Runalong The Short Shelves - Pseudopod in June

Source –  Pseudopod.org

Hosts – Alasdair Stuart, Joshua Tuttle, Scott Campbell

Hellooo!

Its sweltering here in the UK and work has involved quite a few office trips and delayed trains so my print reading speed is a bit slower than normal this week. But this and some nice walks through Manchester have given me the opportunity o catch up on Pseudopod’s recent output which the horror podcast has had a Mythos Month in June and this look at cosmic horror and the flawed legacy of one of it’s proponents gave me a fascinating trip into looking at my own tastes and a reminder how horror evolves and re-evaluates its creators.

A good example starts with episode 979 which is a double bill. The more recent tale is ‘Old Things Are Meant To Be Found And Shared’ by and narrated by Leanna Renee Hieber and Alasdair Stuart. We start with a New York tour guide who specialises in ghost stories and the histories of famous authors of the genre who lived there including H P Lovecraft. Our first narrator has a touch of the gothic about her as she describes the streets and then a growing sense of disquiet felt as she finds an old book lying in the street which she then read. At this point we switch narrators, and Stuart takes over as a man discusses his project many years ago. This is a very good tale within a tale wrong-footing us as we move back into he past and watch a man well versed in the power and history of Old Ones decide upon his next acolyte. The tone changes with a sense of wistfulness, satisfaction and hungry malevolence but the story is also in dialogue with horror itself as we find a certain H P Lovecraft in our narrator’s sights and he has plans for him. There are comparisons with Poe in terms of personality, and this is a story not in love with its target but acknowledging he creates stories and has a much harder crueller side to await. It neatly sets up the dialogue this set of episodes will create. Stuart also reminds us finding out how heroes of a genre still have feet of clay is sadly not something our genre is stopping with.

The second tale is The Secret In The Tomb from Robert Bloch. A much older tale from 1935 here narrated by Andrew Leman. A recurring theme also starts which is I don’t particularly enjoy this style of story. A lot of this early cosmic horror is very over descriptive – for example the moon here is compared to a golden bat. It feels even for 1935 quite archaic in tone and like someone aping the 19th century style. Leman gives it gusto and verve which for me elevates this but I’m initially not warming to it . That said Bloch is an incredibly versatile writer (see his Pyscho script) and overall my sense is an author adapting his skill to the style – he knows the words, the way to make them click together, make an atmosphere or push a pace along. The actual plot is engaging a cursed family, hidden secrets of power and death and then undercuts the pomposity beautifully with a finale about good old violence solving things rather than doomed heroes which some cosmic horror seems to avoid. I like a happy ending sometimes sue me!

With episode 980 we get Nesters by Siobahn Carrol narrated really well by Leanna Renee Hieber another modern tale but again in dialogue with american history. An immigrant family are trying to start a new life but are slowly being consumed by the american dustbowl. It starts with a calf dying and to be found with a stomach full of dust and sand. That is not the supernatural but the dying town that drains everyone of life. Ye the family hold on and a strange US government group offer a large sum for the family’s father to investigate some land. Our narrator’s father does not return. This story really makes you feel the family’s struggle and our young teenager’s growing realisation the world is cruel and hard to a level no parent can solve. When she decides to search for her father the story changes into something a lot more graphic and chilling with body horror and good old monsters to fight. But the real horror comes afterwards in the story’s aftermath where the experience is not empowering the surviving characters but instead its making their situation ever worsening and the people seem to simply accept that. A gorgeous story.

Then episode 981 returns to Robert Bloch with his 1935 tale The Shambler From The Stars read by Jon Padgett. In many ways I feel this longer tale has the same odd mix of reactions as Bloch’s earlier tale did for me. It feels archaic in tone for 1935 (the time of noir, zippy SF tales and more) and the over-elaborate descriptions again for me put a barrier up tot eh language. But its also really cunningly constructed. The first half is all about how a narrator fell into the realm of secret histories, magical books and rituals. It builds up a whole fascinating hidden world and clearly acknowledges the cosmic horror mythos of others and this sub-genres ability o meld into other tales. It is weirdly affectionate tribute rather than parody. The second half of the story then moves into horror first by what our narrator witnesses and then the uncomfortable realisation this is coming for him no mater what he does. I don’t love this tale I do respect it though.

Episode 982 gave me a quandary. I never got round to reading a HP lovacraft tale when I was younger and then when I found out what kind of racist bigot he was that underlined my desire to avoid. But with this episode we get his ‘The Haunter of The Dark narrated with verve by Boocho McFly and its hosted by Alasdair Stuart who I know isn’t a fan of Lovecraft either. So puzzling what this would mean I decided to test the waters and the episode really works as a examination of this part of genre history. But I again can confirm I don’t like Lovecraft

The story – ultimately doesn’t work for me. In many ways it’s a similar issue to Bloch’s tales but actually magnified. Lovecraft is verbose and will never miss an opportunity to describe something. You can’t have darkness its got to be coloured in with a few extra long words. There are the bones of tales we know that come afterwards secret societies in power, doomed characters and dangerous knowledge but its saturated you can tell an author really ‘feels’ this and lacks Bloch’s playfulness and art .It also has racist attitudes towards Italians and catholics which underlines we are dealing with one of the genre’s most prejudiced of authors.  For me overall quite dull and as the only Lovecraft tale I ever want to inflict on my ears satisfies me that I’m not missing out . But the real passion is in Stuart’s afterword. A few quotes from Lovecraft about his respect for Hitler’s aims underlines the kind of man this writer was and while so many love his lore and legacy I cannot ever want to accept his work, look past these attitudes or say well at least his stories were good. As this cycle of tales shows other writers of the period do better and others have built on the bones much better tales many of whom Lovecraft would have run from. Rather than a foundation stone perhaps better to see Lovecraft as the compost of the genre’s blooming and he hopefully will in a few more years be truly in the dust where he belongs. Horror’s power is often to make us really look and this set of tales makes us see cosmic horror and those in it and makes us really look at some of the people it still overly respects too much. That indeed is a scary concept

Finally, outside of the cycle for June 19th something fascinating and Jesus Christ in Georgia from 1991 written by civil rights pioneer W E B DuBois is a mix of parable, social commentary and indeed horror but not from the supernatural. We see black prisoners exploited in chain gangs to profit those in power, the black servants being ignored and the causal racism and disgust white people will show to anyone with non-white skin. Our mysterious stranger’s identity is slowly revealed (the title does give it away) and while certainly a tale of religion it also highlights hypocrisy, the lynching going on in plain sight and the feeling that the world needs to do better. It’s a tale told from the heart and burns with anger at what was going on at the time. Its also reminding us there is a lot still to do and sadly all too much still relevant to 2025.