/lit/ - Literature

[RaggleFraggle No.1855134]

So...what does /lit/ think of H. P. Lovecraft? Currently pushing the entire collection of his work.

[Anonymous No.1855137]

He's okay but also overrated. His stories are fun and he has moments that are really good, but on the whole he's just not that great of a writer - his prose tends to be purple and stilted for one thing.

Also, was a virulent racist.

[Anonymous No.1855139]

>>1855134
The only good point I think he has are that he was descriptive (though sometimes too descriptive).

[ColonelEnid No.1855143]

Yes, yes, yes! I love H.P. Lovecraft. I'm currently reading 'In The Witch House and other Weird Stories' I was thinking about makig a thread about reading snippests of what we're currently reading and I was going to read one of his short stories, or a part of it.

[Anonymous No.1855171]

His prose is often stylistically inept but that's par for the course with much genre fiction. He's middling I'd say—not as bad in that respect as Asimov, Tolkien, or Heinlein, not as good as Gene Wolfe or Le Guin.

As for the content of his stories, some of them are genuinely creepy and interesting, many are just rawr monster drivel. His "cosmic horror" is often more interesting to read about than to actually read, and if you really want to read about lonely men trapped in an incomprehensible universe, there's plenty of good absurdist/existential and postmodern fiction out there. Some of his stories get samey once you've read a lot.

In general I like the Dream Cycle much more than the Cthulhu Mythos, although there's considerable overlap. The Silver Key and Through the Gates of the SIlver Key are two of my favorite stories, the closest things he has to masterpieces.

[Anonymous No.1855176]

He was very good at what he did in spite of his dreadful writing style.

[Anonymous No.1855181]

When, long ago, the gods created Earth
In Jove's fair image Man was shaped at birth.
The beasts for lesser parts were next designed;
Yet were they too remote from humankind.
To fill the gap, and join the rest to Man,
Th'Olympian host conceiv'd a clever plan.
A beast they wrought, in semi-human figure,
Filled it with vice, and called the thing a Nigger.

[Anonymous No.1855199]

>>1855176
>He was very good at what he did because of his dreadful writing style.

Fixed. I have never seen the atmosphere in Lovecraft's stories replicated. Primarily the sense of dread which permeates his best fiction. Dreadful indeed.

I'm not saying he was amazing on the stylistic side, but in spite of all the technical shortcomings of his writing it worked.

[Anonymous No.1855204]

His work ranged

Some pieces of writing were fantastic but others were essentially extended descriptions of monoliths.

[Anonymous No.1855209]

Can't stand his writing, fucking awful. Though the opening paragraph of Cthulhu is great.

[Anonymous No.1855244]

>>1855199
Clark Ashton Smith did a good job of replicating Lovecraft's style without the dreadful prose.

[Anonymous No.1855252]

>>1855204
Much like all pulp writers of the time really, I don't think any could boast a body of work that was all great. A lot of people forget that he was a pulp writer and was bashing these things out for magazines.

[Anonymous No.1855259]

>>1855199
You should try Clark Ashton Smith. He is Lovecraft with better atmosphere and infinitely better prose. Look into Abominations of Yondo and Dark Eidolon for a start

[Anonymous No.1855260]

He's one of my favorite authors

[Anonymous No.1855269]

>Currently pushing the entire collection of his work.

you got that hardcover from barnes and nobles, didn't you?

[Anonymous No.1855270]

I enjoy his stories very much. However his writing style is sometimes pretty hard to bear. I always thought it's because English isn't my first language and I still lack some proper reading comprehension. But I dunno man.

[Anonymous No.1855287]

>>1855244
>>1855259
I actually love Clark Ashton Smith, but the atmosphere is simply not the same. I do not experience the same kind of intense dread with his work as I have with Lovecraft's best (Lovecraft's poorer writings are not very effective).

Overall I think CAS is a better writer for sure, but Lovecraft's purple prose sometimes worked wonders for me in a way that I think warrants my compliments to him and which has not really been replicated elsewhere.

[Anonymous No.1855311]

>>1855270
His style is pretty bad even for a native speaker.

[Anonymous No.1855332]

>>1855311
He spoke English a century ago, it's gonna be different you fucking lightweight.

[Anonymous No.1855346]

>>1855332
Don't shit around. His english was outdated for his own time. Authors of the time thought he was archaic.

It does create an athmosphere though.

[Anonymous No.1855347]

His stories tend to consist of good build up...and then the monster...which is...a monster, duh. Lovecraft did not learn what Hitchcock learned about how not to diffuse the tension by simply plunking in the murderer/monster/bomb into the story.

ps: Pic contains Lovecraft's works in html.

[Anonymous No.1855544]

>>1855347
I forget how to open these :S

[Anonymous No.1855581]

His writing style looked like a pull between scholarly and clinical versus prophetical and foreboding. I like to pretend it was intentional since it really creates an atmosphere where the standard gentlemanly scholar protagonist starts slipping into madness.

[Anonymous No.1855593]

>>1855544
Firesteg extension

[Anonymous No.1855594]

>>1855581
Thank you for putting into clearer words what I couldn't