Blind Read Through: H.P. Lovecraft; The Shadow over Innsmouth, pt 3

The ravings of an old madman fill our minds through the next chapter of this story.  Our narrator gets some bootleg alcohol and gets the elderly Zodak Allen to follow him to a spot by the sea where they can talk out of prying eyes.  Zodak confirms a number of suspisions that I had previously while reading through, however he expounds more than expected and we are posed with more questions than he ended up answering.

Zodak tells of how Captain Obed brought the people of the Order of Dagon to the mainland, because he wanted to promote a healthy community.  The mills were dying out and the fish were getting fewer and fewer, but he remembered an island where the people had abundance.

The people of this Island mated with fish people.  Then twice a year they would sacrifice their young to Dagon in the sea, and they never ran out of fish.  The offspring that came from the human fish relations, started out as human, then began to transform as they got older, to the point of transitioning completely and leaving land and heading for the sea.  If we are to believe Zodak completely, then my previous theory is (mostly) out the window.

The interesting part of Zodak monologue to me, is the three Oaths of Dagon.  We never find out what these are, but we know that the many people in town took the first two (which had something to do with not telling anyone outside the cult of the cult inter-workings).  Zodak was wholly against taking the third Oath, which seems to me an Oath of body, soul and spirit.  This could be how, beyond interbreeding, the entire town of Innsmouth has begun to transform.  That third Oath, could be inviting the change into you.

We do know that the previous two oaths did give Zodak some knowledge however.  He knows of Shoggoth.  The mentions Cthulhu R’lyeh, which I’m pretty sure is the sunken city which is Cthulhu’s prison.  What is interesting about this is that Cthulhu is imprisoned under the water and Dagon is a god of the water.  Which means there is a definite connection there, and there is a connection with the Order of Dagon, because Zodak obviously learned this through his Oaths.

So now we have three deities in the mythos, concretely linked.  Shoggoth, Cthulhu, and Dagon.  Let’s see where this story leads us…

What do you think?

Join me next week for the last two chapters of The Shadow over Innsmouth.