The Dark Philosophy Behind HP Lovecraft's Cosmic Horror

Mountains of Madness is going on my reading list!! Cheers

Iä! Iä! Cthulhu fhtagn! (some cultist had to say it) - great vid on one of the (grand)fathers of modern horror (Poe might be one of the others) - and it can well be seen that nature is totally indifferent to humanity when you consider the stupendously long ages of the Earth, so why would the greater cosmos be any different? I like to think that grain of truth really adds to the Lovecraftian viewpoint

slight error - lovecraft was born in 1890, not 1980 :D otherwise, i love your videos, darryl, and am pleasantly surprised to see you have expanded your reviews to cover other related genres :D

Two others to check out Thomas Ligotti (cosmicism) and Charles Stross (especially the The Laundry Files). Stross’s other SCIFI is excellent as well.

Thank you for this great video. My favorite story by Lovecraft is "The Colour Out of Space," but "The Mountains of Madness" is also wonderful. He's one of my favorite authors and it would have been an interesting experience knowing him -- he was such a mysterious person.

Read enough lovecraft and it usually boils down to "i went somewhere lost and forgotten and there i saw something conveniently indescribable and lost my wits!"

I find our insignificance in the universe comforting. Love the video.

While I enjoyed the overview of his works and cosmicism, I find it disappointing you went into his life and real world influences without mentioning once his pretty extreme racism and xenophobia. These were big and unfortunate influences on his work and important to point out, and I think you could have done so without undermining his influence if that’s what you were trying to avoid

The Spain-Germany match is going on and I'd much rather watch Darrel speak about H.P. Lovecraft. His view of the cosmos is accurate; we just don't matter to it! 😅

Lovecraft I believe pierced the veil of what reality was. But he clothed what he found there with horror as it did threaten his very materialistic egocentric outlook. From an occult perspective Kenneth Grant fully used the Cthulhu mythos to further the work of Aleister Crowley in exploring these unknown realms. But in modern depth psychology and in the works of the likes of Donald Hoffman, Rupert Sheldrake and Dr Anthony Stevens that placid island of Ignorance may be sinking into having to understand what lies beneath and it is everything Lovecraft wrote in terror about. You make a mistake. He wasn't born in 1980! Think that should have been 1890. Apologies for nit picking on that point.

Make a video on Arthur Machen!

YEAY!!! Our Darrel is BACK!!! 🙂 ❤

Lovecraft: "but what if Anglo-Saxon men aren't the most powerful minds in the universe? 😱"

By the way, Lovecraft influenced by the pictures of Himalayans by russian painter Nikolaj Roerich!

As I have been a life long Fan of Creators such as Lovecraft and Many Others, so then enjoyed your thoughts mentioned with this Video about Lovecraft and his Great Ideas put forth.. As I think You did Sum up Very Well the Concepts and Visions as how H P Lovecraft did see the World and far Beyond.... As for how we are also part of that Dark never Ending Spider Web, spread through out the Depths of the Big Black, that Always seems to Calls to Us. But then the Question, Should We Answer or invite such Shadowed Stranger from Far and Distant Places, to come and know that we are Here, as the Results of such a Meeting, might not be an Event, that would end Well for any of Us here, on this Small Blue Dot... And then as an Artist, Animator and Designer.... So also have had many thoughts and Ideas about Lovecraft and his Works. As then Projects, I too have been thinking about, so for myself also Creating a Few Small Productions of my Own... And so then many ideas I too have, for New Projects to come And though such specific ideas I see only in my Minds Third Eyes... Ideas are Coming together.. As then Very Much Enjoyed Your HP Lovecraft Video... So until I get on with those Next Potential Projects, I still then have other Images of My Works, that can be Seen, on My Gordon Strong FB Art Page... As a Very Good Day to You and All Other Lovecraft Fans....... 🐙🐙🐙

If you don't already know it, I would recommend the cosmic horror visual novel titled Saya No Uta (Song of Saya). It is heavily influenced by cosmic horror but has a very distinct take on it. Beware though! It is not only a story that will get under your skin and stay with you long after you've finished it, but it is also very graphic and explicit, including scenes of s.a. Mature audiences only please.

There is also the Call of Cthulhu of tabletop role-playing game by Chaosium Inc. Its an excellent game that has been in print since 1981 and has had a major influence on the industry.

A good presentation revealing Lovecraft's thoughts and philosophies. As for my insignificance in the universe, the my main problem with this notion of my insignificance is if I'm so insignificant then what am I doing here in the first place? I exist with or without a purpose and thus I'm here, so I might as well make up my own mind why I'm here.

Another "way of thinking" or philosophy opposite to the nihilism of cosmic horror is what I would call "Cosmic Wonder" or "Cosmic Significance". This would refer to stories where readers follow humans, mainly an individual or pair of individuals, who are exploring and taking significant actions in a universe that is filled with diverse life, ancient mysteries, ancient races, god like aliens, a few legitimate cosmic horror entities you don't want to come across and a few hints that the universe itself is somewhat alive and has a consciousness of it's own.

