Now that we've discussed Lovecraft's approach to myth-making-how he adapts and appropriates
his own creations the way cultures do with their mythological iconography-we should probably
talk about some of his actual mythos.
That's a... surprisingly tall order though, because Lovecraft's mythos kind of got away
from him after his death.
Some of his protege's-August Derleth and Donald Wandrei-pushed Lovecraft's relatively obscure
oeuvre into the limelight by extrapolating on his work at length, and now there are so
many additions by so many authors...
there's just no way to fit all that into one video.
And Lovecraft never had an opportunity to play with any of these new elements, so although
he probably would've appreciated them, they aren't quite a part of his personal mythology.
So here, we're going to focus on the madness of Lovecraft's own mind, keeping as close
to what he directly came up with as possible.
Let's talk about Five of the most important gods in Lovecraft's mythos, and what they
may have meant to him.
"Outside the ordered universe is that amorphous blight of nethermost confusion which blasphemes
and bubbles at the center of all infinity-the boundless daemon sultan Azathoth, whose name
no lips dare speak aloud, and who gnaws hungrily in inconceivable, unlighted chambers beyond
time and space amidst the muffled, maddening beating of vile drums and the thin monotonous
whine of accursed flutes."
This is about as close as Lovecraft's mythos ever come to establishing a "creator deity".
It was Azathoth who birthed the Darkness and the Nameless mists, from which nearly all
the other gods and deities sprang.
It was he who created the universe, and he who will one day be its destruction.
His "court"-if you can call it that-exists at the "center of ultimate chaos", separated
from reality by a strange and colorful barrier that prevents him from entering the known
cosmos by any means except through a very particular summoning incantation.
Only the most devoted nihilist would do so, as anyone with that kind of knowledge would
also know that Azathoth is neither malevolent nor benevolent-that he is entropy incarnate;
a mindless, indifferent force of pure chaos.
The "Blind Idiot God".
There is nothing to gain from calling on him, and quite literally everything to lose.
This is what Azathoth meant to Lovecraft.
He is the epitome of cosmic horror in the mythos, embodying the cold indifference of
the cosmos and the sheer insignificance of intelligent life.
"Yog-Sothoth knows the gate.
Yog-Sothoth is the gate.
Yog-Sothoth is the key and guardian of the gate.
Past, present, future, all are one in Yog-Sothoth."
Locked away at the border of our reality, there exists an intelligence.
Rather, the intelligence.
All of it.
Yog-sothoth holds the knowledge of all that is, all that was, and all that will be.
He guards the gates of cosmic ignorance, and for those who worship him, represents the
key.
For this reason, he's one of the most heavily-worshipped entities among the Outer Gods.
His name is frequently invoked during the rituals and incantations of those who seek
hidden knowledge.
And often, he answers.
Sadly for the ones who call on him, the knowledge he grants almost always leads to madness and
self-destruction.
Not because Yog-Sothoth is evil or malevolent-he doesn't force anyone turn the key or step
through the gate-he only lurks at the threshold, now and then opening the way to paths no mind
was ever meant to travel.
To us, the apparent symbolism of Yog-Sothoth is two-fold.
He is both the danger of knowledge and the inability of mankind to handle it.
His role in the mythos mirrors Lovecraft's own auto-didactic obsession with the sciences,
as well as his academic failings.
"Ever praises and abundance to the Black Goat of The Wood.
Ia!
Shub-Niggurath, The Black Goat of The Wood with a Thousand Young!"
Imagine a roiling, miasmic mass of twisting tendrils and drooling mouths, so tenuous in
composition that its limbs vanish as quickly as they materialize, its very form dividing
constantly into a surplus of smaller abominations that are either reabsorbed into its great
form, or that escape to some hideous life elsewhere.
Not the spitting image of a "fertility goddess", but this is as close as the mythos get.
Shub-Niggurath may well be the most widely-revered among the outer gods, influence reaching not
only to the Greeks, Cretans, Egyptians, and some druids, but to races so far-flung across
the cosmos as the Mi-go of Yuggoth, and the Dholes and Nug-Soth of Yaddith.
The great spread of her worshippers likely comes from the fact that, as the "spouse"
of Yog-Sothoth, she birthed a great number of the gods and deities in the mythos, including
Nug, Yeb, Cthulhu, and Tsathoggua.
Usually the creation of new life-especially intelligent life-is held as a sacred act.
