Literary Analysis question concerning Lovecraft's short stories

[lewelma]

I'm struggling to name some of the features that my ds is noticing in the literature he is reading.  If I can get proper terms for these literary devices, we could look them up and study them.  So any help would be most appreciated.

 

1) DS and I are analysing the short stories by Lovecraft.  DS has read all 60 and is interested in exploring how they change over time.  He believes that the themes of 1) being small in the universe and 2) hopelessness are consistent throughout Lovecraft's work, but he thinks that the topics used to explore these themes change from Poe-like gruesomeness to supernatural beings and power.  Is there a name for this concept of topic?  It is not a motif, but I am unsure what it is called. 

 

2) In addition, he has noticed that the later short stories (he read them in order) have a 'mythos' that is lacking in the earlier ones.  It is not that the stories are connected in plot, as each concerns a unique situation, but more that if you read them in order Lovecraft assumes knowledge from previous books.  So he might mention a supernatural being in passing, that you would only know the mythology behind if you had read the previous short stories.  Is there a name for this?

 

see post #4 for more details.

 

Thanks!

 

Ruth in NZ

[charlotteb]

My daughter used IEW's Windows to the World curriculum last semester.  It is great for learning literary devices. I highly recommend it!

 

Also, here is a link to literary terms:

 

http://www.roanestate.edu/owl/ElementsLit.html

 

Not sure if theyre exactly what youre looking for, but maybe theyll help!

[Lori D.]

1. Possibly (?) -- theme is being supported by the literary elements of (____fill in the blank____)

In this specific example, the theme of smallness or the theme of hopelessness is expressed through, or supported by, style (possibly voice) or mood (the gruesomeness), or character (supernatural beings and power). Not having read Lovecraft, I'm not sure how specifically the gruesomeness is working, whether through style or mood (although those are often interconnected, so maybe both), and to what effect.

 

Style refers to the author's use of word choice, sentence structure, figurative language -- the particular way this particular author writes to establish mood, images and meaning. Style describes how the author describes events, objects and ideas. Style is about how an author uses language to express ideas and story.

 

Voice is the specific author's individual writing style. Voice is about how a specific author speaks to readers.

 

Mood, or atmosphere, is the emotion created in the reader. Mood is created through setting, point of view (how closely connected to a character is the point of view), and of course through style. Mood is the effect an author tries to create within the reader, to add to the overall reading experience, act as foreshadowing, or possibly support theme.

 

Tone is the attitude of the author (or narrator of the story) toward the subject. (examples: ironic, playful, formal, intimate, mocking, condescending, somber, despairing…) Tone can give the reader a subtle feel for where the story might be going or what kinds of choices the characters will make.

 

 

2. Mythos is a great term here: "mythos: … a myth or mythology; (in literature) a traditional or recurrent narrative theme or plot structure; a set of beliefs or assumptions about something".

 

So, in this case, you'd be looking a thesis that runs something like this, as one possibility: "There is a mythos which (____fill in the blank with what specifically the mythos does____) present in the later short stories that is lacking in earlier stories. This mythos has the effect of ……"

 

I don't know as though there is a specific term that refers to a mythos being present in some works and not in others… DS may find this brief Wikipedia article of interest: the Cthulhu Mythos, about one reoccuring element that explains how characters in the interconnected works gained knowledge.

 

 

Not an expert -- these are just my thoughts. Sounds like your DS is seeing some fascinating things going on in Lovecraft, and reading large numbers of works by a single author really allows you to see overarching or repeated themes, and the author's style. Warmest regards, Lori D.

[lewelma]

Thanks guys!

 

Lori, I would like him to do more than just describe this development in Lovecrafts 'approach'.  I would like for him to discuss how it affects his development of his themes of hopelessness and insignificance, or how it affects the atmosphere of breathless and unexplainable dread of outer unknown forces..  But 'approach' is not the right word.  I wonder if it is genre.  Some people say that he is the link between victorian horror and modern science fiction.  Interestingly he starts with a victorian horror 'approach' and over 60 short stories mutates his writing to what some people call Lovecraftian horror.  I just seems like we need a word to describe this 'approach'.

 

Sounds like I need someone who has read some Lovecraft to help me identify what we are talking about.

 

Thanks!

 

Ruth in NZ

[lewelma]

I think it is sub-genre.  The genre of horror broken down into victorian horror (with guts and ghosts) and Lovecraftian horror (with aliens and unknown creatures of the depths).

 

I've been reading in Perrienes and what ds wants to write about is considered 'a more ambitious type of paper'.  Figures.  My ds does nothing half way.  He wants to 'examine the works for signs of development' in the author. 

 

So I guess his generalized question is how does Lovecraft's use of different sub-genres affect the theme of insignificance.  Or something like that.

[KarenNC]

This is from my husband, the Lovecraft fan... 

I think the word you are looking for to describe Lovecraft's change over time is "evolution"... and whole books have been written on this evolution in Lovecraft's case :)  It can't be stressed enough that the Mythos did not develop in isolation. Lovecraft was a tireless letter writer, and some of the most distinctive features of the Mythos grew out of this correspondence, particularly with the "Lovecraft Circle" (August Derleth, Frank Long, Clark Ashton Smith and a few others) who all took a turn at writing stories in the general Cthulhu universe (and incorporating each other's ideas into later stories)... any analysis that doesn't take this into account will have a pretty big hole in it. It's also important to know that Lovecraft was a committed atheist (he would have approved heartily of Richard Dawkins, IMO)... and the Cthulhu universe is a decidedly atheistic one (if your son has not yet come across the term "cosmic horror", it's a fruitful avenue for exercising his Google-fu :) ). That aspect, I think, is one of the most important to his evolution away from the more supernaturally-tinged Victorian style horror to the very modern, mechanistic and "Deco" horror for which he is best known.

 

Here is where I would start if I wanted to dig deeper -

• the Lovecraft Wiki (this is different than  Wikipedia... here's a good starting point: http://lovecraft.wikia.com/wiki/Cthulhu_Mythos )
• Lovecraft's own essay, "Supernatural Horror in Literature" (can be read here: http://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks06/0601181h.html )
• The work of S.T. Joshi

 

Ancillary but still interesting and/or useful:

• There is a good blog called Theofantastique, that focuses on the meeting of horror and spirituality... here is a link to their archive of entries tagged "Lovecraft" (http://www.theofantastique.com/?s=lovecraft )
• The H.P. Lovecraft Historical Society - they produce an astonishing amount of Lovecraft related media, including podcasts, radio theater, two movies (shot in the cinematic style common when the stories were written - their "Call of Cthulhu" is a silent movie(!), and "The Whisperer in Darkness" look like it's from the early 1930s), and even a full-length Cthulhu-based parody of "Fiddler on the Roof", which is quite funny.