Some notes on H.P. Lovecraft’s British correspondent, Arthur Harris (1893-1966), of Penrhyn Bay, Llandudno.
Harris was a professional printer in North Wales, and a correspondent of H.P. Lovecraft. Harris’s long-running amateur publication was titled Interesting Items, sized approx 7.4” x 4.4” and well printed. It was one of the longest running amateur publications, and the oldest of the British amateur publications.
Harris also appears to have printed amateur publications for others…
“the late George W. Macauley recalled printing an issue of his journal The Hay Field with Arthur Harris’s press in Wales” (The Fossil, #352, Jan 2012, p.7)
Harris also printed small pamphlets. In a four-page pamphlet edition of the poem “The Crime of Crimes: Lusitania, 1915”, he gave H.P. Lovecraft his first standalone publication. The poem is Lovecraft’s polemical response, in the context of the early years of the First World War, to the notorious German U-boat sinking of the passenger ship Lusitania off the coast of Ireland.
S.T. Joshi notes in The Lovecraft Encyclopedia (2001) that Lovecraft usually corresponded by letter about once or twice a year with Harris. In the mid 1990s the Library of Brown University…
“acquired a collection of 52 letters and 5 postcards written by Lovecraft to Arthur Harris of Llandudno, Wales, between June, 1915 and January, 1937. This cache of previously unpublished correspondence is important…” (Brown University Library, Annual Report of the University Librarian, 1995, Page 20).
I’m not sure if these have yet been transcribed and published. I’m guessing that these letters are perhaps related to, or essentially the same as, the set of photocopies sold on eBay in February 2013…
“58 letters from Lovecraft to Arthur Harris an amateur publisher from North Wales who published some very early Lovecraft pieces, the letters begin from 1915 and they maintained a correspondence the last letter being dated 1936. The majority of the letters are from the earlier period. There are a few other pieces (again all photocopies) articles and poems. Plus some letters relating to the original collection.”
A print fanzine called World of H.P. Lovecraft issued a #7 issue in 2010, edited and compiled by Les Thomas, which appears to have had materials on or from the letters…
“The latest issue of The World of H.P. Lovecraft featuring Arthur Harris Collection listing unpublished letters and H.P. Lovecraft literary references”.
This description is a little vague, and so it’s difficult to learn if the actual contents of the letters are given — or just a listing, or a listing and selected extracts.
An undated edition of the trade publication The Small Printer (volumes 1-2, page 42), partly available online, ran an obituary titled “Arthur Harris of Llandudno”. This is presumably from 1966, since the obituary opens…
“Arthur Harris died during March. Although he was a professional printer from 1909 until his retirement he was better known by his activity in the world of amateur publishing…”
Sadly, no more of this obituary is available online. It seems probable that the local Llandudno press would also have carried an obituary for Harris in the first half of 1966, and someone with access to the local North Wales archives might usefully look it up and place it online.
The Library Association Record of 1966 ran a survey of originality in printing among the little and private presses in Britain, noting of Harris his…
“Interesting Items, which he started printing [as a schoolboy] with rubber type, and pushing under neighbours’ doors, in [5th Mar] 1904. Mr. Harris, who has a collection of 13,500 amateur magazines… [up from 8,000 in the mid 1940s]”
S.T. Joshi notes in The Lovecraft Encyclopedia that the original title for Interesting Items was Llandudno’s Weekly.
Harris was a member of the British Fantasy Society in the 1940s, and is noted in their publications as attending at least one convention. It appears that by the post-war period Harris was also being noted as a major collector of early British comics…
“Arthur Harris of Penrhyn Bay, Llandudno, owner of that unique collection of nearly 3,000 comics (needless to say the decent British variety), has recently given three talks concerning them [in Llandudno in 1952/3]. (The Collector’s Digest, Vol. 7, No. 75, March 1953, page 67).
There appears to be no record online of what became of his collections. Hopefully his relatives sold them off circa 1966/7, rather than simply burned them all. [Update: in the latest Lovecraft Annual Kenneth J. Faig Jr. notes an article in The Fossil from 1981, which indicated the collection had by then passed to Roy Heaven.]
His home at Penrhyn Bay was and still is actually quite detached from Llandudno town, being in the bay on the far side of the huge and rocky Little Orme’s Headland. Before modern development, the place was very small and remote…
Although in true British fashion, the size of the place didn’t stop it having a museum devoted to weird and wonderful relics…
