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Cthulhu Mythos

 
  

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The Return Of Rothkoid
14:47 / 19.11.01
You've never been there? Sheesh. I thought you were their posterboy, Riz!
 
 
rizla mission
15:44 / 19.11.01
um.. no. somehow I must have missed it previously.
 
 
invisible_al
18:11 / 19.11.01
The neil gaiman story is Shoggoth's Old Peculiar, apprantly it was inspired by a drunken evening at a convention which he spent doing the mythos in the style of Pete and Dud with a fan. Bloke following a Travel guide ends up in Innsmouth by sea.
Its quite amusing if you know Lovecraft :-).

Anyone read the graphic novel of the
The Dream Quest of Unknown Kadath? Its quite good in a disturbing kind of way. Which is how it should be I suppose

[ 19-11-2001: Message edited by: invisible_al ]
 
 
Gus
18:36 / 19.11.01
quote:Originally posted by Rizla Year Zero:
O, yeah, and the best thing of all - Lovecraft's refusal to reveal how much of it he made up, how much of it came to him in dream-visions and how much was based on genuine occult folklore ..


from one of lovecraft's letters to August Derleth, on the site linked above:

quote: I wonder, though, if I have a right to claim authorship of things I dream? I hate to take credit, when I did not really think out the picture with my own conscious wits.

Knowing a bit about the life and thoughts of the man really adds a new dimension when reading his works. You realize that the feeling of otherness which emanates from them truly comes from the fact that, to him, a lot of it was indeed alien, originating either from the deep recesses of his subconscious mind or, just possibly, from some actual otherworldly existence which he could somehow, erratically, tune into.

It's similar to the way in which Grant's visions of Barbelith, Christ, the silvery alien things, etc... add to the mystical aspect of the Invisibles.

I've never really read his letters before but I'll try to find a volume of them now. Fascinating stuff.
 
 
the Fool
20:51 / 19.11.01
Not just an 'otherness', a deeply disturbing 'unknowableness' pervades his work.

I think one of his more striking concepts was the irrelevance of mankind to the mad space gods. That man has no claim to earth other than this brief moment in the sun, followed on either side by abysses of infinite horrible darkness. The great old ones predate us (and want the earth back), as do the shuggoths or the old ones that the shuggoths destroyed. And we will be followed by giant insects that the great race of Yith have already psychically invaded in advance. We have no future, our past just footprints in the sand.

Normality is just a fragile illusion, bordered on all sides by unimaginable, unspeakable horror and endless insanity. Human values of morality are worthless, progress is futile. We might as well all bow down to Azathoth and await destruction. You'll go insane anyway, there is no hope.

I think a concept like that makes up for lack of writing skill and wooden characters. The real characters were the unseen gods and books of forbidden knowledge in any event.

Ull hy'lik Yog Sothoth!!! Ull hy'lik Azathoth!!
 
 
Pin
08:39 / 20.11.01
quote:Originally posted by Rizla Year Zero:
Oh yeah, and avoid August Derleth's stories at all costs - they are to Lovecraft what Bush are to Nirvana.


As a small aside, that is quite possibly the most, howyousay... Rizlaish thing I think I've ever heard.
 
 
rizla mission
13:35 / 20.11.01
Um .. yes, you're quite possibly right.

(except it doesn't have enough 'ums', 'ers', brackets and ..'s).

Fool And Gus: EXACTLY! Spot on!
 
 
Sharkgrin
20:51 / 20.11.01
Bringing enlightenment to young, hopeful children is truly one of my passions.

quote: ************************************************************************
Dear Editor-
I am 8 years old. Some of my little friends say there is no Great
Cthulhu. Papa says, "If you see it on Alt.Horror.Cthulhu, it's so,"
Please tell me the truth, is there a Great Cthulhu who will rise from the
watery depth of the Pacific to clear the Earth of all living things?
------Virgina Marsh


Virgina, your little friends are wrong. They have been affected by the
fever of enlightenment given to them by a so-called "enlightened" age.
They do not believe in anything unless it carries the weight of scientific
authority. They think that nothing can be which is not comprehensible by
their little minds. Reality is that which can be cataloged and measured,
to be spooned out in rational doses to the common people. All minds,
Virgina, whether they be adult's or children's, are little. In this vast
chaos we laughingly call the universe, man is a mere insect, a bug, whose
intellect has as much chance of grasping the whole truth, as an ant has of
understanding non-Euclidian geometry.

