Question about Joshi's revisions.

Asaki · Post by **Asaki** » Tue Feb 13, 2007 9:44 pm

I've got all (well, most) of the PDF's from the old Lovecraft Library at Gizmology that went down, but for the longest time, I've been meaning to add some paper editions of Lovecraft to my collection. I've got a gift card for B&N's website, but the only copies of the Arkham Press books I can find are more expensive second-hand than to buy them new from Arkham's site. I see there are some Penguin books in an affordable paperback that are further revised from the Arkham books, but nowhere can I find just exactly what is revised in them from the Random House/Ballantine/Del Rey books.

Did Joshi just fix typos and spelling errors, or are there larger revisions, like missing paragraphs or things like that? Info would be great, thanks.

Hodgson · Post by **Hodgson** » Wed Feb 14, 2007 7:59 am

"This is the first paperback edition to include the definitive corrected texts of these classics of American fantasy fiction."
http://us.penguinclassics.com/nf/Book/B ... 46,00.html

I would say that it's mainly menial corrections, but all I have go by is the above.

Asaki · Post by **Asaki** » Wed Feb 14, 2007 5:43 pm

Yeah, I've already searched most of the Internet, and this entire forum, and that was the most info I could find. I'd really like something more specific, so I know if I want to spend extra money on those Penguin books or not, or if I can't decide, I'll probably just get another Oz book.

Hmm...now that I look around...this forum is actually much more idle than I thought it was =/

I've been trying to find a chat room or something, but it seems like #cthulhu on DalNet moved or something, because it's completely empty.

krakenten · Post by **krakenten** » Wed Feb 14, 2007 11:10 pm

Hodgson is a formidable scholar, so follow his advice.
You could do worse, much worse.
These fora have very good discussion of Lovecraft and Co., though they aren't quite as fast paced as chat.

Asaki · Post by **Asaki** » Wed Feb 14, 2007 11:35 pm

I didn't mean to be rude, if I came off that way. I was just agreeing with him, that I knew just as much about the revisions as he does.

I'm just being a little impatient...this gift card is burning a hole in my pocket ¬_¬

I suppose the Penguin books are only about $2 more than the DelRey books, and the one that I'm thinking of getting has better stories than the DelRey I was looking at...guess it can't hurt to get it and find out.

JJ Burke · Post by **JJ Burke** » Thu Feb 15, 2007 2:00 am

while this forum could stand to be busier, there are a few regulars to keep the pilot light going. that's one thing that's never failed since i've been coming

Draconis · Post by **Draconis** » Thu Feb 15, 2007 3:57 pm

Personally I just picked up the three Lovecraft Omnibuseseses. They're UK published though I believe, by Harper-Collins. I think between them they cover everything novel and short-story wise. Glynn Barrass' 'Cthulhu Mythos Bibliography and Checklist' is a damn handy little guide to all the published stuff, too.

krakenten · Post by **krakenten** » Thu Feb 15, 2007 4:02 pm

"Nightmare's Disciple" is also a good place to start.
Not the greatest book I ever read-the style is somewhat clumsy-but the plot is certainly interesting, and it serves as a very good tour of the Mythos.

Asaki · Post by **Asaki** » Thu Feb 15, 2007 8:07 pm

Well, the Penguin book I was going to get was gone, and the next cheapest was still too pricey, so I got Ozma of Oz instead.

Though I did find a tiny snippet of info here: http://www.hplovecraft.com/writings/sources/sot.asp

The recent discovery of Lovecraft’s handwritten manuscript allows readers to appreciate this magnificently cosmic story exactly as originally written. All previous editions of the story contain hundreds of serious errors, including errors in paragraphing, omissions and mistranscriptions of many words and passages, and erroneous punctuation.

So I guess that means there's a little of both =) I'll keep it in mind the next time I get a gift card.

Jesus Prime · Post by **Jesus Prime** » Fri Feb 16, 2007 7:19 am

Some of the Joshi revisions are quite major - "The Shadow Out Of Time", for example, was heavily revised after Joshi located the original manuscript, since the first print version ruined the formatting and omitted a lot of passages to cut down space. I advise you to get the recent Penguin ones if possible, they're heavily annotated so you know exactly what's going on, even if you've never ead a Mythos tale before it'll point out all the allusions, and explain any real world references, which is nice.

Draconis · Post by **Draconis** » Fri Feb 16, 2007 7:24 am

Sounds like that's worth a purchase...

Asaki · Post by **Asaki** » Fri Feb 16, 2007 12:07 pm

Thanks, Jesus Prime =)

I'll have to try to pick one of those up next time, even though I'm really not digging the cover art. I might as well put smiley face stickers all over it, for all the relevance it holds towards the whole pulp/Lovecraft atmosphere

Those Hippocampus/Necronomicon Press books look really nice too, though it's the same amount of money for a lot less stories.

Jesus Prime · Post by **Jesus Prime** » Fri Feb 16, 2007 5:54 pm

I like the cover art, especially for "Call of Cthulhu and Other Weird Stories". The other two work, but not just as well.