Cognitive Fictions Book

So, are you interested in Lovecraft the man? Are you interested in some in depth analysis of some of his works, or a look at the history of the occult books he and his friends used in their works?

Well then, this is the book for you!

I think this was an easier read than An Epicure in the Terrible. So this might be a better starting point for those wanting to look a little deeper into Lovecraft's work and life. I say this because most of these essays are on the older side now, and so they're a bit more…. General? Since you don't have years of doctoral students and critics discussing all kinds of Lovecraft related-topics so all that's left is hyper-specific niche discussions.

And another interesting part of this is that you have essays from people who were actually friends and correspondents of Lovecraft himself, such as Robert Bloch and Fritz Leiber. Bloch's "Notes on an Entity" was as touching as Leiber's "A Literary Copernicus" was insightful. Leiber's essay especially serves to highlight how much Lovecraft changed the direction of the horror/weird genre. And there is a letter in here by ol' Lovecraft himself! <3
He was so self-deprecating and polite; the aristocratic gentleman persona he tried to cultivate in himself really comes across in his letters.

Tierney's "The Derleth Mythos" was apparently one of the first times someone examined Derleth's major participation in creating the Cthulhu Mythos as it existed back in the 70's-80's, since a lot of the 'posthumous' collaborations were at the time thought to be more Lovecraft's work than they really were (though the slight Derleth bashing made for a sad but unsurprised panda). His "When the Stars are Right" was a fun little romp about why R'lyeh rose and sunk when it did in the short story "Call of Cthulhu". (It may or may not have something to do with Aldebaran where a certain King may or may not be *cough*)

Some other interesting essays included Wetzel's "Genesis of the Cthulhu Mythos", which shows the similarities between attributes of Greek myths and the Cthulhu Mythos stories, as Lovecraft was a professed lover of Greek myth. Schweitzer's "Character Gullibility in Weird Fiction" is a good reminder that just because we the reader may know the tropes of horror fiction and can assume that what the character experiences is real, doesn't mean the character themselves should! And poor Lovecraft gets taken to school a bit in "HP Lovecraft and Pseudomathematics".

The last two essays are the real bulk of the book. Joshi's "Textual Problems in Lovecraft" highlight just how much effort goes into restoring Lovecraft's texts. I had no idea how arduous it would be to cross reference multiple published typescripts with varying errors and trying to decipher Lovecraft's scribbles. It sounds like a nightmare trying to figure out which published story is the most accurate when no original manuscript remains and Lovecraft's notes make it hard to tell if he preferred his own edits or not! It's also made clear how lucky we are to have all of the original manuscripts we do thanks to R.H. Barlow's efforts.

Lin Carter's "H.P. Lovecraft: The Books" is a pretty exhaustive look at all of the different Mythos books that pop up throughout Lovecraft and Co's stories. He goes into their history, author, story appearances and whether or not they are even actual books. Appending many of the entries are Price's and Joshi's corrections and commentaries and at the end of Carter's list they add more he missed.

This is a great book to get started for a Lovecraft fan looking to get their feet wet with some Lovecraft studies, especially since this is a historical look at what the field looked like a couple of decades ago.