Customer Reviews

Essential Solitude: The Letters of H. P. Lovecraft and August Derleth (2 VOLUME SET)

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David E. Schultz, S. T. Joshi and Hippocampus Press are determined to give us all of H. P. Lovecraft's extant letters in handsome hardcover editions. S. T. confess'd to me, during a drive home, that he thought these two volumes less edifying than others because the "talk" is mostly of literary matters and thus do not showcase Lovecraft's philosophic ideas, with which Joshi is understandably fascinated. Still, this is such an important relationship, between the writer and the man who would dedicate his life and money to publishing Lovecraft in hardcover, the man who gave us those first wonderful Arkham House editions of Lovecraft's SELECTED LETTERS, the man who saw to it that Lovecraft was first published in early paperbacks editions that had such amazing circulation, the man who saw that Lovecraft's works were widely published in England.

There were never two people more different than H. P. Lovecraft and August William Derleth, and this can be gauged in their approach to the writing of weird fiction. For Derleth it was a pleasant and easy way to help pay the bills, but not writing that he took very seriously. For HPL, it was his Life's Work, his Art, and he was intensely serious about it. These letters are really charming in every way, and they give such a wonderful history of the Weird Tale gang and the art of writing fiction. Lovecraft's letters are amply illustrated with sketches of houses, landscapes, maps, &c, and in some of Augie's early epistles we are given snatches of his verse. Presentation, annotations -- everything about these volumes is first-rate. The dust jacket illustrations by the remarkably talented David C. Verba are very fine, and I especially love his rendition of ye Shunn'd House for Vol. II.

These volumes from Hippocampus Press sell out quickly and should be ordered, when first announced, without delay -- for once they are out of print, dastardly rip-off dealers will have ye audacity to charge $1,000 for the books.