Monthly Archives: March 2021

New book: Le guide Lovecraftien de Providence

30 Tuesday Mar 2021

Posted by in New books

≈ 1 Comment

French tourists to Providence now have a new guidebook, Le guide Lovecraftien de Providence (2021). So far as I know this is the first since Jean-Christophe Requette’s in 1993, which had b&w photos from the mid 1980s.

From a review in French…

… the first real book in French on the city of the Master. And this is not a guide to Providence, but a Lovecraftian guide to Providence, listing the sites surveyed by the writer or mentioned in his short stories. The book is beautifully presented, with colour photos and numerous quotes from his correspondence and fiction. Everything is soberly written, but with a personal tone that conveys all the passion felt by the editor during her journey. Well done, and and perhaps we will soon see a Lovecraftian Guide to New York City?

Another review specifies that there are…

… four routes carefully prepared by field research in 2018 and 2019, with maps and original photos, quotes, biographical insights, showing you the historical and topographical landmarks.

Which reminds me, now NecronomiCon 2023 is scheduled, that a suitable fundraiser for the convention would be an ebook of Henry Beckwith’s Lovecraft’s Providence & Adjacent Parts. In paper it’s now become a £70 ‘collectable’.

Clark Ashton Smith in Brazil

30 Tuesday Mar 2021

Posted by in Kittee Tuesday, New books

≈ Comments Off on Clark Ashton Smith in Brazil

A new blog post from S.T. Joshi. Among other items of note, two volumes of Clark Ashton Smith are now available in Brazil in translation.

Talking of South America, new on Archive.org under Creative Commons is Les Historietas: Un Survol De La BD Argentine, being a sumptuously illustrated fannish history of Argentine comics and their creators. There are several pages on Breccia and Lovecraft.

Trans: “The tale you have told is terrifying, Malinche…”

Lovecraft, mon amour

29 Monday Mar 2021

Posted by in Lovecraft as character, Lovecraftian arts

≈ Comments Off on Lovecraft, mon amour

Martine Chifflot’s Lovecraft-Sonia stage play “Lovecraft, mon amour” will be staged in Burgundy, France, in September 2021…

It appears to have premiered(? on Zoom?) in March in Clermont-Ferrand, which is smack in the middle of France about 40 miles west of Lyon…

A fantastic theatrical and musical biopic, written for the centenary (1921-2021) of the meeting of H.P. Lovecraft and Sofia Greene Davis, his only wife. The play immerses the audience in American popular music from the years 1920-47. It opens in 1947 when Sonia learns of the passing of her husband H.P. Lovecraft, ten years after his death. This news upsets her and causes memories to flood back. But then a strange feeling grows — Howard is here [to speak to]. From recollections to confidences, these two people reconstruct the course of their thwarted love, so extraordinary and overwhelming. Will Sonia understand Howard [at last]? Is love stronger than death?

The book version of the play appeared in 2018, and was acclaimed by S.T. Joshi…

Update: Apparently there was a “Vichy” date also, now “postponed to 2023”. A first-try “movie of the play” is also being made and said to be “online soon”.

Ian Miller

28 Sunday Mar 2021

Posted by in Lovecraftian arts

≈ Comments Off on Ian Miller

Ian Miller, cover artist for the British Panther paperback Lovecraft editions, has a new original on sale, “Ghast, dissected” along with a variety of similar pen sketches including Poe illustrations.

Two of the Panther Lovecraft book covers can also be had as large fine-art prints.

The “Haunter” art had to be recreated and is not quite the same as the lost original…

There are also several collectable books…

Subways, street lights and superstitions

27 Saturday Mar 2021

Posted by in Historical context

≈ Comments Off on Subways, street lights and superstitions

More brief notes on interesting items gleaned from Letters to Family…

* Lovecraft’s experience of New York City subway travel was likely not the same in 1922 as in 1924-26, due the carriage types. He appears to have been at the cusp of a changeover in the types, from old to modern. In 1922 he remarks on the very old hand-crafted and very large carriages. He preferred travelling on the largest and most palatial of these, and went out of his way to do so.

* Providence had good strong street-lighting at night by 1922, not always the case in comparable provincial cities. Relevant to the inclination to take Providence night-walks, with Eddy and alone.

* In spring 1924 Lovecraft researched and wrote three chapters of a book on “American superstitions”. This was prior to his work for Houdini, and his own Supernatural Literature. There is no footnote detailing the fate of this text, though possibly I’ll encounter more details on later pages. I’d suspect it was later rolled into the Houdini work.

Flying down to Chile

27 Saturday Mar 2021

Posted by in Podcasts etc.

≈ Comments Off on Flying down to Chile

Lovecraft in Chile. A new 70 minute video talk which appears to be a broad survey on Lovecraft in Chile (a nation formed from the provinces that run all down the Pacific coast of South America). Sergio Fritz…

… reviews how Lovecraft and his literature arrived in Chile, how he has influenced certain national authors, musicians, filmmakers, illustrators … Chilean bands that have taken Lovecraftian elements, such as: Dorso, Atomic Aggressor, Demonic Rage, Miskatonic Union, Nyarlathotep, Arkham, Disembowel, Inanna, Inhumano, Cryptic Cult, Unnaussprechilchen Kulten, Lluvia Acida, etc. Writers like Hugo Correa, Sergio Meier, Patricio Alfonso and myself. Magazines like Yermo Frio and Vientos de Irem. Movies like Chilean Gothic … Juan Vasquez in comics … my essay on Lovecraft, the texts of Hugo Correa, the anthology Chile del Terror, Visiones Lovecraftianas.

Since YouTube has the automatic transcripts, you could likely learn more by running the transcription through a translator-bot.

How to search Hathi and Archive.org

26 Friday Mar 2021

Posted by in Odd scratchings, Scholarly works

≈ Comments Off on How to search Hathi and Archive.org

Useful for online searchers, Hathi has a new video webinar primer on how to use their Search and ‘Collection Builder’ tools.

A couple of months back Archive.org released something similar on YouTube. Although they seem to change or tweak their search UI layout and keyword algorithm almost monthly now (and usually for the worse, sadly), so it may already be a touch out-of-date.