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L'Affaire Barlow: H. P. Lovecraft and the Battle for His Literary Legacy
214 pages, Paperback
Published November 14, 2023
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February 21, 2026
The introduction states that this is a story with no winners…and in many ways that is true of this sad tale, but ultimately there are winners – those of us who have benefited from the various efforts to preserve the works (fiction and non-fiction) of an author who was, at best, barely recognised in his lifetime. Outside of his circle of dedicated followers, the name Lovecraft didn’t really start to hit the ‘mainstream’ until, arguably, the paperback releases of the 1960’s/70’s and in the 1980’s with the release of the Call of Cthulhu role playing game.
The creation of Arkham House, specifically to release the collected manuscript that the major publishers passed on, may be a heartfelt tale of dedication, but the tale of how those manuscripts were collected, and just who had the rights to them, as covered in this excellent book, is anything but. What we find is a bitter feud, the unravelling of a community and, at the centre, a teenager coping with the loss of the biggest influence on his young life, whilst desperately trying to do the right thing, whether he had the maturity to know what that was or not…
On the one side we have Robert Barlow, a dear friend of the author and the person named as his ‘literary executor’. On the other we have August Derleth and Donald Wandrei, who, in the creation of Arkham House, kept the Lovecraftian lamp burning…as they had always expected; from this letter of Derleth’s:
“I had always assumed that complete responsibility for the HPL material would ultimately rest with us by hook or crook”
Many of the group were of the same mind – after all Derleth was an established writer, had the credentials and the wherewithal. Barlow was just a kid that many took exception to and never understood Lovecraft’s relationship with. But it was Barlow that the old gent chose, and his actions to gather and secure Lovecraft’s material ultimately created the canon that we enjoy today. It was Barlow who started the depositing of materials with the John Hay Library at Brown University – unlike Derleth who was known to sell to the private market.
It’s a bitter tale, fabulously researched and told by Legaria and in the background is the old gent himself, who would have hated what happened – so much fuss over his substandard scribblings (as he would have put it), and his beloved Aunt who simply couldn’t cope without him “…everything seems a terrible mountain to me without Howard. I miss him more and more each day.”
One surprising point, for me, was the general absence of Frank Belknap Long; I would like to know more about his life following the passing of his friend.
Where I would nudge the interested reader, is in the series of collected letters (of which Barlow was the first to state that they were as important as the tales themselves). Before making any judgements, read the letters to understand the relationship that HPL had with the various characters in this tale. Derleth may have been the obvious choice as executor, but he never met the man himself and his collected letters lack the warmth that you find in the collected letters of Barlow, let alone Conover, Robert E Howard, or even the brothers Wandrei…I’m sure HPL would have been shocked by the venom and vitriol that ultimately came from Donald W…and dismayed that Barlow was never even given a credit in the publication of ‘The Outsider and Others’ and ‘Beyond The Walls Of Sleep’.
If you have any interest in HPL the man, this is a must read.
The creation of Arkham House, specifically to release the collected manuscript that the major publishers passed on, may be a heartfelt tale of dedication, but the tale of how those manuscripts were collected, and just who had the rights to them, as covered in this excellent book, is anything but. What we find is a bitter feud, the unravelling of a community and, at the centre, a teenager coping with the loss of the biggest influence on his young life, whilst desperately trying to do the right thing, whether he had the maturity to know what that was or not…
On the one side we have Robert Barlow, a dear friend of the author and the person named as his ‘literary executor’. On the other we have August Derleth and Donald Wandrei, who, in the creation of Arkham House, kept the Lovecraftian lamp burning…as they had always expected; from this letter of Derleth’s:
“I had always assumed that complete responsibility for the HPL material would ultimately rest with us by hook or crook”
Many of the group were of the same mind – after all Derleth was an established writer, had the credentials and the wherewithal. Barlow was just a kid that many took exception to and never understood Lovecraft’s relationship with. But it was Barlow that the old gent chose, and his actions to gather and secure Lovecraft’s material ultimately created the canon that we enjoy today. It was Barlow who started the depositing of materials with the John Hay Library at Brown University – unlike Derleth who was known to sell to the private market.
It’s a bitter tale, fabulously researched and told by Legaria and in the background is the old gent himself, who would have hated what happened – so much fuss over his substandard scribblings (as he would have put it), and his beloved Aunt who simply couldn’t cope without him “…everything seems a terrible mountain to me without Howard. I miss him more and more each day.”
One surprising point, for me, was the general absence of Frank Belknap Long; I would like to know more about his life following the passing of his friend.
Where I would nudge the interested reader, is in the series of collected letters (of which Barlow was the first to state that they were as important as the tales themselves). Before making any judgements, read the letters to understand the relationship that HPL had with the various characters in this tale. Derleth may have been the obvious choice as executor, but he never met the man himself and his collected letters lack the warmth that you find in the collected letters of Barlow, let alone Conover, Robert E Howard, or even the brothers Wandrei…I’m sure HPL would have been shocked by the venom and vitriol that ultimately came from Donald W…and dismayed that Barlow was never even given a credit in the publication of ‘The Outsider and Others’ and ‘Beyond The Walls Of Sleep’.
If you have any interest in HPL the man, this is a must read.
Displaying 1 of 1 review