk on “The Developing Storyworld of H.P. Lovecraft”, Van Leavenworth (Umea) demonstrated that Lovecraft’s works hold two mythical concepts that appeal to his followers who have not only developed a number of textual, audio-visual and interactive fictions but also integrated elements of his stories into obscure cults: the loss of control or ‘cosmic fear’ and humanity’s inability to understand cosmic knowledge. Apparently, these universal human concerns adapt well to different uses and invite recipients to engage in the spiritual and transcendent body of thought that is attributed to the author’s name and persona. Hence, Leavenworth, as the previous speakers, put Ryan’s criteria of consistency and media-exclusiveness of the storyworld up for debate.”

* David Marks (2011). From the will to Wessex to Arkham: Lovecraft’s geophilosophical debt to Hardy. California State University, M.A. dissertation. (Hardy as in Thomas Hardy. Not yet online.)

* Julio Franca (Oct 2011). “Fundamentos Esteticos da Literatura de Horror: A influencia de Edmund Burke sobre H. P. Lovecraft“. (Article in Spanish on the influence of Edmund Burke’s A Philosophical Enquiry into the origin of our ideas of the sublime and beautiful, on Lovecraft. Online.)

* Matthew Strohack (2011). “The City under the Hill: Allegorical Tradition and H. P. Lovecraft’s America.” A chapter in the book American Exceptionalisms: From Winthrop to Winfrey, SUNY Press, December 2011. (Already available to read online at Google Books.)