C'thulhu Wgah'nagl Fhtagn

     No, I didn't just slam my fists on the keyboard and hit enter for the title. That statement, or, rather, a phrase within a larger statement, is a pop-culture phemenomenon nearly as old as, well, pop culture (or, depending on how you look at it, as old as the universe itself). Conceived by a madman to populate the minds of fictional madmen who, in turn, were also conceived by the aforementioned non-fictional madman, the full phrase is "ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn." Roughly translated- and, boy, do I mean roughly as there is no indication of any grammar or sentence structure- this phrase means "In his house at R'lyeh, the dead Cthulhu waits dreaming." First documented, fictionally, in the Necronomicon by Abdul "The Mad Arab" Ahalzred and, in reality, by H.P. Lovecraft in pulp magazines, this is the motto of the Cthulhu Cult. 

      I'm sure, of course, that many of my presumed readers are familiar with the Cthulhu Cult and the Necronomicon, or at least Cthulhu! So, what previous exposure do you have, Dear Reader, to the wondrous beast from afar known as Cthulhu? 

      I see... Well, this won't do at all. What, then, do you know about the Necronomicon? 

     Surely, you must be joking. This... this schock is the only encounter you've had with H.P. Lovecraft's legendary legacy? Isn't there anything else you know about Lovecraftian horror motifs?! 

Honestly, I don't know why I even bother. 

     Well, it looks like I have a lot of work ahead of me. Read on, true believers or those wishing to convert to the one true faith in the Great Old Ones, and we shall explore the depths of the author's madness and the impact the Cthulhu Mythos has had on the world as we know it. 

     First, as always, let's start with some background. I through around the name H.P. Lovecraft a lot in that intro segment, but who is this Lovecraft guy, anyway? And is that a pseudonym? That can't possibly be his real name, can it? Well, since you asked... 

     H.P. Lovecraft is a science-fiction and horror author who was popular at the time when the lines between sci-fi and horror were blurred to the point of homogeny and jointly referred to as "Weird Fiction." Among the most popular installments in this now unfortunately dead genre were the John Carter of Mars series by Edgar Rice Burroughs, the collective works of Algernon Blackwood (another name that sounds like a kick-ass pseudonym) and, most prominently and permanently, the Cthulhu Mythos of Howard Phillips Lovecraft. 

     Like all authors as influential as Lovecraft, legacy can be measured in three distinct sections: Sociological implications at the time of publication (read: What was this guy saying about the time and place he was living and his interactions with this setting), influence in later popular culture (which is as straightforward as it sounds), and how later scholars use his work to peer into the mind of H.P. Lovecraft as he was in the 20's and 30's. 

     The Sociological Implications of Lovecraft's Work 

     Basically, racism. Lots and lots of racism. 

Just picture this guy sacrificing virgins to giant alien gods.

 Only he's wearing a leopard print loincloth. 

     Now, it's a little unfair to say that white supremacy is at the heart of Lovecraft's speculative epics... except that it's totally true. In most of his stories, the world is divided along lines of "inhuman beasts incapable of any deep thought and lacking a soul save for the portion that they sold to the devil in exchange for fried chicken and the blood of your virgins" and "white people." Of course, these stories were all published in a period of American history where there were laws against miscegenation. 

     What is miscegenation? you may be asking. It sounds like some sort of horrible genocidal act of terrorism! 

      Oooh. A good guess, but I'm sorry, you don't get the prize. Miscegenation actually means (and this is a quote from an actual law in America): "marriage of any person of African descent ... to any person not of African descent." Just so we're clear, these laws lasted until 1967, but that's neither here nor there as far as Lovecraft is concerned. Just know that the racism that he displays quite readily in his writing is not specific to either him or Weird Fiction authors in general; it was all encompassing. 

Pop-Culture Influences of the Cthulhu Mythos 

    Let's start with the most direct and immediate influences: adaptations. In all fairness, most adaptations of Lovecraft's works are underground to the point of utter obscurity. In essence, the cult followings they've gathered are analogous to the cults depicted in the mythos. Firstly, there's this little beauty: 

In one scene, that head gives head. 

    Contrary to the title, H.P. Lovecraft's Re-Animator, this movie has little to do with the original novela Herbert West: Reanimator save half of the title and the fact that they both technically feature a scientist and the process of bringing dead things back to life. 

