Blind Read Through, H.P. Lovecraft: Memory/What the Moon Brings

These two are merely vignettes, minute glimpses into the world that Lovecraft was in the process of creating; the strange and the cosmic.

“Memory” is a look forward and “What the Moon Brings” is a naval gaze of the apocalypse.  Both are no more than 2 pages a piece, but both are full of meaning.

In Memory we are shown a shambles of a world.  Ruins that are over run and the only inhabitants are apes.  Two gods are having a discussion, and where one cant remember the past, asks the other “Daemon” about the beings who built the original ruins.  The Daemon says that he is Memory and what he remembers is that they were insignificant and their deeds were forgotten as soon as they were preformed.  They built the ruins and their name was Man.

The meaning behind the vignette is that, far in the future, the deeds and actions of humans are forgotten and the only thing that remains is earth.  The gods themselves look over everything, but they forget as well, which makes them insignificant as well.  The ultimate god, the ultimate truth is the earth.  The land holds the longest memory and will outlive and outlast all.

What the Moon Brings flows into a similar vein.  The narrator tells of their own death.  He (due to Lovecraft’s sexism and racism, I assume that every narrator is a white man) describes what he can see from the light of the moon.  The moon (a otherworldly being in and of itself that is the origin of many of Lovecraft’s creatures) shows the death of civilization through the reflection of the lake.  He can also see creatures in the water.  He decides at the end to go and join them, because he knows that the moon will continue to come and continue to bring the visions of what is coming.  In his despair he walks into the waters and either drowns himself or lets the creatures have him.

It is intimated that he is the last of the population and is giving in to despair, as he gazes at the reflection of the “dead, dripping city”.  The book I’m reading through (Del Rey 1971 ISBN: 0345331052) should have put them in reverse order, because What the Moon Brings, shows the decline and fall of civilization and Memory shows the aftermath.

What the Moon Brings is much less deep, but by far the creepiest of the stories thus far, because it is more direct (with the exception of The Tomb).  Both a lot of fun, but I still feel as though these stories are merely setting up the mythos that are coming.