Abstract

Thanks for the loan of Arthur Machen's The House of Souls (of which Smith especially like "The Great God Pan" and "The White People"), and "The Colour Out of Space," with praise for the latter; Smith writing "A Tale of Sir John Maundeville"; on Smith and Lovecraft's respective libraries; August Derleth, Donald Wandrei, and Farnsworth Wright unenthusiastic about "An Offering to the Moon"; Ghost Stories returns "Medusa" ("The Gorgon"); a call for more Volmar tales from Wonder Stories, with Smith suggesting competition from Astounding Stories; Smith would be glad to hear from Henry S. Whitehead; the letter started a week ago, but writing and correspondence put aside from some necessary labor; Smith has received Lovecraft's letter; the return of "Like Mohammed's Tomb," and the discussion of the difficulty of transmission in weird fiction (citing the astral records of Esoteric Buddhism and occultism, and Ambrose Bierce's "Bayrolles"); Smith not making progress on the new Volmar story, and glad to hear Frank Belknap Long is bringing a complaint against the Jewish publishers; on Lovecraft's time-travel story idea; on the travels of William Gifford Palgrave, John Lewis Burckhardt, and James Wellsted, looking for a book on the Assassins, Smith reading Ignatius Donnelly's Atlantis: the Antediluvian World and James Churchward's The Lost Continent of Mu, Smith having seen neither J. Macmillan Brown's The Riddle of the Pacific and W. Scott-Elliot's The Story of Atlantis and the Lost Lemuria; on Irem, Smith's tale "The Ghoul," the Necronomicon, and some other ghastly ideas (later used for "The Supernumerary Corpse," "The Return of the Sorcerer," and "A Good Embalmer"); a clarification on Smith's remarks about wanting to voyage in time and space; on the problem of style in writing, citing several of his stories for example, as well wondering what Farnsworth Wright would say to Arthur Machen's "The White People"; thanks for Lovecraft's suggestions; on Lovecraft's commonplace book, and Smith's own habit of jotting down ideas (including outlines for "Vizaphmal in Ophiuchus" and "The Sorceress of Averoigne"); on Lovecraft's Dunsanian tales (mentioning "The Music of Erich Zann," "The Silver Key," and Lord Dunsany's The Book of Wonder, A Dreamer's Tales, and The Gods of Pegāna); Smith still reading Machen's The House of Souls and "The Colour Out of Space," though looking forward to reading M. R. James, and dreading an 85,000 word manuscript by a local author; on The Mystic Magazine (with mention of August Derleth); glad Donald Wandrei liked "The Whisperer in Darkness"; wishing Farnworth Wright would publish "The Venus of Azombeii" and "The Monster of the Prophecy," as Smith needs the money; looking forward to Frank Belknap Long's "The Horror from the Hills."

Note: Clark Ashton Smith: Letters to H. P. Lovecraft reproduces some alien squiggles of Smith's.

Cited By

TBD

Included In

• Clark Ashton Smith: Letters to H. P. Lovecraft (highly abridged)
• Selected Letters of Clark Ashton Smith (abridged)