Letters to Dagon

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The first story of TL's to appear in Dagon was "The Journal of J.P. Drapeau." This appeared in Dagon #20 November - January 1987. This is the letter by TL that appeared in the same issue.

Thomas Ligotti, Michigan, USA. This is this first time I've had the pleasure of reading your publication, and I'm extremely impressed by the pains you've taken in presenting all that one could possibly want in an issue or magazine devoted to a single author, right down to the most incidental illustration. I'm not familiar with fantasy games, but I read the scenario "Landscrapes" with great interest, finding much to admire in the way a horror plot was reduced to its essentials and then reconstructed in tantalizing fragments. I would very much like to see a horror game that could be played by a single person, a plot of dreams; paranoia that might be integrated into someone's every day routine.

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Letter from Dagon #21 March-May 1988

Thomas Ligotti, Michigan, USA. Thanks for the inclusion of "The Journal of J.P. Drapeau" in Dagon #20. I enjoyed the issue very much, with my prejudice naturally leaning towards the macabre contributions of N. Mark Gordon and D.F. Lewis. And once again, to my surprise, I found the game scenario very entertaining and instructive in the essentials of horror. No doubt I'm not the first reader to appreciate a game scenario as a prose screenplay for a horror movie that one is allowed to flesh out in the imagination. And the title "You In Your Small Corner" is excellent! Worthy of Ramsey Campbell.

This issue included TL's story "In The Shadow of Another World" illustrated by Jeffrey Salmon

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Letter from Dagon # 22/23 Thomas Ligotti Special Double Issue September-December 1988

Thomas Ligotti, Michigan, USA. I received Dagon #21 and commend you on the presentation of "In the Shadow of Another World". The illustration by Jeffrey Salmon was really superb and suitably cosmic, and once again you have my praise for publishing Lewis's "Stories of Murkales", which are sophisticated far beyond the usual fare of small press horror zines and remind me quite a bit of William S. Burrough's Naked Lunch.


This all Ligotti issue of Dagon is, like Crypt of Cthulhu #68, a nice addition to any Ligotti collection. Many of the essays have never been reprinted elsewhere. And the same can be said of the artwork that accompanies TL's stories. The contents are as follows:

The Knave of Darkness: The Evolution of Horror in the Fiction of Thomas Ligotti A Survey by Mike Ashley

Beyond Dualism An Appreciation of the Writings of Thomas Ligotti by Christine Morris

The Mystagogue, the Gnostic Quest, the Secret Book by Robert Price

"Nothing is What It Seems to Be": Thomas Ligotti's Assault on Certainty by Stefan R. Dziemianowicz

Autumn Horror by Thomas Ligotti Illustrated by Harry O. Morris

Notes on the Writing of Horror: An Interview with Thomas Ligotti by Carl T. Ford

The Library of Byzantium by Thomas Ligotti Illustrated by Dave Carson

In a City of Bells and Towers A Call of Cthulhu Scenario by Mark Morrison

Oneiric Horror by Thomas Ligotti Illustrated by Harry O. Morris

"The Lost Art of Twilight": Two Aspects of the Vampire by Simon MacCulloch Illustrated by Jeffrey Salmon

A Thomas Ligotti Bibliography by Thomas Ligotti

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This is TL's letter from Dagon 24, the issue immediately following the Thomas Ligotti Special Double Issue. Reader reaction was very positive.

Thomas Ligotti, Michigan, U.S.A. What an extravaganza you've put
together! Paranoid that I am, I can't help picturing the consternation
of certain Dagoniana as they heft their double-barrelled issues and
mutter, "What the hell is this?" Nevertheless, from the perspective of
this follower of Dagon, the volume that you and your contributors have
conspired to assemble — from the four eyes on the front cover (two of
them labyrinthine pits!) to the four eyes on the back cover (all agoggle
with nearsightedness) — has inspired an admiration and gratitude just
this side of insanity. I'm tempted to try and mitigate the impression
some readers of Dagon #22/23 might have received that I've managed to
scribble some things that are the equivalent in prose of hallucinogenic
drugs — no horror story can do that, except perhaps in very slow and
awkward motion — but I think it quite probable that someone else will
kindly step forth and perform this service for me. For my part, I'm
content with the easy and pleasurable task of appreciation for the
efforts of the artists and writers who delivered a succession of delight-
ful shocks and lightning flashes of illumination to my brain: Allen
Koszowski's nicely putrescent double portrait of the somnabule in "Drink
to Me Only with Labyrinthine Eyes" — Mike Ashley's insightful and
scholarly survey (from which I glanced up every so often in possessive
gaze at the copies of Who's Who in Horror and Fantasy and Algernon
Blackwood, A Bio-Bibliography on my bookshelves) — Christine Morris's
excursion through the prism (my compliments on this image) of her own
penetrating perceptions, especially those regarding the conventions of
supernatural fiction — Robert Price's typically omniscient synthesis,
which actually began to eclipse his subject i.e., my horror tales, in my
mind, so that by the time he referred to "Ligotti's Library" I knew that
the story "Library of Byzantium" appearing later in the issue existed
only as a sort of Borgesian footnote to illustrate and support his
preemptive critical analysis — Stefan Dziemianowicz's anatomy of unreal-
ity, which I cheered on as I read it for considering at length certain
points that I struggled to articulate in my interview responses, once
again regarding the priority of perception — that is, a sense of the
supernatural as opposed to documentary approaches that neatly dichotom-
ize ordinary and the extraordinary (with a nod back to you, Christ-
ine). When Mr. Dziemianowicz concludes of the protagonist of "Vastarien"
that "either possibility [re: the supernatural vs. psychological resol-
ution to his predicament] is reasonable", he very well might have added
that rationally settling one way or the other is not an important issue
- Dave Carson's appropriately restrained incarnation of Fr. Sevich,
whose justly Jamesian countenance is fabulously suggestive of everything
I tried to flesh out in his character, and then some — Harry Morris's
transfigurations of the "Autumn and Oneiric Horrors" into mystifying
icons that somehow manage to weigh down the mere paper on which they
are printed with a miraculous tonnage of shadows and symbols — Mark
Morrison's spectacularly haunting scenario which I'm sure would bring as
much nightmarish satisfaction to J. P. Drapeau himself as it did to me.
And Phillip Anderson's incunabulaic cartography beautifully facilitated
Morrison's medieval cum surrealistic visions — Simon MacCulloch's
striking analysis of "The Lost Art of Twilight", deftly crystallizing
and coordinating far more and far more interesting insights into
vampire fiction than the usual "neck biting equals copulation" readings.
And Jeffrey Salmon's portrait of the empty-eyed and bloody-toothed
vampire is as much a sanguinary "symphony of horror" as Murnau's
Nosferatu, evoking all the oppressive density of the vampire's endless
nocturne.
   In closing, I would like to repeat my thanks to you and your contrib-
utors for the honor of your efforts.