Unlike cosmic horror stories the protagonists aren't random people that die or lose their minds at the end but established individuals that take center stage in different stories that may be seen as separate stories but at some point it becomes clear that they have been taking part in a larger and grander narrative. And while in cosmic horror stories humans are insignificant in the universe, their actions in a cosmic significance/wonder story actually have meaning and have an actual effect on the universe as a whole; sometimes it is hinted that they have being guided (not controlled) and protected by some superior force like unseen god like aliens or an actual will of the universe/ a legitimate god.

Another factor would be that while cosmic horror works better through literature in order to let the reader's imagination fill the horrifying details, a cosmic wonder story would have to be through a medium with visuals that would fill the eyes with great art and sublime imagery.

One good example of this type of story is the movie Cloud Atlas, wich is a great movie regardless of if what most people say. However the best example I know is the french comic Valerian and Laureline, a story which contains all the previously mentioned factors which after reading lead me to come up with this concept, highly recommend the read. Ironically I read the comic right after reading Alann Moore's Providence, the man's take on lovecraftian horror wich helped made the parallels between this types of stories hard to ignore.

As someone getting on in years, I often revisit videos I remember as being significant when they were released, some obviously before the introduction of the internet but now more obtainable than ever before. One such video is ''The Pale Blue Dot'' as narrated by Carl Sagan. In this he reduces all of humanity and human history to insignificance when the Earth is considered from a distance in space. When I watch it I am reminded of Lovecraft and wonder if this is what he was trying to convey, not so much that there are monstrous entities out there but that we have no idea at all of what we might come across. This, and the fact that, to any other entity, we might well be considered as insignificant due to our recent arrival in the cosmos whereas they might have been around for millennia.
Of course one has to consider Lovecraft's upbringing, the times in which he lived and his peculiar temperament (paranoia?) that I gather greatly affected his style. To accuse him of racism or whatever from a modern perspective is to completely miss the times in which he lived and the peoples whose opinions he might have become swayed by.
I personally enjoy his writing and the frisson of existential fear he provides without, often, being too detailed in his descriptions of whatever horror is in question, because it leaves it to my imagination. It is a cliche nowadays I know to say nothing compares to the horrors one's own mind can produce and that is part of Lovecraft's power.
It is also true of the movies you mention. We never see ''The Thing'' in its true form, ''Event Horizon's'' protagonist has to be inferred, and as for ''The Mist'', it's horrors are visible enough but from what ghastly place did they originate and what might be next?
Every astronomer, physicist, astronaut or cosmologist that I've ever heard from (in the real world) has always emphasized that Space is completely hostile to known life. If Lovecraft was aware of this, or even suspected it, one could understand his hostility to the ''great out there''. He was ahead of his time whilst, at the same time paradoxically, stuck in the mind-set of his time.

Interesting video... thanks for the two podcasts you mentioned, will check them out.

Galactic Horrors YT channel has delved into this with his short creepy pasta stories

I honestly don't find cosmicism terrifying but humbling

I like how Lovecraft personally knew the author that created Conan the Barbarian. And how they would exchange ideas. Some if Lovecraft's cosmic horrors ecen showed up or are mentioned in the classic Conan the Barbarian novels.

Further, I like how Lovecraftian horror continues to inspire modern media. Just yesterday I saw on Steam an upcoming city builder game called Worshippers of Cthulhu that centers on creating a city based around the worship and use of cosmic horrors.

I absolutely love that his work makes us feel small and insignificant, because we are. I often think, how hard we make things for ourselves and how much we worry and fuss about insignificant things. It actually feels comforting that there is more in the universe, things that mean more than the world humanity makes. Also, reading his work always makes me realize the change of times. His characters go mad from the things they see and encounter, while we.. would just think back of the horror movies we have seen and shrug. Humanity has become jaded.

Thank you for mentioning Clive Barker at the end. While I know he isn’t Sci Fi I would love to see his work make an appearance on this channel because he really was and in many ways still is the successor to cosmic horror. And SCP is pretty overt about the Lovecraft connections.

He wrote many gripping stories but was a terrible racist. I now read his work in that light.

The color out of space is my favorite story of his. The fact that the enemy is simply a light color plasma thing, and not a humanoid shaped creature, makes it completely alien and unknown and freaky.

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I believe in an indifferent universe, but I can't relate to Lovecraft. His conception of an indifferent universe is so different from mine.

Not even a short mention of the super racist concepts that make his works pretty much unreadable to many? I really wonder why you fail to bring it up...

Suc ha master at making music almost from his writing. Color Out of Space is so great. Nothing we can do in the face of a force that twists and warps nature itself.

The concept of human civilisation expanding across the universe is madness. We are only robots, soon to be superseded..

H.P. Lovecraft was an intelligent man. In a way, he was ahead of his time with his viewpoints he had. And no, I’m not talking about racism, I’m talking about his cosmicism philosophy. It is true that humans aren’t able to comprehend the existence of entities outside our solar system. Especially people nowadays, we are all doomed if an alien invasion happens sooner or later.