![]() ![]() ![]() "Lovecraft Country" is 1950's (and perhaps even present-day) America, a country that fears and hates 'the other' as Lovecraft did. It unequivocally condemns the racism of Lovecraft, even in the title. Lovecraft Country is one of the first works of Lovecraft-influenced fiction I've read that tries to recognize and confront both of these extremes. One friend I know even goes so far as to suggest that most of Lovecraft's stories are "racist trash," and that cosmic horror is not a real genre, and that this "non-genre" is characterized only by the poorly disguised white racial anxieties of the period. On the other hand however, you have people who read "The Horror at Red Hook," or have heard the factoid about the unfortunate naming of Lovecraft's cat, don't bother to look any deeper, and dismiss all of Lovecraft's work as racist, and his legacy as irredeemable. ![]() On one hand, you often have people who will try to completely disregard or downplay Lovecraft's racism, saying things like "Almost everybody was racist back in his day," which ignores the reality that even among his peers and contemporaries, Lovecraft's racism was particularly excessive, and sometimes is present in his stories to such a degree as to be almost inseparable from the narratives themselves. I've always loved Lovecraftian and cosmic horror, but I have also often struggled with separating the stories and their influence on horror from the contemptibly racist views of Lovecraft himself. I recently read Lovecraft Country in anticipation of the upcoming HBO series. ![]()
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