Clark Ashton Smith (1893-1961), perhaps best known today for his association with H.P Lovecraft and the Cthulhu Mythos, is in his own right a unique master of fantasy, horror and science-fiction. Highly imaginative, his genre-spanning visions of worlds beyond, combined with his profound understanding of the English language, have inspired an ever -increasing legion of fans and admirers.
For most of his life, he lived in physical and intellectual isolation in Auburn, California (USA). Predominantly self-educated with no formal education after grammar school, Smith wore out his local library and delved so deeply into the dictionary that his richly embellished, yet precise, prose leaves one with the sense that they are in the company of a true master of language.
Though Smith primarily considered himself a poet, having turned to prose for the meager financial sum it rewarded, his prose might best be appreciated as a "fleshed" out poetry. In this light, plot and characters are subservient to the milieu of work: a setting of cold quiet reality, which, mixed with the erotic and the exotic, places his work within its own unique, phantasmagoric genre. While he also experimented in painting, sculpture, and translation, it is in his written work that his legacy persists.
During his lifetime, Smith's work appeared commonly in the pulps alongside other masters such H.P. Lovecraft, Robert E. Howard, August Derleth, and E. Hoffmann Price and like many great artists, recognition and appreciation have come posthumously. In recent decades though, a resurgence of interest in his works has lead to numerous reprintings as well as scholarly critiques.
The Eldritch Dark is a site to facilitate both scholars and fans in their appreciation and study of Clark Ashton Smith and his works.
Re: A Possible Source for "The Hound"
4 Apr, 2025 8:58AM by Knygatin
“Kipling Wrote:
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> How much of M.P. Shiel have you read? He revised
> his novels, that originally were serialized. The
> originals are better; he just revised them for
> monetary considerations. ... Sam Moskowitz, a science fiction scholar,
> wrote a biographical article on Shiel that more
> than suggested he was mentally unbalanced ... The… ”
Re: "Double Cosmos" and the influence of Machen
4 Apr, 2025 3:41AM by Sawfish
“I read it just now and enjoyed it.
It's a very good example of commercial weird fiction, I think. It's short enough (the theme would not warrant a more lengthy tale), and the actual visualization of the alternate dimension, the way objects are attached and act/react to the corresponding stimuli in each dimension, is very well… ”
"Double Cosmos" and the influence of Machen
2 Apr, 2025 3:13PM by Kipling
“According to Scott Connors and Ron S. Hilger's textual notes for Clark Ashton Smith's "Double Cosmos", in volume 5 of the collected fantasies, Smith gave a typescript of this story to his literary agent at the time, and never heard back from him. On reading it a second time, I think it's at least a… ”
Re: A Possible Source for "The Hound"
22 Mar, 2025 6:16PM by Kipling
“I found only one edition of "Eureka" with the revisions included, a 2017 CreateSpace paperback. Also in 1928 50 facsimile copies of Poe's heavily annotated personal copy were printed. An interlibrary loan is all I'll need since I'm only curious to see the emendations, which probably are no improvement to the original, judging from a… ”
Re: A Possible Source for "The Hound"
22 Mar, 2025 11:07AM by Kipling
“Knygatin Wrote:
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> I am sure Sterling got inspiration from Poe's Eureka. Sterling had an advantage into the cosmic perspective by actively practicing astronomy. I have for that matter heard very little comment on Eureka,
,(,...) To me Poe's cosmic perspective seems to be that of a vast intelligence who suddenly looks up at the… ”