Varela 1 Jane Varela Professor Michael Wilson The XIXTH Century Novel LET1747 24 June 2013 The Call

of Cthulhu: A Futuristic Science-Fiction Myth Infecting the Reader with Fear of the Unknown In The Call of Cthulhu, H.P. Lovecraft presents his own personal view as a reaction to the historical context surrounding his writing, especially in relation to the advancement of the sciences towards knowledge of the world, the role of the universe and its vastness. Lovecraft was confronted to the era of Modernism, a term which is very difficult to define but that is mainly characterized by loss of faith, collective trauma and disillusionment together with the chaos brought about by all the changes experienced because of World War I. Along with these factors, the emergence of Freuds psychoanalysis carried with it the concept of awareness of reality; a shifting consciousness regarding all the events happening at the end of the nineteenth and beginning of the twentieth centuries. Lovecrafts reaction to all these changes is mainly expressed by his fear of the unknown and his own uncertainty regarding the future of humankind. The Call of Cthulhu unveils the idea that the more humankind knows about the universe, the more endangered their order is. As a result, Lovecraft materializes his fear into Cthulhu, a monster that represents the unknown and a future threatening chaos, that (in which) which humankind will find at the end of its search and whose discovery will bring, according to him, either madness or death. Thus, The Call of Cthulhu represents a futuristic sciencefiction myth infecting the reader with uncertainty and fear of the unknown.

Varela 2 Even though social, cultural and technological development can be considered to be a positive state of affairs for individuals, commonsense ascertains that it is not possible for anybody to know and predict exactly what is going to happen in the future. Nevertheless, Lovecraft presents his own prediction in the form of a science fiction myth of Cthulhu. According to the Oxford Dictionaries (2013), myth is a traditional story, especially one concerning the early history of a people or explaining a natural or social phenomenon, and typically involving supernatural beings or events. From this definition, the focus will be on the part of the explanation of natural or social phenomena which typically involves supernatural events or beings. Regarding science fiction, it is defined as fiction based on imagined future scientific or technological advances and major social or environmental changes, frequently portraying space or time travel and life on other planets. (Oxford Dictionaries 2013). The key words here are imagined, space or time travel and life on other planets. Consequently, Lovecrafts The Call of Cthulhu represents a myth that attempts to explain the social phenomena unfolding in his times by imagining a supernatural being witnessing life in other planets, found in space and in times different from humankinds notions of it. But what does this science fiction myth have to do with the reader? According to Muriel Rukeyser in Science Fiction as the Mythology of the Future (yo agregaria apocalyptic science fiction) Science fiction, like myth, contains personified characters, thus creating a personal connection with the reader. The reader often identifies with the characters sometimes positively, sometimes negatively - and vicariously experiences the drama and events of the story through the characters. (2). The reader empathizes with what the characters are experiencing within the story: misfortune and terrible endings occur to every single character who reaches the truth. All

Varela 3 the people involved with the knowledge of Cthulhu do not live to tell the tale. However, there are manuscripts which give testimony of that secret thing which for Lovecraft represents the unknown. He claims that only a diseased mind could conceive of such a creature as Cthulhu a figure of evidently pictorial intent, though its impressionistic execution forbade a very clear idea of its nature. It seemed to be a sort of monster, or symbol representing a monster, of a form which only a diseased fancy could conceive. . . an octopus, a dragon, and a human caricature, I shall not be unfaithful to the spirit of the thing. A pulpy, tentacled head surmounted a grotesque and scaly body with rudimentary wings; but it was the general outline of the whole which made it most shockingly frightful. (2-3) However, this description of Cthulhu appears in the mind of the reader who in the process of reading ponders the possibility of its existence. In Do I Write for an Audience? Wolfgang Iser claims that the text is realized in the readers consciousness and that it transposes him/her to a dimension different from his/her physical existence; a doubling in which the reader is with and simultaneously outside him/herself (312). In this way, the reader is not only outside the story but also s/he is witnessing the facts present within it through the process of reading. Throughout the story, it can be also seen that Lovecraft believes that the unknown is found in outer space, in the cosmos; a cosmos that was possibly originated from chaos and that one day might come back to its original chaotic status. In this sense, Rukeyser also states that science fiction stories are often set within a cosmic context and have the same breadth and scope that mythic tales do; they also address the same expansive themes

Varela 4 of the nature of reality and the meaning of human existence. In fact, as in myth, science fiction connects the personal with the cosmic. (3) This is what happens to the reader; s/he is connected to the cosmic reality presented by Lovecraft so as to imagine how infinite and vast it is and how impossible it is to grasp every single element of its components. Thus, knowledge becomes reduced as the universe, the cosmos is impossible to attain. Notwithstanding, for Lovecraft, sciences are getting closer to this purpose and he is eager to warn the reader of this fact and to awake his/her consciousness regarding this issue. In Is There a Text in This Class? (1980), Stanley Fish also states that the authors intentions are crucial to reader response towards the text. At the end of the story, Lovecraft accomplishes his purpose of creating his expected effect, in this case, the engagement of the reader in the awareness of the facts presented in The Call of Cthulhu (338). With his science fiction myth, Lovecraft explains, in a certain way, what will happen in the future with the development of the sciences towards the unknown and he infects the reader with his own fear. He narrates his perspective regarding the future of humankind in such a way that he tries to transform the standard fashion of thinking. In Rukeysers words, Lovecrafts myth provides meaning and direction for the reader (4) by using Cthulhu as a fantastic being. . . to symbolically highlight important features of humanity or reality (Rukeyser 3). That is to say, Lovecraft is symbolically representing reality according to his own vision but at the same time, he is involving the reader to sympathize with him and acknowledge that the future of humankind may be endangered if scientists continue to look for the unknown.

