“Wise men have interpreted dreams, and the gods have laughed.”
(Hypnos, pg.206)
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“Hypnos“
As you may have possibly guessed, “Hypnos” is yet another dream-travel story, in this case similar to “Beyond the Wall of Sleep” as the characters actively strive to see things and travel places while their physical bodies are asleep – and they don’t exactly travel to the beautiful lands and cities that some of our past soul-travelers have gone. In this case, they’re pushing through strange barriers and soaring through dark abysses. Likewise, rather than seek amazing things and simply experience them or enjoy what they have found, these two are ambitious – one more so than the other. And it brings them horror. Naturally.
In some ways this is kind of the opposite of Lovecraft’s other dream traveling stories where the characters always seem to see something beautiful or memorable (or just generally not terrifying). But this is the first one in which there is something that decides to come after the characters, though its primary goal is the narrator’s friend. Does it succeed? Probably. Can the narrator do anything about it and does anyone believe him when he tell them? No.
It may be interesting to note that Hypnos is a Greek god who is the son of Nyx (Night), and Erebus (Darkness), and brother to Thanatos (Death). While none of these deities are inherently evil (though Zeus didn’t like to mess with Nyx), they are things that Lovecraft uses to create fear in his stories and characters. I only bring up the Greek mention because at the end of the tale we see Hypnos’s name carved in Greek letters at the base of a particular statue. What exactly this means I can’t say, but it is the sort of detail that makes you want to go digging in an effort to figure out what Lovecraft might have been thinking as he put this tale together for the first time.
A brief prose poem, it’s just the narrator’s experience (dream, real, who knows?) as the moon comes out and shines its light on everything. From a massive city of the dead (not living dead, we’re talking dead-dead) to a terrifying idol in the waters, the narrator simply can’t handle the moon and its light.
Sometimes I wonder what Lovecraft’s true thoughts on the moon were because this isn’t the first piece to feature moonlight and terrible things that happen beneath it.
Shame. I like moonlight.
Featured image © Nicole Taft
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