The War against Lovecraft

I've often joked that nowadays, in critical discussions of the creator of Conan the Cimmerian, it's almost required that he be referred as "that writer who killed himself, Robert E. Howard." It's a joke – but only barely – because you can easily find plenty of examples where the circumstances of Howard's death have become the most important thing about him. I find this frankly bizarre, as if any man can be reduced to a single fact about his life, never mind a man as complex and, let's be honest, troubled as Robert Ervin Howard.

I was reminded of this recently because I was given a copy of Free League's oversized edition of H.P. Lovecraft's "The Dunwich Horror," illustrated by François Barranger. It's an absolutely gorgeous book that pairs HPL's text with Barranger's moody, evocative artwork. The back of the book includes "A Note about H.P. Lovecraft," which reads:

There has long been an ongoing debate about Lovecraft's world view and prejudices. Lovecraft wrote in a time when racism was widespread and accepted in literature, and it is in this context that his works should be read.

Lovecraft himself expressed a racist world view and often let it shine through in his texts. Lovecraft's novels are outstanding classics, but the racism that now and then appears in certain texts is reprehensible, and something that we in Free League reject and distance ourselves from.

Despite this, we have chosen to print The Dunwich Horror without linguistic intervention. It is one of the greatest classics in horror literature. Lovecraft's stories deserve to be released and find a new readership, but at the same time, the author's racism should be approached critically and rejected.

What's the purpose of this "note?" No doubt I am biased, but I can't recall anything in "The Dunwich Horror" that could be called racist by any reasonable definition. Given that, why alert the reader that Lovecraft himself held odious views about his fellow man? Had the text of "The Dunwich Horror" contained clear and unambiguous evidence of these views, this approach might – might – have made some sense, but it doesn't. Consequently, the boast that "we have chosen to print The Dunwich Horror without linguistic intervention" is an empty one. There's nothing courageous or principled about it. Instead, it comes across as an attempt to look virtuous while doing to Lovecraft what is often done to Howard: reduce him to a single fact about his life – "that racist writer, H.P. Lovecraft."

I don't begrudge anyone his feelings about H.P. Lovecraft and his reprehensible opinions. If someone sincerely believed that even his stories with no explicitly racist content are somehow tainted because of HPL's views, I can find no fault with him. I don't share that belief any more than I share Lovecraft's beliefs about race, but it's not for me to say what is or is not beyond the pale for someone else. We should be free to decide what we like and don't like without censure, especially when it comes to works of art, whose impact is often intensely personal. 

That said, I strongly reject the tendency of the last decade or so to try to tarnish Lovecraft's literary fame by pointing out his racism at every turn. To me, it smacks of an invidious effort to diminish the influence he continues to exert on fantasy, science fiction, horror, and the wider popular imagination. When one considers that, at the time of his death in 1937, Lovecraft and his comparatively small corpus of writings were largely unknown, his lasting impact is all the more remarkable. He belongs to a very select group of popular writers, whose ideas have transcended the short span of his life and now belong to the ages. What better way to take Lovecraft down a peg than to point out again and again that he was a virulent racist?

I regularly say that it's easy, from the vantage point of the present, to hurl brickbats at our ancestors for their ignorance, shortsightedness, and other sins. That's especially true of a man like H.P. Lovecraft, who is estimated to have written nearly 90,000 letters to dozens of correspondents during his lifetime. In those letters, of which only about 10% survive, HPL revealed much about himself, his life, and his opinions. We thus have a much better sense of him as a man, both good and bad, than we do about many historical figures, which, of course, makes it all the easier to highlight his flaws, if that's what one wishes to do.

As for myself, I prefer, on the occasion of 134th anniversary of his birth, to unambiguously celebrate H.P. Lovecraft and his works. All of us reading this owe him and his singular imagination a debt of thanks.