SOURCE: Joshi, S. T. H. P. Lovecraft, pp. 20–30, 44–50. Mercer Island, WA: Starmont House, 1982.

In the following excerpt, Joshi, author of several books on Lovecraft, examines Lovecraft's stories in regard to the influence of Lord Dunsany, their New England settings, and the influence of Edgar Allan Poe.

The “dunsanian” Tales

Dunsany has influenced me more than anyone except Poe—his rich language, his cosmic point of view, his remote dream-world, and his exquisite sense of the fantastic, all appeal to me more than anything else in literature. My first encounter with him—in the autumn of 1919—gave an immense impetus to my writing; perhaps the greatest it has ever had.

(SL: I, 243)

That statement, uttered in 1923, sums up the enormous hold that Lord Dunsany's work took over Lovecraft's imagination. Critics, however, have always been dissatisfied with the dozen or so tales of Lovecraft's that can be called “Dunsanian”—they...