The New Annotated H. P. Lovecraft, edited and annoated by Leslie S. Klinger

The New Annotated H. P. Lovecraft
Editor, annotator: Leslie S. Klinger
Norton & Co
ISBN: 9780871404534
852 pages.
Collection of most of Lovecraft's "Arkham Cycle" stories, from Dagon to the Haunter of the Dark.
Read ALL FREAKING SUMMER

Confession.  I've never actually read any Lovecraft, other than At the Mountains of Madness and The Call of Cthulhu.  This is a fantastic way to have remedied that oversight.  The collection puts them all in roughly chronological order, and only includes the stories that have major elements of what Klinger calls the "Arkham Cycle" of nebulous mythology.  (Interesting discovery that the idea of a coherent and complete "Cthulhu Mythos" was more likely the hero-worshipping tendencies of the young author who oversaw the preservation of Lovecraft's legacy.)

Anyway - if you like Lovecraft, or enjoy a good annotation (don't be ashamed to admit it - I've got my eye on that Laura Ingalls Wilder annotated autobiography Pioneer Girl next...) then this is an excellent collection.  Just be warned.  It's a freaking TOME, and it's heavy and awkward as hell.  This is a desk read if I ever saw one.


Stories: great fun, occasionally a bit overwrought.  Not actually frightening, which was a bit unexpected.  He name-dropped his own mythos and his own stories (and to be fair, the mythos, characters, and stories of other authors) with truly astounding frequency.  Not much for subtlety.

Annotations: usually very interesting, occasionally a bit too densely architectural or local-history-centric.  Really drove home the amount of research (or, alternatively, the really terrifying amount of arcane science and historical knowledge) that went into writing; setting these stories in superbly realistic, everyday, mundane surroundings, up to and including citing recent scientific discoveries and having accurate moon phases referenced ALL THE TIME (I'm giving Tolkien a dirty look here).

Author: (ie Lovecraft) blazing racist asshat with really severe anxiety about progress and "otherness."  Lots of weird fascination with the size and scope of the universe, and of our solar system, and humanity's relative un-importance in relation to that.  Lots of body horror.  Overly concerned with inhuman things coming out of the ocean or from space, from what we now know as the Kuiper Belt.


So, that's Lovecraft for me done.
Now I really want to go out and hit up Klinger's Annotated Sherlock and Annotated Sandman. I'll leave you with a lovely link to a really nice interview by Klinger and Neil Gaiman about Lovecraft and the New Annotated collection.