The Shadow Over Innsmouth

[Tinsel]

I have read about seven of his stories. Not a lot, and out of that group I liked, "The Rats in the Walls" and "The Shadow Over Innsmouth". I did glance at the Dunwich story, but I'm basically moving down the list of stories on my Sony Reader. The epub title is called "Waking up Screaming...Tales of Terror".

Well Lovecraft sounded so good that it was hard to believe that anyone could write that way. There is so much to read in such little space. What amazed me is that I started to write an outline. I don't know why, but it is sort of nuts. It would be really difficult though to capture the storyline of this story because there is so much that occurred in the reading. Anyway, here is this that I found myself doing, what in the hell is going on I say, I can hardly wait to read the next great short story of his. I'm hoping that there are more. It appears from the sound of it that there are other good ones.

Story Outline (section 1 of 5):

The narrator has escaped from a seaport called Innsmouth where a series of odd events occured. After his return to the main land, he pleads his case to the authorities. The area is subsequently investigated, leading to a military effort, and finally concluded with an abrupt campaign to silence information. In the aftermath, Innsmouth is held intact by a shadow of rumors. The narrator, waiting until now, decides to talk about his past ordeal. He has endured hardship that he thinks will preceed some long awaited last step.

His personal accounting of the events beigns in a place called Newburyport. He intends to travel directly by steam train from there to Arkham. The terminal agent suggests an alternate budget accomidation. It is a depricated route, viewed as a deture for including a site of long standing decline; the remote locale known as Innsmouth. Having no alternative solution, the narrator tries to gather more information.

Library sources reference a port city situated at the mouth of the Manuxet river, founded in 1643. Location of marine vessel manufacture, including a factory centre. All operations were reduced by civil strife and plague in the 1840's that afflicted the population. Contact with the mainland was limited to exports, including fish and lobsters, and ingots. An exotic museum piece of note, exists at the Newburyport Historical Society.

 

[j d worthington]

...what in the hell is going on I say, I can hardly wait to read the next great short story of his. I'm hoping that there are more. It appears from the sound of it that there are other good ones.

Yes, there are quite a number. It sounds as if you are falling under the Old Gent's spell, and that can be a lifelong addiction.

As for your outline... are you planning on posting the remainder, or...?

 

[Lobolover]

Oh , we've got him now , hand me the rubber gloves .

Anyway , glad youre starting to like it .

 

[Tinsel]

Yes, there are quite a number. It sounds as if you are falling under the Old Gent's spell, and that can be a lifelong addiction.

As for your outline... are you planning on posting the remainder, or...?

I thought that this was all Dagon worship. As for the outline, I guess that I will keep slugging it out. It might take a few months just because the story is beyond imagining.

BTW do you know about the Atlanta Radio Theater Company (ARTC), because they did a few dramatic audios of some of Lovecrafts short stories that are on iTunes. I just saw that there is a "The Shadow Over Innsmouth" audio for free on a podcast, but the one that is $5 is better. Anyway, that is what I am listening to and I love it. I would consider doing my own Radio Theater here in Canada but it would likely turn into a non profit venture, and I'm not quite ready for that. Anyway, yeah, I will try to keep going on the outline, and the stories are so cool, I just read half a paragraph of another of his stories and it sounded great, but I probably won't get to that story for a couple months. I downloaded some other epub book for my Reader called something or other about "[...]The Witch House[...]". I was a bit disappointed that there is no Necronomicon that had all of his stories, on the Sony Reader Store.

 

[Tinsel]

Oh , we've got him now , hand me the rubber gloves .

Anyway , glad youre starting to like it .

I had heard of Lovecraft years ago but since his name sounded childish, I totally ignored him, thinking that he was some second rate character who wrote crap, but now that I am actually reading it, he might be the best that there is, and I'm wondering why I was never introduced to this writer in school. Why are they trying to get these kids to read a whole bunch of Shakespeare. That just is fuel to the fire.

 

[j d worthington]

That would be "The Dreams in the Witch House" -- not one of his very best, but it is a personal favorite of mine nonetheless....

 

[Lobolover]

Excuse me but how does a person's name indicate their literary qualities ?

I mean if you think about it Shakes-peare sounds rather silly as well .

 

[Tinsel]

I'm reading through "Waking Up Screaming....", and "The Dreams in the Witch House" does look like a better anthology. I would have bought a compendium if it was available in e-pub, regardless going with books that take selections, even if they are hand picked for a reason.

Yes, the name sounded odd and I don't mind it now. That is how I thought about things at the time and for many years. I am not the same as most people, but to tell you the truth, not many people that I have known read literature. Not many people that I know talk about history. Not many people I know read the plays in their historical context, etc.

