H.P. Lovecraft/Nightmare Fuel: Difference between revisions

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[[H. P. Lovecraft]] is probably one of the most respected horror writers of all time. Pretty much any horror author that came after him owes him for at least one idea. He codified the idea of the [[Eldritch Abomination]] in fiction, was one of, if not the first, writers of the [[Cosmic Horror Story]], there were so many [[Brown Note|brown notes]] in his work, you could call it a brown opera, he is the trope namer for [[Go Mad Fromfrom the Revelation]], created the creature Cthulhu, one of the most well known monsters in horror literature outside of [[Dracula]] or the [[Frankenstein's Monster]], and in general, wrote some pretty spooky stories.
 
 
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== Lovecraft canon ==
 
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* Or [http://www.dagonbytes.com/thelibrary/lovecraft/thefestival.htm "The Festival."]
* Or "[http://www.dagonbytes.com/thelibrary/lovecraft/thewhispererindarkness.htm The Whisperer In Darkness]" - ''never'' look at those "lonely woods" the same way again.
** The last freakin' sentence.
{{quote|"For the things in the chair, perfect to the last, subtle detail of microscopic resemblance - or identity - {{spoiler|were the face and hands of Henry Wentworth Akeley.}}"}}
* Or [http://www.dagonbytes.com/thelibrary/lovecraft/thethingonthedoorstep.htm "The Thing on the Doorstep"], or [http://www.dagonbytes.com/thelibrary/lovecraft/themusicoferichzann.htm "The Music Of Erich Zann"]. This guy was a master of horror. "The Music of Eric Zann" has some of the best examples of [[Nothing Is Scarier]] and [[Hell Is That Noise]] ever devised. Even better is that the latter is invoked ''without actually being able to hear it.''
* [http://www.dagonbytes.com/thelibrary/lovecraft/thepictureinthehouse.htm "The Picture In the House]." Unusual for Lovecraft, as it does not involve [[Cosmic Horror]], or even the supernatural, and it actually has fairly effective dialogue. Also, the single scariest use of ''italics,'' ever.
* ''[[The Colour Out of Space]]''. It's a story about a goddamned ''color'' that will give you nightmares. [http://www.dagonbytes.com/thelibrary/lovecraft/thecolouroutofspace.htm Lovecraft was Just That Good]. Imagine something so abstract that you can never comprehend it slowly eating you and the entire landscape around you alive over the course of months, and being even unable to flee. And considering that the dam project mentioned in the story was real, one has to wonder how many contemporary readers got really uncomfortable about drinking tap water.
** His description of the [[Incredibly Lame Pun|epileptic trees]] just feels so wrong and vivid.
{{quote|''...And yet amidst that tense, godless calm the high bare boughs of all the trees in the yard were moving. They were twitching morbidly and spasmodically, clawing in convulsive and epileptic madness at the moonlit clouds; scratching impotently in the noxious air as if jerked by some alien and bodiless line of linkage with subterrene horrors writhing and struggling below the black roots.''}}
* You think his [[Cosmic Horror|standard]] stories are scary? Try reading some of his calm and lucid descriptions of his own ''real'' dreams. The man was the living embodiment of [[Nightmare Fuel]].
* ''[[The Dunwich Horror]]''. [http://www.dagonbytes.com/thelibrary/lovecraft/thedunwichhorror.htm See it here]. One of the worst things about this one is that, for once, Lovecraft didn't [[Take Our Word for It|skimp on the descriptions]]. The titular Horror was only visible for a second, but... well, how about we just let the witness explain.
{{quote|''Bigger'n a barn... all made o' squirmin' ropes... hull thing sort o' shaped like a hen's egg bigger'n anything with dozens o' legs like hogs-heads that haff shut up when they step... nothin' solid abaout it—all like jelly, an' made o' sep'rit wrigglin' ropes pushed clost together... [[Eyes Do Not Belong There|great bulgin' eyes all over it]]... ten or twenty maouths or trunks a-stickin' aout all along the sides, big as stove-pipes an all a-tossin' an openin' an' shuttin'... all grey, with kinder blue or purple rings... an' Gawd it Heaven—[[Nightmare Face|that haff face on top]]...''<br />
...<br />
''Oh, oh, my Gawd, that haff face—that haff face on top of it... that face with the red eyes an' {{spoiler|crinkly albino hair, an' no chin, like the Whateleys}}... It was a octopus, centipede, spider kind o' thing, but they was {{spoiler|a haff-shaped man's face on top of it, an' it looked like Wizard Whateley's}}, only it was yards an' yards acrost...'' }}
** {{spoiler|Wilbur Whateley's}} true, undisguised form was also pretty [[Body Horror|dreadful]]:
{{quote|''"The back was piebald with yellow and black, and dimly suggested the squamous coloring of certain snakes. Below the waist, though, it was worst; for here all human resemblance left off and sheer phantasy began. The skin was thickly covered with coarse black fur, and from the abdomen [[Squick|a score of long greenish-grey tentacles with red sucking mouths protruded limply.]] ...On each of the hips, deep set in a kind of pinkish, ciliated orbit, was what seemed to be [[Eyes Do Not Belong There|a rudimentary eye]]; while in lieu of a tail there depended a kind of trunk or feeler with purple annular markings, and with many evidences of being an undeveloped mouth or throat. The limbs, save for their black fur, roughly resembled the hind legs of prehistoric earth's giant saurians; and terminated in ridgy-veined pads that were neither hooves nor claws.'' }}
* "[http://www.dagonbytes.com/thelibrary/lovecraft/coolair.htm Cool Air]". The next time someone asks you to crank up the AC for them, you're ''definitely'' going to think twice...
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* [http://www.dagonbytes.com/thelibrary/lovecraft/thecallofcthulhu.htm "The Call of Cthulhu"], the penultimate of all things Lovecraft and the birthing place of the horrid thing itself.
** "The stars were right again, and what an age-old cult had failed to do by design, a band of innocent sailors had done by accident. {{spoiler|After vigintillions of years great Cthulhu was loose again, and ravening for delight."}} Aaaagh! [[Nightmare Retardant|Though]] {{spoiler|he gets taken out by being smacked in the head with a boat.}}
* ''[[The Shadow Over Innsmouth]]'' [http://www.dagonbytes.com/thelibrary/lovecraft/theshadowoverinnsmouth.htm (available here)] because of one thing: when the village drunk tells the protagonist the tale about the reason the people of Innsmouth are part fish. Some real [[Squick]] and [[Fridge Horror]] (or [[Nightmare Fuel]], if you are particularly awake when you read it) when he mentions that the sailors ''mated with some strange-looking fish''! That isn't the worst of it: {{spoiler|the protagonist is also part of the Innsmouth folk}} and, upon learning this, he decides to invite his family to swim in the water in a manner that is seriously creepy.
* "[http://www.dagonbytes.com/thelibrary/lovecraft/thecaseofcharlesdexterward.htm The Case of Charles Dexter Ward]". Even if you see the twist {{spoiler|that Curwen had come back to life and killed Ward to assume his identity}} coming from a mile away, the storytelling is so good, and the writing so skin-crawlingly creepy, that ''it doesn't matter.'' Now that, my friends, is some damned effective horror.
* Similarly, we have ''Under the Pyramids'', listed here as "[http://www.dagonbytes.com/thelibrary/lovecraft/imprisonedwithpharaos.htm Imprisoned With Pharos]", a Lovecraft story that relates Harry Houdini's experience in Egypt. After being lowered into a pit near the Giza pyramids and the Sphinx, Houdini {{spoiler|follows a procession of beings that look similar to the Egyptian Gods, along with mummies and assorted undead. He then watches an elaborate ceremony that eventually reveals the Sphinx itself, which has 5 heads and tentacles. Except these are actually the toes and the claws of the creature; the narrator simply mistakes the being's single paw for the creature itself. The thing's true face, which is supposed to have been the Giza's Sphinx's original image is left completely to the reader's imagination}}.
* "Herbert West-Reanimator". It's not that Mr. West reanimates the dead--it's what he reanimates them ''as''.
 
