There are really only two significantly influential writers to H.P. Lovecraft: E.A. Poe and Lord Dunsany. Even Lovecraft admitted this himself in a letter to Elizabeth Toldridge (March 8th, 1929):
"Even when I break away, it is generally only through imitating something else! There are my 'Poe' pieces & my 'Dunsany' pieces—but alas—where are my Lovecraft pieces?"
Certainly there were other influences, but those were the two big ones. I would actually like to focus on minor influence to Lovecraft: John Donne. Donne didn't have that great of an impact on Lovecraft (it seems difficult to imagine how he could have), but one of Lovecraft's famous "poems" (for it is only two lines longs) certainly has some some Donnian influence:
That is not dead which can eternal lie,
And with strange aeons even death may die.
This poem was originally written in The Nameless City, but is reiterated again in The Call of Cthulhu. It is the "even death may die" portion that seems to resonate with Donne's Death be not Proud (I will write the whole thing — it's not a long poem):
Death be not proud, though some have calléd thee
Might and dreadfull, for, thou art not so,
For, those, who thou think'st, thou dost overthrow,
Die not, poore death, nor yet canst thou kill me.
From rest and sleepe, which but thy pictures be,
Much pleasure, then from thee, much more must flow,
And soonest our best men with thee doe goe,
Rest of their bones, and soules deliverie.
Thou art slave to Fate, Chance, kings, and desperate men,
And does with poyson, warre, and sicknesse dwell,
And poppie, or charmes can make up sleepe as well,
And better then thy stroake; why swell'st thou then;
One short sleepe past, wee wake eternally,
And death shall be no more; death, thou shalt die.
It is in particularly the last line that resonates with Lovecraft's couplet: "And death shall be no more; death thou shalt die" vs. "And with strange aeons even death may die." Interestingly neither author capitalizes the word death, which would indicated there is no metaphysical or supernatural tone in the usage of the word death: death is not some daemon or god incarnate such as Milton renders Death in Paradise Lost (though Donne does speak directly to death); death is just the end of life. So what Donne and Lovecraft are both saying is paradoxical: death can achieve death.
But die is another word used here: "death may die" and "thou shalt die." Dying is a something that is done, and death is both something that has been done and the effect of the doing. I'm mincing words and being pedantic here, but both Lovecraft and Donne are being either redundant (like Nietzsche's example of lightning strike: the "doing-doing") and paradoxical... Paradoxical because it would be absurd for an effect (i.e. death) to cause (i.e. dying) its own effect upon itself, being simultaneously the cause of itself, and effecting itself as its own cause (I know that is confusing... it took me a couple of minutes to think through how to write that). It would seem that the ending of the end of life is the nature of immortality ("That is not dead which can eternal lie"), so the question arises: is immortality a paradox? If it is redundant, then it would be just a silly play of words and inherently meaningless. But if it is a paradox we might as well accept what Cantor, Gödel, and Turing concluded: there will be paradoxes, and many of them, that are unsolvable and incomprehensible. I suppose we don't even understand death enough to ponder the implications of death being no more.
There is something almost terrifying and painful in our inability to understand both death and Donne's paradox of death's death. Perhaps this is why Lovecraft used "death may die."
There is, however, one subtle but important different between the two: Donne says "death, thou shalt die" and Lovecraft says "even death may die." Donne renders the death of death as imperative and inevitable — a commandment. Lovecraft renders it as something possible but not inevitable; it can happen, but it does not have to happen.
In reality what either author means is, admittedly, perplexing, though Donne is far more transparent than Lovecraft (and that only by comparison). Donne is essentially trash-talking death, calling death a slave that must obey fate and chance (note that Fate and Chance are made proper nouns by being capitalized in the poem). He is also saying to death that good men do not fear death, and that death is not unlike sleep: short and then we wake up (presumably in the afterlife: "One short sleepe past, wee wake eternally"). Death makes us sleep through its weapons of war, sickness, and poison, but we, too, induce sleep with drugs and charms — in a sense we possess the same powers as death. In short, Donne is saying that when we die we sleep for a short while and awake immortal; and by awaking eternally death will die. Lovecraft, however, does not give so much context as to his take on the death of death. In fact the poem is only given in those two short stories because the protagonist was reminded of the mad Arab, Abdul Alhazred, who wrote that couplet in his book The Necronomicon. But given the general content of Lovecraft's works we can conclude that he would be referring to ancient, immortal monsters that slumber ("eternal lie"). But then again, Lovecraft could be saying that all things die, and all things must come to an end, so that after many "strange aeons even death may die." Like his monsters and aliens and ancient cities, Lovecraft is just as vague and haunting as he is with that couplet. Those two lines might be meant to drive the reader mad if one thinks about it for too long and in too much depth.
As to their exacting meaning and usage of death no more, it nonetheless seems reasonable to conclude that Lovecraft's "death may die" was inspired by Donne's Death be not Proud — the two poems are too strikingly similar (certainly Donald Burleson, Lovecraft: Disturbing the Universe, found the similarity between the two to be striking). It is difficult to imagine Lovecraft escaping grade school without ever having read some of Donne's work, even though he never finished high school. I personally discovered Death be not Proud and memorized it before I ever had to read it in high school.
And though the influence and inspiration of Donne and other authors (these other authors I will discuss in other posts down the way) upon Lovecraft do not readily jump off the page like Poe and Lord Dunsany do, it is nevertheless refreshing to take a look at other authors that inspired one of the great masters of horror.
Further reading:
Burleson, Donald R. Lovecraft: Disturbing the Universe. University Press of Kentucky. 1990.
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