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4.13 AVERAGE
4.13 AVERAGE
Like a lot of "complete" collections, like the Complete Emily Dickinson, it's a testament that not everything a master writes is gold. You probably already know the "good" Lovecraft: "Call of Cthulhu," "At the Mountains of Madness," "Rats in the Walls," "The Shadow Over Innsmouth," "The Curious Case of Dexter Ward," "The Whisperer in the Darkness," "The Shadow Out Of Time," "Pickman's Model," and a few others.
But this collection is filled with a lot of junk I think Lovecraft would not be keen on people reading. Unfinished works, experiments, and prototypes of stories he'd do much better later. It's a maddening slog through messy drab (like the baffling "The Transition of Juan Romero") to get to Lovecraft at his best.
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The HP Lovecrraft Society's audiobook version is serviceable and well-read (and about the most practical way to muscle through)...but there is an annoying habit in the longer stories where it plays the "bum buuumm" sound effect at the end of chapters...even if the chapters ended pretty ho-hum.
But this collection is filled with a lot of junk I think Lovecraft would not be keen on people reading. Unfinished works, experiments, and prototypes of stories he'd do much better later. It's a maddening slog through messy drab (like the baffling "The Transition of Juan Romero") to get to Lovecraft at his best.
----
The HP Lovecrraft Society's audiobook version is serviceable and well-read (and about the most practical way to muscle through)...but there is an annoying habit in the longer stories where it plays the "bum buuumm" sound effect at the end of chapters...even if the chapters ended pretty ho-hum.
adventurous
dark
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
I started reading this book my freshman year of college and it took me until today to finally get through it. That’s for a couple of reasons. A) It’s really long and I felt like reading someone else at different points and B) a lot of it is really tedious and/or repetitive. Lovecraft’s influence on the horror genre cannot be overstated. His highs are incredible—Call of Cthulhu, Color Out of Space, the Outsider, Cats of Ulthar, and the Case of Charles Dexter Ward all come to mind—but his lows are pages of overly worded descriptions of caverns and beings so unfathomable they cannot be described (yet are described endlessly). The other undeniable aspect of Lovecraft is his overt racism, xenophobia, and overall bigotry. Stories like Rats in the Walls and the Shadow Over Innsmouth (among others) are marred by his own personal beliefs on those different from himself, and his fear and hatred of other races becomes clear in many of his narratives. There’s not a whole lot to say on Lovecraft that hasn’t already been said. There’s definitely some stuff worth reading, some stuff that can be skipped, but all should be read with an awareness of his role in the history of horror and his own personal beliefs when writing each story.
Las ediciones góticas de Valdemar nunca defraudan, son preciosas (+1 estrella). Pero el contenido, esta vez... Me ha decepcionado.
En muchos casos Lovecraft falla al transmitir los momentos de intensidad, terror o desenlace. Se confunden los pasajes de lore, necesarios para conocer que hay detrás de la historia que estamos leyendo, con los momentos importantes que definen el relato.
Básicamente, no me ha parecido que Lovecraft sea un buen narrador.
Las descripciones, tanto físicas como emocionales, son de lo mas flojo que he visto en literatura de terror. Abusa mucho de los términos como insondable, innombrable, inenarrable, indescriptible, incalificable, inconcebible, indecible. Al final el lector tiene que tener más imaginación que el autor si quiere formarse una idea mental de lo que está leyendo.
En cuanto al imaginario que construye Lovecraft en sus historias, más allá de que sea repetitivo, no me ha defraudado pero no le da la suficiente profundidad o detalle. Intenta que todo se adapte a un formato de relato corto, pero hay historias que hubieran necesitado una extensión mayor para aprovechar el potencial de una trama que, al final, solo deja entrever la superficie.
Y en cuanto a lo onírico... No creo que sea para mí. Al menos el estilo onírico de Lovecraft. No le cojo el ritmo, me aburre, en ocasiones no lo entiendo.
Resumiendo: no creo que me lea el segundo volumen.
En muchos casos Lovecraft falla al transmitir los momentos de intensidad, terror o desenlace. Se confunden los pasajes de lore, necesarios para conocer que hay detrás de la historia que estamos leyendo, con los momentos importantes que definen el relato.
Básicamente, no me ha parecido que Lovecraft sea un buen narrador.
