{"id":1870,"date":"2018-04-05T14:40:27","date_gmt":"2018-04-05T18:40:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lucysnyder.com\/?p=1870"},"modified":"2018-04-05T14:40:27","modified_gmt":"2018-04-05T18:40:27","slug":"the-call-of-cthulhu","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lucysnyder.com\/index.php\/the-call-of-cthulhu\/","title":{"rendered":"The Call of Cthulhu"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cThe Call of Cthulhu<\/a>\u201d is probably\u00a0H.P. Lovecraft’s most enduring and influential\u00a0story. It\u2019s been reprinted and borrowed from and adapted in thousands of ways since its publication in\u00a0Weird Tales<\/em>\u00a0in 1928. Lovecraft, a\u00a0movie\u00a0fan, would probably approve of the faithfully retro black-and-white film<\/a> of his tale released by\u00a0H. P. Lovecraft Historical Society\u00a0in 2005; he might be horrified by the\u00a0adorable\u00a0Cthulhu<\/a>\u00a0plush toys and pun-laden C<\/a>thulhu tee shirts<\/a> sold at\u00a0science fiction conventions around the globe. The\u00a0tropes from this classic horror story have become so ubiquitous throughout\u00a0weird fiction\u00a0and\u00a0horror books, stories, comics<\/a>, movies and games<\/a> that it\u2019s the kind of tale that most any\u00a0speculative fiction\u00a0reader thinks he or she has surely already read \u2026 but in many cases has not.<\/p>\n

I initially read this story to capture some of the “flavor” of Lovecraft\u2019s style and\u00a0world building for a writing project. I figured I would find it a bit old-fashioned, and while parts did creak \u2026 it also gave me nightmares! Not many stories do that to me these days.<\/p>\n

Clearly, there\u2019s something here that resonated and continues to resonate with readers. So I took a harder look at the story to find out what I found it so\u00a0unsettling\u00a0and why. I think that the disturbing core of this story is the kind of\u00a0cosmic horror\u00a0that Lovecraft evokes from the very first two lines:<\/p>\n

The most merciful thing in the world, I think, is the inability of the human mind to correlate all its contents. We live on\u00a0a placid island of ignorance\u00a0in the midst of\u00a0black seas of infinity\u00a0\u2026.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

At first glance, these lines simply look like a variant of the old adage \u201cIgnorance is bliss.\u201d But there\u2019s more at work here. Lovecraft isn\u2019t writing about bliss; he\u2019s writing about\u00a0mercy. And the structural\u00a0ignorance\u00a0of our minds is portrayed as the greatest mercy\u00a0humanity\u00a0can experience \u2026 greater even than the mercy of a quick death in the face of prolonged suffering. At the time the story was written, Lovecraft\u2019s world was less than a decade past the horrors of\u00a0World War I\u00a0and a half-dozen smaller wars raged around our planet \u2026 which he describes as “placid”. So Lovecraft is setting some pretty high horror stakes right from the start: as violent and brutal as humanity can be, it\u2019s nothing compared to the horrors lurking amongst the stars.<\/p>\n

Lovecraft ratchets up the horror in his description of the\u00a0Great Old Ones: \u201cBut although They no longer lived, They would never really die. \u2026 They could only lie awake in the dark and think whilst uncounted millions of years rolled by.\u201d<\/p>\n

I found this part utterly horrifying. Many of us, I think, have a terror of being\u00a0buried alive. Of being conscious in the darkness, helpless, unable to move, unable to escape. And if it dragged on?\u00a0Boredom\u00a0and\u00a0anxiety\u00a0would quickly escalate to helpless insanity, as prisoners committed to solitary confinement can attest. Being alone with nothing but your own thoughts to keep you company is\u00a0not<\/em>\u00a0a merciful fate.<\/p>\n