     There are several other adaptations of his works, the only two that are famous enough to merit any results on a Google Image search are the following: 

This was released in 2006. Seriously. 

They wanted it to look like it was released the

same year as the book.

This is a still from the Stop-Motion  Music of Erich Zann. 

It is so obscure that there is virtually no poster image. 

    Beyond direct adaptations, Lovecraft's work assimilated into the popular consciousness so completely that, frequently, you don't even realize that you're watching or reading something that owes its very existence to giant giggly galactic gods. Here's a good example: In many Lovecraftian stories, the protagonist or antagonist ends up in a hospital for the mentally ill... That could be anything, right? Well, did I mention that all of these characters hail from a town called Arkham? 

Yeah, that's where that came from. 

     There are also references to Cthulhu and Lovecraft in nearly every aspect of pop culture. I don't want to bore you with a description of them all, so here's a brief list of images: 

There's a single on this called "Call of Ktulu" 

     In a sense, the Southpark version was the most accurate to the source material: Mysterious cults all over the world try to bring back the Elder Gods who sleep in a cyclopean prison beneath the ocean, but a commercial vessel inadvertently awakens the same Gods, thus fulfilling hundreds of years of human effort in a single blunder. The fact that it's B.P. drilling in the Gulf that awakens the Great Old Ones is beyond hilarious, even though the orignal had some Dutch fisherman accidentally (and quite literally) bumping into his bedroom door and bugging him with the noise. 

    The one lasting legacy that we needed, though, was never executed. A few years back, Universal Pictures had Guillermo "Dreams-in-weird-fiction" Del Toro lined up to direct a feature-length adaptation of At The Mountains of Madness starring Tom Cruise and the Great Old Ones (as rendered by James Cameron's badass computer animation software leftover from Avatar). Who better for the job than the director who brought us horrifying monsters like Pale Man, The Faun, Hellboy, Samael, and Abe Sapian, the producer who conceived creatures like The Terminator, Xenomorphs, and the Na'Vi (who also happens to be armed to the gils with the best CGI equipment money can fabricate), and the actor who, if nothing else, has proven more than capable of putting his time and money behind alien gods from the minds of mentally disturbed sci-fi authors. 

   

     Unfortunately, this opportunity was robbed rom humanity by the cruel mistress that is corporate filmmaking, thus cementing Del Toro's reputation as the least-luckiest man in Hollywood. 

H.P. Lovecraft as a Person 

     I don't claim any particular expertise in psychoanalysis, but I can read Wikipedia pretty darn well. Also, I've spent the last year aquatinting myself with the complete works of H.P. Lovecraft and can therefore verify and extrapolate upon everything I've read about the man and his writing. 

     First of all, Howard Phillips Lovecraft was not a mentally healthy dude. His family had a history of nervous breakdowns and multiple relatives of his ended up in psychiatric wards (which indicates an origin for the prevalence of such establishments in his books). Lovecraft himself had several retro-diagnosed nervous disorders, which, when combined with all of his loved ones succumbing to insanity, probably led to the dominant themes of sanity's fragility and the balancing act required to maintain a healthy mind throughout his published works. 

     As we've established, race was a powerful motive for Lovecraft's literature, and it deeply affected him as a writer and, more generally, as a person. Even in the 20's, which were, of course, only 50-60 years after slavery was banned in the United States, Lovecraft was known to his friends as especially racist in a racist culture. 

    Even more prevalent than race, though, were the matters of religion and faith. Lovecraft's famous Cthulhu Mythos is jam-packed with all sorts of deities and divine beings, each one less plausible than the next. Lovecraft, as we know from his correspondances, was deeply conflicted by his religion. Raised by an orthodox Christian family, he later developed a nagging doubt that developed into atheism, which he was keen to deny but ultimately had to accept: "In theory I am an agnostic, but pending the appearance of radical evidence I must be classed, practically and provisionally, as an atheist." Lovecraft's alien monsters consistently mock- or at least question the plausibility of- divine governing spirits such as the Abrahamic God. 

    Well, I feel as if I have left you all enough to chew on for a bit. As an addendum, I heartily reccomend any of Lovecraft's works, especially: The Lurking Fear, Herbert West: Reanimator, At The Mountains of Madness, The Call of Cthulhu, The Music of Erich Zann, and anything else you can get your hands on. 

     Stay tuned, True Believers and, until next time, always remember: ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn.