HPLinks #86.
* From Brazil, the latest May 2026 issue of the open-access journal Abusoes is a special Gothic Arts issue. The lead essay is “Dagon a a Sombra Sobre Innsmouth: Duas Pecas Da Terrivel Arquitetura De Lovecraft” (‘Dagon and The Shadow Over Innsmouth: Two Examples Of Lovecraft’s Terrifying Architecture’. Freely available online. The same issue also has essays on Poe and H.R. Giger. In Portuguese, but easily auto-translated.
* An abstract for a forthcoming article in the Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, “Epistemological Horror”. The author identifies three types of this horror, one of which is termed “Lovecraftian epistemological horror”.
* Wormwoodiana discovers more unknown non-pulp fantasy from the 1920s.
* A new YouTube recording of a panel of experts discussing “A Brief History of Robert E. Howard Scholarship”.
* S.T. Joshi announces the formation of The Friends of August Derleth…
“a new organization to promote the life and work of August Derleth has now been established: The Friends of August Derleth, Inc. […] We hope to begin the process of soliciting new members shortly, but we are not quite ready to do that yet. We also hope to augment the current board of directors with additional members.”
* PulpFest has a trailer blog post for the convention, which outlines this year’s themes. It will… “celebrate the centennials of Amazing Stories and Ghost Stories” pulp magazines, and the post also notes “Doc Con returns to PulpFest in 2026”, this being the Doc Savage convention. PulpFest will also… “be celebrating the sesquicentennial of writer Jack London’s birth, the centennial of the birth of artist Robert Kennedy Abbett”.
* The Colour Out of Space artist’s edition from Suntup Editions. New and finely printed, with seven woodcuts by Sally Hands. Introduction by S.T. Joshi.
* The Worlds Of Speculative Fiction podcast reaches Lecture 102: Robert Bloch’s Lovecraftian Tales.
* Methods & Madness ponders the omission of Clark Ashton Smith from Appendix N and thus early D&D…
“I have wondered many times (and even tried to investigate as best I could) why Clark Ashton Smith is not in the Appendix N. […] he would be even MORE fitting than most of the books that are actually listed there. […] Could it be that Gygax simply did not know Smith?”
* New on Archive.org, AFS Magazine No.2., in which an article by Robert J. Kuntz recalls how he infused Lovecraft and C.A. Smith into his own D&D Lake Geneva Original Campaign, 1973-1976 and its associated items, taking D&D and…
the PCs [player-characters] away from simple dungeon delving for treasure” and into… an ever-expanding story arc involving the advent of the Elder Ones in the known planes of existence [and ancient weird cities]. That beginning grew to span most of my published career
The run of six issues of Seattle’s substantial AFS (2012-2014) is now available as scans, described as… “A pulp literature and old school [RPG] gaming zine available in print only.” See also No.3 for “Adapting ‘The Uncharted Isle’ by Clark Ashton Smith to Adventure & Setting”, and No.5 for “Hyperborean Grimoires”.
* Bone and Silver ponders why D&D’s Appendix N didn’t make more of Manly Wade Wellman.
* The Second World War Lovecraftian RPG Achtung! Cthulhu is coming to an end, after a decade of gaming, and a… “vast 50-odd library of books, PDF adventures, and accessories”.
* Talking of RPGs, new at the HPLHS Store is Eternity at Sea…
Eternity at Sea is an original scenario written by the HPLHS’ Sean Branney with a fantastic set of props created by Andrew Leman. Set in 1925, the adventure makes extensive use of real history and locations from the Oregon coast to create the most authentic setting possible. Both newcomers to Call of Cthulhu and seasoned veterans will find this story an engaging mystery filled with perilous surprises.
Due in mid-July 2026 and pre-ordering now.
* Also at the HPLHS Store, I see that the The Starry Wisdom Library auction catalogue (2014) can now be had as an affordable ebook in .PDF or ePub format. The paper edition is sold out. This imagines the library of… “the disliked and unorthodox Starry Wisdom sect” in Lovecraft’s “The Haunter of the Dark”.
* There’s a table-of-contents for the new Atlas of Deep Ones anthology, planned since 2024 and available now. Not actually an Atlas, but an anthology of new tales and poems of the Deep Ones. It also has a few items that sound like they might be pseudo-scholarly in-world articles, e.g. “The Third Oath of Dagon, Part II: Towards a Scientific Treatise on Dagon and the Third Oath of Dagon”.
