Willow
06-07-2008, 03:39 PM
Originally Posted by Albert Zero
I've been reading a lot of Lovecraft shorts lately and I've noticed a pattern.
After distilling it all, you too can create your own Lovecraft story with some simple steps.
1) HEAVY EXPOSITION. Introduce your character (who should seem excessively educated), and make sure that your character prefaces the story by a heavy foreshadowing, generally by letting slip a hint of the consequences from the story (never can sleep, is in an asylum, face etched with lines of horror that should never be on a human face...).
2) EXCESS OF THE MUNDANE. Your character should be involved in something relatively mundane, and do it for about 90% of the story. Shelving books in a library, having tea with a friend, exploring a strange town. Feel free to give hints to something curious.
3) FOOLISH EXPLORATION. Your character runs across something that any truly sane person would either ignore or run away from, but being trapped in a Lovecraft story, they are compelled to investigate. Just because. Oh, and when the character does, be sure to needlessly have the character narrate how much they lament doing it in retrospect.
4) ENCOUNTER WITH SOMETHING ICKY. This shouldn't happen until the last couple of pages in the story. Your character encounters something so sick, twisted, profound, and not of this world that their mind cannot comprehend it. Be sure that every adjective you use has at least 4 syllables in it.
5) CATHARSIS - NOT. The character survives, usually being found by authorities. And some detail makes not only people in the story, but the reader itself think the character is crazy and imagined it all. People watched the character talking to himself, or no time has actually passed, or the door they passed through is not there, etc. Of course the character will insist that the discrepancies are the product of the supernatural.
There you have it! Now you can turn your tale of EVIL TOASTERS FROM MARS into a true Lovecraftian tale.
Reuben Dodd responded:
Lol. Its true its true! But you forgot to mention the use of historical fact, real places (as well as made up) and the altered versions of your friends names as characters because there is nothing more fun than mutilating your friends minds on the printed page. Eg Robert Blake from 'the haunter of the dark' is actualy Robert Bloch.
Jonathon Neale responded:
And use antiquated words. It's a lanthorn, not a lantern. Instead of scaley, try squamous. Forget gigantic, cyclopean is what you're looking for. It's not old it's antediluvian. Hunchbacked is now gibbous. Find as many old obscure words as you can.
Suede responded:
Tentacles. Got to have tentacles, too.
Use the word "prismatic" wherever you can. Don't worry if it makes sense or not.
Geometry is better if it's non-Euclidian.
The only motivation for intelligent life forms other than human is eating. That and sex (with humans)...are TWO motivations for intelligent life forms other than human. Humans are only interested in forbidden knowledge and pure science.
Mr. Head_shot responded:
Meh, not always true there were the old ones in at the mountains of madness, who were scientists.
Use lot's unspeakable, un-nameable, blasphemous, fetishes, ancient, and elder.
I've been reading a lot of Lovecraft shorts lately and I've noticed a pattern.
After distilling it all, you too can create your own Lovecraft story with some simple steps.
1) HEAVY EXPOSITION. Introduce your character (who should seem excessively educated), and make sure that your character prefaces the story by a heavy foreshadowing, generally by letting slip a hint of the consequences from the story (never can sleep, is in an asylum, face etched with lines of horror that should never be on a human face...).
2) EXCESS OF THE MUNDANE. Your character should be involved in something relatively mundane, and do it for about 90% of the story. Shelving books in a library, having tea with a friend, exploring a strange town. Feel free to give hints to something curious.
3) FOOLISH EXPLORATION. Your character runs across something that any truly sane person would either ignore or run away from, but being trapped in a Lovecraft story, they are compelled to investigate. Just because. Oh, and when the character does, be sure to needlessly have the character narrate how much they lament doing it in retrospect.
4) ENCOUNTER WITH SOMETHING ICKY. This shouldn't happen until the last couple of pages in the story. Your character encounters something so sick, twisted, profound, and not of this world that their mind cannot comprehend it. Be sure that every adjective you use has at least 4 syllables in it.
5) CATHARSIS - NOT. The character survives, usually being found by authorities. And some detail makes not only people in the story, but the reader itself think the character is crazy and imagined it all. People watched the character talking to himself, or no time has actually passed, or the door they passed through is not there, etc. Of course the character will insist that the discrepancies are the product of the supernatural.
There you have it! Now you can turn your tale of EVIL TOASTERS FROM MARS into a true Lovecraftian tale.
Reuben Dodd responded:
Lol. Its true its true! But you forgot to mention the use of historical fact, real places (as well as made up) and the altered versions of your friends names as characters because there is nothing more fun than mutilating your friends minds on the printed page. Eg Robert Blake from 'the haunter of the dark' is actualy Robert Bloch.
Jonathon Neale responded:
And use antiquated words. It's a lanthorn, not a lantern. Instead of scaley, try squamous. Forget gigantic, cyclopean is what you're looking for. It's not old it's antediluvian. Hunchbacked is now gibbous. Find as many old obscure words as you can.
Suede responded:
Tentacles. Got to have tentacles, too.
Use the word "prismatic" wherever you can. Don't worry if it makes sense or not.
Geometry is better if it's non-Euclidian.
The only motivation for intelligent life forms other than human is eating. That and sex (with humans)...are TWO motivations for intelligent life forms other than human. Humans are only interested in forbidden knowledge and pure science.
Mr. Head_shot responded:
Meh, not always true there were the old ones in at the mountains of madness, who were scientists.
Use lot's unspeakable, un-nameable, blasphemous, fetishes, ancient, and elder.