Lovecraft (was: Pynchon, the normal guy)

[rich]

well worth reading.

rich

On Thu, Dec 12, 2019 at 6:57 AM Kai Frederik Lorentzen <lorentzen at hotmail.de>
wrote:

>
> The second part of "Against the Day" starts with a - not so funny & much
> too long - parody of "At the Mountains of Madness", one of Lovecraft's
> best stories respectively novellas.
>
> I have read only one text about Lovecraft but that one is excellent.
> It's by the French novelist Michel Houellebecq and I can recommend it
> wholeheartedly. Same for the essay on Schopenhauer he published in 2017
> (not translated into English yet).
>
> + Michel Houellebecq is the ultra-hip author of fashionably
> deconstructive modern French novels, so what interest would he have in a
> dead American writer consigned by many to the despised category of pulp?
> It turns out that Houellebecq is a big fan of American horror; among the
> writers he cites in this excellent short book are Richard Matheson and
> Robert Bloch, two disciples of Lovecraft. H.P. Lovecraft: Against the
> World, Against Life is a very satisfying read. Houellebecq escapes the
> jargon and theory of most modern literary criticism and simply delivers
> the goods: a passionate explication of Lovecraft's life and work which
> makes sense and gives you a new appreciation for the Bard of Unnameable
> Terror. Its fitting that Stephen King provides the introduction, because
> this book is very much in the spirit of his own landmark book Stephen
> King's Danse Macabre. Houellebecq asserts that Lovecraft's kindly,
> reclusive, poverty-stricken life was exemplary because it was integral
> to the vision of his work. That is, he wrote as a protest against life
> as we live it, the old human condition. Someone once said the negative,
> by contrast, suggests the other and Lovecraft's dark mythology is a
> satire of, and pessimistic comment on the mythologies we live by.
> Included in this volume are two of Lovecraft's more mind-blowing
> stories; The Call of Cthulhu and The Whisperer In Darkness. If the cult
> of Cthulhu was a twisted opposite of, and challenge to Christianity,
> then reading these stories makes you rethink exactly what it is you
> believe in and why. Lovecraft shouted No! to the seeming cruelty of the
> cosmos, and as King argues, gave space for attentive young readers to
> lick their wounds before engaging once again in the next battle of life.
> Houellebecq deals with Lovecraft's racism and Antisemitism, revealed in
> his letters published after his early death, by comparing him to
> Louis-Ferdinand Celine, the great French black comedy novelist who was
> also guilty of bigotry. Houellebecq demonstrates that fear was at the
> heart of their similar world views, not merely fascism,and that fear
> sharpened their work. Those who love life don't read books or see movies
> is a questionable statement by Houellebecq, but it contains a grain of
> truth. We read in part to take us out of this world and into alternative
> ones. Lovecraft is tremendously influential; the movie Alien is mostly
> an elaboration on his themes and method of attack. Houellebecq's little,
> readable book is a welcome addition to the small list of really
> enjoyable contemporary literary criticism. +
>
>
> https://bryantxonu.files.wordpress.com/2019/04/h-p-lovecraft-against-the-world-against-life.pdf
>
>
> Am 12.12.19 um 03:29 schrieb John Bailey:
> > Lovecraft pioneered a vision of the universe which is full of
> unimaginably
> > vast and terrible horrors that humanity is blind to. We're like ants
> > blissfully ignorant of the true nature of things, which is total abject
> > monstrosity. His protagonists get a glimpse of what's really out there
> and
> > generally lose their minds completely.
> > 'Lovecraftian' (also 'cosmic horror') tends to refer to a) work that
> > similarly presents the secret reality of the universe as being total
> horror
> > or b) TENTACLES TENTACLES EVERYWHERE
> >
> > On Thu, Dec 12, 2019 at 10:04 AM David Morris<fqmorris at gmail.com>
> wrote:
> >
> >> Never read Lovecraft, but know about Chullu and hidden plans and such.
> I
> >> generally hate conspiracy fiction, unless it is very refined.  Even so,
> I
> >> think it cheap.  So "Lovecraftian" fiction isn't a term I can easily
> try to
> >> understand w/o prejudice.
> >>
> >> That said, care to elaborate?
> >>
> >> David Morris
> >>
> >> On Wed, Dec 11, 2019 at 4:44 PM Mark Thibodeau<jerkyleboeuf at gmail.com>
> >> wrote:
> >>
> >>> How is the Joshi?
> >>>
> >>> I've been following Joshi's career and reading his Black Wings of
> Cthulhu
> >>> collections, representing the best of contemporary Lovecraftian short
> >>> fiction (of multiple different types... and featuring some wonderful
> >> stuff,
> >>> as well as some mediocrities, unfortunately), and was thinking of
> picking
> >>> up his more academically grounded work.
> >>>
> >>> On Wed, Dec 11, 2019 at 9:36 AM rich<richard.romeo at gmail.com>  wrote:
> >>>
> >>>> i doubt I would even talk about his work if I ever got the chance to
> >> meet
> >>>> Mr Pynchon. Probably Godzilla or favorite beer.
> >>>> He strikes me as a normal guy in that sense.
> >>>> I mean he's not HP Lovecraft (finally reading Joshi's exhaustive
> >>> biography
> >>>> thereof.)
> >>>>
> >>>> rich
> >>>>
> >>>> On Wed, Dec 11, 2019 at 6:32 AM Mark Kohut<mark.kohut at gmail.com>
> >> wrote:
> >>>>> I am conversationally friendly with a NYC writer online named
> >>>>> Margo Howard. She wrote something about not showing up for the
> >>>>> Nobel Prize and I did my bit---that is what the Swedish Academy most
> >>>> fears
> >>>>> as I've said here and why no Pynchon win, etc.
> >>>>>
> >>>>> She then riffed on TRP's reclusiveness, asking me about it, etc, esp
> >>> with
> >>>>> his wife, his agent, etc.
> >>>>> Then she said that a young man who was her assistant on a recent book
> >>> did
> >>>>> get to meet Mr. Pynchon. Pronounced him "normal" to her.
> >>>>>
> >>>>> That's all I got, folks. And it ain't much, I know.
> >>>>> --
> >>>>> Pynchon-L:https://waste.org/mailman/listinfo/pynchon-l
> >>>>>
> >>>> --
> >>>> Pynchon-L:https://waste.org/mailman/listinfo/pynchon-l
> >>>>
> >>> --
> >>> Pynchon-L:https://waste.org/mailman/listinfo/pynchon-l
> >>>
> >> --
> >> Pynchon-L:https://waste.org/mailman/listinfo/pynchon-l
> >>
> > --
> > Pynchon-L:https://waste.org/mailman/listinfo/pynchon-l
> > .
> >
>
> --
> Pynchon-L: https://waste.org/mailman/listinfo/pynchon-l
>