A relatively minor character, seldom-used by other Mythos writers (Brian Lumley’s “The Mirror of Nitocris” comes to mind), the idea of the ghoul-queen as a spiritual patron-someone to model yourself after-is both entirely appropriate and offers interesting possibilities. One thing that jumps out in this work is the clever expansion of the role of Nitocris in the Mythos from her original appearances in both Lovecraft’s “The Outsider” and “Under the Pyramids” (as “Nitokris”). The carnality by contemporary standards is subdued and artistic erotic fantasies are better hinted at for the imagination to paint than spelled out explicitly, and there is always beauty in it, nothing as gritty as “Cthulhu Sex (ahem!)-a poem-” (1998) by Katherine Morel. ”On A Dreamland’s Moon,” Diary of a Sorceress 121Īgain, very much in the tradition of Clark Ashton Smith, whose work so often dealt with love, sorcery, and death. Of His enchantment will coil round my soul! In language and imagery, however, the influence of Clark Ashton Smith is more evident, echoing some of his narrative poems such as “The Nightmare Tarn.” The purpose for which the narrator seeks out the soul and messenger of the Other Gods is revealed in such lines as: “On A Dreamland’s Moon” takes its most direct inspiration from Lovecraft’s The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath, but the object of this dreamer’s quest is not the hidden gods of dream, but Nyarlathotep, the crawling chaos. Howard’s “Arkham” and the verses of the mad poet Justin Geoffrey capture in “The Black Stone.” Fans got in on the act fairly early on, including “Shadow Over Innsmouth” (1942) by Virginia Anderson & “The Woods of Averoigne” (1934) by Grace Stillman, and the poetic tradition of the Mythos has continued down to the present day, through practitioners such as Ann K. Lovecraft and many of his contemporaries were poets, from the sonnet-cycle “The Fungi from Yuggoth” published in Weird Tales by the grace of editors Farnsworth Wright and Dorothy McIlwraith, to Robert E. Poetry is an inextricable part of the Mythos, there from the beginning. Opening stanza of “On A Dreamland’s Moon” by Ashley Dioses, Like Beacon lights toward where their kingdom lies. Of molten gold that twinkle and that gleam Of my subconscious with their purrs and eyes On paws of softest fur and blure the seams The cats of Ulthar steal across my dreams
0 kommentar(er)
