New to H.P. Lovecraft

[odin2]

I just started looking into Lovecraft and would like to know if there is a bookthat I shuld read first??
Thank you,
Odin

[Aleister]

The first one I ever read was ' The Best of H. P. Lovecraft: Bloodcurdling Tales of Horror and the Macabre'.

Any of the compilation books would be good...

'Tales of the Cthulhu Mythos'
'Dreams of Terror and Death : The Dream Cycle of H. P. Lovecraft'
' At the Mountains of Madness and Other Tales of Terror'
'The Thing on the Doorstep and Other Weird Stories'

If you like annotated books, I recommend anything by S. T. Joshi. They are filled with information and many have short bios about Lovecraft.

[Adrian]

The dream cycle stories are a bit rough to start off by. First the Dunwich and Innsmouth ones, then the deeper stuff.

[odin2]

Thank you both for the information I will have to see what I can find at the book-store..

[david]

I just started looking into Lovecraft and would like to know if there is a bookthat I shuld read first??
Thank you,
Odin

I think you should read also the most interesting biography on Lovecraft(written like a sort of novel), by Michel Houellebecq "H.P.L. - Against the World, Against the Life" (this is my english translation from french and italian titles).

[Aleister]

I will have to check that one out

[murgan]

Odin2,


Go with the Penguin Twentieth Century Classics collection, these trio of books though not as complete as the Del Rey trilogy, contain the corrected definitive texts.

Here are the titles:

The Call of Cthulhu and Other Weird Tales

The Thing on The Doorstep and Other Weird Tales

Dreams in the Witch House and Other Weird Tales



Nothing wrong with the Del Rey collection as it contains collectively a WHOPPING 70 individual stories, and H.P. Lovecraft wrote 109 altogether, 29 of which were collaborations with other authors of which only one is included in the Del Rey collection btw which means you have 69 of the author's 80 sole works. But if you want to assure yourself of possessing the definitive texts of H. P. Lovecraft choose the Penguin Classic collection listed above instead.

Here are the Del Rey collection titles:

Bloodcurdling Tales of Murder and The Macabre: The Best of H. P. Lovecraft

Dreams of Terror and Death: The Dream Cycle of H. P. Lovecraft

The Road To Madness: The Transition of H. P. Lovecraft


I strongly lean towards the former but if you have the latter well I think everyone that has introduced themselves to H. P. Lovecraft have begun with the Del Rey trilogy. However, Lovecraft purists usually insist on the hardcover volumes from Arkham House. The same publisher also offers multivolume letters sets and has a volume containing his collaborative works too. They are usually priced just under thirty dollars with some exceptions.

[murgan]

Correction, Howard Phillips Lovecraft produced 109 fictional writings of which 29 were collaborations. Here is the fictional stories in the author's bibliography as cut and pasted from HPL Archives:

