The results of a quick bit of thesis hunting.

New to me, the PhD thesis ‘Determined To Be Weird’: British weird fiction before Weird Tales. Or perhaps I had looked at it, but then it was embargoed for years to come? Anyway its record page was modified a few days ago, and it’s now freely available as a PDF.

The author presents an “examination of the earlier weird fiction that fed into and resulted in Lovecraft’s work”, and also surveys the grudging changes in sentiment that occurred over time among elite critics. Ironically one might argue that by the time the elite critics had changed their minds on such things, only blurb-hunting publishers cared much about their opinions.

Another PhD I found is still embargoed for another three years, titled The Palimpsests of Cosmic Horror: space, mythicity, and rituality in the writings of H.P. Lovecraft and his Spanish successors. There’s an abstract, but it’s “Restricted until September 2026”.

Another, with a current embargo but no release date, is Predestination, textuality, and cosmic horror in the works of H.P. Lovecraft and their comics adaptations.