3. According to Joshi (2007), a tale from the Cthulhu Mythos has several defining features that occur regularly throughout Lovecraft’s work. What are these features and how are they used in The Shadow Over Innsmouth? Furthermore, can you see any of these features being used in The Colour out of Space?
Joshi mentions that there are several defining features that can be seen explicitly within Lovecraft’s Mythos. The imaginary New England topography used throughout Lovecraft’s works, the study of occult books, both old and new, by academic researchers, the mention or the explicit interactions between humanity and the “gods” and the perception of the cosmic fear (Joshi, S. T., 2007). These themes can be identified within Lovecraft’s works of The Shadow Over Innsmouth and The Colour out of Space.
Innsmouth was described by Lovecraft as a depopulated seaport in which the neighbours believed it to be “an exaggerated case of civic degeneration.” (Lovecraft, H. P., 1936). Lovecraft goes on with the ticket agent who spends a lengthy amount of time recounting Innsmouth’s history, landscape and geology, focusing upon the Devil Reef where the elderly of the neighbouring Newburyport told stories about devils which could be seen beneath the water “darting in and out” (Lovecraft, H. P., 1936) of the reef tunnels and caves. Furthermore, within The Colour out of Space, Lovecraft describes Arkham and its surrounding terrain in vivid detail, from the rising and wild hills, the valleys of deep woods and the narrow glens where the trees slope fantastically. Lovecraft uses the descriptions of roads overgrown and replaced and the way in which the old had been replaced by the new (Lovecraft, H. P., 1927). By doing this, Lovecraft has used the extensive descriptions of imagined New England to establish feelings of otherness and isolation, creating a framework in which the small and narrow world of his topography becomes a character and an antagonist within itself without personifying it completely.
In The Shadow Over Innsmouth, the protagonist is a studious man on a journey to explore New England as his coming of age, we follow him as he spends an entire evening pulling up as much information on Innsmouth as he can at the Newburyport Public Library as well as attempting to interview locals at stores, open garages and even the fire station in the hopes of discovering more about the mysterious seaport town but is met with cold shoulders and “obscure suspicion” (Lovecraft, H. P., 1936.) throughout his quest of discovery, demonstrating the second theme seen within Lovecraft’s works of the use of both ancient and modern occult books or study and the way in which the protagonist is demonstrated as having an inquisitive and rational mind. Meanwhile, the protagonist of The Colour Out of Space is a surveyor sent to study the new reservoir of Arkham where the locals told him stories about the legends of witches and evil that plagued the area (Lovecraft, H. P., 1927). This protagonist is once more described as a level-headed and rational man, who’s interest in the area stems from an academic or scholarly perception.
Furthermore, throughout Lovecraft’s Mythos is the perception of “cosmic fear” (Sederholm, C., & Weinstock, J. A., 2015) which is used often to negate the idea of human exceptionalism in the face of the immensity and power of the unknown. In Lovecraft’s essay Supernatural Horror in Literature, he says “the oldest and strongest kind of fear is fear of the unknown.” (Lovecraft, Supernatural Horror 12). This is demonstrated within The Shadow Over Innsmouth with the introduction of the undersea hybrid creatures known as The Deep Ones which acts as the sense of otherness, difference and alien unknowing that is prevalent within the Cthulhu Mythos. Now, while The Colour Out of Space does not cite creatures from the deep sea, it does exhibit the crashing of a meteorite which lands on a farmers property in which a mysterious entity or entities begin to manipulate and change the landscape and those whom reside upon it eventually leading to the mental instability and final death of the humans that had come into contact with it (Mastropierro, L., 2009). The sense of the otherness corrupting that which was once normal and right into something maddening and otherworldly is another demonstration of one of Lovecraft’s trademarks within his Mythos.
References
Joshi, S. T. (2007). Icons of horror and the supernatural: An encyclopedia of our worst nightmares. Greenwood.
Lovecraft, H. P. (1927). The color out of space. Amazing stories.
Lovecraft, H. P. (1936). The shadow over innsmouth. Visionary Publishing Company.
Lowell, M. (2004). Lovecraft’s Cthulhu mythos, The Explicator, 63:1, 47-50, DOI: 10.1080/00144940409597257
Mastropierro, L. (2009). The theme of distance in the tales of H. P. Lovecraft. Hippocampus Press.
Norris, D. (2018). The void. Hippocampus Press.
Sederholm, C., & Weinstock, J. A. (2015). Introduction: Lovecraft now. International Association for the Fantastic in the Arts.
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