The process of delving into the black abyss is to me the keenest form of fascination.
H. P. LOVECRAFTThe process of delving into the black abyss is to me the keenest form of fascination.
H. P. LOVECRAFTHeaven knows where I’ll end up – but it’s a safe bet that I’ll never be at the top of anything! Nor do I particularly care to be.
H. P. LOVECRAFTBut are not the dreams of poets and the tales of travellers notoriously false?
H. P. LOVECRAFTBlue, green, grey, white, or black; smooth, ruffled, or mountainous; that ocean is not silent.
H. P. LOVECRAFTScience, already oppressive with its shocking revelations, will perhaps be the ultimate exterminator of our human species – if separate species we be – for its reserve of unguessed horrors could never be borne by mortal brains if loosed upon the world.
H. P. LOVECRAFTLife is a hideous thing, and from the background behind what we know of it peer daemoniacal hints of truth which make it sometimes a thousandfold more hideous.
H. P. LOVECRAFTIn writing a weird story, I always try very carefully to achieve the right mood and atmosphere and place the emphasis where it belongs.
H. P. LOVECRAFTTo me, there is nothing but puerility in a tale in which the human form – and local human passions and conditions and standards – are depicted as native to other worlds and universes.
H. P. LOVECRAFTNever should an unfamiliar word be passed over without elucidation, for, with a little conscientious research, we may each day add to our conquests in the realm of philology and become more and more ready for graceful independent expression.
H. P. LOVECRAFTOne can never produce anything as terrible and impressive as one can awesomely hint about.
H. P. LOVECRAFTOne superlatively important effect of wide reading is the enlargement of vocabulary which always accompanies it.
H. P. LOVECRAFTThe man or nation of high culture may acknowledge to great lengths the restraints imposed by conventions and honour, but beyond a certain point, primitive will or desire cannot be curbed.
H. P. LOVECRAFTIf I could create an ideal world, it would be an England with the fire of the Elizabethans, the correct taste of the Georgians, and the refinement and pure ideals of the Victorians.
H. P. LOVECRAFTEven when the characters are supposed to be accustomed to the wonder, I try to weave an air of awe and impressiveness corresponding to what the reader should feel. A casual style ruins any serious fantasy.
H. P. LOVECRAFTThat metre itself forms an essential part of all true poetry is a principle which not even the assertions of an Aristotle or the pronouncements of a Plato can disestablish.
H. P. LOVECRAFTFrom my experience, I cannot doubt but that man, when lost to terrestrial consciousness, is indeed sojourning in another and uncorporeal life of far different nature from the life we know; and of which only the slightest and most indistinct memories linger after waking.
H. P. LOVECRAFT