The Shadow Over Innsmouth

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The Shadow Over Innsmouth
Author H. P. Lovecraft
Country Flag of United States USA
Language English
Genre(s) Horror short story
Released in The Shadow Over Innsmouth
Media Type Book
Released April, 1936

"The Shadow Over Innsmouth" is a novella by H.P. Lovecraft. Written November-December 1931, the story was first published in April 1936 as a small book[1] — this was the only piece of Lovecraft's fiction to appear outside of a periodical during Lovecraft's lifetime.[2]

The story tells of a strange hybrid race, half-human and half-fish, that dwells in the seaside village of Innsmouth (formerly a large town, but lately fallen into disrepair). The townspeople worship Dagon, a Philistine deity incorporated into the Cthulhu Mythos.

Contents

[edit] Inspiration

Robert M. Price cites two works as literary sources for "The Shadow Over Innsmouth": Robert W. Chambers' "The Harbor-Master" and Irvin S. Cobb's "Fishhead". Chambers' story concerns the discovery of "the remnants of the last race of amphibious human beings", living in a five-mile deep chasm just off the Atlantic coast. The creature of the title is described as "a man with round, fixed, fishy eyes, and soft, slaty skin. But the horror of the thing were the two gills that swelled and relaxed spasmodically."[3]

Lovecraft was evidently impressed by this tale, writing in a letter to Frank Belknap Long: "God! The Harbour-Master!!!"[4]

"Fishhead" is the story of a "human monstrosity" with an uncanny resemblance to a fish:

His skull sloped back so abruptly that he could hardly be said to have a forehead at all; his chin slanted off right into nothing. His eyes were small and round with shallow, glazed, pink-yellow pupils, and they were set wide apart on his head, and they were unwinking and staring, like a fish's eyes.[5]

Lovecraft, in "Supernatural Horror in Literature", called Cobb's story "banefully effective in its portrayal of unnatural affinities between a hybrid idiot and the strange fish of an isolated lake".[6]

Price notes that Fishhead, as the "son of a Negro father and a half-breed Indian mother", "embodies unambiguously the basic premise of 'The Shadow Over Innsmouth'.... This, of course, is really what Lovecraft found revolting in the idea of interracial marriage...the subtextual hook of different ethnic races mating and 'polluting' the gene pool."[7]

Price points out the resemblance in names between the Deep One city of Y'ha-nthlei and Yoharneth-Lahai, a fictional deity in Lord Dunsany's The Gods of Pegana who "sendeth little dreams out of Pegana to please the people of Earth"--a precursor to Lovecraft's fictional deity Cthulhu, who sends less pleasant dreams from R'lyeh.[8]

[edit] Reaction

Lovecraft was quite critical of "The Shadow Over Innsmouth", writing to August Derleth that the story "has all the defects I deplore--especially in point of style, where hackneyed phrases & rhythms have crept in despite all precautions.... No--I don't intend to offer 'The Shadow over Innsmouth' for publication, for it would stand no chance of acceptance."[9]

Indeed, the story was rejected by Weird Tales editor Farnsworth Wright when Derleth surreptitiously submitted it for publication in 1933. "I have read Lovecraft's story...and must confess that it fascinates me," he wrote to Derleth. "But I don't know just what I can do with it. It is hard to break a story of this kind into two parts, and it is too long to run complete in one part."[10]

It was eventually published as a slim book published by William L. Crawford's Visionary Press with a run of 200 copies--the only book of Lovecraft's fiction distributed during his lifetime.[11] After Lovecraft's death (and Wright's), it appeared in an unauthorized abridged version in the January 1942 issue of Weird Tales.[12]

August Derleth called "The Shadow Over Innsmouth" "a dark, brooding story, typical of Lovecraft at his best."[13]

[edit] Synopsis

Spoiler warning: Plot and/or ending details follow.

The story is divided into five chapters. In the first chapter, the narrator begins by telling the reader that a secret investigation has recently been undertaken by the government at the ruined town of Innsmouth, Massachusetts, and that the story told to them by the narrator himself is the reason for this investigation. He proceeds to describe in detail the events surrounding his initial interest in the town (archaeological). While he waits for the bus that will take him to Innsmouth, he busies himself in the neighboring town of Newburyport by gathering information from local townsfolk; all of it with superstitious overtones.