Varela 5 Rukeyser also asserts that there are two types of emotions conveyed by science fiction: fear and hope and remarks that both of them make reference to the future. In addition, she claims that both terms enclose expectation and anticipation the experience of fear involves the expectation of something dangerous or destructive. Science fiction deals with the strange and the different, which can stimulate negative or positive emotions in the reader. The unknown and the mysterious can provoke awe, hope, and wonder, or anxiety, fear, and terror. (11) In this sense, Rukeyser proposes two alternatives for the reader: either s/he feels hopeful about the future or frightened for what will come. Nevertheless, Lovecraft invites the reader not to be so hopeful because first, he is rather pessimistic; and second, he intends to cause anxiety and terror in the reader. Moreover, the fact that other types of civilizations existed before the current humankind conception about society is by far more horrible in the eyes of the reader There had been aeons when other Things ruled on the earth, and They had had great cities. Remains of Them, he said the deathless Chinamen had told him, were still to be found as Cyclopean stones on islands in the Pacific. They all died vast epochs of time before men came, but there were arts which could revive Them when the stars had come round again to the right positions in the cycle of eternity. They had, indeed, come themselves from the stars, and brought Their images with Them. (12) The mere thought of an object having the capacity of reviving what is dead causes in the reader terror and fear. Also, the cosmic cycle referred to by Lovecraft by which after the stars align to favor the rise of the unknown, Cthulhu and its civilization, produces a sense of hopefulness with respect to the future. Thus the reader may ponder again what will

Varela 6 happen and questions whether it is possible that what sciences are seeking will finally become the end of humankind. In addition, even though Lovecrafts story is just a hypothetical invention, the preciseness of his mathematical terms and their existence in reality causes a great sense of credibility from the part of the reader. Regarding this fact, Rukeyser states that science fiction often attempts to create plausible futurist scenarios and extrapolations on present trends. At the very least it gets the reader thinking about the various possibilities of tomorrow and it has actually inspired outside of the genre a host of predictions and goals for the future. It has even provoked the real-world creation of technologies and hypothetical realities envisioned in its stories. Science fiction may accurately predict the future by stimulating the creation of the future that it is imaginatively and vividly describing. (15) In this sense, The Call of Cthulhu represents a futuristic prediction of a scenario full of chaos and disorder as implied by Lovecraft in the first paragraph of the text The most merciful thing in the world, I think, is the inability of the human mind to correlate all its contents. We live on a placid island of ignorance in the midst of black seas of infinity, and it was not meant that we should voyage far. (1) Thus, from the very beginning Lovecraft is saying that humankind, to which the reader also belongs, is not able to grasp every single thing related to the cosmos and that they have to be aware of this fact because the consequences, in his pessimistic perspective, will not be in any way positive, a reason why he blames the sciences which [each] straining in its own direction, have hitherto harmed us little; but some day the piecing together of dissociated knowledge will open up such terrifying vistas of

Varela 7 reality, and of our frightful position therein, that we shall either go mad from the revelation or flee from the deadly light into the peace and safety of a new dark age. (1) Again, Lovecraft is reinforcing the idea of the consequences of getting to encounter the unknown: either humankind gets mad or ends dead. Lovecraft does this not only referring to the horrible scenes that surpass reality but also by restating that humankind, and the reader, is in a disadvantageous position; humankind will not be able, according to Lovecraft, to overcome the shocking consequences of the disclosure of the unknown. A remark needs to be made with respect to Lovecrafts attempt to warm the reader of what is going on in reality. Seen as a science fiction myth, The Call of Cthulhu is intended to explain the changes that society in the oncoming twentieth century is experiencing. Technological advances are presented to the public as the utopia of the future that promises people better lives, better jobs and better opportunities. Nevertheless, Lovecraft is anticipating that these promises may indeed not be real and that the final results may be destructive for the humankind. Going back to Rukeyser that the situations present in science fiction are conceptualized in the form of a story. . . [which] allow[s] us to think through the possible effects, repercussions, or implications of different imagined futures, or the possible future effects of present trends and developments. (16). In other words, a science fiction story makes possible to consider all the likely consequences of humankinds actions and to anticipate the negative effects that a bad decision could bring about with it which is exactly what Lovecraft does. By presenting the myth of Cthulhu, the spatial being who waits under

Varela 8 the seas in order to emerge one day and destroy humanity, Lovecraft displays his own fear and passes it onto the reader as a contagious disease. In conclusion, as it has been stated before, social, cultural and technological development can be seen as a beneficial situation for individuals. However, there is no way to predict whether or not the consequences are going to be positive. Instead, there is always an invitation to question if humanity is prepared to confront possible threatening consequences for the future. Again, commonsense ascertains that prediction is not possible but to think about possible repercussions, implications and effects may prevent human beings to encounter a terrible thing which is unknown to them but represented in Lovecrafts materialization of his fears into Cthulhu. Thus, as a myth, The Call of Cthulhu attempts to explain what is happening and what might happen to humankind in the future and as such, its role as a science fiction story is to give alternatives to the reader to be aware of these facts. ( yo me explayaria mas aca)

Varela 9 Work cited Lovecraft, H.P. The Call of Cthulhu. From the Papers of the Late Francis Wayland Thurston, Boston (1926). Rukeyser, Muriel. Science Fiction as the Mythology of the Future Wolfgang, Iser. Do I Write for an Audience?. Modern Language Association, (2000): 310-314. Fish, Stanley. Is There a Text in This Class? Harvard University Press. Cambrige, Massachussets (1980). myth. Oxforddictionaries.com. 2013. Oxford University Press, 2013. Web. 21 June 2013. science fiction. Oxforddictionaries.com. 2013. Oxford University Press, 2013. Web. 21 June 2013.