Extraordinary images, delicious writing

books:


	• Dreams of Terror and Death: The Dream Cycle of H. P. Lovecraft H. P. Lovecraft Del Rey, 1995 - 400 pages average customer review:based on 26 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

Even Death May Die

While not the best Lovecraft collection, this one is well worth reading if only to get a serious case of the creeps. ("The Case of Charles Dexter Ward" will do it by itself.)

Centered around dreams, the stories in this collection can be hard to get through at times, but there is usually a tremendous pay off. If this is your first experience with Lovecraft, however, there are better places to begin, as this collection contains some early writings that just aren't up to snuff with is later material.

Lovecraft fans will have already read most of these stories, and newcomers may be put off by them, but for those who have experienced one or two tales before, this is a great way to become more familiar with the writer and his worlds.

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Extraordinary images, delicious writing

These days i find myself sadly jaded. I pick up books, read partway through, and lose interest... either because the plot is too predictable (been there, read that, know what's going to happen) or because the writing is mediocre. I find that good writing is increasingly important to me as I get older.

So, a couple of years back when I picked up this collection in a bookstore and started to read, my happy little synapses started firing as they hadn't in quite a while. Lovecraft writes more hauntingly than most anyone; I mean this in the sense of conveying extraordinary images and a sense of fabulous unworldliness, in language that is so deliciously balanced, complex and graceful that it makes one slow down and read every word.

At times dark and macabre, at others lyrical and filled with magic, the stories here really do have the quality of dreams. One encounters lost or fabulous worlds, and intimations of age-old terror. I was instantly transported into Lovecraft's world, and return there periodically to lose myself in his magic, and to recall that once upon a time, people could use the English language to enchant.

Here is the opening to "Azathoth", the first brief story (which is unfinished). If you like this language and the rich concepts it conveys, I promise that you'll love the rest of the book:

"When age fell upon the world, and wonder went out of the minds of men; when grey cities reared to smoky skies tall towers grim and ugly, in whose shadow none might dream of the sun or of Spring's flowering meads; when learning stripped the Earth of her mantle of beauty and poets sang no more of twisted phantoms seen with bleared and inward looking eyes; when these things had come to pass, and childish hopes had gone forever, there was a man who traveled out of life on a quest into spaces whither the world's dreams had fled."

Sigh. Now THAT'S writing...

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Not Free SF Reader

A collection of Lovecraft's stories chosen with the dream as a theme of them. A natural for an introduction to such a bunch of stories is therefore Neil Gaiman, the Dream King. He tells why he has been influenced by Lovecraft, and of others, and mentions a few Mythos stories he has done, as well as the fact it is likely to happen again.

So, if you are a Randolph Carter fan, this is a pretty good one.

Dreams of Terror and Death : Azathoth - H. P. Lovecraft
Dreams of Terror and Death : The Descendant - H. P. Lovecraft
Dreams of Terror and Death : The Thing in the Moonlight - H. P. Lovecraft
Dreams of Terror and Death : Polaris - H. P. Lovecraft
Dreams of Terror and Death : Beyond the Wall of Sleep - H. P. Lovecraft
Dreams of Terror and Death : The Doom That Came to Sarnath - H. P. Lovecraft
Dreams of Terror and Death : The Statement of Randolph Carter - H. P. Lovecraft
Dreams of Terror and Death : The Cats of Ulthar - H. P. Lovecraft
Dreams of Terror and Death : Celephais - H. P. Lovecraft
Dreams of Terror and Death : From Beyond - H. P. Lovecraft
Dreams of Terror and Death : Nyarlathotep - H. P. Lovecraft
Dreams of Terror and Death : The Nameless City - H. P. Lovecraft
Dreams of Terror and Death : The Other Gods - H. P. Lovecraft
Dreams of Terror and Death : Ex Oblivione - H. P. Lovecraft
Dreams of Terror and Death : The Quest of Iranon - H. P. Lovecraft
Dreams of Terror and Death : The Hound - H. P. Lovecraft
Dreams of Terror and Death : Hypnos - H. P. Lovecraft
Dreams of Terror and Death : What the Moon Brings - H. P. Lovecraft
Dreams of Terror and Death : Pickman's Model - H. P. Lovecraft
Dreams of Terror and Death : The Dream Quest of Unknown Kadath - H. P. Lovecraft
Dreams of Terror and Death : The Silver Key - H. P. Lovecraft
Dreams of Terror and Death : The Strange High House in the Mist - H. P. Lovecraft
Dreams of Terror and Death : The Case of Charles Dexter Ward - H. P. Lovecraft
Dreams of Terror and Death : The Dreams in the Witch-House - H. P. Lovecraft
Dreams of Terror and Death : Through the Gates of the Silver Key - H. P. Lovecraft

Star naming.

3 out of 5

Necronomicon purchase leaves death as something that is not too scary afterwards.

3.5 out of 5

Night car wolves.

3.5 out of 5

Starry wanderings.

3.5 out of 5

White trash dream space journey death discovery.

4 out of 5

Monster mash, idol's revenge on old city destroyers.

4 out of 5

Investigating legions of monsters equals fair chance someone dies.

4 out of 5

Kitty killers meet their self-imposed feline fate.

3.5 out of 5

Childhood visions visitation.

3.5 out of 5

If you look for space monsters, they just might get you.

4 out of 5

Egyptian Old One visit.

4 out of 5

A traveller finds a city under the sand, and exploring, a doorway into it. He explores for a time, but strange noises start coming close:

"I fell babbling over and over that unexplainable couplet of the mad

Arab Alhazred, who dreamed of the nameless city:

That is not dead which can eternal lie,
And with strange aeons even death may die."

He eventually makes it out.