* Lovecraft by the Sea. In which the London Lovecraft Festival players visits the seaside at Brighton, England, on the evening of 10th July 2026. Presenting on stage…
‘The Doom That Came to Sarnath’, a silhouette puppetry performance [and] ‘The Haunter of the Dark’, an original adaptation
* Popping up on eBay, the old ‘Providence in 1810’, that I seem to recall Lovecraft saw painted on the drop-curtain of a local theatre…
* Also on eBay, a 1908 map of Rhode Island that has the Dark Swamp marked on it…
* Another eBay pick, a nicely-angled ground-level view of the Market Place in Providence, looking up College St. in the distance. Possibly the early 1900s?
* And finally, authors and publishers may be interested to know that PDF Index Generator is now at version 3.6. This adds AI divination of topic categories. The worthy $70 desktop software auto-generates a back-of-the-book index for your book(s).
— End-quotes —
Tobacco smoke and smoking were very common in Lovecraft’s time.
“Philandering and Nicotinical Sir:- I’ve never smoked since donning long trousers; since the fragrant weed is to me no more than a choking nuisance. When I was small, I smoked because it was the grown-up, masculme, and forbIdden thing to do; but as soon as I could present a reasonably grown-up appearance without it, I relievedly suffered it to become a none-too-cherished memory. I naturally have to tolerate clouds of mephitic vapour from most of my friends, and I flatter myself that I do it without complaint. But at least I don’t have to thicken the cloud of tear-gas by any voluntary exhalations of my own!” — Lovecraft to Rheinhart Kleiner, November 1919.
Really — what pleasure one can gain from puffing away at nauseating & stifling fumes is beyond me! I did it once— when 11 to 14 years old — for no boy in my vicinity was then considered manly unless he surreptitiously emulated the graceful smokestack either behind the stables or in the neighbouring sylvan retreats. I sampled cigars, cigarettes, pipe, & the like; & puffed like a veteran; but always detested the infernal stuff. Glad enough was I to fling away tobacco when long trousers & increased inches made my manliness an obvious fact which needed no nicotinical corroboration! Nor have I any literary need of tobacco. When I go in for drugs, I am no “tin-horn”, but buckle right down to opium — vide “Dagon”. Since it is not I, but my heroes, who indulge, I do not feel the ill effects. Incidentally — I think Alfredus [Galpin] has given up his cherished hasheesh!” — Lovecraft to Rheinhart Kleiner, February 1920.
“Anent the smoke nuisance — you may be correct in theory about the reason for my aversion for the weed, but I would lay a heavy wager that it would take years of practice for me to cultivate a taste which after all is not worth cultivating! I am a conservative soul, & am not as radically different in tastes from the 14-year-old Theobaldus as one might fancy from a mere reading of the numerals which proclaim my proximity to thirty. All I know is that smoke is smoke, & just as choking when from a pipe as when from a leaky stove! Of course, connoisseurs make fine distinctions — but I prefer to breathe pure air than to inhale malodorous fumes. To me the ultimate horror of earth is a smoking car [train carriage set aside for smokers]. As a rule, I avoid taking drugs to stimulate literary endeavour; but when I try to describe hell — if ever I do — I fancy I shall take a ride in a smoker to work up atmosphere! Of course, the quality of the tobacco doubtless means something — but I find I acquire just as severe headaches when calling on a friend of mine who smokes quarter cigars.” — Lovecraft to Rheinhart Kleiner, March 1920.
Lovecraft’s New York City poem “On the Double-R Coffee House” (1st February 1925), on the bohemian hang-out, has… “Mids’t them I sit with smoke-try’d eyes”. He also talks in one of his letters of the… “nicotined atmosphere” there. The mid-1920s Kalem Club meetings also appear to have been rather smoky at times, and what with that and the strong coffee, Lovecraft must have come away with quite a ‘buzz’.
“While I am peculiarly repelled by unpleasant odours, I have no vast hankering after perfumes, & always urge barbers not to smell up my old bean [his head] with patent citified lotions. I like the fresh scent of springtide on the hills, & the August aura of new-mown hay, but I’d never go to the trouble of building an organ of olfactory notes — with perfume-phials for pipes — as did des Esseintes in the tenth chapter of A Rebours!” — Lovecraft to Fritz Leiber, December 1936.