The Curse of Yig

The Curse of Yig was originally published in the November 1929 issue of Weird Tales

"The Curse of Yig" is a short story by H. P. Lovecraft and Zealia Bishop in which Yig, "The Father of Serpents", is first introduced.

Background

Bishop supplied the story idea and some notes, paying Lovecraft to flesh it out in 1928. It could be said the tale was "ghost-written"; however, others class it as a "collaboration". Bishop then sold the story under her own name to Weird Tales magazine. It was published first in the November 1929 issue (volume 14, number 5) on pages 625-36.

It was the first of three tales Lovecraft wrote for Bishop, the others being "The Mound" and "Medusa's Coil".

Synopsis

Based in Oklahoma around 1889, a newly arrived couple learn about the local legends surrounding a "Snake God", Yig, who takes vengeance on anyone who kills a serpent by killing them or turning them into a half-snake monster. The husband has an intense snake phobia and his wife kills a nest of rattlesnakes at one of their campsites to prevent him finding them. He is horrified by the thought that Yig will take vengeance. They arrive at their plot of land and build their cabin. The husband is insistent on practicing various rituals from the native tribes to keep Yig away, grating heavily on his wife nerves.

In fear the woman kills her own husband in the dark, thinking he is Yig. She is taken to an asylum, and dies there... but not before giving birth to a half-snake creature.

Republication

The story has appeared in a number of horror anthologies, including:

A Treasury of American Horror Stories, ed. Frank D. McSherry, Jr., Charles G. Waugh & Martin H. Greenberg, Bonanza/Crown Books 1985, ISBN 0-517-48075-1
Tales of the Dark #3, ed. Lincoln Child, St. Martin's Press 1988 ISBN 0-312-90539-4
The Horror in the Museum and Other Revisions, H. P. Lovecraft, Arkham House 1989 ISBN 0-87054-040-8

External links

The Curse of Yig title listing at the Internet Speculative Fiction Database
Works related to The Curse of Yig at Wikisource
Online text

Works by H. P. Lovecraft
Cthulhu Mythos Dream Cycle
Novellas	The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath The Case of Charles Dexter Ward "The Whisperer in Darkness" At the Mountains of Madness The Shadow over Innsmouth The Shadow Out of Time
Short stories	"The Mystery of the Grave-Yard" "The Beast in the Cave" "The Alchemist" "The Tomb" "Dagon" "A Reminiscence of Dr. Samuel Johnson" "Polaris" "Beyond the Wall of Sleep" "Memory" "Old Bugs" "The Transition of Juan Romero" "The White Ship" "The Street" "The Doom that Came to Sarnath" "The Statement of Randolph Carter" "The Terrible Old Man" "The Tree" "The Cats of Ulthar" "The Temple" "Facts Concerning the Late Arthur Jermyn and His Family" "Celephaïs" "From Beyond" "Nyarlathotep" "The Picture in the House" "Ex Oblivione" "Sweet Ermengarde" "The Nameless City" "The Quest of Iranon" "The Moon-Bog" "The Outsider" "The Other Gods" "The Music of Erich Zann" "Herbert West–Reanimator" "Hypnos" "What the Moon Brings" "Azathoth" "The Hound" "The Lurking Fear" "The Rats in the Walls" "The Unnamable" "The Festival" "The Shunned House" "The Horror at Red Hook" "He" "In the Vault" "Cool Air" "The Call of Cthulhu" "Pickman's Model" "The Silver Key" "The Strange High House in the Mist" "The Colour Out of Space" "The Descendant" "History of the Necronomicon" "The Very Old Folk" "Ibid" "The Dunwich Horror" "The Dreams in the Witch House" "The Thing on the Doorstep" "The Evil Clergyman" "The Book" "The Haunter of the Dark"
Collaborations	"The Green Meadow" "The Loved Dead" "The Crawling Chaos" "The Horror at Martin's Beach" "Imprisoned with the Pharaohs" "The Curse of Yig" "The Mound" "Medusa's Coil" "The Horror in the Museum" "Through the Gates of the Silver Key" "Out of the Aeons" "The Tree on the Hill" "Till A’the Seas" "In the Walls of Eryx" "The Thing in the Moonlight"
Poetry	Fungi from Yuggoth
Essays	"Supernatural Horror in Literature" To Quebec and the Stars The Cancer of Superstition Autobiography: Some Notes on a Nonentity

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