Your Favourite Lovecraft.

[Nemonymous]

THE HOUND is certainly my favourite, from first reading it in the1960s.
See this earlier thread: Who Killed St John?
Who Killed St John? (The Hound) - THE NIGHTMARE NETWORK

I reread THE DREAM-QUEST OF UNKNOWN KADATH very recently after first discarding it in my youth, now reviewing it and discovering another new favourite!
The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath | THE DF LEWIS DREAMCATCHERS

[luciferfell]

Some of my favorites would be The Festival, The Hound, The Haunter of the Dark, The Testament of Randolph Carter, Pickman's Model... I do reread HPL maybe about every two years. And I will reread maybe 10-15 stories when I do. I gorge on them and love them all over again.

[ramonoski]

Quote Originally Posted by hopfrog

This is so interesting, to see the wide spectrum of favourites. I am curious to know how long it has been since most of y'all have actually read the stories.

I first read Lovecraft in translation when I was a highschool student, some 13-14 years ago. Looking back, those translations were absolutely terrible! As a translator I realize the many difficulties in translating Lovecraft (and believe me, I've tried to knock out some "definitive" versions of my own), but whoever was in charge of those editions wasn't even trying. Not the best example but the first that comes to mind: the subtitle of the first chapter in The Call of Cthulhu was rendered into "the horror from Clay"—'clay' left untranslated and implied to be a place, as evidenced when later the text tells us about "the bas-relief from Clay" (emphasis mine). Not good. Due to the quality of the texts, or lack thereof, at the time I was more fascinated by specific things—the Necronomicon, the brains in jars, the Innsmouth taint et al—than the writing itself. It wasn't until I was in my mid-twenties when (thanks to the internet) I started reading Lovecraft in English and finally got on my proper way to appreciate him as an author.

As for how long, well... I do re-read a lot of things and Lovecraft hasn't been an exception. There's perhaps some stuff I haven't read in a few years (The Case of Charles Dexter Ward and The Shadow Out of Time come to mind) but I'll find myself returning to this or that or that other one story every now and then, either to recall plot details, to relive the ambiance of the piece, or because it was referenced somewhere and I need to compare notes, so to say. A good deal of his work is quite fresh in my mind but yes, there's also a good deal of material overdue for a revisit.

OK, as an experiment in mental discipline I am going to choose only four.

1. The Colour Out of Space.
2. The Music of Erich Zann.
3. The Thing on the Doorstep.
4. The Call of Cthulhu.

Not necessarily in that order.

1. The Colour on the Doorstep.
2. The Call of Erich Zann.
3. The Music of Cthulhu.
4. The Spaced Out Thing.

Now I am confused.

Mark S.

[teguififthzeal]

I really do enjoy his poems, except for that pesky one, what was it called. Oh yeah, "On the Creation of N***rs".

Quote Originally Posted by teguififthzeal

I really do enjoy his poems, except for that pesky one, what was it called. Oh yeah, "On the Creation of N***rs".

That one was errm ... pretty awful.

What I like about some of HPL's verse is when he drifts into the obligatory refrain about hailing the Muse! And, in that vein, I am going to paste and copy the following by Hilaire Belloc.

