Should a Mythos author write Lovecraftian pastiches? Is the Mythos anything, really, but a colossal pastiche of Lovecraft? Is the Mythos’ value lessened by its collective nature? These are big questions and very important ones for anyone who wants to write Mythos.
The word ‘pastiche’ comes from the Italian pasticcio – “piecrust,” or, more literally, “composed of paste.” It has two meanings in literature: a jumbled collection of something or something made in imitation of another. For instance, Horace Walpole used the term in 1752 to describe a hodgepodge of songs. I think this is appropriate because Walpole created a pastiche of a German castle in his home Strawberry Hill, in which turrets and such were made of paper and paste. He also got the Gothic ball rolling with the Castle of Otranto (1864), a novel that was fiercely pastiched for decades, inspiring our modern horror field.
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