Despite these precedents, Derleth could have been more conscientious about his depiction of Lovecraft. Lovecraft’s fiction and letters, with which he was intimately familiar, included few signs of a cosmic war and many passages indicating that cosmic indifferentism was his chosen framework for the tales. Even if he had missed these, Clark Ashton Smith pointed them out to him in a letter written shortly after Lovecraft’s death. It appears that Derleth received some misleading information in his career on these topics and chose never to re-evaluate his conclusions.
Derleth’s other innovation, the elemental theory, associated some of the Great Old Ones with the four traditional elements—fire, air, earth, and water. Some have attributed the “elemental theory” to Francis T. Laney, whose error-ridden “The Cthulhu Mythology: A Glossary” in Beyond the Wall of Sleep (1943) was the first attempt to create a “guide” to the Mythos. Nonetheless, Derleth was using the elemental theory in such stories as “The Thing That Walked in the Wind” long before Laney published his piece. Within the elemental system, a few beings (such as Cthulhu and Dagon) were defined as water elementals, with the vast bulk being earth elementals. Derleth decided to remedy this “imbalance”, creating or reassigning Great Old Ones to both fire (Cthugha) and air (Ithaqua, Lloigor, Zhar).
While these are Derleth’s best remembered changes, perhaps the greatest—or most enduring—was the concept of the Cthulhu Mythos itself. His reasoning behind the title remains obscure. Cthulhu did show up regularly in Lovecraft’s stories after he wrote “The Call of Cthulhu”, but the king of R’lyeh is not the most important or most frequently mentioned of Lovecraft’s creations. (He is more prominent than Hastur, the being Derleth wanted to name the Mythos after originally.) Still, it was “The Call of Cthulhu” that might be seen as the basis for Derleth’s organization, as he brought together a wide array of gods and monsters from Lovecraft’s fiction and that of others to comprise the “Great Old Ones” mentioned in that story. Overall, Derleth tended to emphasize the material from certain of Lovecraft’s stories—“The Call of Cthulhu”, “The Shadow over Innsmouth”, and especially “The Dunwich Horror”—choices that affected how future authors and readers used the Mythos.
As Derleth created the Cthulhu Mythos, he created another category—the Cthulhu Mythos story. As Robert M. Price points out, the Mythos may also be seen as a collection of tales surrounding these imaginary beings, books, and places. While Lovecraft referred once to his “Arkham cycle” of tales, it is unlikely that any of the Weird Tales authors thought of their in-jokes as a means of categorizing their stories. It cannot be said that the original stories defined as belonging to the Mythos have a common setting, plot, or tone—the connections between them are often tenuous and not readily discernible. Still, Derleth had his corpus, and he took it upon himself to add to it a series of tales that he admitted were potboilers. This was a shame, as Derleth was a talented writer who could have provided a fresh look at the same themes that Lovecraft treated. Instead, readers were treated to a set of tired motifs—New England settings used for their own sake, libraries bulging with arcane lore, professors who spouted forth codified lore, and tale upon tale of ancestral vengeance and resurrected wizards. Sadly, many took these stories to be the epitome of Cthulhu Mythos tales, and stories aimed at only recycling these tropes continue to be written today.
For these definitions to be accepted, much of what Lovecraft and others said about their creations had to be overlooked. Arkham House gave Derleth a forum to advocate these views through his introductions and non-fiction articles, not to mention to publish his stories and those of others who shared his interpretation. His “posthumous collaborations”, tales based on Lovecraft’s story seeds but mostly Derleth’s work, confused the issue by associating Derleth’s concepts of the Mythos with Lovecraft’s name. All of this occurred at a time when Weird Tales authors received little attention from other sources. In this way, Derleth made his position the default for understanding the Mythos he created.
