Fungi From Yuggoth, a poem by HP LovecraftPublished 1943
Illustration by Nottsuo
Category: Dream Cycle/Cthulhu Mythos
I find that I am a little behind with this blog so, to catch up I decided to read a poem, his most famous and one of his longest, yet still short enough to get done before the day is out.
Wow - what a trippy bit of poetry. It's written in 36 small, two stanza poems, each with it's own title (my favorites are "Night Gaunts" and "The Elder Pharos".) Also the book I read it from has some insane illustrations in it (see the edition note below and follow the link for some more work by the illustrator!)
That said the poem tells the story of the classic Lovecraftian protagonist - the humble, weak man who desires to know That Which Man Was Not Meant To Know.
I entered, charmed, and from a cobwebbed heap
Took up the nearest tome and thumbed it through,
Trembling at curious words that seemed to keep
Some secret, monstrous if only one knew.
He steals a book from the shop and takes it home (and yes, of course he's followed by an unseen entity!) and learns how to leave our world and travel to lands beyond. OK, fun fact - Yuggoth is Pluto! Yeah, who knew.
This is trippy and fun and the illos in my book - oh man, I wish I could just upload them all. So freaky. All right, I'll upload some!
The Elder Pharos or WTFuh?!?!?!!
The Howler or This unit has a great half bath downstairs...
Zaman's Hill or "The eyes of the hill was meant to be figurative..."
~~
In my travels to any and all used bookstores around the country I always look for the Lovecraftiana and one of my discoveries was this little gem, a crumbling old paperback with that bizarrely and bad yet weird and fun illo on the cover, by Frank Utpatel.
I remember squatting in the racks of an old specialty bookstore as a kid and hand copying this LONG poem out of a very expensive vanity edition of TFfY. I dreamed of NightGaunts for years afterward.
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