Page:Joseph Payne Brennan - H. P. Lovecraft, An Evaluation.pdf/7

3. as much importance to the "Mythos" as do some of his disciples!

Many of the Cthulhu stories, such as "The Dunwich Horror" and "The Whisperer in Darkness", are actually tedious. They are too long; our interest is apt to flag; our "willing suspension of disbelief" may not hold to the final page. All too often we read on without compulsion, without belief, without very much actual enthusiasm.

Lovecraft often seems so intent on introducing and exploiting the "Mythos", he loses sight of some of the basic elements which are essential in a good short story: economy of wordage, verisimilitude, mounting suspense sweeping to a single climax followed quickly by the final denouement.

Referring to the "Mythos", Edmund Wilson concluded: "It is all more amusing in his letters than it is in the stories themselves." Of course it was not intended to be in the stories, but I think Wilson's meaning is clear.

When it still possessed the freshness of novelty, the Cthulhu Mythology afforded a vast amount of entertainment. But with the passage of time the novelty has evaporated and the myth has become threadbare. Lovecraft used it in story after story and his disciples have exploited it since his death and it now seems wrung nearly dry of interesting effects.

It remains, of course, an integral part of the bulk of Lovecraft's work. To attempt to dismiss it as incidental or unimportant would be to close our eyes to the facts.