Arkham House went on to publish new Mythos stories by established and new authors. Some hold up Derleth as a defender of the Mythos, but I feel this support may be misplaced. Most Mythos aficionados prize the mythology’s social aspect—by writing and sharing a story, they become part of a grand tradition reaching back to Lovecraft. Derleth would have none of this—he claimed ownership of not only Lovecraft’s stories, but also Lovecraft’s creations. Both assertions were of dubious legality; Derleth only bought the copyrights to some of the stories, and no renewals for them have been found. In addition, enough people had used the Mythos that claiming rights to its components was a hopeless case. This did not stop Derleth from telling new authors not to write such stories. Near the end of their tenure, Derleth and Wandrei stated that Lovecraft authorized only a few authors to write Mythos stories, and now only Arkham House could do the same. Of course, no one else has found a letter in which Lovecraft excludes other authors or permits anyone else to exclude them.
During the Sixties, matters Lovecraftian began to pick up speed. It was during this time that Lovecraft began to gain critical attention, though his overseas reception was much warmer than that in the States. More importantly, new paperback editions of Lovecraft’s works began to appear, as did the first movie adaptations. Possibly as a result of Arkham House’s profits from the sale of these movie rights, Arkham House released the three-volume set of Lovecraft’s tales which has remained in print even today—The Dunwich Horror, At the Mountains of Madness, and Dagon. Arkham House also published the Mythos stories of two new authors—Ramsey Campbell and Brian Lumley—who would leave their mark on the world of horror fiction.
After Derleth’s death in 1971, Lovecraft’s popularity grew at a phenomenal rate—though whether these two events were connected is hotly debated. What is known is that the Seventies saw a boom of Lovecraft-related material on several different fronts. L. Sprague de Camp published his famous work Lovecraft: A Biography (1975), the occultist Kenneth Grant linked Lovecraft’s fictional symbols to the works of Aleister Crowley in The Magical Revival (1972), and Mythos books such as Brian Lumley’s The Burrowers Beneath (1974) and E. P. Berglund’s anthology The Disciples of Cthulhu (1976) appeared at a surprising rate. One of the guiding lights of this period was Lin Carter, a prolific author and the editor of the Ballantine Adult Fantasy Series who would often include Mythos fiction in his anthologies. Amateur press organizations such as the Esoteric Order of Dagon flourished, their members sending each other chapbooks and newsletters filled with both literary criticism and fiction. It was a good time for Lovecraft devotees.
To the chagrin of many in the Lovecraft-Mythos community, the most influential Lovecraftian works to come out of the Seventies were not among those mentioned above. Instead, they were different editions of the Necronomicon, Lovecraft’s fictional book. The most influential of these, known as the “Simon” Necronomicon, was a grimoire originating from the Warlock Shop in Brooklyn that linked Lovecraft’s Mythos with Sumerian mythology. Running close behind was the “George Hay/Colin Wilson” Necronomicon, which asserted that Lovecraft had received his inspiration from Masonic lore gained through his father. Though neither Sumerian mythology nor Freemasonry impacted Lovecraft’s work in any significant way, most of the readers of these Necronomicons have not realized this, and these misconceptions still circulate today.
During this period, a split occurred between those concerned with literary criticism of Lovecraft and those more interested in the Cthulhu Mythos. When Derleth was alive, he would often publish critical essays along with Mythos fiction in his anthologies, but after his death the situation deteriorated. Lovecraft scholars became incensed at Derleth for foisting his own interpretation of Lovecraft’s work on all his readers. In addition, they decided to de-emphasize the Cthulhu Mythos’ significance, in order to separate Lovecraft from other writers in the genre and to stress other aspects of his work, such as its philosophy and literary influences. This split does not appear to have been
entirely amicable, and though some authors are comfortable with writing both Lovecraft criticism and Mythos fiction, tension still exists between members of the two groups.
In 1980, the Arkham anthology New Tales of the Cthulhu Mythos brought new voices into the Mythos arena. Instead of sustaining the Seventies trend, however, New Tales signaled an end to the Mythos boom. It is difficult to say why enthusiasm flagged, but it might have had something to do with the way in which material was circulated. After Jim Turner took over the editorship of Arkham House following Derleth’s death, that publisher moved away from Cthulhu Mythos fiction. Although it still issued Lovecraft’s work, it became more concerned with more traditional varieties of science fiction and horror. No publisher truly rose to the occasion as Arkham House’s successor, leaving many of the Cthulhu Mythos stories to be printed in a variety of anthologies, magazines, and small-press publications. There was no way for potential fans to find out about this material save by word of mouth, a difficult proposition when so much of it received limited circulation to begin with. Though other factors were probably at work, this was probably the most important. For the time being, Mythos publishing went into hibernation.
