Lovecraft & Astronomy podcast

A new one-hour ‘Lovecraft & Astronomy’ podcast, Talking Weird #52. Talking with the authors of the forthcoming book on Lovecraft and Astronomy, Edward Guimont & Horace Smith. Released on Lovecraft’s Birthday.

Please note that I’ll now be taking a week’s break from the usual daily posting on Tentaclii, since there’s not much Lovecraft news at present. I plan to be back around 1st September.

“Lovecraft, mon amour” in full on YouTube

The French stage-play Lovecraft, mon amour as a 90 minute recording on YouTube. YouTube will auto-translate the subtitles to an English which is often rather puzzling or garbled (even the best ‘AI auto-translate’ is still poor, at present). Looking back through my Tentaclii posts, I don’t seem to have spotted an English translation in book form as yet, with which one might follow along.

Posted as a kind gift for Lovecraft’s Birthday, I assume.

Tolkien Gleanings issue 6

Now available, my free PDF Tolkien Gleanings, issue 6 (2023) for Tolkien scholars and academics. At just 56 pages this is not as large and magazine-like as the previous issue 5. This new issue just collects and proof-reads my Gleanings blog-posts from June to August, and also has a gallery which surveys ‘walking trees’ in Edwardian arts and literature.

To get clickable Web links, you need the PDF rather than the Archive.org flipbook preview.

The new German ‘Fungi from Yuggoth’

A review in German, of the new Fungi from Yuggoth German edition…

The German versions of the poems are not literal translations, but adaptations that author, actor and theatre director Frank Dukowski put together over many years of work. Here it was particularly important for Dukowski to maintain the form of the respective poem [and] Dukowski’s interpretations are closer to the original work than a literal translation ever could be. […] The Lovecraftian poetry is loosened up and framed at the same time by black-and-white illustrations by Jorg Kleudgen.

Pictures of Eddy’s bookshop on Weybosset

At the risk of boring regular readers of Tentaclii, here are four more glimpses of the ‘Uncle Eddy’ bookshop on Weybosset in Providence. Readers of the Lovecraft Annual 2022 will recall my detailed article which revealed the bookselling uncle of Eddy Jr., a firm “favorite” for the book collectors in Lovecraft’s circle whenever they visited Providence. The largest used bookshop in Providence, for many years. In the article I was only able to furnish a bit of a poor picture-postcard…

I’ve since found four more glimpses of the site. Though only glimpses, not a straight-on picture of the doorway to the cellar bookstore.

First, an early image of the site (here outlined in red) from the archives of the Providence Public Library. Two distinctive domes are clearly seen. The nearer one on the far-left, and in the distance the old Beneficent Congregational ‘Round Top’ Church. These provide useful orientation.

Next a detail from another Public Library picture. Here we look the other way, and see only the distinctive domed building on the corner. Again, the doorway is outlined in red.

Next we again look toward the Round Top church. The bookstore entrance, or what would later be a bookstore, is obscured by a street fountain.

Here we look toward the Crown Hotel, and can just see the same distinctive dome on the corner building. The entrance is again obscured, by what might be a short telegraph pole.

While looking for pictures I did however stumble on a rare good front-view of a Providence ‘news-stand’ store, and in what might be the early 1920s. The Narraganset Smoke Shop, probably in Dorrance Street since an adjacent/above sign (seen on the wider picture) for “T.H. D’Arcy, Engraver” leads me to 86 Dorrance Street. Just around the corner from Weybosset Street. This hole-in-the-wall magazine, tobacco and candy store looks a likely prospect for a fellow wanting to bag a copy of the curious new magazine called ‘Weird Tales’. Here newly colourised.

“Illustrating the Grotesque” exhibition

The UK’s Heath Robinson Museum has an “Illustrating the Grotesque” exhibition, 23rd September to 10th December 2023. Focussing on his illustrations for The Works of Rabelais (1904, 2 vols., not on Archive.org), but probably also drawing on his earlier Poe work and others. The museum is in Pinner, about 12 miles north of central London.

Currently the Museum has an exhibition of Robinson, one the UK’s best-loved illustrators, “Illustrating Andersen & Perrault”.