The second chapter details his ride into Innsmouth, described in great detail as a crumbling, mostly deserted town full of dilapidated structures and people who look just a bit odd and who tend to walk with a distinct shambling gait. All of this is offputting to the narrator, who describes the people as having the "Innsmouth look", "queer narrow heads with flat noses and bulgy, stary eyes". Only one person in town appears normal, a young clerk at the local First National grocery store who comes from neighbouring Arkham. The narrator gathers much information from the clerk, including a map of the town and the name of a local who might be a good source of information; a man named Zadok Allen, known to open up about the town when plied with drink.

The majority of the third chapter is comprised of the conversation between Zadok and the narrator. Zadok, who is very old, has seen much in the town and goes on at length, telling a tale of fish-frog men known as Deep Ones who live beneath the sea. It seems they bring prosperity in the form of fish as well as fantastically wrought gold jewelry to those who offer them human sacrifice. These fish-frog men are amphibious and willing to come to land to mate with humans, creating deformed offspring which can live forever. These fish-frog men were first discovered in the Indies by a native island tribe, which was itself found by a resident of Innsmouth named Obed Marsh. When hard times befell Innsmouth, Obed and some followers did what they could to call up the fish-frog men in their New England town. When the story is over, the narrator is unnerved but thinks it a product of a fertile imagination.

Chapter four tells of the night that the narrator was forced to spend in town, after being told that the bus in which he came to town is experiencing engine trouble. The narrator has no choice but to spend the night in a musty hotel. While attempting to sleep, he hears noises at his door like someone trying to enter. Wasting no time, he attempts to escape out a window and through the streets, at times imitating the peculiar walk of the Innsmouth locals. Eventually he makes his way to some train tracks where he hears a great many creatures passing in the road before him. He hides and resolves to close his eyes, having at this point come to accept the idea that Zadok's story is true. He cannot keep them closed however, and upon seeing the fish-frog creatures in full light for the first time, faints in his hiding spot.

In the final chapter, we hear of how the narrator wakes up unharmed and quickly walks to the next town. Over the years that pass, he begins doing research into his family tree, discovering some disturbing information along the way. Eventually it becomes clear that he is a descendant of Obed Marsh himself and nightmares accompany the narrator's realization that he is changing into one of the creatures. As the story ends, the narrator tells us that his horror at the idea is changing into acceptance, and that he will be quite happy living forever in the city Y'ha-nthlei, deep beneath the sea. He also has a cousin who is even further transformed than he is being held in a mental hospital whom he plans to break free and take with him.

[edit] Characters

[edit] Robert Olmstead

The narrator of the story, he discovers Innsmouth on a tour of New England seeking genealogical information, and finds more than he bargains for. The character, unnamed in "A Shadow Over Innsmouth", is called "Robert Olmstead" in Lovecraft's notes for the story, published in Arkham House's Something About Cats and Other Pieces (1949).[14]

An H. P. Lovecraft Encyclopedia points out that Olmstead's travel habits parallel Lovecraft's own--Lovecraft too would "seek the cheapest route", and Olmstead's dinner of "vegetable soup with crackers" is typical of Lovecraft's low-budget diet.[15]

[edit] Obed Marsh

A sea captain and the founder of the Esoteric Order of Dagon. He was referred to by Zadok Allen as being the man who first summoned the Deep Ones to Innsmouth. In 1846, he was jailed after the towns bordering Innsmouth became suspicious of his crew. He died in 1878.

According to Lovecraft's story notes, Marsh's daughter Alice is Robert Olmstead's great-grandmother.[16]

[edit] Barnabas Marsh

Barnabas Marsh, known as Old Man Marsh, is the grandson of Obed Marsh and the owner of the Marsh refinery at the time of "The Shadow over Innsmouth". His father, Onesiphorus Marsh, was Obed's son by his first, fully human wife, while his mother, never seen in public, was apparently a deep one. Zadok Allen says of him: "Right naow Barnabas is abaout changed. Can't shet his eyes no more, an' is all aout o' shape. They say he still wears clothes, but he'll take to the water soon."

[edit] Zadok Allen

One of the few completely human residents of Innsmouth. An alcoholic, his drunken ramblings allow Lovecraft to convey much of the town's secret backstory to the story's protagonist. Born in 1831, Allen disappears and dies in 1927 after being taken and sacrificed by the Esoteric Order of Dagon.