And the Great Old Ones did this to themselves on purpose. That kind of eternal\u00a0torment\u00a0is part of their selfish design. And if they\u2019d do that to themselves? The mind reels at the thought of what they\u2019d do to any other living thing in the cosmos. And it\u2019s staggering to imagine the thoughts such beings would ponder after such a long time locked in dark madness. That\u2019s a masterful bit of horror that Lovecraft evokes in this tale.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cThe Call of Cthulhu\u201d is probably\u00a0H.P. Lovecraft’s most enduring and influential\u00a0story. It\u2019s been reprinted and borrowed from and adapted in thousands of ways since its […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1874,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[31],"tags":[9,99,94,95],"class_list":["post-1870","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-book-review","tag-horror","tag-lovecraft","tag-short-fiction","tag-short-stories"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.lucysnyder.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/call_of_cthulu_logo.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p8qT6f-ua","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":1436,"url":"https:\/\/www.lucysnyder.com\/index.php\/whats-weird-fiction\/","url_meta":{"origin":1870,"position":0},"title":"What’s Weird Fiction?","author":"Lucy A. Snyder","date":"July 12, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"Weird fiction can refer to a couple of different types of literature, depending on who's discussing which books and stories. Classic Weird Fiction \"Classic\" weird fiction is the type of late 19th Century\/early 20th Century speculative fiction written by authors such as H.P Lovecraft, Robert Chambers, William Hope Hodgson, Lord\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "dark fantasy"","block_context":{"text":"dark fantasy","link":"https:\/\/www.lucysnyder.com\/index.php\/category\/dark-fantasy\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lucysnyder.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/07\/looming-low-cover-spread.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lucysnyder.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/07\/looming-low-cover-spread.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lucysnyder.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/07\/looming-low-cover-spread.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":2016,"url":"https:\/\/www.lucysnyder.com\/index.php\/blossoms-blackened-like-dead-stars\/","url_meta":{"origin":1870,"position":1},"title":"New online serial","author":"Lucy A. Snyder","date":"July 1, 2018","format":false,"excerpt":"Broken Eye Books is publishing my new serialized novel Blossoms Blackened Like Dead Stars. The serial continues where I left off in my contribution to their Lovecraftian space opera anthology Ride the Star Wind. Publishers Weekly praised my short story as \"superbly creepy.\" This serial chronicles the adventures of Beatrice\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "novel"","block_context":{"text":"novel","link":"https:\/\/www.lucysnyder.com\/index.php\/category\/novel\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lucysnyder.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/RideStarWind.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lucysnyder.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/RideStarWind.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lucysnyder.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/RideStarWind.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lucysnyder.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/RideStarWind.jpg?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lucysnyder.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/RideStarWind.jpg?resize=1050%2C600&ssl=1 3x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lucysnyder.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/RideStarWind.jpg?resize=1400%2C800&ssl=1 4x"},"classes":[]},{"id":1816,"url":"https:\/\/www.lucysnyder.com\/index.php\/dead-but-dreaming\/","url_meta":{"origin":1870,"position":2},"title":"Dead But Dreaming","author":"Lucy A. Snyder","date":"March 19, 2018","format":false,"excerpt":"That is not dead which can eternal lie, And with strange aeons even death may die. In his house at R\u2019lyeh dead Cthulhu waits dreaming. \u2013 \u201cThe Call of Cthulhu\u201d by H.P. Lovecraft \u00a0 So, I was at a party discussing rum and elder gods, as one does, and we\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "humor"","block_context":{"text":"humor","link":"https:\/\/www.lucysnyder.com\/index.php\/category\/humor\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lucysnyder.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/drinks.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lucysnyder.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/drinks.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lucysnyder.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/drinks.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lucysnyder.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/drinks.jpg?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 2x"},"classes":[]},{"id":2090,"url":"https:\/\/www.lucysnyder.com\/index.php\/garden-of-eldritch-delights\/","url_meta":{"origin":1870,"position":3},"title":"Garden of Eldritch Delights","author":"Lucy A. Snyder","date":"July 31, 2018","format":false,"excerpt":"My new collection Garden of Eldritch Delights was released by Raw Dog Screaming Press on October 18th. You can order it direct from the distributor or via Amazon or Barnes & Noble. This is my third collection with RDSP. The first two, While the Black Stars Burn and Soft Apocalypses,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "My Books"","block_context":{"text":"My Books","link":"https:\/\/www.lucysnyder.com\/index.php\/category\/my-books\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lucysnyder.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/EldritchDelights-e1533052283615.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lucysnyder.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/EldritchDelights-e1533052283615.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lucysnyder.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/EldritchDelights-e1533052283615.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lucysnyder.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/EldritchDelights-e1533052283615.jpg?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 2x"},"classes":[]},{"id":1982,"url":"https:\/\/www.lucysnyder.com\/index.php\/the-ballad-of-black-tom\/","url_meta":{"origin":1870,"position":4},"title":"The Ballad of Black Tom","author":"Lucy A. Snyder","date":"June 6, 2018","format":false,"excerpt":"As a person who\u2019s attempting to write thoughtful, modern weird fiction, I found\u00a0The Ballad of Black Tom\u00a0by Victor LaValle to be a pure delight. Go read this one, folks! It\u2019s a fabulous novella. The narrative is very much in a dialog with (and functions as a razor-sharp rebuttal to) H.P.\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "book review"","block_context":{"text":"book review","link":"https:\/\/www.lucysnyder.com\/index.php\/category\/book-review\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lucysnyder.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/06\/ballad.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lucysnyder.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/06\/ballad.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lucysnyder.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/06\/ballad.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":2630,"url":"https:\/\/www.lucysnyder.com\/index.php\/weirdbook-annual-2-cthulhu\/","url_meta":{"origin":1870,"position":5},"title":"Weirdbook Annual #2: Cthulhu","author":"Lucy A. Snyder","date":"March 21, 2019","format":false,"excerpt":"My story \"A Noble Endeavor\" is in the new Weirdbook Annual #2. This edition contains a variety of Lovecraftian horror and dark fantasy tales. Here's the full table of contents: \"The Shining Trapezohedron\" by Robert M. Price \"A Noble Endeavor\" by Lucy A. Snyder \"Ancient Astronauts\" by Cynthia Ward \"The\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "publishing"","block_context":{"text":"publishing","link":"https:\/\/www.lucysnyder.com\/index.php\/category\/publishing\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lucysnyder.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/weirdbooktrim.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lucysnyder.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/weirdbooktrim.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lucysnyder.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/weirdbooktrim.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lucysnyder.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/weirdbooktrim.jpg?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 2x"},"classes":[]}],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lucysnyder.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1870","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lucysnyder.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lucysnyder.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lucysnyder.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lucysnyder.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1870"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/www.lucysnyder.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1870\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1877,"href":"https:\/\/www.lucysnyder.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1870\/revisions\/1877"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lucysnyder.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1874"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lucysnyder.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1870"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lucysnyder.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1870"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lucysnyder.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1870"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}