Weird Fiction discussion

For September's Lovecraft read in the ongoing dream cycle, skipping the excellent "Pickman's Model" and "The Dream Quest of Unknown Kadath", both of which we read last year, next up is The Silver Key. This is eleven text pages long in my book.

"The Silver Key" was written in 1926 and first published in the January 1929 issue of Weird Tales. It is a continuation of "The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath", and was followed by a sequel, "Through the Gates of the Silver Key", co-written with E. Hoffmann Price. We will be reading that story later this year. "The Silver Key" and its sequel both feature Lovecraft's recurring character Randolph Carter as the protagonist.

I don't know if we are in for a treat here or not. This story, it seems to me, is essential for Lovecraft's Dream Cycle and establishes many of the concepts for it. Nevertheless, Weird Tales editor Farnsworth Wright rejected "The Silver Key" when Lovecraft submitted it in mid-1927. The next year, however, Wright asked to see the story again and accepted it. He later told Lovecraft that the story was "violently disliked" by readers.

What do you think of it? Love it or violently dislike it?

The story starts with the following sentence: "When Randolph Carter was thirty he lost the key of the gate of dreams." Here is a link to one place you can read the rest of the story online if you wish to: https://www.hplovecraft.com/writings/...

Wow! I was not expecting to find my favorite Lovecraft story here, this late in the game: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

I liked this one too. It is a true dream story.

I was about to read this story tonight, but with you saying it's a continuation of "The Dream Quest of Unknown Kadath", I thought I'd just read that one first real quick, but it's novel length!

So, I will have to get back to this one later.

I don't think a reading of The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath is essential or even all that beneficial for "The Silver Key." The short story can (and does) stand well on its own.