== Inspired by Lovecraft ==
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* The cult favorite [[Thomas Ligotti]], who should probably have his own HONF page, has written essays on Lovecraft.
* "Children of Cthulhu": An anthology of short stories in the Lovecraft manner...the very first one was essentially based on the old adage "The Devil's in the details!"
* A story from the ''[http://cthulhurotica.com/ Cthulhurotica]'' anthology called "Flash Frame" by [https://web.archive.org/web/20120526211915/http://www.innsmouthfreepress.com/?page_id=17 Silvia Moreno-Garcia] was pretty [[Fan Disservice|goddamn disturbing]]. It's basically a modern-day retelling of ''[[The King in Yellow]]'' with a good dose of ''[[The Ring]]'' thrown in. A reporter for a Mexico City tabloid is on the hunt for a sensational story when he hears about some kind of cult meeting at a local porno theater. So he decides to spy on them. Strangely, all they seem to do is view a few minutes of some faux-Roman [[Brown Note|exploitation flick]] that seems a bit... [[Uncanny Valley|off]]. After a few sessions, the reporter starts having nightmares about a [[The Blank|grotesque]] [[Humanoid Abomination|seductress]]. And then he realizes his tape recorder has picked up the hidden audio track...
{{quote|{{spoiler|The sound was yellow. A bright, noxious yellow.}}
{{spoiler|Festering yellow. The sound of withered teeth scraping against flesh. Of pustules bursting open. Diseased. Hungry.}}
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{{spoiler|Insatiable. Yellow.}} }}
 
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{{reflist}}
[[Category:Literature/Nightmare Fuel]]
[[Category:H.P. Lovecraft]]
[[Category:Nightmare Fuel]]