When reading Outer God or Old Ones stories is it best just to read Lovecraft work only?

When reading Outer God or Old Ones stories is it best just to read Lovecraft work only?

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Kind of yes. The other autors tried to set all the old ones in a christian good vs bad scenario and in turn destoryed the cosmic nihilism of the original Lovecraft stories.

By "other writers" this user just means Derleth (who was totally a hack.) And maybe Brian Lumley (who is also a hack) but I don't believe user has read enough Lovecraft-style horror to have read him. (And really isn't missing out.)

Clark Ashton Smith is very much worth reading, and a better writer than Lovecraft, although going for a different thing most of the time.

Ramsey Campbell is pretty good, although his earliest stuff is kind of awkward and that's when he did a lot of his Yog-sothothery. Try to find the short story "The Voice on the Beach" for a good example of him.

Robert Bloch (the guy who wrote Psycho) wrote some Lovecraft-style stuff early in his career and some of that is pretty good.

"The Willows" by Algernon Blackwood is a story Lovecraft was inspired by and is better cosmic horror than anything Lovecraft wrote.

Laird Barron is probably the best current writer in this vein.

Jesus! Laird Barron?! Really?!
Laird Barron is goosebumps tier.

How's Robert E. Howard? He contributed a bit to the Cthulu mythos. Did he retain Lovecraft's cosmic nihilism?

>lovecraft
What are you, a 15 years old goth girl?

I read a few Clark Ashton Smith stories, and to me, lot of the writing seemed pretty clumsy. Like never using contractions, even when when it fucks up the rhythm, or using uncommon/ archaic words when they don't quite fit (in both meaning and rhythm).

I'm pretty sure modern teenage girls would hate Lovecraft for being racist.

If your first/only exposure to him is the story "Don’t Make Me Assume My Ultimate Form” then I pity you, but give him another chance. That story is garbage, and overall he is fairly uneven, but when he is on his game he can be pretty great.

John Langan was the other writer I almost mentioned but couldn't think of his name in the moment.

Howard is a better writer than people give him credit for, but most of his writing wasn't horror. His best horror story is Pigeons from Hell which has nothing to do with Cthulhu. The Black Stone is short and pretty good and a good Lovecraft imitation, but overall Howard isn't all that similar to Lovecraft. They were BFFs (along with Smith) and really that's the bigger link between them, not style or themes.

Honestly all these guys are uneven as fuck, and Smith definitely likes his big words that don't quite fit sometimes. He doesn't always fuck up his own rhythm though, only sometimes.

Aren't current writers obsessed with Cthulhu only? Because the internet loves him?

What stories about Cthulhu have you read? He gets used in titles a lot, but for actual fictional appearances he's not that common. List a few?

Cthulhu is the main character of these books right?

Pop culture yes, but actual writers not so much. Anyone who is trying to write in the Lovecraft mythos has presumably at least taken the time to read his work outside of CoC and therefore understands that Cthulhu isn't that big of a character. Anyone who's trying to write Lovecraft-eque horror without having read a ton of his work is going to be dog shit, no exceptions.

I doubt such a person exists, but it would be interesting if someone had read basically all of Poe, Dunsany, Blackwood, Machen, Hodgson and maybe someone like M.R. James, and then skipped ahead and read Aickman and a few other more recent horror writers but somehow never read Lovecraft or the directly Lovecraft-influenced writing. I would like to see what kind of horror writing someone like that would produces.

>main character
God that better be bait. If not, no. He was only described as legends in a handful of lovecrafts works, before his buddies took over and ass raped the mystery of the mythos

What do you recommend for pretty "great".

I'm basing my opinion off of swift to chase.

The book that he wrote using only a fraction of lovecrafts words was good. It was called 'lurker at the threshold'. I have read it recently and I liked it very much

It's not by Howard...

When I read a series or anthology that became famous and created a string of writers wanting to add to it, I stick with the original author.

HOWEVER

Lovecraft had a circle of writer friends that he included in his mythos universe. So I'd include them too. One was Clark Ashton Smith.

I didn't know he had friends he gave the "okay" to. I just assumed everyone else was shitting up his work without his say.

Mostly the ones written while he was still alive. He took from them just as they took from him. Clark Ashton Smith, Robert E. Howard, Robert Bloch, Frank Belknap Long. And a single story by August Derleth.

Father a child and find out

this.

As much as I enjoyed lovecraft all the people that tried to use the setting were really shit and never really had that sense of cosmic horror.

I have no idea what. I want to read that King in Yellow book though!

Agreed. Laird Barron is pretty bad. The Croning is one of the few books I haven't been able to finish simply because it was so poorly written.

only pulp author worth reading besides Lovecraft is Robert Howard. He and Lovecraft had differing views on the role of humans, so there will be a difference in their tone/theme.

Lovecraft subscribed to cosmicism which emphasized the insignificance of humans in the grand scheme of things and that if there are higher powers they don't care for us and are beyond our comprehension and can't be defeated.

Howard, on the other hand, saw some kind of majesty in unknown powers, and believed that humans had a strength to them that could trump even the most horrible and hopeless situations. a good illustration of their differing ideas is the short story they wrote together with two other authors. Lovecraft set it up to end in his typical nihilist way, but then Howard does a 180 with the story to suit his own ideas. Honestly a hilarious read and would 10/10 recommend you find it.

Favorite Howard story for me is "The God in the Bowl." touches on this Old Ones idea in a way that is creepy and scary, but not totally hopeless.

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