Ross Lockhart’s Reviews > A Look Behind the Derleth Mythos: Origins of the Cthulhu Mythos > Status Update

"Lovecraft has become, paradoxically, a minor figure in the area of Cthulhu Mythos fiction." —Stefan Dziemianowicz, "Divers Hands," Crypt of Cthulhu No. 80 (Eastertide 1992)

Derleth was a pulp-hound who knew what sold, and his 'codification' of the mythos was appropriate to the times, a bridge to SF in the era of rocket ships, ray guns, and beautiful space heroines. —John D Haefele

"There is a transition whereby the feared entities become the fearing; the author shows us horrors and then pulls back the curtain a little farther, letting us glimpse the horrors of which even the horrors are afraid!" —Fritz Leiber, "A Literary Copernicus" (1949)

"Yes, indeed – voodoo, black magic, the history of the witch-cult, & everything of that sort is surely of the keenest interest to me. I continually borrow the standard classics on this subject…" —HPL to Wooley, 26 Jan 1935

"The idea of the black magic exist[s] in secret today, or that hellish antique rites still survive in obscurity, is one that I have used & shall use again. […] Do you know any good works on magic & dark mysteries which might furnish fitting ideas & formulae?" —HPL to CAS: Oct 9, 1925

"The years following Lovecraft's death […] inaugurated an era in which Cthulhu and his cosmic cohorts were scrutinized, analyzed, categorized, systematized, bent, folded, stapled—and mutilated." —James Turner, "Iä! Iä! Cthulhu fhtagn!", Tales of the Cthulhu Mythos

"I put in all that artificial mythology myself — since Smith & Howard & I like to have our synthetic demons popularized by wide use. Such use tends to give them a convincing air of actual mythological standing. I've also put Yog-Sothoth & Tsathoggua in yarns ghost written for Adolphe de Castro, & have encouraged other writers (Derleth, Long, Bloch, Wandrei, &c.) to use them." —HPL to Emil Petaja: 31 May 1935

"[Lovecraft] created a cult of readers who could fill in the gaps of suggestion because they had followed him through the earlier tales. Their minds were tuned to the same key; their imaginations had been trained to venture in the same directions. The details they filled in were at least close to those Lovecraft himself would have imagined...." --P. Schuyler Miller, "Let's All Jump on H.P.L.", 1945