Las descripciones, tanto físicas como emocionales, son de lo mas flojo que he visto en literatura de terror. Abusa mucho de los términos como insondable, innombrable, inenarrable, indescriptible, incalificable, inconcebible, indecible. Al final el lector tiene que tener más imaginación que el autor si quiere formarse una idea mental de lo que está leyendo.
En cuanto al imaginario que construye Lovecraft en sus historias, más allá de que sea repetitivo, no me ha defraudado pero no le da la suficiente profundidad o detalle. Intenta que todo se adapte a un formato de relato corto, pero hay historias que hubieran necesitado una extensión mayor para aprovechar el potencial de una trama que, al final, solo deja entrever la superficie.
Y en cuanto a lo onírico... No creo que sea para mí. Al menos el estilo onírico de Lovecraft. No le cojo el ritmo, me aburre, en ocasiones no lo entiendo.
Resumiendo: no creo que me lea el segundo volumen.
Definitivamente Lovecraft no ha sido para mi, he sufrido muchísimo para terminar los dos volúmenes.
Le reconozco el mérito de imaginar lo que nadie había imaginado antes, pero es repetitivo hasta el infinito y más allá. Sus narraciones no me atrapan y sus personajes parecen todos iguales.
Le reconozco el mérito de imaginar lo que nadie había imaginado antes, pero es repetitivo hasta el infinito y más allá. Sus narraciones no me atrapan y sus personajes parecen todos iguales.
After reading everything Lovecraft ever wrote, I can say I prefer Lovecraftian fiction more than fiction written by Lovecraft. His word choices can be repetitive, and which is easier to deal with than the overt racism/racial panic the runs through a lot of the work.
A few of these stories are excellent and cement Lovecraft’s standing as the grandfather of horror. A lot of them are unremarkable and repetitive. And more than a few have dated atrociously and are obviously and problematically racist, sexist, and ableist. It didn’t make for pleasant reading, even acknowledging it’s a product of its time (etc etc). That’s enough Lovecraft for me, for a lifetime.
It's not 'complete', but an excellent selection with a short introduction to each chapter by the inimitable S. T. Joshi, Lovecraft authority.
The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath (Beyond the Wall of Sleep, 1943) - 81-page novella. 2 stars.
According to this anthology's introduction, "Lovecraft felt that the work was merely 'practice' for novel-writing, and he made no effort to prepare it for publication...." It's easy to see that Lovecraft didn't think much of the finished product, more a draft or outline than actual story. But his estate apparently didn't care and published it posthumously. As such, it is more of a historical artifact than a real piece of literature. The Retro Hugo voters undoubtedly nominated it on the strength of Lovecraft's name rather than the story's quality.
Nevertheless, this novella is not without some measure of interest. In it, Lovecraft certainly created a myriad of strange and monstrous landscapes and creatures. The stream-of-consciousness style of the story is quite dreamlike.
But the overall effect is not very satisfying. There is no dialog save for a long monolog near the end by Nyarlanthotep, an outer god. The protagonist, Randolph Carter, moves from one event to another without any chapter or section breaks. The prose is often dense with long, descriptive sentences, yet just as often these sentences don't really convey a clear mental picture of what's going on. I imagine it could be expanded by another writer and a compelling book would emerge.
I didn't read the rest of this anthology, although I have read many of the stories elsewhere. So I give the anthology 4 stars, but the novella only gets 2 stars.
According to this anthology's introduction, "Lovecraft felt that the work was merely 'practice' for novel-writing, and he made no effort to prepare it for publication...." It's easy to see that Lovecraft didn't think much of the finished product, more a draft or outline than actual story. But his estate apparently didn't care and published it posthumously. As such, it is more of a historical artifact than a real piece of literature. The Retro Hugo voters undoubtedly nominated it on the strength of Lovecraft's name rather than the story's quality.
Nevertheless, this novella is not without some measure of interest. In it, Lovecraft certainly created a myriad of strange and monstrous landscapes and creatures. The stream-of-consciousness style of the story is quite dreamlike.
But the overall effect is not very satisfying. There is no dialog save for a long monolog near the end by Nyarlanthotep, an outer god. The protagonist, Randolph Carter, moves from one event to another without any chapter or section breaks. The prose is often dense with long, descriptive sentences, yet just as often these sentences don't really convey a clear mental picture of what's going on. I imagine it could be expanded by another writer and a compelling book would emerge.
I didn't read the rest of this anthology, although I have read many of the stories elsewhere. So I give the anthology 4 stars, but the novella only gets 2 stars.