Yes, Virgina, there is a Great Cthulhu. He exists as certainly as the
cold unfeelingness of the cosmos exits, and you know that this
meaninglessness abounds and gives to your life its highest absurdity.
Alas! how comfortable would be the world if there were no Cthulhu! It
would be as comforting as if a Santa Claus truly did care and reward
children for doing good. There would be childlike faith then, a world of
sweet believable poetry and romance to make existence idyllic and
appealing. The external light with which childhood fills the world would
never end.

Not believe in the Great Cthulhu! You might as well not believe in Hastur
or the Necronomicon. You might get your papa's science books and
Skeptical Inquirers to see if Cthulhu is mentioned in any historical
contexts or if R'lyeh truly does rest under the Pacific Ocean, but even if
you did not find either mentioned in your 'holy' books, what would that
prove? Nobody sees or knows of Cthulhu, but that is no sign that there is
no Great Cthulhu. The most real things in the world are those that we can
not know through the senses. Can the headache of your friend be felt by
you? No, but his pain affects your life regardless. Do you feel the
angst of living a life you never wanted through any of your five senses?
No, yet the despair remains. Yet if such realities are known but are never
seen, then why should other's ignorance of the unseen lead us to share in
their blindness. By what right have they earned your obedience? Nobody
can conceive of the inconceivable, including your leaders of thought.

You tear apart the rattle of a baby to see what lies inside to make such
noise, but the tiny balls there can not explain or illustrate the fear of
a hostile world, that makes that baby clutch and shake that rattle so.
Only reaching for insanity can push aside the curtain of our hopes and
view with stark madness the emptiness that lies beyond. Is that reality?
Is that the truth? To give an answer is to replace the curtain with but
one more. And it is this, that makes the Great Cthulhu as true and as
real as any veil we place on the chaos beyond. If one must create a
meaning, why not the Great Cthulhu. At least the choice is free.

Thank Azathoth! The Great Cthulhu lives and lives forever. A thousand
years from now, Virgina, nay 10 times 10,000 years from now, he will
continue to await the time when the stars are right again. For with those
which eternal lie, with strange eons even death may die.


(From Editorial Page, Arkham Advertiser, 1928)


/Fiendish cackle, stomps off into underground fortress, throws more sacrifices on the fire.../

[ 20-11-2001: Message edited by: Sharkgrin ]
 
 
STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK
07:25 / 21.11.01
I don't think anyone was claiming his actual technique was any good... (although it does grow on you)... remember the guy was being paid (badly) by the word...
More his mythologising. And he did articulate cosmic loneliness so well...
That was why I found both Derleth and the Call of Cthulhu RPG so disappointing (though I had loads of fun with the latter)- the protagonist can win. Kind of drained it of something, I felt.
And although I admit the "Simon" Necronomicon is shit... though fictional, the George Hay edited one (published last, I think, by SKOOB), at least makes the effort. And has Colin Wilson AND Dave Langford contributing.
 
 
rizla mission
13:18 / 21.11.01
On the subject of the various Necronomicon's out there, I found this brilliant text-file Necronomicon when I was first on the 'net -

It was full of dire warnings of the "Do not fuck with these rituals - they are only to be performed by highly trained magicians who have accepted the inherent dangers of mental and spiritual trauma! We cannot be held responsible for any physical or psychological hamr that may ensue!" variety, and the rituals it presented were just horrific and otherworldly enough to appear genuine, but just practical enough to actually be performed.

And in true Lovecraft tradition, I accidentally deleted my copy of it, and have never been able to find it again!
 
 
grant
13:33 / 21.11.01
quote:Originally posted by Black John Bonnie the Stoat:
the Call of Cthulhu RPG so disappointing (though I had loads of fun with the latter)- the protagonist can win.


