Where does madness leave off and reality begin? ― H.P. Needless to say, the narrator discovers all too soon that the old man’s ramblings may have some sort of truth to them. Plied with a drink, the old and probably insane man starts telling a story of cults, sacrifices, tremendous bounties, and a race of fish-like humanoids that are slowly turning the town’s people into their own kind. In it, we follow a young narrator who is keen on piercing the town’s secrets after he comes across a curious piece of jewelry in a museum that he was told came from there.Īll signs and warnings can’t serve to dissuade the young man from visiting the nearly-abandoned town, and once there he meets a local drunk amidst the unfriendly locals. The Shadow over Innsmouth is arguably one of Lovecraft‘s most-adapted tales, having made it’s way into movies and even video games. On the contrary, the strangers may already be here, deep down in the abyss that is the sea. Merely because something is alien to our world doesn’t mean it needs to come out there from the stars. This approach works fantastically well at creating a true feeling of hopelessness and despair, and while it may not scare you in the traditional sense of the word, it will definitely sow deep feelings of unease within you. The antagonist in this story is quite different from what we’re used to in horror, having no real physical presence or identifying characteristics other than the colour. He does a phenomenal job at developing the plot, characters and the colour itself gradually so that we slowly sink into the horror that surrounds the little farmstead, just like the owner did. At the length of a regular novella, things move along fairly quickly in this story, but not so much that we don’t get treated to Lovecraft‘s powerful trademark descriptions. It is known that this particular short story was amongst the works Lovecraft was most proud of, and I can certainly see why. It has no name nor face and feels more like a force of nature than anything else. Things only spiralled from there on out as the colour spread madness into the air.Īs far as intentions go, what Lovecraft sought to do here was to create a being that was truly alien in every sense of the word, something with intentions we cannot decipher despite seeings its actions. The stone was eventually destroyed by a bolt of lightning, and forgotten about until next season when the crops were unnaturally large and bountiful, and yet inedible. The tale reeks of ridiculousness as it begins with a meteorite crashing down into the land, with a strange colour seeping out of it and into the air. Unable to find any actual information on why the place is feared so much, our unnamed protagonist seeks out an alleged crazy man, Ammi Pierce, who begins telling a most incredible story about the farmer who used to own the now-cursed property. A simple surveyor from Boston is drawn by a mystery, that of a place shunned by the locals of Arkham, only referred to as the “blasted heath”.
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