Octavia E. Butler against Lovecraft (World Fantasy Award).

[Frater_Tsalal]

I would also like to say that I don't think Huysmans would immediately dismiss Lovecraft: it's already been mentioned on here that he was an early champion of Poe and other decadent writers/poets/artists, and he was certainly interested in all things grotesque (in one of his letters from 1885, for example, he heaps praises on Maldoror, which he refers to as a "hymn of homosexuality"... the shark-screwing scene and the disembowelment through the vagina scene in particular he enjoyed, the latter episode he deemed "appetizing"). Even the Christian artwork he admired tended to be somewhat dark and grotesque, such as the Grunewald crucifixion that he writes at length about in La-Bas. He might not have cared for Lovecraft's philosophy or worldview (though both were pessimists), but I think he would certainly appreciate the horrific effect they generate.

Quote Originally Posted by Alarm Agent

It's easy : if you are a white man (living or dead) who made racial slurs you don't belong to the accepted progressive establishment, no matter what other qualities or opinions you may have. If you are a black woman you automatically belong to the progressive establishment, no matter what writerly qualities you mave have (or if any at all.)

Yes and no. H.G. Wells is still able to get away with having espoused bloody murder. He's long had a free-pass with the Left despite his championing of a eugenics policy even the state of Oregon would think twice over.

Mark S.

[Justin Isis]

Wasn't there a Wells book where he wipes out all Muslims worldwide in order to establish Utopia? If I remember right it included airplane (then super science fiction tech) raids on Mecca.

It's interesting to note what the present does and doesn't let the past get away with. Most people wouldn't think of rich Harvard graduates who got away with irresponsible murder because their parents kept bailing them out as their idea of counter cultural heroes, but William S Burroughs. M.P. Shiel probably isn't well-known enough for the child molester revelations to generate much interest. I remember Arthur Koestler - at present pretty obscure but once well-known - got dug back up for a while because it came out that he was a serial rapist. 

It's nothing new, Catullus and other classical writers were banned through much of the 19th century, and Shakespeare got Bowdlerized. I wonder if there's a statute of limitations...haven't heard many recent attacks on Ovid despite him recommending rape...

Current society isn't much different from the Victorians...ask anyone who has failed a job interview because of the wrong pictures of them coming up on Google...in some respects it is worse than the 19th century.

Quote Originally Posted by Justin Isis

Wasn't there a Wells book where he wipes out all Muslims worldwide in order to establish Utopia? If I remember right it included airplane (then super science fiction tech) raids on Mecca.

Probably. I have had a downer on Wells since forever. I'm sure he once grumbled that the Allies had held off from bombing the Vatican City during WW2.

It reminds me somewhat of HPL's asides about "greasy Italian Popes".

After blasting my beloved Huysmans I was waiting for another Catholic blacklist from Brendan in the hope I could drag all of Zen Buddhism down by posting this link.

Zen at War - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Zen_at_War

Hmmph! I don't care. I'll post it anyway...

Next time it'll be a link to Baron Ungern Von Sternberg, the crazed Buddhist Monarchist.

So it goes.

Mark S.

[Druidic]

Zen at War is great.

It reminds me of a story by Gurdjieff. A bandit hid in the hills for hours, everyday for years, motionless, ignoring his hunger for food and water, exposed to the merciless heat, ignoring that too, only concentrating and waiting for his next victim to rob. After some years he crystalized a soul, a true Self. He had followed the path of the fakir, not even knowing it.
He was still a killer and a bandit.

Enlightenment is never what its cracked up to be.

[brendanconnell]

1. "If you are a black woman you automatically belong to the progressive establishment, no matter what writerly qualities you mave have (or if any at all.)" You must be a fun guy to hang out with. Ah yes, those hordes of black women coming to steal the laurels from big-jawed Lovecraft. 2. Mark: My one merit is that I probably have read more subversive Catholic writers than most. I did, after all, dedicate my first novel to Baron Corvo. But I did also mention Bloy, I would also haul out Ernest Hello for this argument of Catholic writers I like but don't approve of. Of course if people here were worshipers of Bloy, Huysmans, Hello or Corvo, I would let it all slide since those fellows were good writers. 3) I think that Huysmans would not have liked Lovecraft. Yes, he did like a few people (not decadents, since there was no such thing until Huysmans himself came along), but he would have considered Lovecraft a weak stylist. He also would have most certainly considered Lovecraft to be working basely for the Evil One..... 4) I would of course prefer a debate on the merits or not of Ernest Hello, rather than Lovecraft, but since the latter is the figure of such great adulation, we are stuck where we are.

[brendanconnell]

I also would of course be happy to debate the merits of some Buddhist or Taoist writer of my choosing against Lovecraft.

Quote Originally Posted by brendanconnell

I also would of course be happy to debate the merits of some Buddhist or Taoist writer of my choosing against Lovecraft.

Stylistic or moral merits? Or a conflation of the two, as with Lovecraft?

You can start with Mishima.

Mark S.

[brendanconnell]

I think stylistic merits would be the most interesting. But "of my choosing". I have not read a great deal of Mashima, but have not liked what I have read. I think however that Justin has read a good bit and might be willing to take up the gauntlet.

[Justin Isis]

Quote Originally Posted by brendanconnell

I would of course prefer a debate on the merits or not of Ernest Hello, rather than Lovecraft, but since the latter is the figure of such great adulation, we are stuck where we are.

Can u post some prose excerpts from Hello that are good?