You obviously weren't playing in the full spirit of the game, then.
I loved driving the brave heroes completely mad... give one man in a two-man deepsea submersible a sudden, irrational fear of water, and see if they can reach the surface in time..... ah, memories.
 
 
deja_vroom
15:55 / 21.11.01
ah, the call of cthulhu rpg... the only rpg i ever went through the trouble of learning the rules of, being this lovecraft geek that I am... really wanted to play a session again... you raised memories, grant, for sure
 
 
MJ-12
16:04 / 21.11.01
We used to refer to the RPG as V&V, Victims & Vegetables
 
 
deja_vroom
21:29 / 21.11.01
shortfatdyke, in this thread:
quote:i loved 'the case of charles dexter ward' and i love the IDEA of lovecraft, but his inability to describe anything scary does have me snorting with frustration and laughter....

From his short story Dagon:
"The region was putrid with the carcasses of decaying fish, and of other less describable things which I saw protruding from the nasty mud of the unending plain.

I think the text in bold illustrates well why Lovecraft is so popular. Those four words only are capable of - at least in my case - to keep one wondering a lot of time about the strangeness of those things. This thing that he did often - en passant, casual descriptions of things that were obviously just fucking wrong, was one of his best tricks.

It's all in the mood, actually. The reader makes all the hard work for him (which is great), and I think that this characteristic was what led others to write down their interpretations of the Mythos, which now is a half-formed pantheon on its own. So, yeah, one-trick poney, but what a trick!...
 
 
Knight's Move
22:59 / 22.11.01
Rizla, if you want to locate The Necronomicon itself you can always go to Yale library (I think it was that or Harvard or UCLA or...someone help me out here) where a library card appeared for the book courtesy of some of the students

As to the rpg it was superb. Sanity points fell left, right, and centre as myself and friends attempted to get more disturbed beasties and ritual murders into our adventures, hehehe. Does anyone else remember the 'old days' of White Dwarf when they printed rp stuff (before the cartoony alteration in favour of wargaming) and everything was dark and wierd. If you do you may remember Elder Nguyen Seth and the Demon Download series featuring Elvis and voodoo, the ancient Krokodil spirit, and the Papal cyber exorcist vs the Great Old Ones. Now they were great.

quote:I saw the future and it was dark...
Then I took off my sunglasses...
- some Thrudd cartoon


Ah, what happened to the days when rpers were treated as if they had intelligence and the spirit to handle darkness of the human soul? Well written stuff with an amazing amount of 'real' background to it. Speaking of which (and slightly off topic) did anyone come else across Kult?
 
 
moriarty
23:16 / 22.11.01
quote:Originally posted by Knight's Move:
Speaking of which (and slightly off topic) did anyone come else across Kult?


Well, there's that can of worms reopened. You'll find alot of former and current geeks have fond memories of Kult.

So far as CoC goes, I remember one game where I described an encounter with some spiders so vividly that my players demanded I give them a sanity check, even when I felt no sanity check was necessary. They lived to be turned into vegetables.
 
 
The resistable rise of Reidcourchie
08:00 / 23.11.01
Originally posted by the Damned Yankee

"Another one for the Mythos completist is called "Scream for Jeeves", by the illustrious I-Forget-Who. Basically it's G. K. Chesterton's Bertie Wooster and Jeeves encountering the horrors of the Mythos."

PG Wodehouse.

There are some short stories on the Delta Green web site that are very well written. You do have to search through some shit ti find them but they are good. Especially a hysterical one set in the Dreamlands. Though that may only be funny if you're a role playing geek.
 
 
Jack The Bodiless
11:35 / 25.11.01
There's a statue of HPL in Arkham that I need to buy when I'm in Brighton next Tuesday. It's beautiful. They used to have a gorgeous Cthulhu statue exactly as it's described in 'Call Of Cthulhu', but it was limited edition, and is now gone. The newer ones aren't as good...
 
 
rizla mission
12:58 / 26.11.01
I went into that shop when I was in Brighton, on the basis that any shop called 'Arkham' has to be worth a visit.

I think I was wearing a stripey orange shirt. I got funny looks.
 