1 The Alchemist (1908)
2.1 Ashes (with C. M. Eddy, Jr.; 1923)
3. At the Mountains of Madness (February-22 March 1931)
4. Azathoth (June 1922)
5.2 The Battle that Ended the Century (with R. H. Barlow; June 1934)
6. The Beast in the Cave (21 April 1905)
7. Beyond the Wall of Sleep (1919)
8. The Book (late 1933?)
9. The Call of Cthulhu (Summer 1926)
10. The Case of Charles Dexter Ward (January-1 March 1927)
11. The Cats of Ulthar (15 June 1920)
12. Celephaïs (early November 1920)
13.3 The Challenge from Beyond (with C. L. Moore; A. Merritt; Robert E. Howard, and Frank Belknap Long; August 1935)
14.4 Collapsing Cosmoses (with R. H. Barlow; June 1935)
15.The Colour Out of Space (March 1927)
16. Cool Air (March 1926)
17.5 The Crawling Chaos (with Winifred V. Jackson; 1920/21)
18.6 The Curse of Yig (with Zealia Bishop; 1928)
19. Dagon (July 1917)
20.7 Deaf, Dumb, and Blind (with C. M. Eddy, Jr.; 1924?)
21. The Descendant (1926?)
22.8 The Diary of Alonzo Typer (with William Lumley; October 1935)
23.9 The Disinterment (with Duane W. Rimel; September 1935)
24. The Doom That Came to Sarnath (3 December 1919)
25. The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath (Autumn? 1926-22 January 1927)
26. The Dreams in the Witch House (January-28 February 1932)
27. The Dunwich Horror (Summer 1928)
28.10 The Electric Executioner (with Adolphe de Castro; 1929?)
29. The Evil Clergyman (October 1933)
30. Ex Oblivione (1920/21)
31. Facts Concerning the Late Arthur Jermyn and His Family (1920)
32. The Festival (October 1923)
33. From Beyond (16 November 1920)
34.11 The Ghost-Eater (with C. M. Eddy, Jr.; 1923)
35.12 The Green Meadow (with Winifred V. Jackson; 1918/19)
36. The Haunted House (1898/1902; nonextant)
37. The Haunter of the Dark (November 1935)
38. He (11 August 1925)
39. Herbert West – Reanimator (September 1921-mid 1922)
40. History of the Necronomicon (1927)
41.13 The Horror at Martin's Beach (with Sonia H. Greene; June 1922)
42. The Horror at Red Hook (1-2 August 1925)
43.14 The Horror in the Burying-Ground (with Hazel Heald; 1933/35)
44.15 The Horror in the Museum (with Hazel Heald; October 1932)
45. The Hound (September 1922)
46. Hypnos (March 1922)
47. Ibid (1928?)
48. In the Vault (18 September 1925)
49.16 In the Walls of Eryx (with Kenneth Sterling; January 1936)
50. John, the Detective (1898/1902; nonextant)
51.17 The Last Test (with Adolphe de Castro; 1927)
52. Life and Death (1920?; lost)
53. The Little Glass Bottle (1897)
54.18 The Loved Dead (with C. M. Eddy, Jr.; 1923)
55. The Lurking Fear (November 1922)
56.19 The Man of Stone (with Hazel Heald; 1932)
57.20 Medusa's Coil (with Zealia Bishop; May 1930)
58. Memory (1919)
59. The Moon-Bog (March 1921)
60.21 The Mound (with Zealia Bishop; December 1929-early 1930)
61. The Music of Erich Zann (December 1921)
62. The Mysterious Ship (1902)
63. The Mystery of the Grave-Yard (1898)
64. The Mystery of Murdon Grange (1918; nonextant)
65. The Nameless City (January 1921)
66.22 The Night Ocean (with R. H. Barlow; Autumn? 1936)
67. The Noble Eavesdropper (1897?; nonextant)
68. Nyarlathotep (early December 1920)
69. Old Bugs (1919)
70. The Other Gods (14 August 1921)
71.23 Out of the Aeons (with Hazel Heald; 1933)
72. The Outsider (1921)
73. Pickman's Model (1926)
74. The Picture (1907; nonextant)
75. The Picture in the House (12 December 1920)
76.24 Poetry and the Gods (with Anna Helen Crofts; 1920)
77. Polaris (May? 1918)
78. The Quest of Iranon (28 February 1921)
79. The Rats in the Walls (August-September 1923)
80. A Reminiscence of Dr. Samuel Johnson (1917)
81. The Secret of the Grave (1898/1902; nonextant)
82. The Secret Cave or John Lees Adventure (1898)
83. The Shadow Out of Time (November 1934-March 1935)
84. The Shadow Over Innsmouth (November?-3 December 1931)
85. The Shunned House (16-19 October 1924)
86. The Silver Key (1926)
87. The Statement of Randolph Carter (December 1919)
88. The Strange High House in the Mist (9 November 1926)
89. The Street (1920?)
90. Sweet Ermengarde (1917)
91. The Temple (1920)
92. The Terrible Old Man (28 January 1920)
93. The Thing in the Moonlight (spurious)
94. The Thing on the Doorstep (21-24 August 1933)
95.25 Through the Gates of the Silver Key (with E. Hoffmann Price; October 1932-April 1933)
96.26 "Till A' the Seas" (with R. H. Barlow; January 1935)
97. The Tomb (June 1917)
98. The Transition of Juan Romero (16 September 1919)
99.27 The Trap (with Henry S. Whitehead; late 1931)
100. The Tree (1920)
101.27 The Tree on the Hill (with Duane W. Rimel; May 1934)
102.28 Two Black Bottles (with Wilfred Blanch Talman; July-October 1926)
103. Under the Pyramids (with Harry Houdini; February-March 1924)
104. The Unnamable (September 1923) 105. The Very Old Folk (2 November 1927)
106. What the Moon Brings (5 June 1922)
107. The Whisperer in Darkness (24 February-26 September 1930)
108. The White Ship (November 1919)
109.29 Winged Death (with Hazel Heald; 1933)

[Lagwolf]

Woah, I have ways to go to hit 109 methinks.

[The Huntsville Horror]

Read "The Colour Out of Space." Now. Do it.