Well I don't worry about such things because they are small matters and what actually counts is the real work, the end product, that stands the test of time. It doesn't matter if any of these people were nice or not, for all we know all of these authors wouldn't last a week here for they would be banned due to the strength of their imaginations. What I had said about the name was the truth and the answer to your question is that the name probably has no bearing on their literary qualities, but I do not know for sure, least God hold it against me.

 

[Lobolover]

You can find the majority of the man's work online for free , granted there are a few text coruptions here and there .

 

[Tinsel]

I know about the H.P. Lovecraft archives. One problem there is there is that my laptop monitor is not as nice as the Sony Reader. The Reader presents the text in a grey scale, and it also has a few other supporting features, so I want to read it on the Reader if I can. Now I actually have three epub's "Waking Up Screaming Haunting Tales of Terror", "The Thing on the Doorstep and Other Weird Stories", and "The Dreams in the Witch House".

Now I am just finishing reading "The Shadow Over Innsmouth" for about the fourth time. It is clear that there are some plot twists and details that can easily be missed and are up for interpretation. The narrator seems to have questioned the entire series of events himself, while the same is said about Innsmouth and everything that comes into contact with it.

I believe that if there are a dozen stories out there like this one, than that should be enough reading material for a lifetime. I wonder why the Bible was not written this well.

 

[j d worthington]

The latter two sound like e-versions of the Penguin collections, in which case I'd definitely go for them. Waking Up Screaming, iirc, uses the old, corrupt texts, whereas (despite some typos) the Penguin editions use the authoritative editions of Lovecraft's work.

And yes, you'll find more than a dozen stories of that quality from Lovecraft. If you're enjoying it this much, I think you can safely say you'll be fascinated for a looong time to come.

Incidentally... funny you mentioned the Bible in this context. Note any Biblical parallels in "Innsmouth"... I mean, aside from the fact that it was the Temple of Dagon that Samson pulled down, whereas Dagon-worship takes over all the churches in Innsmouth, figuratively tearing them down. Think "23rd Psalm"....

 

[Tinsel]

That is good information there about the texts. What I did was I bought texts in which different stories were collected in order that I might have all of them. Where there is some repetition, I can read the Penguin versions instead, thanks.

The Hebrew version of the word Dagon is apparently the word fish.

Well I can see that Lovecraft's writing pattern is different than what one typically finds in an author. I can see this in Bram Stoker and R.L. Stevenson. I simply think of them as using a power dynamic rather than static writing.

 

[J-WO]

There's both an Innsmouth and a Dunwich in the UK. My parents took me to Dunwich on holiday once!

 

[Lobolover]

I know about the H.P. Lovecraft archives. One problem there is there is that my laptop monitor is not as nice as the Sony Reader. The Reader presents the text in a grey scale, and it also has a few other supporting features, so I want to read it on the Reader if I can. Now I actually have three epub's "Waking Up Screaming Haunting Tales of Terror", "The Thing on the Doorstep and Other Weird Stories", and "The Dreams in the Witch House".

Now I am just finishing reading "The Shadow Over Innsmouth" for about the fourth time. It is clear that there are some plot twists and details that can easily be missed and are up for interpretation. The narrator seems to have questioned the entire series of events himself, while the same is said about Innsmouth and everything that comes into contact with it.

I believe that if there are a dozen stories out there like this one, than that should be enough reading material for a lifetime. I wonder why the Bible was not written this well.

There is a v bulletin forum for e-book readers where I have/had an acount , I'll try to remember it and see what it does .

And there are many more places on the net for HPL etexts then just the archives .

Incidently while you're mentioning Stoker - have you ever read "The Lair of the White Worm" ? What a mess that one was :rolleyes


Speaking of which you may find Lovecraft's essay on the subject to be very insightfull .


http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Supernatural_Horror_in_Literature

 

[Fried Egg]

There's both an Innsmouth and a Dunwich in the UK. My parents took me to Dunwich on holiday once!

When I read "Shadow's over Innsmouth", the description reminded me strongly of Porthoustock in Cornwall. If you've ever been there, you will know what I mean...

 

[Ningauble]

You can find the majority of the man's work online for free , granted there are a few text coruptions here and there .

The H.P. Lovecraft Archive has the best versions I've seen online.

 

[Ningauble]

There's both an Innsmouth and a Dunwich in the UK. My parents took me to Dunwich on holiday once!

I knew about the real Dunwich, but never heard about the real Innsmouth. Cool! Where is it?

 

[Fried Egg]

I knew about the real Dunwich, but never heard about the real Innsmouth. Cool! Where is it?

I don't think there is an Innsmouth...not in the UK anyway.

 

[j d worthington]

I knew about the real Dunwich, but never heard about the real Innsmouth. Cool! Where is it?

Yes, this is news to me, too. I knew about HPL setting Innsmouth in England originally in "Celephaïs", but I don't recall ever hearing about an actual town (or village) called Innsmouth in the UK before.....

 

[Lobolover]

Does the name even make sense from a linguistic point of view ?