Looking at this picture, Lovecraft appears to be a man that is straight out of a horror story himself. Between his emotionless gaze and the deadly shadow casted across his face he truly embodies his creations. His most famous creation and most recognizable being Cthulhu which was first introduced in his short story "The Call of Cthulhu". His other famous works include "The Whisperer in Darkness", "The Dunwich Horror", "At the Mountains of Madness", "The Color out of Space" and "The Shadow Over Insmouth". Despite creating a plethora of different stories, Cthulhu has always stood at the center.
Cthulhu in recent years has become somewhat of a pop culture icon. It has been featured in games such as Terraria via a giant eyeball named "The Eye of Cthulhu" and in World of Warcraft which took Cthulhu (and some of his evil cosmic brethren), expanding upon the idea of an everlasting evil being. In all adaptions of Cthulhu though, they all share at least one of these characteristics, lots of eyes, enormous size, pale skin, squid like head and of course lots of tentacles. There is even a game named Call of Cthulhu which is a faithful rendition of H.P. Lovecraft's original story. ALSO! there is a new tv show that came out recently called Lovecraft Country. I have not watched it yet so I can't speak on its content but from what I've seen it holds a lot of the same horrific tone and mood that the all of his original stories have. Although, I have watched The Color out of Space which is a spectacular film which is about 90% accurate to the source material that Lovecraft wrote. Before you ask, yes that is Nicolas Cage starring in the movie.
"Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn"
Lovecraft is such a puzzle. It almost feels like to me half the reason he's able to convey those emotions of revulsion for the audience is because he was such a misanthrope himself. I'm certainly glad he succeeded in writing some utterly raw emotional works, but it probably would've been nice if it hadn't come out of so much pain and hatred on his part.
ReplyDeleteInterestingly enough, I've only seen visual adaptations of Lovecraft's work including The Color out of Space movie and a comic adaptation of At the Mountain of Madness. While I enjoyed the experience of both, I feel like something was missing. I found myself more impressed by Nicholas Cage's performance, or the artwork of the comic adaptation, then I did with the story of Lovecraft. It was interesting to see how such a well-known creator of indescribable horrors was adapted into primarily visual media.
ReplyDeleteI am so fascinated by Lovecraft's work. It just feels... different... from similar creations in this genre. Maybe part of the reason that his horror was conveyed so well is that certain parts of his distanced, often averse personality shone through the his creations. I really enjoyed reading your perspective on what makes him so unique!
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