"Azathoth" is the beginning of an incomplete novel written by American

horror fiction Horror is a genre of speculative fiction that is intended to disturb, frighten, or scare an audience. Horror is often divided into the sub-genres of psychological horror and supernatural horror. Literary historian J. A. Cuddon, in 1984, defin ...

writer

H. P. Lovecraft Howard Phillips Lovecraft (, ; August 20, 1890 – March 15, 1937) was an American writer of Weird fiction, weird, Science fiction, science, fantasy, and horror fiction. He is best known for his creation of the Cthulhu Mythos. Born in Provi ...

."H. P. Lovecraft's original fragment, 'Azathoth'"
/ref> It was written in June 1922, and published as a fragment in the journal ''Leaves'' in 1938, after Lovecraft's death. It is the first piece of fiction to mention the fictional being

Azathoth Azathoth is a deity in the Cthulhu Mythos and Dream Cycle stories of writer H. P. Lovecraft and other authors. He is the supreme deity of the Cthulhu Mythos and the ruler of the Cthulhu Mythos deities#Outer Gods, Outer Gods, and may also be see ...

, one of the major entities in Lovecraft's

Cthulhu Mythos The Cthulhu Mythos is a mythopoeia and a shared fictional universe, originating in the works of American Horror fiction, horror writer H. P. Lovecraft. The term was coined by August Derleth, a contemporary correspondent and protégé of Lovecraft, t ...

, though the entity only appears in the title.

Plot

The story begins by describing how the modern world has been stripped of imagination and belief in magic. The protagonist is an unnamed man who lives in a dull and ugly city. Every night for many years, the man gazes from his window upon the stars, until he comes over time to observe secret vistas unsuspected by normal humanity. One night, the gulf between his world and the stars is bridged, and his mind ascends from his body out unto the boundless cosmos.

Inspiration

Lovecraft described his planned novel as a "weird Eastern tale in the 18th century manner" and as a "weird ''

Vathek ''Vathek'' (alternatively titled ''Vathek, an Arabian Tale'' or ''The History of the Caliph Vathek'') is a Gothic novel written by William Beckford. It was composed in French beginning in 1782, and then translated into English by Reverend Sa ...

''-like novel", referring to a novel of

Arabia The Arabian Peninsula (, , or , , ) or Arabia, is a peninsula in West Asia, situated north-east of Africa on the Arabian plate. At , comparable in size to India, the Arabian Peninsula is the largest peninsula in the world. Geographically, the ...

written by

William Thomas Beckford William Thomas Beckford (29 September 1760 – 2 May 1844) was an English novelist, art critic, planter and politician. He was reputed at one stage to be England's richest commoner. He was the son of William Beckford (politician), William Beckf ...

in 1786. Suggesting that his story would involve "material of the ''

Arabian Nights ''One Thousand and One Nights'' (, ), is a collection of Middle Eastern folktales compiled in the Arabic language during the Islamic Golden Age. It is often known in English as ''The Arabian Nights'', from the first English-language edition () ...

'' type", he wrote that Lovecraft later wrote a novella with a similar theme, ''

The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath ''The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath'' is a Horror fiction, horror novella by American writer H. P. Lovecraft. Begun probably in the autumn of 1926, the draft was completed on January 22, 1927 in literature, 1927, and it remained unrevised and u ...

''.

References

External links

* * 1938 short stories Short stories by H. P. Lovecraft American short stories Short stories published posthumously Fantasy short stories Cthulhu Mythos short stories Unfinished novels Works originally published in American magazines {{1930s-horror-story-stub