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HP Lovecraft & the French Connection University of South Carolina Scholar Commons Theses and Dissertations 2015 H.P. Lovecraft & Ther F ench Connection: Translation, Pulps and Literary History Todd David Spaulding University of South Carolina - Columbia Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarcommons.sc.edu/etd Part of the Comparative Literature Commons Recommended Citation Spaulding, T. D.(2015). H.P. Lovecraft & eTh French Connection: Translation, Pulps and Literary History. (Doctoral dissertation). Retrieved from https://scholarcommons.sc.edu/etd/3152 This Open Access Dissertation is brought to you by Scholar Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in Theses and Dissertations by an authorized administrator of Scholar Commons. For more information, please contact [email protected]. H. P. Lovecraft & The French Connection: Translation, Pulps and Literary History by Todd David Spaulding Bachelor of Arts State University of New York at Geneseo, 2006 Master of Arts University of South Carolina, 2010 Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements For the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Comparative Literature College of Arts and Sciences University of South Carolina 2015 Accepted by: Jeanne Garane, Major Professor Alexander Beecroft, Committee Member Michael Hill, Committee Member Meili Steele, Committee Member S. T. Joshi, Committee Member Lacy Ford, Vice Provost and Dean of Graduate Studies ©Copyright by Todd David Spaulding, 2015. All Rights Reserved. ii Dedication To my best friend, my wife and everything in between, Nathacha. iii Acknowledgements I would like to thank Dr. Jeanne Garane whose guidance, suggestions and editing has helped me beyond belief. Thank you for your patience and willingness to help me pursue my interests. I would like to personally thank the following French experts on H. P. Lovecraft, Cédric Monget, Phillipe Gindre, Adam Joffrain, Stéphane Delure, Joseph Altairac, Bertrand Nébel Bonnet, L.V. Cervera Merino, Werna Burton, Arnaud Moussart and the talented artist, Jeff Grimal. Your comments and insight on Lovecraft’s reception in France have been the greatest source of information that I could have asked for. I would like to especially thank Cédric, Adam and Stéphane who have responded to countless questions over emails and Facebook posts to the group H. P. Lovecraft: Francophone. Last, but certainly not least of all I would like to thank Mr. S. T. Joshi for his participation as a committee member for my dissertation. I would also humbly thank him for his herculean feat of editing, publishing and writing on all things Lovecraft. Without Mr. Joshi, Lovecraft studies would be stuck somewhere in the shadow of August Derleth. iv Abstract Weird fiction writer H. P. Lovecraft captured the zeitgeist of the modernist movement, despite his association with popular fiction. Lovecraft’s post-mortem climb from the margins of the American literary system to its center is indicative of his influence on “mass” and “elite” cultures alike in the second half of the twentieth century and onward. Lovecraft’s influence is not restricted to American culture, but it spread like an airborne virus to other cultures, and to France in particular. His imaginative weird fiction, a unique combination of horror and science fiction, has been translated into more than 25 languages from Bengali to Serbo-Croatian. The French were the first to translate Lovecraft and, according to S. T. Joshi, they hold provocative and insightful ideas and interpretations about him. Their interest in Lovecraft and their philosophical tradition have lead them to be the assumed champions of Lovecraft. Due to their unique differences, how does a comparison of Lovecraft’s image in French culture inform the modern American Lovecraft scholar and ehtusiast? This question is important because the modern American Lovecraft scholarship is primarily monolingual, and therefore cannot fully benefit from the excellent scholarship that is produced in the French language. The goal of this dissertation is to trace Lovecraft’s literary and cultural history in France, from its beginning to present-day. This lineage will be traced through an application of translation polysystems literary theory as described by Itamar Evan-Zohar v and Gideon Toury. This system is effective in offering a conceptual model for the structures of literary systems on the micro (national) and the macro (world) level. Regarding the world literary system, the French have gained a particularly dominant position. Therefore, if the French have been leaders of Lovecraftian scholarship, how much of their interpretation of Lovecraft is visible in the American interpretation of Lovecraft? Ultimately, despite the literary influence of France on world cultural systems, polysystems literary theories explain the particular role that translation plays in the balance of literary domination. vi Table of Contents Dedication .......................................................................................................................... iii Acknowledgments .............................................................................................................. iv Abstract ................................................................................................................................v Introduction ..........................................................................................................................1 Chapter One: “Lovecraft’s Literary History” ....................................................................26 Chapter Two: “Surrealism, Fantastic Realism and Image Manipulation” .........................81 Chapter Three: “Houellebecq and Lovecraft: A Bolder Lovecraft” ................................157 Conclusion .......................................................................................................................189 Works Cited .....................................................................................................................200 End Notes .........................................................................................................................207 vii Introduction Howard Phillips Lovecraft (1890-1937) is most well known for his contribution to pulp-fiction magazines with his weird fiction tales such as “The Call of Cthulhu,” “The Whisperer Out of Darkness,” and “The Colour Out of Space,” among many others. Similar to many authors in their lifetime, he did not receive the recognition that he deserved. This is perhaps due more to the medium in which Lovecraft’s stories were published than to the content, though that cannot be overlooked as well. S. T. Joshi observes that despite the fact that the pulp magazine Weird Tales “provided the first steady professional market for Lovecraft’s tales . ., Lovecraft and other practitioners of weird fiction began a process of self-marginalization that was not overcome for decades” (Forward xi). Retrospectively Lovecraft’s notoriety and importance in shaping a whole genre of weird fiction has been recognized by his elevated status, according to Joshi, as “a cultural icon . whose imagination populated the world with a legion of cosmic horrors that bleakly underscored the significance of humanity and all its works in a blind, godless universe” (“Introduction” ix). Lovecraft’s childhood and adolescence can be characterized as introverted due to the death of his father, Winfield Scott Lovecraft (1898) and his grandfather Whipple Phillips (1904). Lovecraft’s mother, Sarah Susan Phillips Lovecraft’s treatment of her son was a mixture of “overprotectiveness and a curious emotional distance” (ix). Due to health concerns, Lovecraft dropped out of high school in 1908 without a diploma, which 1 meant that he could not attend Brown University, as he desired. Lovecraft’s adolescence is what perhaps earned him the title as “the recluse from Providence” because he mostly confined himself to his house, where his only companions were his books. In 1913, Lovecraft wrote a letter criticizing Fred Jackson, whose sentimental romances were often featured in Argosy. This launched a debate, and it was in this manner that Edward F. Daas, an official of the United Amateur Press Association invited Lovecraft to join the association. Lovecraft also later joined the National Amateur Press Association. Arguably, it was the supportive atmosphere of the amateur press associations that allowed Lovecraft to become confident in his capacities as a writer. He even published thirteen issues of his own journal, Conservative (1915-1923) which “reflect[ed] both his political and literary conservatism, as befitted one who felt he belonged in the eighteenth century” (x). Lovecraft submitted three short stories through the encouragement of his friends to the magazine The Vagrant in 1919. Of the three, “Dagon” was published. HPL’s mother died in 1921 and it was his two aunts who took care of him until he married Sonia H. Greene in 1924. The newlyweds moved to Brooklyn, NY where Sonia was an executive in a department store. Lovecraft was unable to find employment in New York City despite his constant search. Their marriage only lasted two years. Sonia left NYC to find a job in Cleveland, and Lovecraft, who developed a distaste for New York City, returned to Providence in 1926. The two were divorced shortly after his return to Providence. The time in New York City was relatively fallow in his production, but rich in offering him material for the stories he would write upon his return to Providence. 2 In Providence, Lovecraft corresponded
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