Monthly Archives: August 2018

A macabre Providence artist

27 Monday Aug 2018

Posted by in Historical context, Lovecraftian arts, New discoveries, Odd scratchings

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John La Farge (1835–1910, lived in Providence, Rhode Island). Bed-ridden early in his career and in need of the cash, La Farge produced fairly loose watercolour designs which were engraved by Henry Marsh (American, 1826–1912) and published as story illustrations in the Riverside Magazine for Young People. He later regained his health and turned to the more respectable, and probably more profitable, trade of stained-glass windows.

Lovecraft knew of him, since he mentions him by name in a letter to Moe, 24th November 1923. Lovecraft had written “The Rats in the Walls” a few months earlier, August–September 1923. An interesting co-incidence, given the picture seen above, I’d suggest. There was apparently also a ‘Bishop Hatto’ story by Sabine Baring-Gould.

Lovecraft Studies on Archive.org

27 Monday Aug 2018

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Lovecraft Studies journal, issues 9-21, now on Archive.org for free.

For search-engine indexing purposes I have a plain-text listing of the essay titles from these issues over at my JURN blog, along with a short listing of the essays included in Archive.org’s sundry copies of old Crypt of Cthulhu magazines. A useful time-saver if you just want to quickly run your eyes down the titles list, and thus save time laboriously opening and flipping through each scan. You’ll also find per issue links there.

The Secret Origins of Weird Tales

27 Monday Aug 2018

Posted by in Historical context, New books, Scholarly works

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A new book on Weird Tales, The Thing’s Incredible: The Secret Origins of Weird Tales, albeit with what is possibly one of the worst covers ever put on a serious book. One glance at that and half the potential audience is gone.

Yet it debuted at PulpFest 2018, where they know their stuff, and it’s had some favourable blog comments. It even had a mention in a Washington Post multi-book review of recent fantastika. The book offers a revisionist business history of the ‘early days’ of the famous magazine, 1923-24, and these years are scrutinised in detail…

“Who were Henneberger and Lansinger, the founders of the magazine, and what strange forces joined them? How did first editor Edwin Baird become the wild man of the pulps? What lay buried in haunted second editor Farnsworth Wright’s past that he never dared speak of? What was the uncontrollable “reorganization” that sucked legendary horror author H.P. Lovecraft into a vortex he barely understood? Why did world-famous magician Harry Houdini suddenly appear on the covers of the obscure magazine, and just as suddenly disappear? Finally, how did an all-out war behind the scenes at the magazine lead to the long peace of the Wright years?”

Forthcoming: H. P. Lovecraft in Florida

27 Monday Aug 2018

Posted by in New books, Scholarly works

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In the latest issue of The Fossil (#376, July 2018, free online)… “Dave Goudsward describes his transformation from high school social outcast to a published author of 13 books.” Including H. P. Lovecraft in the Merrimack Valley (review).

The article notes…

“My next book will be H. P. Lovecraft in Florida (Bold Venture Press, 2019)”, with a side-project for… “a cenotaph for Robert Barlow near his mother’s grave in Cassia, Florida.”

At the end of 2015, Goudsward also published his more general Horror Guide to Florida: A Literary Travel Guide.

Also of note in recent years in The Fossil is Goudsward’s article “Cassie Symmes: Inadvertent Lovecraftian – How H. P. Lovecraft touched the life of a New York socialite”. To be found in The Fossil, April 2017.

Full Weird Tales scans continue to flow onto Archive.org

26 Sunday Aug 2018

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Scans of full copies of vintage Weird Tales are continuing to be archived on Archive.org. Regrettably my WordPress blog refuses to post a link that goes to these uploads sorted by texts-only / upload date. Because it gets freaked out by [] square brackets in the URL, and presumably thinks it’s under attack from script-kiddies. Here’s how to manually filter out the irrelevant ‘relevance’ fluff and sort at Archive.org…

Once that’s done you’ll see there have been ten new uploads in August 2018, and all from the ‘prime Lovecraft’ period.

Fairly dismal cover paintings during this period, by the looks of it, and one can see how the magazine might have struggled to attract new readers on the crowded news-stands.

The latest upload, Feb 1926, printed “The Cats of Ulthar”. This was the first public appearance, it having previously been published only in the amateur journal Tryout in 1920.

Paul Cook in the public domain, 2019

26 Sunday Aug 2018

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A range of texts drop out of copyright each year. At the start of 2019, for the UK it will be the turn of books whose authors died in 1948. One such will presumably be W. Paul Cook. Cook was an amateur journalist, printer and bookman, and a good friend of H.P. Lovecraft. He was later the author of the important long memoir In Memoriam: Howard Phillips Lovecraft. This text can be found in full in the handsome volume Lovecraft Remembered…

Although it appears that Lovecraft Remembered is now yet another Lovecraft volume being listed at very expensive ‘only for the rich book collector’ prices.

Given that the text appears to be coming out of copyright in the UK and Europe, an abridged version of In Memoriam might make for an interesting graphic novel adaptation project for someone.

Last year (start of 2018) the public domain also welcomed: Alfred North Whitehead (a British philosopher whose 1920s works influenced Lovecraft); M. P. Shiel (Lovecraft thought his “The House of Sounds”… “the most haunting thing I have read in a decade” when he read Shiel circa 1923); and of course Arthur Machen.

Crypt of Cthulhu returns

25 Saturday Aug 2018

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Necronomicon Press has a swishy new website. Including three new issues of Crypt of Cthulhu from 2017 and 2018. Who knew?

As well as fiction and poetry and reviews…

Crypt of Cthulhu #108 has:

* “Deconstructing Nug and Yeb” by Will Murray.
* “The Grip of Evil Dream: Donald Wandrei” by Morgan Holmes.
* “Genomic Criticism: A Lovecraftian Introduction” by Donald R. Burleson, Ph.D.
* “An Online Crypt of Cthulhu Index” by Donovan K. Loucks.

Crypt of Cthulhu #109 has:

* “Providence’s Poe Street” by Ken Faig, Jr.
* “”The Pain of Lost Things”: The Randolph Carter Stories as Veteran’s Narrative” by Dr. Geza A. G. Reilly.

Crypt of Cthulhu #110 has:

* “Lovecraft’s Copy of Blackwood’s Shocks and Other Artifacts: Where Did They Go?” by Marcos Legaria.

There are also now $3 digital downloads in PDF for 107 (2001) back to 101 (1999). Of these #103 will be of most interest to scholars, for…

* “The Unknown Lovecraft I: Political Operative” by Kenneth W. Faig, Jr.

Strange Country: Sir Gawain in the moorlands of North Staffordshire

25 Saturday Aug 2018

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Are you interested in who wrote Sir Gawain, one of the most famous works of supernatural English literature? And in discovering the castle on which the Gawain-castle was modelled? My new 2018 book on Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, titled Strange Country: Sir Gawain in the moorlands of North Staffordshire, an investigation, now has a 40% discount for a limited time. Plus a free low-res PDF copy until the end of August 2018.