The most merciful thing in the world, I think, is the inability of the human mind to correlate all that it knows about H.P. Lovecraft: the admired, reviled, and deeply weird 20th century horror writer whose tentacles keep creeping into our Satanic philosophy. We’re finally breaking out the Elder Sign on some old school horrors as we look at the life and writings of good ol’ Howard Phillips, and the weird effect he’s had on Satanism and pop culture. Plus, in our extra-long news segment, we discuss the Satanic Temple controversy over their devil’s advocate. (Note: in this episode, the news comes after our main topic, to spare newbies and casual listeners.)
Praise, condemnation, more questions, and satisfying ways to spend a dollar can be sent to blackmassappealpod@gmail.com.
SHOW LINKS
- Nikol King, artist who both Simone and Tab loved at the TST Seattle show
- Arkansas Times: “Chick tract” illustrates Sen. Jason Rapert learning about civil liberties and religious freedom
- Buy Tabitha a coffee!
The H.P. Lovecraft stories we read:
Everyone’s favorite stories:
- Daniel: Pickman’s Model, Dreams in the Witch-House
- Simone: The Rats in the Walls
- Tabitha: Call of Cthulhu video games
- Meghan: The Call of Cthulhu, Nyarlathotep; stories by Cassandra Khaw, Jonathan L. Howard; Bloodborne video game
- H.P. Lovecraft’s wife, Sonia Greene’s story in Weird Tales, “The Horror at Martin’s Beach”
- Naked Dudes Reading Lovecraft
- Definition of Cyclopean (Simone was basically right, if we’re looking at the second definition)
- Awesome collection of Lovecraft’s stories, featuring an introduction by Guillermo Del Toro
- Lovecraft, Racism, & the World Fantasy Award
- The Man Who Haunted Horror
- Lovecraftian Magic in “Satanic Rituals” (page 173)
- Barnes & Noble Blog: “The Enduring Legacy of H.P. Lovecraft, Genre’s Crazy Racist Uncle,” by our very guest, Meghan!
- Meghan on Twitter
- Cthulhu Problems on Twitter
I’d have liked to hear more about how Lovecraft’s works became public domain, and the relationship between him and the author Robert E. Howard.
I mean, these days they’re just Public Domain because they’re old and not owned by Disney. I do know there was some argument for years over whether Lovecraft’s work was PD before its time, so to speak, but I couldn’t say whether there was any merit to that.
I love Robert Howard (his stories that is, not the person, on a personal level he was a cancer-filled boil), but I don’t think I’ll ever be able to quite eke out a rationale for a Conan episode. Can’t win ’em all.
Hey, can you guys add what songs are used in the intros and outros. You guys have some great music taste (I mean you like Ghost after all) and I would love to look into some more of the music you use in the podcast.
Hello all, working my way through the episodes, never commented before but I’m a big HPL (writings not writer) fan, so here I am.
I realized something new while listening; that a lot of HPLs fiction, unlike so much other horror, ONLY works in a modern, scientific universe. Unless you have Deep Time and a modern nearly infinite universe, stories like At The Mountains of Madness don’t work at all.
A young earth of 6000 years won’t cut it, and you need a modern understanding of space for things like “The Color Out of Space” to work.
Just an observation, but makes sense since Dreams in the Witch House, Shadow Out of Time, etc read more like SF than supernatural horror.
Hope there’s a “Lovecraft films” episode in the offing. I have… opinions.
I get the feeling that terms like “Old Earth” didn’t have the baggage in Lovecraft’s day they do now. -D