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Cthulhu
Oct 26, 2010 1:46:53 GMT -5
Post by Deleted on Oct 26, 2010 1:46:53 GMT -5
I've been reading on this, and it seems pretty cool. Any other fans here with recomendations on the series for a newbie?
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Cthulhu
Oct 26, 2010 2:02:03 GMT -5
Post by toast on Oct 26, 2010 2:02:03 GMT -5
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Deleted
Deleted Member
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Cthulhu
Oct 26, 2010 2:13:39 GMT -5
Post by Deleted on Oct 26, 2010 2:13:39 GMT -5
Not quite what I had in mind, but entertaining. Thanks for the laugh
I did find out that every thing about him published before 1923 is in the public domain though!
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Cthulhu
Oct 26, 2010 6:24:19 GMT -5
Post by WildKnight on Oct 26, 2010 6:24:19 GMT -5
Go go Geutenberg Project!
Anyway, pretty much everything that was written by Lovecraft is awesome. Everything that was written by others who came after... not so much. Generally Cthulhu materials are found in anthologies of short stories. Avoid the movies like the plague. There has never been a worthwhile adaptation of Cthulhu into film, with the exception of the silent film "Call of Cthulhu"
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Cthulhu
Oct 26, 2010 7:42:25 GMT -5
Post by VirgoDragon2288 on Oct 26, 2010 7:42:25 GMT -5
If you drop by pretty much any used bookstore you should find about 50 bazillion Arkham House books. Like WildKnight said things actually by Lovecraft are best, but there are some stories he wrote that don't actually have him attributed as the author.
My three favorite stories are "The Rats in the Walls", "At The Mountains of Madness", and (of course) "The Call of Cthulhu". The Rats book is less of the whole Mythos, and more normal horror (still awesome though), and MoM is one of his longest books, so you might not want to start there.
Really anything written by Lovecraft (with maybe a few exceptions, depending on how well you can take racism) is pure gold.
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Cthulhu
Oct 26, 2010 9:40:35 GMT -5
Post by WildKnight on Oct 26, 2010 9:40:35 GMT -5
Thats 2 for Rats and Mountains of Madness. Not that Call itself is bad, I just don't think it lives up to the standard of the others.
I'm not much of a fan of Lovecrafts "Dream Cycle" stuff, but even that is worth a read.
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Cthulhu
Oct 28, 2010 22:28:05 GMT -5
Post by browwiw on Oct 28, 2010 22:28:05 GMT -5
Anthologies of Lovecraft's short stories are very easy to find. Any decent chain bookstore with a horror section will have a couple copies. Also, don't forget to check out used bookstores.
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Cthulhu
Oct 28, 2010 22:33:31 GMT -5
Post by Dullahan on Oct 28, 2010 22:33:31 GMT -5
I love Lovecraft's stuff....with a caveat. I hate the man's dialogue.
Other than that....his stuff is great. Anthologies are easy to find, and well worth reading.
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Cthulhu
Oct 28, 2010 22:45:15 GMT -5
Post by browwiw on Oct 28, 2010 22:45:15 GMT -5
That's a valid criticism. Lovecraft's prose is often cited in writing books on a writer can have excellent descriptive and story telling skills, but fall flat when it comes to dialogue. Lovecraft was something of an eccentric shut in that kept and amazing amount of correspondence through the mail. His collected letters dwarf his all of his fiction. Lovecraft really didn't know how 'real people' spoke.
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Cthulhu
Oct 28, 2010 22:47:20 GMT -5
Post by Dullahan on Oct 28, 2010 22:47:20 GMT -5
Yep. And the odd thing is, he seems to have known it, as his stories tend to have little dialogue. If something has to be told to a character, it's in letter form. I think something like less than 5,000 lines of prose are dialogue in all his work.
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Cthulhu
Oct 28, 2010 22:50:10 GMT -5
Post by browwiw on Oct 28, 2010 22:50:10 GMT -5
You know what they say: write to your strengths. I never made the connection between his real life letter writing and his use of the conceit in his fiction. That actually makes me like Lovecraft even more. Good catch, Nightmare.
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Cthulhu
Oct 29, 2010 5:55:16 GMT -5
Post by WildKnight on Oct 29, 2010 5:55:16 GMT -5
Lovecraft was well aware of his limitations. He also didn't know jack about women (which is evident in his writing). He tends to not include a lot of female protagonists. He's been called sexist because of it (and he may have been), but I think its more self-aware than sexist to refuse to avoid including characters that you'll only mess up anyway.
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Cthulhu
Oct 29, 2010 11:59:14 GMT -5
Post by dorkknight23 on Oct 29, 2010 11:59:14 GMT -5
Also, his representations of different ethnicities can be a touch on the...troubling side, especially considering the whole "human vs. inhuman" thing. You have to keep in perspective the time and place, to be sure.
Yeah, At the Mountains of Madness is definitely my favorite of the Cthulu mythos stories, definitely if you read just one Lovecraft story read that one. But you should read all of them, of course.
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Cthulhu
Oct 29, 2010 12:51:56 GMT -5
Post by WildKnight on Oct 29, 2010 12:51:56 GMT -5
I think its pretty well documented that Lovecraft and a lot of his circle (including Robert Howard, my personal favorite) had some troubling views of non-caucasians.
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