Many humans derive joy and self-import from the notion that their kind was toiled over
by some kind of divine intelligence.
Shub-Niggurath, with her blind, indifferent, prolific procreation, undermines this idea.
How can any one species claim special import or artistry when the very gods of the cosmos
were born of incidental undulations?
Insignificant ripples across the belly of an inky horror?
Shub-Niggurath was Lovecraft's affirmation that life itself is nothing extraordinary.
"Into the lands of civilization came Nyarlathotep, swarthy, slender, and sinister.
Men advised one another to see Nyarlathotep, and shuddered.
And where Nyarlathotep went, rest vanished; for the small hours were rent with the screams
of a nightmare."
So far most of these grand universal powers have been indifferent and oblivious.
Azathoth doesn't try to be the ultimate chaos, Yog-Sothoth is only dangerous if you seek
him out, and Shub-Niggurath is like a protean wildfire of life.
Nyarlothotep is nothing like them.
He travels by his own laws, into and out of the known cosmos, acting as a messenger to
and from the Outer Gods.
His strange personality-or perhaps the simple fact that he has a personality-baffles them,
and they regard him with everything from contempt to esteem.
To lesser intelligences, he's a trickster, malevolent and cruel, bequeathing gifts of
wisdom and power to those who seek it, and whom he knows cannot handle it.
Where Nyarlathotep goes, madness follows.
He is "The Crawling Chaos", and as the only direct offspring of Azathoth, he revels in
it.
To Lovecraft Nyarlothotep must have been a perfect manifestation of his racism and xenophobia.
He is not only is the "outside" seeping, but a malevolent, undectable outside seeping in.
On a greater, less prejudiced scale, Nyarlothotep is the simple fear of one's comfort zone-their
reality-being breached.
"They worshipped, so they said, the Great Old Ones who lived ages before there were
any men, and who came to the young world out of the sky.
Those Old Ones were gone now, inside the earth and under the sea; but their dead bodies had
told their secrets in dreams to the first men, who formed a cult which had never died."
Cthulhu is eponymous with the mythos.
If you know nothing else of Lovecraft's body of works, you at least know the visage of
this subterranean horror.
Which is interesting, because he's relatively tame compared to the other entities on this
list.
Although he may be worshipped like a god by many, he isn't one.
Not really.
In simple terms, one might call him a priest.
He belongs to a prehistoric race who came to this world in its infancy, and who ruled
for untold millennia before the stars finally fell out of favor and they could not survive
on the surface.
In time, R'lyeh and rest of their great cities sunk into the sea and beneath the earth's
crust, and in them The Great Old Ones lie dormant under Cthulhu's spell, waiting in
a sort of waking stasis.
"Death", some call it, but not in the way that we know, for "that is not dead which
can eternal lie, and with strange eons even death may die".
Since the dawn of man, these beings have been guiding the species through dreams and through
psychic manipulation.
Someday, when mankind has abandoned its morals and descended into madness, they will wake
Cthulhu from his slumber, and he will raise the Old Ones from death, and "all the world
[will] flame with a holocaust of ecstasy and freedom."
This, you may have noticed, is a little closer to home than others on the list.
Cthulhu is not oblivious or indifferent to mankind.
He isn't even malevolent.
He is Lovecraft's simple promise of evanescence.
Nothing belongs to man.
Not this world, not the home they've built on it, not even the human mind.
It is the ultimate destiny of this species to unravel into primal chaos, as all things
must.
To the sounds of their laughter and exultant shouts, all man has ever built will one day
fade away.
(sigh) ...about as bleak as the Greco-Roman gods are beautiful, aren't they?
Nevertheless, they were all powerful props in the performance of Lovecraft's own psyche,
and I imagine they'll be just as evocative when we're using them to shine light on the
dark corners of my mind... this upcoming short story should be an interesting experience...
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Lately, the Tale Foundry team has been listening to the "Complete H.P.
Lovecraft Omnibus, Volumes 1 & 2", compiled and read by Finn J.D John.
If you haven't yet had a chance to catch up on your Lovecraft, this is a great opportunity
to do it while you drive or work or create whatever art it is that you create.
Anyway, that's all for this list!
We've still got a Lovecraftian short story on the way, and after that we'll be diving
into the world of Slavic Mythology, so stick around if you're as excited about that as
we are.
As always, thanks for watching, and keep making stuff up!
We'll see you... next time.
Bye!