“That is not dead which can eternal lie,
And with strange aeons even death may die.”
(The Nameless City, pg.141)
Welcome back to Our Daily Lovecraft – and the unluckiest of numbers. At least it’s not on a Friday…
If you’re just joining us, you can start your Lovecraftian journey here!
This story is certainly a departure from what we’ve been reading so far. According to the introduction, it’s roots are in Horatio Alger stories which typically feature rags-to-riches plotlines and young men who go out to seek their fortunes. Divided up into seven “chapters,” Lovecraft’s tale features a beautiful girl named Ethyl Ermengarde, a young man Jack Manly, the dastardly ‘Squire Hardman, and a few other characters. It almost feels like satire of the whole dashingly perfect hero, damsel in distress, and moustache twirling villain – and it very well may be for all I know. Hardman does, in fact, twirl his moustache and spy on the young lovers from the bushes.
But it’s actually quite funny, with little asides by the narrator (my favorite being after Hardman kicks a cat in his anger and the next line is, ‘”Curses!” he cried—Hardman, not the cat.’) and a lot of random occurrences – for a short story there’s a surprising amount going on that Lovecraft manages to wrap up at the end with no trouble. And the end isn’t what you’d expect, which makes it even better. It’s the sort of goofy tale that I hope Lovecraft had fun writing because it seems like the kind of story that would be enjoyable to create with all that sass and nonsense.
Here we have another first person narrator who is visiting a nameless city, which is shunned by others for reasons we will discover in the end. Naturally, despite all the fears the narrator experiences and no matter how bad they get, he pushes on and makes numerous discoveries – primarily about who the city’s inhabitants were, although not until the very end, where things started to feel a little on the vague side.
Two things I found quite intriguing here. One being that this is the first story I’ve come across thus far to reference something in a previous tale. In this case, the narrator recalls Sarnath the Doomed, Ib, and the land of Mnar, all of which were from the story “The Doom That Came to Sarnath.” I suppose because we’re in yet another ancient city, it’s something that just pops into the narrator’s head, but not as any kind of phantom thought, but rather something that perhaps he’d read about due to how casual it’s mention was.
The second was how these ancient creatures are almost always horrendous for humans to look upon, and most of the time never show any actual violence toward man (though there is one bas relief the narrator stumbles upon that shows the creatures from this story killing a human). Most of the time they’re just doing their thing and it’s the appearance of them and their actions that creep men out. This was the reason for the destruction of the city of Ib, and why the character from “Dagon” has issues – they simply can’t handle the strangeness of the folk they encounter. There’s no telling just what the reason is for the human killing in the relief. The creatures were already driven out of their homes by, what I assume, was the shifting of the earth as the sea retreated and the desert grew. Perhaps their encounters with man were less than friendly on man’s part. It wouldn’t surprise me, in this world that Lovecraft is slowly building upon.
No matter how you look at it, the story makes for some interesting speculation and discussion. Perhaps I’ll learn more as the stories continue and the world grows. Whatever Earth Lovecraft is utilizing with these various cities and peoples is certain to come around more and more, and I most definitely look forward to seeing it.
Featured image © Euan Carmichael via Unsplash
I’m enjoying these refreshers of HPL stories. I read him in HS and early college (1966-1970) when they were reprinted in mass market anthologies by Ballantine, Belmont, and other publishers, but not much since. HPL had a profound influence on my reading and writing. When you’re finished, you might want to check out CARTER & LOVECRAFT by Jonathan L. Howard, and LOVECRAFT COUNTRY by Matt Ruff, for more contemporary takes on his mythos. There have also been some tribute compilations that might be worth checking into.
The funny thing was that I’d never even heard of him until going to Seton Hill for the graduate program. People kept mentioning Lovecraft and I just thought, “Who IS this guy??” Debated about getting his collective works for a while, and finally just decided to grab it and dive in!