H.P. Lovecraft a Century Less a Dream

Rating:
Summary: Casting Light on those Strange, Far Places
Review: There are some authors whose work I enjoy reading, some whose work I enjoy reading about--but rarely read anymore--and others whose work is sufficiently rich and strange that I appreciate discovering other people's insights into it as much as I enjoy reading and re-reading it myself. One of the authors in this last category is H. P. Lovecraft.

A copy of A CENTURY LESS A DREAM, a book of essays devoted to the work and thought of HPL, arrived late this week, and I have been poring over it with delight whenever I have had a spare moment. This is the most intelligent collection of essays devoted to H. P. Lovecraft I have seen in a long time. All too often in collections of this sort, no matter how brilliant some of the essays might be, the excellent entries cannot entirely make up for their dull, superficial or obvious companions, resulting in an odd, almost contradictory mish-mash. In this book, each of the essays, complete in itself and written from a
variety of viewpoints, adds to a cumulative view of the author's work that is larger than the sum of its parts. From articles applying biographical, psychological, philosophical, mythological, historical, semiotic and other methods to the analysis of individual tales, to such broader subjects as S. T. Joshi's disquisition on Lovecraftian satire, Steven J. Mariconda's contemplation of the cultural artifact in Lovecraft's work, Robert H. Waugh's exploration of Lovecraft's use and divergence from the theses of Dr. Margaret Murray, Robert M. Price's separation of canon, apocrypha and pseudepigrapha in the NECRONOMICON, and David E. Schultz's point-by-point destruction of the misconceptions which repeatedly lead to the creation of "Lovecraftian" myth-systems based even on the work of such debunkers as Tierney and Mosig, each subject is developed with skill and finesse. Even the more esoteric articles, such as that by Dan Clore, remain cogent, clear, and free of artifice: models for applying advanced critical methods to a text rather than against it. The editor's introduction and annotated bibliography offer additional insights and tie the whole book together admirably.

My single regret is that, although the Wildside Press has produced a durable volume and provided clear reproductions of the charts accompanying Jason Eckhardt's and Robert T. Marten's articles, the proofreading is a bit rough in spots. This does not occur to the extent that the text is ever in doubt, but it can become a little distracting on occasion, and costs the book half a star.

CONTENTS
-Introduction by Scott Connors
-H. P. Lovecraft "Continuity"
-Kenneth W. Faig, Jr. "'The Silver Key' and Lovecraft's Childhood"
-David E. Schultz "Who Needs the Cthulhu Mythos?"
-Robert M. Price "Higher Criticism and the NECRONOMICON", by
-Jason C. Eckhardt "Beyond the Mountains of Madness: Lovecraft and the Antarctic in 1930"
-Robert Marten "Arkham Country: In Rescue of the Lost Searchers"
-Robert H. Waugh "Dr. Margaret Murray and H. P. Lovecraft: The Witch Cult in New England"
-S. T. Joshi "Humour and Satire in Lovecraft"
-Steven J, Mariconda "H. P. Lovecraft: Art, Artifact, and Reality"
-Robert H. Waugh "The Structural and Thematic Unity of FUNGI FROM YUGGOTH"
-Dan Clore "Metonyms of Alterity: A Semiotic Interpretation of FUNGI FROM YUGGOTH"
-James Anderson "'Pickman's Model': H. P. Lovecraft's Model of Terror"
-Donald R. Burleson "The Mythic Hero Archetype in 'The Dunwich Horror'"
-Donald R. Burleson "Prismatic Heroes: The Colour out of Dunwich"
-Carl J. Buchanan "'The Music of Eric Zann': A Psychological Interpretation (or Two)"
-Paul Montelone "The Vanity of Existence in 'The Shadow out of Time'"
-Steven J. Mariconda "Tightening the Coil: The Revision of 'The Whisperer in Darkness'"
-Clark Ashton Smith "H. P. L. "
Selected Bibliography