For the next fifteen years, little Lovecraftian material appeared on the market, and the movement appeared to have been merely a passing fad. The groundwork for the next resurgence was already being laid, however. One of the most important factors was the release of the Call of Cthulhu role-playing game in 1981. Its creator, Sandy Petersen, combined the lore from many different Cthulhu Mythos authors to assemble the monsters and books to create the background for his game. Call of Cthulhu brought Lovecraft and the Cthulhu Mythos to the attention of many who would otherwise not have encountered it, providing key information on its own selection of elements in a single place. Until recently, it had little influence on writers—Petersen’s “Outer Gods”, a term coined for the more powerful beings in the Mythos, has only appeared in fiction in the past five years—but it nonetheless established a broad base of fans to whom future work would appeal.
As Call of Cthulhu was finding success, other aspects of the Mythos were slowly germinating. Mythos fiction continued to circulate through amateur press associations such as the Esoteric Order of Dagon. The magazine Crypt of Cthulhu, started in 1981 by Robert M. Price, served as a forum for fiction, essays on the Mythos, and other materials of interest to fans. Kenneth Grant’s teachings and the Necronomicons came to influence occultists, especially those involved with chaos magick, a belief system aimed at destroying the practitioner’s beliefs. Peter Carroll, the founder of chaos magick, utilized fictional beings such as Azathoth as a means of deconstructing notions of what is real and powerful for the budding magician.
A revival eventually came, starting with Arkham House’s re-release of a revised Tales of the Cthulhu Mythos (1990). Fedogan and Bremer followed suit in 1992 with Tales of the Lovecraft Mythos, with other Mythos anthologies quickly on their way. In 1993, Chaosium released The Hastur Cycle, the first in a series of trade paperbacks dealing with different aspects of the Mythos. Mythos anthologies and fanzines appear each year, and although many of the magazines and publishers have vanished over the years, Lovecraft and the Cthulhu Mythos are more popular than ever, with new material appearing constantly in many different media, ranging from computer games to graphic novels.
One of the most recent factors to affect the growth of the Cthulhu Mythos has been the expansion of the Internet. Though it may be too early to fairly assess the impact of this technology, it has already done much to bring together Mythos fans across the world. In addition, it is likely to make publication of Mythos stories much easier, especially with the blossoming of “fanfic”, or fiction based in particular worlds by fans. Whereas before amateurs printed their work in low circulation journals, now they can put it on a Web page where thousands or millions of people can read it. Given the nature of the Web, most of this material vanishes as user accounts are closed or are no longer maintained, but new sites are always appearing. This will probably continue as more people join the Internet community, allowing the Mythos to reach an even wider audience than before.
So why has the Cthulhu Mythos become so popular? There are a variety of reasons that may account for this. The first of these may be its diversity. The mythologies of Dunsany, Machen, and Chambers were limited; they appeared in one author’s stories, and thus had a single mood and style about them. The early Mythos writers wrote using a variety of styles and subject matter, making it interesting to more people. Someone who doesn’t like the Deep Ones may like the Yithians, and vice versa. Another reason may be its resemblance to existing mythologies. In creating his own pantheon, Lovecraft used his own prodigious knowledge of folklore, leading to many of the same fundamental ideas and concepts turning up in both. This has led to his popularity among occultists, many of whom find their own beliefs and ideas mirrored in his work. But there may be another reason we should consider.
Much of the appeal of the Mythos has to do with filling in the “holes in the text.” Since my first proposal of this idea, a similar one has been explored by H. S. Versnel in his article “The Poetics of the Magical Charm: An Essay in the Power of Words” from Magic and Ritual in the Ancient World. A common feature of many incantations is their use of voces magicae, words without any known meaning. Versnel argues that these are not mere distortions, but in fact integral to the spells’ perceived powers:
… the specificity of voces magicae and other anomalous expressions conveys them a special function of passwords that take us literally “out of our place” into a different world, where paradox reigns … in short a reversed reality, the world of abnormality, the world of otherness.
