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Tentaclii

~ News and scholarship on H.P. Lovecraft (1890–1937)

Tentaclii

Monthly Archives: June 2023

A place Lovecraft never went?

30 Friday Jun 2023

Posted by asdjfdlkf in Picture postals

≈ 1 Comment

New on honest Abe’s site, five issues of Driftwind as produced by Walter J. Coates. All with Lovecraft contributions.

Looking quickly through my resources, I’m not sure that Lovecraft ever actually visited Montpelier in Vermont, to see Coates and his Press ‘at home’. They met, but Coates had to travel some hundred or so miles to talk with Lovecraft. Cook at least once made the trip to Montpelier, but quite possibly Lovecraft never made it?

Lovecraft commented on Coates being present at an amateur meeting… “Coates, [who has travelled] all the vast way down from the Montpelier region”. In another letter he has… “the indefatigable Walter J. Coates of Montpelier (editor of Driftwind) came down nearly a hundred miles to mingle in the throng.”

Which suggests Montpelier was rather inaccessible. Postcards from Cook were postmarked ‘North Montpelier’, and presumably so were letters to Lovecraft. Which might lead one to think that Coates was in the hills somewhere at the back of the town, as seen here…

However, Google Maps has North Montpelier / East Montpelier closely abutted together, a small narrow river-valley settlement located about five winding miles east of the main town. So perhaps there’s just a postmark / postbox confusion here. Possibly Coates used the Post Office at North Montpelier because it was the nearest, but where was he really?

I have however managed to get and colourise a card of “North Montpelier” itself, which suggests a rather sleepy place. Possibly we see here the main ‘one man and a dog’ stores and Post Office.

The place was on the often flooded Winooski River, and of that I found an evocative postcard which may interest Mythos RPG makers in need of photo-props for a 1920s ‘Whisperer in Darkness’ type adventure…


Update: The East Montpelier Historical Society has online a detailed historical essay on the Coates little magazine and its editor, including several photographs. Thanks to a prompt from a reader I’ve now been able to re-find this (the link had been broken) and it reveals the Coates / Driftwind location…

In November 1922, he and Nettie purchased the George Pray store in North Montpelier, and the Coateses and son John continued as the storekeepers.

Thus the store seen in the above picture would soon become the Coates store, as one can see the “Pray” signboard.

The Quest of Bleheris

29 Thursday Jun 2023

Posted by asdjfdlkf in Scholarly works

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An Unfinished Teenage Novel, “The Quest of Bleheris”, by the young C.S. Lewis (Narnia books)…

“In 2021, Inklings scholar Don W. King was able to provide a full transcription of “The Quest of Bleheris” in Sehnsucht journal. Recently, Sehnsucht has become an open-access journal.”

It’s an Arthurian romance in the William Morris mode.

Dark Kingdom

28 Wednesday Jun 2023

Posted by asdjfdlkf in Odd scratchings

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Frank Frazetta’s “Dark Kingdom” painting sells at auction for a healthy $6 million. Which I suspect will look like a bargain, after another decade or so.

Via Heritage Auctions

On your bookshelf in 1976

Beyond The Gate Of Dream – and others new on Archive.org

28 Wednesday Jun 2023

Posted by asdjfdlkf in Odd scratchings

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Lin Carter’s Beyond The Gate Of Dream, a yellowing paperback, which has an extended and poignant introduction in which Carter recalls his boyhood among the pulps and comics-strips. Available on Archive.org to borrow.

Also new on Archive.org to borrow, Black Sabbath and the Rise of Heavy Metal Music (2010); Frontier Gothic: terror and wonder at the frontier in American literature (1993); New England’s Gothic Literature: history and folklore of the supernatural from the seventeenth through the twentieth centuries (1995).

Forthcoming: ‘The Weird Cat’ anthology

27 Tuesday Jun 2023

Posted by asdjfdlkf in Kittee Tuesday

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S.T. Joshi announces a new anthology, The Weird Cat. Nope, not 1960s groovy hep-cat hippies in San Francisco. It’s the furry variety…

that this [anthology] has some features not present in other such volumes — notably its wide chronological range and its inclusion of fiction, poetry, essays, and even a letter (by Lovecraft, of course).

He gives the contents list. Shorter items only, by the look of it, so “Beware the Cat!” (1561) is not present.

While you’re waiting for the book, a new H.P. Lovecraft’s poem “Cats” (AI assisted short film) is new on YouTube. It’s amazing that AI knows how to craft a cat (an amazingly multi-formed creature, in terms of posture and silhouette) in a few seconds, let alone can put many of them on video at once.

