Weird Tales - The Strange Life Of HP Lovecraft (Documentary)

Geoff Ward examines the strange life and terrifying world of
American horror author HP Lovecraft.

BBC Radio 3
Sunday December 3rd 2006
45m

Produced by Paul Quinn

Stephen King has hailed the writer HP Lovecraft as the most important
exponent of weird fiction since Edgar Allan Poe.  Although Lovecraft
never had a book published commercially in his lifetime, his stories
did feature in lurid magazines devoted to fantastic fiction that were
printed in the United States in the 1020s and 30s, such as 'Weird Tales'
of this biography's title.  Geoff Ward, professor of literature at
Dundee University and presenter of this programme, argues a strong case
for Lovecraft as a writer who brought something very different to the
horror genre, both in his stylised writing and his desire to leave the
reader in a dark place from scary start to frightening finish.  Other
contemporary fantasy writers, like Neil Garmain, back Ward up, with
exquisite examples of how deliberately peculiar the author's choice of
adjectives was - 'gibbous' being a particular favourite for a nearly
full moon.  But the most fascinating insights into his work come from
the realisation that it was the horrors in Lovecraft's home life and a
hellish upbringing that helped shape his fiction.

3 MP3 files, 45m in total