#AntiLovecraftian Horror

[thenightling]

I feel H. P. Lovecraft is overrated

Confession:   I am not a fan of H. P. Lovecraft. I don’t hate him.  I’m just not a fan.  

It's not just that H. P. Lovecraft was a known antisemite, racist, and xenophobe (even by early twentieth century standards he was extreme).  

I just never liked his writing style.

Years ago I had been part of a Facebook group called Super Scifi Saturday - which was based on MeTV's Saturday night programming block, including the horror host Svengoolie.  (If you've ever seen the 1985 Fright Night he's sort of like Peter Vincent only in ghoulish makeup).

One day one of the group admins posted a thread "What is one of your scifi or horror unpopular opinions?"

So I said that I think H. P. Lovecraft is overrated.  

It's not that I think he is a bad writer.  It's not that I don't think he influenced and inspired a lot of people. I just felt he was overrated.

Even the world Eldritch today (which just means "weird or mysterious or sinister") has come to mean "Lovecraftian to most people.

I also notice he gets credit for a lot of tropes he didn't actually invent such as the forgotten primordial Gods. See "The Mothers" in Goethe's Faust Part 2 for a pre-Lovecraft example.

And we reached a point where anything with tentacles is associated with Lovecraft.

Well, one of the group admins really didn't like me saying this and suggested that I probably couldn't follow Lovecraft because he uses too many "Big" and "archaic words" that aren't common anymore.

As a book lover I tried to swallow my pride and not be offended at this assessment.  I tried to assure him that I read many books from that era and the chosen words do not bother me though I admit to not being a fan of his particular writing style.

He then suggested that I needed to read more stories in the genre to appreciate Lovecraft.

I, again, attempted to remain calm and polite and said that I have read many storied from that era *and* genre.   And that there are authors who use Lovecraftian characters and concepts that I like better than Lovecraft, like Neil Gaiman.

The group admin again suggested that I just "Don't get" Lovecraft. That I don't appreciate him because I don't understand his writing.   It was very much sealioning.  Very politely suggesting- again- that the words were too big for me and that if I studied more and read more I'd come to appreciate it.

Finally I snapped and asked him to stop with the condescension.   He had asked for an unpopular opinion and that was mine.   I told him he was being rude and disrespectful in assuming that just because I don't like something it means I'm not well-read enough, or my vocabulary is too limited, or that I'm not familiar with that genre.   I told him flat out that he was treating me like the only reason I could have for not liking Lovecraft is if I'm too ignorant or stupid to appreciate him and it was starting to offend me.

He said "I'm sorry you feel that way." and I thought he was genuinely apologizing but immediately after he said that I was blocked from the group.