An H. P. Lovecraft Encyclopedia notes that Allen resembles--and shares his years of birth and death with--Jonathan E. Hoag, an amateur poet of Lovecraft's acquaintance. A possible literary inspiration is the character of Dr. Humphrey Lathrop in Herbert Gorman's The Place Called Dagon (1927), who, like Allen, is a drinker who knows the secret history of his town.[17]

[edit] Cthulhu Mythos

  • As related in "The Thing on the Doorstep" (1937), Asenath Waite, the possessed victim of her father Ephraim Waite, is by implication one of the human/deep one hybrids, and was a resident of Innsmouth before attending Miskatonic University. The servants she brings into her marriage to Edward Derby are likewise Innsmouth natives. This occurs after "The Shadow Over Innsmouth" and Asenath's father and she escaped the government raid mentioned in the original story.
  • The Waites, Gilmans, Eliots and Marshes are the "gently bred" families of Innsmouth. Despite his name, the protagonist of "The Dreams in the Witch House", Walter Gilman, is not established as having any links to Innsmouth or the deep ones.
  • August Derleth also used the deep ones in the short story "Innsmouth Clay", which he completed from Lovecraft's notes. "The Shuttered Room" is another short story started by Lovecraft and finished by Derleth that involves the deep ones. It mentions a connection between the Marsh family of Innsmouth and the Whateley family of Dunwich from "The Dunwich Horror".

[edit] Other Appearances

  • "The Shadow Over Innsmouth" is the principal storyline in the 2001 film Dagon, which also credits the Lovecraft short story of the same name.
  • The town of Innsmouth is the backdrop for the 2005 Xbox PC game Call of Cthulhu: Dark Corners of the Earth, the opening plot of which follows the second, third and fourth chapters of "The Shadow Over Innsmouth" with a great degree of accuracy (though the game takes place several years prior to the book and with a different protagonist, and could be considered a prequel).
  • In The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, the quest "The Shadow over Hackdirt" entails rescuing a captive from the cultist village of Hackdirt, in tribute to "The Shadow Over Innsmouth". The MMORPG RuneScape also has a quest inspired by this story, featuring a character named Lovecraft.

[edit] References

Wikisource has original text related to this article:

[edit] Bibliography

  • August, Derleth (Lammas 1996). "H. P. Lovecraft—Outsider". Crypt of Cthulhu #93: A Pulp Thriller and Theological Journal Vol. 15 (No. 3).  Robert M. Price (ed.), West Warwick, RI: Necronomicon Press. Original publication: (June 1937) "H. P. Lovecraft—Outsider". River Vol. 1 (No. 3). 
  • Lovecraft, Howard P. [1936] (1984). "The Shadow Over Innsmouth", in S. T. Joshi (ed.): The Dunwich Horror and Others, 9th corrected printing, Sauk City, WI: Arkham House. ISBN 0-87054-037-8.  Definitive version.

[edit] Notes

  1. ^ A picture of this book can be found at this website.
  2. ^ August Derleth, "H. P. Lovecraft—Outsider", p. 18, Crypt of Cthulhu #93.
  3. ^ Robert W. Chambers, "The Harbor-Master", The Innsmouth Cycle, p. 22.
  4. ^ H. P. Lovecraft, letter to Frank Belknap Long, October 17, 1930; cited in Robert M. Price, The Innsmouth Cycle, p. 3.
  5. ^ Irvin S. Cobb, "Fishhead", The Innsmouth Cycle, p. 27.
  6. ^ H. P. Lovecraft, "Supernatural Horror in Literature", Dagon and Other Macabre Tales, p. 411.
  7. ^ Robert M. Price, The Innsmouth Cycle, p. 24. The creature in "The Harbor-Master" as well is mistaken for a "demented darky". Chambers, "The Harbor-Master", p. 20.
  8. ^ Lord Dunsany, "Of Yoharneth-Lahai", The Innsmouth Cycle, p. 2.
  9. ^ H. P. Lovecraft, letter to August Derleth, December 10, 1931; cited in Joshi and Schultz, p. 238.
  10. ^ Farnsworth Wright, letter to August Derleth, January 17, 1933; cited in Joshi and Schultz, pp. 238-239.
  11. ^ Lin Carter, Lovecraft: A Look Behind the Cthulhu Mythos, p. 83.
  12. ^ Price, p. 34.
  13. ^ Carter, p. 83.
  14. ^ S. T. Joshi and David E. Schultz, "Olmstead, Robert", An H. P. Lovecraft Encyclopedia, p. 194.
  15. ^ S. T. Joshi and David E. Schultz, "The Shadow Over Innsmouth", An H. P. Lovecraft Encyclopedia, pp. 239-240.
  16. ^ Joshi and Schultz, "Olmstead, Robert", p. 194.
  17. ^ S. T. Joshi and David E. Schultz, "Allen, Zadok", An H. P. Lovecraft Encyclopedia, pp. 3, 239.

[edit] External links

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