Broadswords and Blasters

26 Monday Jun 2023

Posted by asdjfdlkf in Odd scratchings

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A review by DMR tipped me off to to Broadswords and Blasters, a modern indie pulp magazine which first appeared in 2017. I may have overlooked it because the dark and muddy covers have been far from appealing until now. But DMR assures that the latest “Futures That Never Were” special is worth a look. It’s a 500-page whopper of an issue (with a new style cover), and two tales are especially noted…

“Hawks over Reolis” by H.R. Laurence is definitely a success. Hester Craven is a spunky and resourceful protagonist. She will not be daunted or denied. Great steampunk fun. I would eagerly welcome more stories of her exploits. Finally the story that completely exceeded expectation was the gonzo ride that is “The Vengeance of the Silvern Hand” by Ethan Sabatella. I do not want to give anything away, but you should really read this story. It is certainly everything I love about pulp stories. Not to be missed!

A Mythos gathering

26 Monday Jun 2023

Posted by asdjfdlkf in Lovecraftian arts

≈ 1 Comment

Tentaclii doesn’t normally cover the surging horde of Mythos writers and podcasters, apart from noting the very occasional interestingly-themed story anthology. But an exception can be made for the large Innsmouth Literary Festival, right here in the UK. Booking now.

I had to look up “Bedford”, somewhere ‘down south’ perhaps? Yes, turns out it’s in the flatlands between Milton Keynes and Cambridge, and about 40 miles north of central London. Appears to be well-served by trains from the south (Brighton, Gatwick Airport, London).

New from Librivox and the HPLHS

25 Sunday Jun 2023

Posted by asdjfdlkf in Lovecraftian arts, Podcasts etc.

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The public domain Short Science Fiction Collection 093, new from Librivox. Includes new free-to-reuse audio readings of the original “The Silver Key” from Lovecraft, and “The Miniature Menace” (1950) by Frank Belknap Long. The latter appearing to be Long trying his hand, for Future magazine, at a two-fisted space thriller with a jut-jawed hero.

Also, in paid media the download for Dark Adventure Radio Theatre’s adaptation of “The Shunned House” is now available. There’s also the final cover-art…

Alex Nino art for The Weird Tales Story

24 Saturday Jun 2023

Posted by asdjfdlkf in Lovecraftian arts

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New on Archive.org to borrow, The Weird Tales Story (1977). This is the one with the Alex Nino art, not in other later editions. Some of his art here… well, much as I like his style, you’re not missing much. But the opening interior illustration is sumptuous. Here partly blocked by the dustjacket and marred by the scanning of two pages.

But you get the idea. Definitely a collectable for Nino fans.

A very poor Pinterest pin reveals what’s missing…

Also new on Archive.org, French Science Fiction, Fantasy, Horror and Pulp Fiction, subtitled ‘a guide to cinema, television, radio, animation, comic books and literature from the middle ages to the present’. A 800-page McFarland tome from the year 2000. Twenty years later I imagine that a lot of this previously very inaccessible stuff is now far more available, and perhaps also has English translations / subtitles.

Tolkien Gleanings – issue 5

23 Friday Jun 2023

Posted by asdjfdlkf in Odd scratchings, Scholarly works

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The new fifth issue of my Tolkien Gleanings ‘zine has been published. 80 pages with the usual news on recent Tolkien scholarship and projects, plus various essays on ‘evil in the landscape’ in Tolkien.

Freely available now on Gumroad (no sign-up needed, donations welcome) or on Archive.org.

Lovecraft’s Quebec

23 Friday Jun 2023

Posted by asdjfdlkf in Picture postals

≈ 1 Comment

This week on my regular ‘Picture Postals’ post… Lovecraft’s Quebec, in my pick of old photographs newly colourised. You’ll recall that Lovecraft wrote nearly an entire book on the place, as well as went into rhapsodies in his letters. One suspects that his friend Everett McNeil must have been here at one time, since Lovecraft later laments that his own interest in old Canada and Quebec came late… and thus he never had a chance to discuss with ‘Good Old Mac’ one of his favourite topics.

Lower Town.

Little Champlain Street.

Sous le Cap Street.

Breakneck Steps.

Montcalm’s House.

Cote de la Montagne and the Post Office.

The city was, for Lovecraft, also a potent draught of the pre-revolutionary France of the Bourbons. Or that was how he saw it. Others were disappointed in the place. His correspondent Helen Sully for instance, though perhaps she was swept up in the usual tourist hustle. Lovecraft was cannier and knew how to escape such wily wallet-emptying locals.

Citadel Ramparts.

Citadel Ridge with cannon.

View from the Citadel. Old Town and river beyond.

A view of the John Hay

22 Thursday Jun 2023

Posted by asdjfdlkf in Odd scratchings

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A view of the John Hay Library I’d not seen before. The lettering and placing of the wording both mark the card as one of the series Lovecraft often sent to correspondents. But I don’t recall seeing this view. Anyway, a nice scan from eBay. This is where the main collection of Lovecraft’s papers and letters are now kept, and these provide the Library with the majority of its online visitors.

The entrance to Lovecraft’s short ‘lane to No. 66’ can just be glimpsed on the far left at the end of the wall. The gates are those of Brown University, at the top of College Street.

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