[Nemonymous]

Interview with Carl Ford:
http://www.yog-sothoth.com/content/8...terview/view/1

[Sand]

I am sorry to report that Carl T Ford, the editor of Dagon, the Lovecraftian journal which also published work by and about Thomas Ligotti, has died. A brief tribute is here. I do not have any other details

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The next few posts will not be by Ligotti but by individuals that TLOers know, and they are referencing his work.

From issue:
Dagon No. 22/23 (1988)

Mark Samuels,
"In the Shadow of Another World" compares favourably with Ligotti's other high-quality work. It reminds me of both The House on the Borderland & "From Beyond", though it still retains its distinctive originality that one may classify as Ligottian. I can't think of another author who has so impressed me, in the amateur field. I doubt he could translate his work into the current professional field - to have to pad out one of the chunky novels publishers like to see printed would be, in his case, a tragedy. This style is perfectly suited to the short story format. Anyway, the underlying idea of "Shadow" is remarkable: the ghost-less house in a haunted world! I have the feeling that Mr. Ligotti is going to be very popular.

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From issue:
Dagon No. 24 (1989)

Harry O. Morris, Albuquerque, NM, U.S.A.
I really wish to thank you for the copies of Dagon 22/23. double Ligotti issue! All in all, a well-balanced issue dealing with off-balance matters. I know this handsomely produced work collecting together essays by many of the leading scholars on the horror/Lovecraft field will be hailed as a pioneering example as Ligotti grows in stature as a writer. I liked all the art in the issue, and was very pleased how my pieces reproduced... just great.

Des Lewis, Coulsdon, Surrey
Thanks very much for the Ligotti special. Let's not beat about the bush, Ligotti has to be my favourite writer, now that your magazine has drawn my attention for the first time to his excellent haunting vignettes, cameos and extended nightmares.

Mark F. Samuels, Sydenham, London.
Thanks for Dagon #22/23. Mike Ashley lists the early stories in just the right way, showing how the development of themes & ideas branch outwards & towards off-shots of ingenuity. Of cardinal interest is his establishment of Ligotti's premier influences: Lovecraft & Poe. Now it seems apparent that all three share the same stylistic nuances to a varying degree. By which I mean that essential & rare, precious, quality of making pale paper & cold black ink leap from the boundaries of the mundane into the reader's imagination with a feverish cosmic life. To my mind, this is the crust of their enduring attraction. Ms. Morris gets right to the heart of the matter in her statement that by choosing to abandon the commercial, Ligotti has more freedom than the horrible enforcements of length, content & style dictated by modern publishers. (This, if I may digress, brings me to an argument I've heard and agreed with about the BFS & like organizations. It is that they don't do enough to apply pressure on said publishers to develop away from standard formulas & sex, violence & gore. With such a body of enthusiasts behind them, one would think the arguments put forward should be of prime importance to the whole field's future. But enough of this...) I also found the comment by Ligotti himself in the essay of note the bit about the commercialism & cheap mass-marketing of horror fiction, to be accurate. Who really cares whether something is the 1st edition or the last edition? Whether it's signed or not? Whether it's in the bound set? I'll tell you who: not people who really care for the stories anymore (though maybe they once did!); but people who have become (1) extremely obsessional (ii) extremely greedy for valuable books (iii) collector's prestige & for reputation (iv) extremely silly. It's all marketing & the transformation of the artistic to that of the commercial.
Dziemianowicz's article comes out tops in the issue, I think. though one fault being its over-bearing on "The Frolic" which was difficult to get through. The force of his considerations regarding the psychological doubts in Ligotti's fiction are unchallengeable, & the delineation of "reality's" fragility superb. But I am surprised that little attention is given to the Machen comparisons here. Their ultimate conclusions on the whole world beyond the veil of reality may differ but the influence surely merits closer scrutiny. Mr. Valentine?
Oh, by the way, here's my contribution to the affair:
"Yes! tho' that long dream were of hapless sorrow,
'Twere better than the cold reality
Of waking life."
There's a Poean influence on Ligotti - well, maybe not.
I was fascinated by the interview. The perspective of Mr. Ligotti differs so much from Lumley, Klein, & Campbell examples in previous issues. Modest, sincere & refreshingly concerned for his work from an amateur viewpoint. I do agree with him when he says he can't achieve the status of "big name" authors of today. His will probably be the voice that echoes into the future; talent seems to be widely reassessed in hindsight! No, a lack of full-length novelisation can't really affect a horror writer's status: M.R. James & Clark Ashton Smith never ranged beyond supernatural novellas.