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habab's review
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
Ahh, the prophetic dystopian that amazes us! Pick this one up if you're in need of your healthy dose of gloom and doom. This is a less popular Lovecraft, named after a lovely poem by Robert Burns. I always say, doomsday panic has been popular since the beginning of time.
aoc's review
3.0
Collaborative work between Lovecraft and Barlow portraying Earth far into the future as humanity takes its very last gasps. I found the "future history" part of the story more engaging than Ull's adventure, but considering Till A' the Seas is public domain and really, really short you should read it for yourself. Expect a very definite tone of nihilism and futility, though.
mabusecast's review
5.0
Damn this was fucking bleak even for Lovecraft/R. H. Barlow!
A very grim tale of cosmic indifference indeed!
A very grim tale of cosmic indifference indeed!
taliesin_hastings's review
challenging
dark
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.5
famel's review
4.0
Wow, that’s really a depressing one. Loved it. This short journey of the main character is just too sad. The story isn’t very deep, but it redeems itself by being beautiful in its own, apocalyptic, way.
festiveconclave's review
dark
emotional
sad
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
3.0
nooker's review
dark
sad
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.5
goranlowie's review
3.0
I didn't think it was particularly good, more so... interesting. This is Lovecraft's attempt at a "Dying Earth" type of story (in fact-- it's even listed on the Wikipedia page for the "Dying Earth" subgenre as the first example). It's interesting to see this mix of typical Lovecraftian stuff in a Dying Earth setting. Two examples:
"It cannot be described, this awesome chain of events that depopulated the whole Earth; the range is too tremendous for any to picture or encompass. Of the people of Earth’s fortunate ages, billions of years before, only a few prophets and madmen could have conceived that which was to come—could have grasped visions of the still, dead lands, and long-empty sea-beds. The rest would have doubted . . . doubted alike the shadow of change upon the planet and the shadow of doom upon the race. For man has always thought himself the immortal master of natural things. . . ."
"And now at last the Earth was dead. The final, pitiful survivor had perished. All the teeming billions; the slow aeons; the empires and civilizations of mankind were summed up in this poor twisted form—and how titanically meaningless it all had been! Now indeed had come an end and climax to all the efforts of humanity—how monstrous and incredible a climax in the eyes of those poor complacent fools of the prosperous days! Not ever again would the planet know the thunderous tramping of human millions—or even the crawling of lizards and the buzz of insects, for they, too, had gone. Now was come the reign of sapless branches and endless fields of tough grasses. Earth, like its cold, imperturbable moon, was given over to silence and blackness forever.
The stars whirred on; the whole careless plan would continue for infinities unknown. This trivial end of a negligible episode mattered not to distant nebulae or to suns new-born, flourishing, and dying. The race of man, too puny and momentary to have a real function or purpose, was as if it had never existed. To such a conclusion the aeons of its farcically toilsome evolution had led."
"It cannot be described, this awesome chain of events that depopulated the whole Earth; the range is too tremendous for any to picture or encompass. Of the people of Earth’s fortunate ages, billions of years before, only a few prophets and madmen could have conceived that which was to come—could have grasped visions of the still, dead lands, and long-empty sea-beds. The rest would have doubted . . . doubted alike the shadow of change upon the planet and the shadow of doom upon the race. For man has always thought himself the immortal master of natural things. . . ."
"And now at last the Earth was dead. The final, pitiful survivor had perished. All the teeming billions; the slow aeons; the empires and civilizations of mankind were summed up in this poor twisted form—and how titanically meaningless it all had been! Now indeed had come an end and climax to all the efforts of humanity—how monstrous and incredible a climax in the eyes of those poor complacent fools of the prosperous days! Not ever again would the planet know the thunderous tramping of human millions—or even the crawling of lizards and the buzz of insects, for they, too, had gone. Now was come the reign of sapless branches and endless fields of tough grasses. Earth, like its cold, imperturbable moon, was given over to silence and blackness forever.
The stars whirred on; the whole careless plan would continue for infinities unknown. This trivial end of a negligible episode mattered not to distant nebulae or to suns new-born, flourishing, and dying. The race of man, too puny and momentary to have a real function or purpose, was as if it had never existed. To such a conclusion the aeons of its farcically toilsome evolution had led."
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