 
Sharkgrin
18:57 / 29.11.01
Remember Great Cthulu died in Ry'legh for our sins...

<dives back into the murky depths to dance along the streets of the sunken city>
 
 
Captain Zoom
19:17 / 29.11.01
That was funny. (if a joke)
That was weird. (if serious)

What is the publication it was lifted from? I'd like to read more.

Zoom.
 
 
Sharkgrin
19:43 / 29.11.01
My Kapitan,
I claim ignorance, and that I have dabbled in forbidden, arcane knowledge that invisible, blood-thirsty bill-collectors will sooner or later take out of my hide.
I refer you to the unintelligable, text-based Proceedings of the Chrono-Causal Contentions Committee that I received from the oracle of Google. Unfortunately, I beleive this group passed intot the annals of Berkeley history some time ago.
I do believe that grumpy alien intelligences are coming back home after a hard days work to find a 6-billion-strong infestation in their living room...
in the brilliant work of a strange agent from Rhode Island.

<Gnaws at the rope tieing his wrists to the sacrificial altar to the strange alien gods>

[ 29-11-2001: Message edited by: Sharkgrin ]
 
 
Captain Zoom
09:53 / 30.11.01
Yer a nut Shark.

(or I'm very scared!)

Zoom.
 
 
Tempus
02:11 / 10.12.01
Just a little note from the Miskatonic Librarian:

_Scream for Jeeves_ is a parody of P.G. Wodehouse's Jeeves & Wooster books (themselves a parody of British high society of the 20s) and the Cthulhu Mythos. It's by P.H. Cannon and available from Necronomicon Press. Fred Chappell loved it, which is good enough for me.

Also, there's a collection of Robert E. Howard's Cthulhu stories out there, published by Baen and edited by David Drake--mine's in a box somewhere.

Finally, the Science Fiction Book Club, of all places, recently came out with a huge collection of Lovecraft stories called _The Black Seas of Infinity_, which includes two stories that haven't seen popular print before, one of which, "The Mound," is an excellent Mythos story.

That is all.
 
 
Tempus
02:12 / 10.12.01
Sorry. Totally my thick-fingered, thin-skulled fault.

Well, while I'm here I might as well note that the H.P. Lovecraft word for the day is "fungous."

Say it with me now:

"Fu-uun-goos..."

[ 10-12-2001: Message edited by: Tempus ]

[ 10-12-2001: Message edited by: Tempus ]
 
 
rizla mission
02:12 / 10.12.01
A bit too similar to 'fun goose' for full horror effect, I feel..

I prefer 'squamous'
 
 
deja_vroom
10:57 / 10.12.01
I go for 'tumescid'.
 
 
grant
15:37 / 10.12.01
The only one that comes back to me again and again is "multiform".
 
 
The Return Of Rothkoid
15:47 / 10.12.01
Eldritch: it's not just a goth surname...
 
 
Gus
04:04 / 11.12.01
Has anyone seen the godawful piece of crap they're actually selling under Lovecraft's name in Italy? I mean, this is much worse than the occasional mis-attribution of a story by Derleth or some other mythos writer, this is a totally unrelated, inferior piece of fiction which stands to really hurt his reputation if read by someone unacquainted with him. This is grave-spinning material!

p.s.: my word is "gibbous"
 
 
Zebbin
04:10 / 14.12.01
"diabolist Eskimos"
 
 
deja_vroom
10:07 / 14.12.01
that's TWO words...

there are 3 kinds of people in the world:
The ones who can count and the ones who can't.
 
 
rizla mission
11:11 / 14.12.01
quote:Originally posted by Zebbin:
"Diabolist Eskimos"


band name thread - now!
 
 
grant
11:54 / 14.12.01
Y'all *might* enjoy this pulpy offering from my buddy over at supernaturalcrime.com.
Hard boiled detectives, gun-toting vigilantes....
 
 
Zebbin
21:09 / 15.12.01
quote:that's TWO words...
there are 3 kinds of people in the world:
The ones who can count and the ones who can't.


Well, then I guess that's my TWO Lovecraft words. Picky...
 
  

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