4 out of 5

Belay well if climbing before checking these guys out.

3.5 out of 5

Sleep search.

3.5 out of 5

City finding.

3 out of 5

Winged dog amulet cult symbol.

3 out of 5

Sleep a bit draining.

3 out of 5

Lunar light, beach bad thing.

3 out of 5

Creepy paintings have too real subjects.

4 out of 5

Your average tourist generally knows where he is going and doesn't seek out Great Old Ones and consider encountering the Crawling Chaos Nyarlathotep. Randy is an adventurer that is not even close to easily scared.

5 out of 5

After opening the iron box and finding what was in it, no one can find Randolph Carter anymore.

4 out of 5

Old man's Elder Ones undersea tales.

4 out of 5

Lengthy investigations of Yog-Sothoth are bad for your mental health.

3.5 out of 5

Talented broke mathematics students should choose other places to study than in a house in Arkham with space-time continuum conduits, witches, and vampire rats.

4.5 out of 5

Randolph, in disguise tells of space, time, Necronomicons and Ancient Ones. One hell of a trip.

4.5 out of 5

4.5 out of 5

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Weird fiction

In Neil Gaiman's Introduction to the collection Dreams of Terror and Death - The Dream Cycle of H.P. Lovecraft, Fantasy and Horror are described as two cities divided by a river and Lovecraft is the road between the two. I go a little further and state that it is really a sparsely populated town called Weird, of which Lovecraft is founder and mayor (other, younger residents include Clive Barker). You won't find the genre of weird fiction in any book store, but it exists nonetheless, part horror, part fantasy and part something unique in itself.

Dreams of Terror and Death collects a series of short stories and novellas by Lovecraft that are loosely joined together as his Dream Cycle. In most of these stories, there is a second reality beyond our own, one that can usually only be reached when a person sleeps and enters into another state of consciousness. Not everyone can do this, only a gifted (or is it cursed?) few. Those who enter this Dream World often want to stay there, but it isn't easy, and the price is often great.

By many standards of judging fiction, Lovecraft comes short. He isn't much for plot. Most of the stories seem to share the same basic framework: a man driven by obsession seeks knowledge (or a place) that is not meant for mortals to know (or see), and when he attains his goal, it is not what he expects. Similarly, there isn't much in the way of characterization; the few characters have little in way of personality beyond their obsessions. The variety of characters are minimal, with only adult males having any significant role; women and children rarely appear, and when they do, they contribute almost nothing to the story.

Outweighing these seeming deficiencies, however, are Lovecraft's powers of description, which fashion worlds that are bizarre and utterly alien, populated by strange creatures and distant, even stranger gods. The novella The Dream Quest of Unknown Kadath is really the centerpiece of this cycle, with protagonist Randolph Carter (who also appears in other stories) searching for a lost, forbidden city in the Dream World.

For a modern reader, Lovecraft's style of writing can be a bit of a chore, at least at first. With a huge emphasis on description and much less in the way of action or dialogue, Lovecraft tends more towards an older, maybe 19th Century form of narrative. This makes the reading slow, but it is ultimately rewarding, not only for itself but for its historical value; Lovecraft is hugely influential on modern horror writers. So if you're a fan of horror or fantasy, this hybrid is a must-read.

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First Time Lovecraft Reader is Hooked

So I was roaming around the bookstore one day, and lazily thinking of names of stories and authors that I had heard good things about, and at one point it fell on Lovecraft. I was looking for a "complete works" edition and found that there is no such book. So which collection to try? This is the one that had "a perfect introduction to his work" plastered right across it so it's the one I bought.

I found these stories, for the most part, not to be horrifying, but interesting all the same. Then I catch on that hey, these short stories are all connected. That added to my interest, as I would flip back and find a name I remembered hearing before that at the time seemed to matter not a whole lot.

The longer stories are what make me want to find more Lovecraft. "The Dream Quest of Unknown Kadath", "The Dreams in the Witch House" (spooky), and "Through the gates of the Silver key." (Which felt like one of those old Twilight Zone Shows). The other stories were passable, but more importantly, contain background data that the later better stories stand on.

So yes, this is a good intro to Mr Lovecraft. If you are reading for the first time, take your time to wade though the "so-so" stuff to the "good" stuff.

Also, when I was done I noted that the cover picture had nothing to do with the inside of the book. It was just some random (?) Horror art that was pasted on. It was slightly annoying. People would walk by and say "my gosh what *are* you reading?"
"Well, you see it's this story about people that are mean to cats and..."
"Whatevers..."

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reviews: page 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6

"[Lovecraft's] dream fantasy works are as terrifying and haunting as his tales of horror and the macabre. A master craftsman, Lovecraft brings compelling visions of nightmarish fear, invisible worlds and the demons of the unconscious. If one author truly represents the very best in American literary horror, it is H. P. Lovecraft."
--John Carpenter, Director of At the Mouth of Madness, Halloween,
and Christine
This volume collects, for the first time, the entire Dream Cycle created by H. P. Lovecraft, the master of twentieth-century horror, including some of his most fantastic tales:
THE DOOM THAT CAME TO SARNATH--Hate, genocide, and a deadly curse consume the land of Mnar.
THE STATEMENT OF RANDOLPH CARTER--"You fool, Warren is DEAD!"
THE NAMELESS CITY--Death lies beneath the shifting sands, in a story linking the Dream Cycle with the legendary Cthulhu Mythos.
THE CATS OF ULTHAR--In Ulthar, no man may kill a cat...and woe unto any who tries.
THE DREAM QUEST OF UNKNOWN KADATH--The epic nightmare adventure with tendrils stretching throughout the entire Dream Cycle.
AND TWENTY MORE TALES OF SURREAL TERROR

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