Thursday 4 March 2010

Horror Tip: The Statement of Randolph Carter

Name: The Statement of Randolph Carter
Type: Short Story
Link: Complete Text
This is one of my favorite stories from HP Lovecraft and it should also serve as an excellent introduction. It is very short and a perfect example of fear of the unknown. This story really got to under my skin and has served as an important influence when coming up with good scares for our horror games.

It is also interesting to note that the story started out as dream that Lovecraft had and the story is extremely close to actual dream*. This makes the story a sort insight into the disturbing mind of the master himself!

Hope you enjoy it and for those of you that have not read anything by Lovecraft, I hope this makes you eager to read more!

*Read it here. Thanks to Sebastian for the tip!
kl.

18 comments:

  1. Mario4 March 2010 at 21:08

    I've read many of his stories and they were really good. Almost as good as E.A. Poes Stories. But my favourite of them all is Poes Story "The Masque of the Red Death".

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  2. Mario4 March 2010 at 21:14

    PS.: Lovecraft has written a letter to August Derleth about his dream. I couldn't find them yet, but i found a book about those letters. Maybe that helps!?

    http://www.hplovecraft.com/writings/sources/es.asp

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  3. Thomas4 March 2010 at 22:00

    Mario:
    Know it was a letter but did not know was to Derleth. I am pretty sure I found it reprinted online. But it was a long time ago, so it might not exist online any more.

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  4. Anonymous4 March 2010 at 22:40

    i herd about "the call of cthulhu", this story was pretty great, i also played the role playing game with one of my freinds, in fact, my freind was obsessed by "the call of cthulhu" , i personnaly d'ont, i hate tentacle!! :S

    my freind tell me there was a kind of book made with human skin and written with human blood, in arabic language, this is why i like Lovecraft: he always got the way too creep the hell out of evreybody!

    p.s. there's also a translated version of this flesh-book, it will be awesome if someone share the name?

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  5. Mario4 March 2010 at 23:53

    1. The book you mentioned is called the "Necronomicon". I don't want to disappoint you, haha... but the story behind that book is fiction. It's just again one of Lovecrafts great ideas. ;)

    2. A budget-game for the Xbox360 got my attention in the last weeks. "Deadly Premonition" (survival-horror), maybe you've already heard about it. Unfortunately it's not available in Europe... which really sucks... hopefully they'll release it here aswell. Anyway, the number at metacritics is really interesting: 48! because the critics are really different. 2/10 from IGN, but 7.5/10 from 1UP and 10/10 from Destructoid. But the more important thing: the gamers loved it.
    http://www.metacritic.com/games/platforms/xbox360/deadlypremonition

    3. I'm a(n) author/storywriter btw., but i'm still at the beginning, cause i'm still 20 years old. Anyway, games like Penumbra are a fantastic experience and inspiration for me and well, who knows, maybe we'll be partners one day. :)

    I wish the team good luck and the best for the future.

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  6. Anonymous5 March 2010 at 00:12

    That's it! Necronomicon! thanks for share! :) i was serching this!, i really want to read this book, my library never got it! XD

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  7. Anonymous5 March 2010 at 02:57

    As has been mentioned before the Necromonicon is a work of fiction, in fact a collection of his best fiction!

    But it is mentioned a lot in other fiction, for example the Evil Dead series reference it as the book that can animate the dead, at least I seem to remember that they used it, I could be wrong.

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  8. Sebastian5 March 2010 at 08:05

    I agree that this is one of my favorite stories from HP as well.
    Here I got a link to his letter that you are refering to.

    http://web.archive.org/web/20031011093233/www.gizmology.net/lovecraft/works/r_carter_letter.htm

    ReplyDelete
  9. Thomas5 March 2010 at 08:52

    Sebastian:
    Thanks a bunch!

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  10. Mario5 March 2010 at 10:27

    @Anonymous

    Yes, they used the Necronomicon in the Evil Dead series.

    @Sebastian

    Thank you for the letter.

    ReplyDelete
  11. Anonymous5 March 2010 at 12:19

    TO ANYONE WHO STILL WANTS TO READ THE ACTUAL NECRONOMICON:

    T H E R E
    I S
    N O
    S U C H
    T H I N G!

    The book of the dead, work of the Mad Arab Abdul Alhazred, is fictional!

    Sure, there are collections of Lovecraft's (or lovecraftian) stories named like that, but you are not going to find the real thing because it is not, well... real.

    At least I think it's not...
    I'm not sure anymore.
    We do "live on a placid island of ignorance in the midst of black seas of infinity"...
    Who knows?
    These dreams... Lately, they are... disturbing.
    There's a something in the air. A sound? Words?
    Could it be real after all?

    P.S. As for the book being made of human skin, I think that's just how it was depicted in Evil Dead.

    P.P.S. Here's an 'excerpt' from the 'real' Necronomicon:
    "That is not dead which can eternal lie,
    And with strange aeons even death may die."

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  12. Mario5 March 2010 at 12:39

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Necronomicon#Locations

    hmmm... that's interesting. According to the fictional history of the books, two of them were in Massachusetts. Well, i bet this was one of the reasons, why the island in "Alone in the Dark - The New Nightmare" is near the coast of Massachusetts. Looks like they've been inspired by Lovecraft aswell.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alone_in_the_Dark:_The_New_Nightmare

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  13. Anonymous5 March 2010 at 22:23

    It's true, the original Alone in the Dark was inspired by Lovecraft's stories.
    It even says so on the cover:
    http://cache.syberplanet.net/blog/images/40/29.jpg

    Speaking of HPL, there's a story called
    At the Mountains of Madness,
    whose title strangely reminds me of a name of a certain blog...
    If I only could remember what it was...

    ReplyDelete
  14. Pengasius9 March 2010 at 00:15

    Ânon:

    I played the RPG of "the call of chtullu" (don't care about the name), the role playing game can be found at www.tentacules.net (game in French only) for those who want to play a role play game...it's pretty awesome if you take the time to prepare the storyline (can be anything) and if you are whit MANY people,
    minimum: 4 (1:game master, 3 characters)
    revommanded player: 7 (1:game master and....well you know!)

    I got a question: is eternal darkness was inspired by a lovecraftian story? I'm a little bit lost....


    p.s. Me too I really hate tenta!!XD and I probably know why! BEWARE!! And stay away from those!!!

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  15. Dan11 March 2010 at 18:54

    Finaly gonna read some of HP Lovecraf stories. Thanks for link:D You guys are my heroes XD

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  16. Bob12 March 2010 at 14:15

    TO ANYONE WHO STILL WANTS TO READ THE ACTUAL NECRONOMICON:

    T H E R E
    I S
    N O
    S U C H
    T H I N G!

    There is no "real" Necronomicon but there are a few artists that have created one and it may be mentioned this weekend on "America's Most Wanted" because of some deranged sociopaths and their copy of Simon's Necronomicon: Check the Propnomicon for details.

    ReplyDelete
  17. tony25 March 2010 at 04:08

    Thank you for introducing me to this!

    ReplyDelete
  18. Anonymous2 October 2010 at 10:46

    Finally a new lovecraftian-style game!

    I loved Dark corners of the earth and I will buy this game, because it looks very creepy and is partly inspired by HPL.

    Maybe, if this sells good, you could buy the rights and make an entire game about a Lovecraft book.

    ReplyDelete

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