The Dunwich Horror and Others

Selected by August Derleth. Edited by S. T. Joshi. Introduction by Robert Bloch.

Here at last is the definitive Lovecraft – the first in a three-volume set of the collected macabre fiction that embodies the author's own final thoughts and stylistic preferences. Based upon S.T. Joshi's extensive and painstaking collation of extant manuscript materials, this new Lovecraft edition from Arkham House is the only completely authoritative text and supersedes all previous editions.

The finest imaginative tales by the outstanding twentieth-century American writer in the genre are to be found in this initial volume, including such classic works as the title, story, "The Colour Out of Space," "The Rats in the Walls," "The Music of Erich Zann," "The Shadow Out of Time," and "The Outsider." Here too are those memorable nouvelles of the Cthulhu Mythos – "The Whisperer in Darkness," "The Thing on the Doorstep," and "The Shadow Over Innsmouth," as well as such chilling tales of pure grue as "In the Vault" and "Pickman's Model."

In the whole range of fantastic literature, Lovecraft created a new form that is neither pure fancy nor pure science fiction. He combined a factual and accurate scientific knowledge with its extension to the absolute limit in supernatural bizarrerie. His work defies classification, for it is as much myth as reality – both lore and legend at their haunting, haunted best, and at the same time science at its most provocative. His tales have been termed the finest weird fantasy ever written, and yet also the most superbly literate science fiction. Lovecraft's work has achieved an honored eminence among the great visionary fiction of the ages precisely because, while betraying no trace of the commonplace, his stories are based convincingly in the world of everyday reality, yet lure the mind into the farthest reaches of the imagination, the star-flung spaces of the universe, the cosmic realm of a master mythmaker.

Contents:

• A Note on the Texts, by S.T. Joshi
• Heritage of Horror, by Robert Bloch
• In the Vault
• Pickman's Model
• The Rats in the Walls
• The Outsider
• The Colour Out of Space
• The Music of Erich Zann
• The Haunter of the Dark
• The Picture in the House
• The Call of Cthulhu
• The Dunwich Horror
• Cool Air
• The Whisperer in Darkness
• The Terrible Old Man
• The Thing on the Doorstep
• The Shadow Over Innsmouth
• The Shadow Out of Time