Notice the “Lovecraftian stories”, not “Cthulhu Mythos stories” of the title. If you have been at this Mythos thing as long as I have (actively reading anything Mythos in the 1980s, I read hundreds of stories and novels, good and bad) you learn to seek the first and avoid the second.
Cthulhu Mythos pastiche is something I can do without. The word “pastiche” came from the same source as “paper mache” because people would make paper copies of things they loved in the style of that object. This same kind of Lovecraft imitating really is as thin as a tissue paper imitation at times. My favorites are always the stories that are Lovecraftian in intent but not execution. The stories of Basil Copper are a good example, as are the best of Fritz Leiber’s horror tales. These two went with the spirit but not the diction.
The stories I have selected here are older ones that were written by friends and acquaintances of HPL, stories with a dash of the old Lovecraftian juice rather than something sauteed to death in it.
“The Jovian Jest” (Astounding Stories of Super-Science, May 1930) by Lilith Lorraine is a delightful surprise in this issue of Astounding. Editor, Harry Bates, filled the mag with big-chinned heroes who rescue fair space damsels, and then he drops this little Lovecraftian bomb into the mix. Elsnore Village gets a visit from a nameless thing, a ship from Jupiter. No Space Opera heroics here.
“The Cosmic Horror” (Wonder Stories, August 1933) by Richard F. Searight was called “Competent pulp thrills” by E. F. Bleiler. A meteorite, when opened, produces a tiny terror that is impervious to bullets. The thing goes around sucking human blood then taking up residence in Dinosaur Cave. of course, it has one objective, to reproduce. Fortunately our heroes kill it in the end. This plot may have started with “The Colour Out of Space” but you can find it in Colin Wilson’s The Space Vampires (1976) and in a thousand B-movies.
“The Terrible Parchment” (Weird Tales, August 1937) by Manly Wade Wellman was an homage to a fallen master. Wellman wasn’t part of the Lovecraft Circle but he admired HPL all the same. His humorous version of a Mythos story was written without the approval of August Derleth, who would lock down the production of Cthulhu-related stories. This tale opens with the author getting his copy of Weird Tales. Later there is a living, evil manuscript with sections from The Necronomicon. The hero defeats it with holy water. I’m not sure HPL would have approved.
“Far Below” (Weird Tales, June-July 1939) by Robert Barbour Johnson can best be described by the author in The Weird Tales Story (1977) by Robert Weinberg, RBJ tellus us:
“Far Below’ was my greatest success and my “swansong” for the magazine. It was my least original story; written as a tribute to the deceased Lovecraft, I even used him as a minor character in the story, to make my intention clear. It was based on the ghouls of one of his best stories, “Pickman’s Model”…I made no attempt to imitate the Master’s style and avoided all references to the Cthulhu Mythos.
Johnson goes on to tell how years later, Dorothy McIlwraith chose “Far Below” as the best story ever from Weird Tales. “While most complimentary, it wasn’t and I’ve never claimed that nor shall I ever.” You decide. Is it that good?
“The Dwellers Under the Tomb” (Lost Fantasies #4, 1976) is another little bit from Robert Weinberg, who published it first. Those occult investigators Conrad and Kirowan are at it again in the Dagoth Hills, looking into the claims of Job Kiles. The answer to his “ghost” proves far more terrifying as the detectives discover just what dwells under the tomb. You can find this one in The Horror Stories of Robert E. Howard (2008).
Well, there you have it. Stories to chill your spine as you laze about in a hammock or on the sands of the beach. I’m sure you have your favorites. Don’t be afraid to let me know what they are. I could use some good Lovecraftian reading material myself…
