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.

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