NEWDIGATE POEM
A Prize Poem submitted by Mr. Lambkin of Burford to the
Examiners of the University of Oxford on the prescribed poetic
theme set by them in 1893, ‘The Benefits of the Electric Light’.
Hail, Happy Muse, and touch the tuneful string!
The benefits conferred by Science I sing.
Under the kind Examiners’ direction
I only write about them in connection
With benefits which the Electric Light
Confers on us; especially at night.
These are my theme, of these my song shall rise.
My lofty head shall swell to strike the skies.
And tears of hopeless love bedew the maiden’s eyes.
Descend, O Muse, from thy divine abode,
To Osney, on the Seven Bridges Road;
For under Osney’s solitary shade
The bulk of the Electric Light is made.
Here are the works; – from hence the current flows
Which (so the Company’s prospectus goes)
Can furnish to Subscribers hour by hour
No less than sixteen thousand candle power,
All at a thousand volts. (It is essential
To keep the current at this high potential
In spite of the considerable expense.)
The Energy developed represents,
Expressed in foot-tons, the united forces
Of fifteen elephants and forty horses.
But shall my scientific detail thus
Clip the dear wings of Buoyant Pegasus?
Shall pure statistics jar upon the ear
That pants for Lyric accents loud and clear?
Shall I describe the complex Dynamo
Or write about its Commutator? No!
To happier fields I lead my wanton pen,
The proper study of mankind is men.
Awake, my Muse! Portray the pleasing sight
That meets us where they make Electric Light.
Behold the Electrician where he stands
Soot, oil, and verdigris are on his hands;
Large spots of grease defile his dirty clothes,
The while his conversation drips with oaths.
Shall such a being perish in its youth?
Alas! It is indeed the fatal truth.
In that dull brain, beneath that hair unkempt,
Familiarity has bred contempt.
We warn him of the gesture all too late:
Oh, Heartless Jove! Oh, Adamantine Fate!
Some random touch – a hand’s imprudent slip -
The Terminals – a flash – a sound like ‘Zip!’
A smell of burning fills the startled Air -
The Electrician is no longer there!
But let us turn with true Artistic scorn
From facts funereal and from views forlorn
Of Erebus and Blackest midnight born.
Arouse thee, Muse! and chaunt in accents rich
The interesting processes by which
The Electricity is passed along:
These are my theme: to these I bend my song.
It runs encased in wood or porous brick
Through copper wires two millimetres thick,
And insulated on their dangerous mission
By indiarubber, silk, or composition.
Here you may put with critical felicity
The following question: ‘What is Electricity?’
‘Molecular Activity,’ say some,
Others when asked say nothing, and are dumb.
Whatever be its nature, this is clear:
The rapid current checked in its career,
Baulked in its race and halted in its course
Transforms to heat and light its latent force:
It needs no pedant in the lecturer’s chair
To prove that light and heat are present there.
The pear-shaped vacuum globe, I understand,
Is far too hot to fondle with the hand.
While, as is patent to the meanest sight,
The carbon filament is very bright.
As for the lights they hang about the town,
Some praise them highly, others run them down.
This system (technically called the Arc),
Makes some passages too light, others too dark.
But in the house the soft and constant rays
Have always met with universal praise.
For instance: if you want to read in bed
No candle burns beside your curtain’s head,
Far from some distant comer of the room
The incandescent lamp dispels the gloom,
And with the largest print need hardly try
The powers of any young and vigorous eye.
Aroint thee, Muse! Inspired the poet sings!
I cannot help observing future things!
Life is a vale, its paths are dark and rough
Only because we do not know enough:
When Science has discovered something more
We shall be happier than we were before.
Hail, Britain, Mistress of the Azure Main
Ten thousand Fleets sweep over thee in vain!
Hail, Mighty Mother of the Brave and Free,
That beat Napoleon, and gave birth to me!
Thou that canst wrap in thine emblazoned robe
One quarter of the habitable globe.
Thy mountains, wafted by a favouring breeze,
Like mighty rocks withstand the stormy seas.
Thou art a Christian Commonwealth; and yet
Be thou not all unthankful – nor forget
As thou exultest in Imperial Might
The Benefits of the Electric Light.


Belloc 1910

Mark S.

And now that cider hath dulled me head

'tis time, methinks, I went to bed. (Mark S. 2014)

[MTC]

Quote

I seem to see a lot of people here remembering the stories from distant readings of years ago. Do any of you actually return to Lovecraft now and reread his stories?

I find myself always returning to the same authors. I don't know if nostalgia is a part of this, but most of these authors I came across in my early youth and it seems they never left again: H.P. Lovecraft, J.G. Ballard, William S. Burroughs, William Gibson, Michel Houellebecq, Cormac McCarthy, Thomas Ligotti. Obviously I also seek out other fiction, but these are the authors I continuously reread and probably will for the rest of my life.

[Waffiesnaq]

Yeah, I didn't get into Dunsany, either. It felt too "try-hard" for me, too artificial and self-conscious, like Homer trying to sell me a used car.

I read Lovecraft at 15. Library. "Dagon." Liked it, abandoned the collection, and didn't return to Grandpa til years later, when I read all his stuff in a mad frenzy. I have no idea why he didn't infect me the first time, maybe I subconsciously wanted to save it for later? I dunno. I was deep into Burroughs at the time.

All this mentioning of "The Music of Erich Zann" has me rewatching John Strysik's 1980 short film. This is how you adapt Lovecraft to the screen:

youtube.com/watch?v=OFnSOfdsblQ

MTC, what's a good work by Houellebecq to start out with? I liked his book on Lovecraft a lot.

[Robin Davies]

I revisit the occasional Lovecraft story but I'm sort of holding back at the moment in preparation for a massive re-read when the Variorum comes out.
My first visit to Providence (for last year's Necronomicon) re-awakened my interest in all things HPL and I'm currently ploughing my way through several volumes of his letters.
I must admit I prefer Lovecraft's Dunsanian fantasies to those of Dunsany himself. Dunsany seems to be idolised by many critics but for some reason I can't quite tune into his wavelength. On the other hand, Algernon Blackwood (who tends to receive more criticism than Dunsany) is right up my street and I adore his work even more than Lovecraft's.

[MTC]

Quote

MTC, what's a good work by Houellebecq to start out with? I liked his book on Lovecraft a lot.

My favourite book by Houellebecq so far is Extension du domaine de la lutte (1994, trans. as Whatever, 1998), which I've read twice. It reminds of a crossover between Camus' The Stranger and Ligotti's My Work Is Not Yet Done. But this is off topic I'm afraid. Back to Lovecraft.