The one hundred and thirtieth natal anniversary of H.P. Lovecraft is upon us. HPL was nothing if not a writer of letters. It was one of his defining traits. Lovecraft’s correspondence with Clark Ashton Smith is among his great legacies. Fortunately, Hippocampus Press has finally published Dawnward Spire, Lonely Hill: The Letters of H.P. Lovecraft and Clark Ashton Smith in fairly affordable trade paperback editions.

A Tentaclii blog post by David Haden apprised me of the new trade editions. Knowing that Klarkash-Tonic and Lovecraftian anniversaries were swiftly approaching, I ordered the two-volume set. The new editions were something I’d been waiting for. I could’ve afforded the hardcover edition from 2017, but I knew it would be too collectible to actually read thoroughly again and again, so I waited for the trade paperbacks. I prefer trades for research purposes.

To get the nuts n’ bolts out of the way… As far as paper quality, binding, typos, etc.—these are quality books, which is something Hippocampus is generally known for. The hardcover edition was one big seven hundred-plus page volume. Hippocampus has split the new trade edition in two. The letters comprise roughly six hundred pages with another hundred pages devoted to an intro, a glossary, an index and other such necessities. The new softcover edition does have some perks, though. This, according to co-editor, Sunand Tryambak Joshi:

“[T]he hardcover edition is just about exhausted [i.e. sold out]. This paperback edition includes one or two scraps of correspondence (a postcard or two) that came to light after the hardcover edition appeared.”

The two editors—David E. Schultz and Joshi—explain in their introduction just how hard it was to assemble the letters from both authors, which missives have been scattered to the four winds over the last eighty years or so. They explain that literary detective work points to there originally being around six hundred letters and postcards total, but we now lack well over one hundred and fifty from that estimate. Extracts from eight of the HPL letters exist solely because of the diligence and scholarship of August Derleth.

Photo of CAS colorized by Chris L. Adams.

So, what are the actual letters like?

The first thing to keep in mind is that this cache represents one of the great epistolary friendships in the history of letters. The two never met in person, but the Mutual Admiration Society CAS and HPL formed between them was forged of eldritch steel. Both considered the other the Greatest Living Weird Fiction Author. It is obvious in every letter they wrote and confirmed by comments they sent to other correspondents.

The topics range from classic horror writers to history to geology to the weather. Each commiserates with the other when it comes to travails in everyday life as well as in placing stories within the narrow pulp weird fiction market.

Two things—both of which I was aware of vaguely—leapt out at me whilst reading these collected letters. One thing was that HPL was not, at all, a “recluse” in how we understand the term. He might not have visited all his close neighbors and shared a beer, but he traveled. A lot. In the roughly fifteen years one sees chronicled in the correspondence, Lovecraft traveled to New York from his home of Providence numerous times—before and after the period he actually lived there. He also visited northern New England and even Quebec, which city he loved above all other North American cities. HPL’s sojourns in the South—he had a medical condition which rendered him very suscepible to cold weather—are lovingly described. He also visited Florida more than once and made it as far south as Key West.

Clark Ashton Smith was a stud when it came to placing stories in pulps. In case you’ve never done so, compare the sales rate of CAS to that of Robert E. Howard. In his prime, Smith was selling at least double what REH was when it came to the SFF pulps. Even figuring in the other/non-SFF pulps which Howard sold to, he didn’t sell at the same rate. If Klarkash-Ton wrote a story, he was very likely to sell it. REH had to stash a lot of his typescripts in the Trunk. Lovecraft openly and continuously marveled at Clark’s ability to sell stories while not sacrificing artistic integrity.

Klarkash-Ton was also one of HPL’s main suppliers when it came to pulps other than Weird Tales. Clark’s relative success selling to the pulps—he supported himself and his two aged parents almost solely on pulp paychecks—meant that CAS had more cash than the financially strapped Lovecraft, who basically gave up on writing for much of the mid-1930s. Klarkash-Ton, like REH, read the pulps he wanted to sell to. He was constantly mailing pulps to HPL. In fact, the entire Lovecraft Circle was one big circulating library, with books, pulps and manuscripts winging from one address to the next, before being sent on to another devotee.

HPL and CAS would constantly evaluate the newest issues of Weird Tales, rating fellow members of the Circle as well as promising—and disappointing—newcomers. Fascinating stuff. In addition, one can read their scathing opinions of Farnsworth Wright and Hugo Gernsback. Neither iconic editor comes out looking good after Klarkash-Ton and Ech-Pi-El are through with them.

Did you know that Clark Ashton Smith was a crossword aficionado to the point of drawing up his own eldritch crosswords? He was. Pages 676 to 686 are devoted to the crosswords Klarkash-Ton sent to HPL. The bulk of the appendices are filled with additional cool CAS miscellanea.

That said, these two volumes are dominated by Lovecraft’s letters. In sheer bulk, more of them survive than the CAS missives, which is one reason I posted this review now. Overall, ol’ Ech-Pi-El shows himself to be good-hearted and fairly humble. His admiration and friendship for Smith shines through in every letter. The same could be said of CAS’ letters in regard to Lovecraft.

Bottom line, these volumes are must-haves for hardcore fans of CAS or HPL. I could say the same for anyone deeply interested in the SFF/weird pulps of 1920-1940.

Happy birthday, HPL.

HPL writing yet another letter, as rendered by Virgil Finlay.