The Mythos uses the same strategy, but instead of using these names to create the impression of power, it does so to entertain the reader. Each Mythos story includes only a few pieces of the puzzle, and one who reads a story can do either of two things. One can either accept the uncertainty and terror that go along with these allusions, or one can attempt to fill them in by reading more Mythos fiction. People who follow the latter course may even write their own stories expanding on one of these mysterious elements or including their own experience within the framework. Thus, the very element that provides these tales with so much of their horror may also have led people to systematize and re-interpret the pantheon.
If one risk arises from the Mythos, it is that of overexposure. Many fans see the Mythos as a list of names and a source of in-jokes (“Cthulhu saves, in case he getes hungry”), filling fanzines and the Internet with knockoffs of Derleth and Carter. As a proud owner of plush Cthulhus, I certainly cannot condemn anyone for having fun or sharing it with others. Still, a proliferation of Mythos material has led to a growing reluctance among authors and editors to promote the genre. For example, Guillermo del Toro decided not to quote from the Necronomicon at the beginning of his movie Hellboy because he feared the book was too exposed. He settled for De Vermis Mysteriis, but his concerns were well founded.
On the other side of the matter are those who feel that the Mythos is a cheap gimmick that distracts from other elements of Lovecraft’s fiction. The question, “What does the Mythos really mean?” is a welcome antidote to the overemphasis on lists of names, and it certainly deserves to be asked. Nonetheless, we must be careful that the question does not become “What did the Mythos mean to Lovecraft specifically, as judged by his explicit statements?” or that it becomes the only question that is asked. The creations of Lovecraft and other authors have had a resonance that derives from their ability to embody numerous meanings within an appealing, albeit horrific and often squamous, exterior. To say that Cthulhu is merely an expression of humanity’s insignificance in an indifferent cosmos is just as fallacious as announcing that he is a huge squid-like monster.
Whatever the reason, the Cthulhu Mythos genre has outlasted its creators and will likely last into the foreseeable future. Its success in doing so will likely be tied to the creativity of
new creators to re-envision its tenets while paying attention to what has come before.
FOR WRITERS, AND A CASE FOR CONTINUITY
A frequent question is how a Mythos creator can handle intellectual property. As a non-legalistic guideline, any Mythos creation of Lovecraft or his contemporaries has likely been used so often that it can be used in a story with no repercussions. Projects in particular fields, such as graphic novels or roleplaying games, or those that are money-making ventures are on more dubious grounds. If in doubt, always ask the author or the estate (information is often available on the copyright page, or can be discovered by asking an appropriate Internet forum) for permission before proceeding.
While rewriting the Encyclopedia, I’ve heard a fair amount of railing against Mythos continuity. After all, Lovecraft’s pantheon is inherently contradictory, with its monsters that dwell beyond time and that can hardly be understood by human minds. Why shouldn’t other authors introduce such contradictions into their own works, whether deliberately or accidentally? Besides, all of those names and dates and pat definitions interfere with the authors’ creativity, and what’s important is for people to find their own voices.
I have to agree with this, to a point. Lovecraft’s Mythos does have its contradictions, and I’d like to see more people use it creatively. I’ve seen some work done to reinterpret the Mythos in fiction and essay that is simply brilliant. On the other hand, I don’t think that abandoning continuity is the answer. Lovecraft did change the meanings of elements between his stories—the Plateau of Leng may shift from Central Asia to Antarctica, and Tsathoggua help whoever tries to figure out who the Old Ones really are. However, this was a result of his own personal development and changes in knowledge and philosophy, rather than being simply arbitrary attempts at contradiction. It should also be noted that when it came to the Necronomicon, Lovecraft wrote out a history of it so he’d use it consistently in his stories.
Cthulhu Mythos Encyclopedia Page 2