His best story, hands down.

[murgan]

The "Holy Grail" collection from Arkham House Publishing

[murgan]

Proof is in the pudding, Del Rey is a collection of early uncorrected proofs with the exception of a miniscule presence of articles in their The Road to Madness: The Transition of H.P. Lovecraft volume that were actually revised by S.T. Joshi himself.



Penguin Twentieth Century Classics:

The Call of Cthulhu and Other Weird Stories (1999)

A Note on the Text

The Stories in this volume derive from corrected editions of Lovecraft's stories: The Dunwich Horror and Others (1984), At the Mountains of Madness and Other Novels (1985), Dagon and Other Macabre Tales (1986), and Miscellaneous Writings 1995. These Editions are based on consultations of Lovecraft's handwritten and typewritten manuscripts and early appearances in magazines. A few additional errors have been corrected.

The Thing on The Doorstep and Other Weird Stories (2001)

A Note on the Text

Althought the text in this edition are similar to those found in my Arkham House's editions of Lovecraft's tales (1984-1986), they have been recollated from manuscripts and early print sources, with the result that several additional errors have now been corrected.


The Dreams in the Witch House and Other Weird Stories (2004)

A Note on the Text

Although the texts in this edition are similar to those found in my Arkham House editions of Lovecraft's tales (1984-1986), they have been recollated from manuscripts and early printed sources, with the result of several additional errors have now been corrected. In particular, the text of "Hypnos" is derived from a newly discovered typescript (in private hands), and the text of "The Shadow Out of Time" is derived from Lovecraft's recently unearthed autograph manuscript.


© S. T. Joshi 1999, 2001, 2004 All Rights Reserved


Just a head's up folks, and here is a wonderful site to check out -- H.P. Lovecraft: A Pictorial Bibliography

[Cthulhu]

Im newish to lovecraft also. One of the books I really loved so far is the dream quest of unkown kadeth. It's a beautiful story more along the lines of sci fi and fantasy if you are into that. You can download it and print it off the net, just google ebooks and hp lovecraft. The ending to this story rocked my world. Few authors have ever done this before!

[Jesus Prime]

Proof is in the pudding, Del Rey is a collection of early uncorrected proofs with the exception of a miniscule presence of articles in their The Road to Madness: The Transition of H.P. Lovecraft volume that were actually revised by S.T. Joshi himself.



Penguin Twentieth Century Classics:

The Call of Cthulhu and Other Weird Stories (1999)

A Note on the Text

The Stories in this volume derive from corrected editions of Lovecraft's stories: The Dunwich Horror and Others (1984), At the Mountains of Madness and Other Novels (1985), Dagon and Other Macabre Tales (1986), and Miscellaneous Writings 1995. These Editions are based on consultations of Lovecraft's handwritten and typewritten manuscripts and early appearances in magazines. A few additional errors have been corrected.

The Thing on The Doorstep and Other Weird Stories (2001)

A Note on the Text

Althought the text in this edition are similar to those found in my Arkham House's editions of Lovecraft's tales (1984-1986), they have been recollated from manuscripts and early print sources, with the result that several additional errors have now been corrected.


The Dreams in the Witch House and Other Weird Stories (2004)

A Note on the Text

Although the texts in this edition are similar to those found in my Arkham House editions of Lovecraft's tales (1984-1986), they have been recollated from manuscripts and early printed sources, with the result of several additional errors have now been corrected. In particular, the text of "Hypnos" is derived from a newly discovered typescript (in private hands), and the text of "The Shadow Out of Time" is derived from Lovecraft's recently unearthed autograph manuscript.


© S. T. Joshi 1999, 2001, 2004 All Rights Reserved


Just a head's up folks, and here is a wonderful site to check out -- H.P. Lovecraft: A Pictorial Bibliography

I also thoroughly recommend these three books. Well, the Call of Cthulhu, and Dreams in the Witch House anyway, been trying to track Thing on the Doorstep. But the content's great, the annotations are extremely in-depth (and cross-referential) and the actual quality of the book itself, layout, print and paper are excellent (unlike most of my Poe collection which seems to have been printed on recycled toilet paper by a dot matrix printer with special[/il] problems).

[jp]

I totally did not realize that the Del Rey collections contained errors and such.


Damn, that means I'm going to have to buy even more collections of his so I can read the proper stories (granted, I still loved what I read in the Del Rey collections).


How is the recent "H.P. Lovecraft: Tales" from the Library of America? Does this contain the corrected texts?