Quote:
Originally Posted by teh603
So I got to reading some Lovecraft stuff I got off a website of free ebooks- his stuff is in the public domain now so its legal- and I found myself marvelling at his simplistic writing style. Sure he has an amazing imagination and pretty good descriptions, but he commits two grievous sins: he tells rather than shows, and he summarizes everything!
Anyone know how the heck he got away with it? A modern audience would rip his head off and jam his manuscripts down his bleeding neck stump if he was to bring that to a workshop.
And yes, I am cross-posting this from the NaNoWriMo board. I figure I might get a wider variety of answers since this board is as much readers as writers.
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First, I am not a horror fan, and I've only read some of Lovecraft. But you're missing the time and the place, teh603.
There
were no workshops in that day. At the height of Lovercraft's popularity,
Doc Savage Magazine was selling in excess of 200,000 copies
a month! And I guarantee that Doc is not fine writing...
There was no television during the time, only radio, toward the last few years of H.P.'s life. Shucks, comic books didn't exist!
The pulps of the 20's, 30's, and 40's were
the place for artistic ferment. They paid peanuts, but if you wanted to write something totally different, the only outlet was the pulps. And you got
read, by people! Maybe you had to write a rattling good story, but they were outlets for unheard of stories, totally different takes on reality.
Modern horror, much of modern fantasy, modern science fiction, all came from the pulps. not to mention the detective story... All from cheap pulps, having to fill it's pages with something, as long as it had good story telling, style be damned.
I don't sneer at Lovecraft, or Howard, or E.E. Smith P.H.D. Their writing style may be obsolete, but the story telling keeps them "coming back for more".
And still today, among people who want a rattling good read, and don't give a hoot about literary standards. I read E.E. Smith
and Cabell....