Lovecraft: Fear of the Unknown

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was a vast-stage of old American values

Lovecraft's family was very well to do

and I believe they consider themselves to be of the Providence aristocracy

the Phillips line goes back very far in Providence history all the way

as early as the late 17th century

the Lovecraft side originates in England, and you could trace that all the way back to about the 15th century

there were Lovecrafts or Lovecrofts in Devon

he was a truly, almost a "Mayflower"specimen

preserved in the formaldehyde of New England you know

and he was an Anglophile that definitely did not get laid much you know

and the guy that was an alien amongst us, in the sense that he was not a very masculine child

after Winfield's death from syphilis on July 19th 1898

young Howard was all Suzie Lovecraft had left

she mothered her child incessantly

so much so, that she was known to make friends stoop when walking hand-in-hand with her son

for fear his arm would be pull from its socket

despite her over attention

Suzie Lovecraft's near puritanical views restrained any physical affections toward her son

Lovecraft would later admit to his only wife

that this form of mothering was a devastating to him

his grandfather Whipple Phillips, was a very impressive industrialist

Lovecraft remembers Whipple telling him oral ghost stories

at the age of 4 or 5

he tutored him in a number of other ways, trying to take an interest into his education

in the attic was an immense library presumably collected by his grandfather

and Lovecraft went up there as a boy with a candle secretly and started reading these old books

and fell in love with the 18th century

Lovecraft is more than a product of his time

he is a product of a couple of centuries earlier, so he was born out of time

one of the important things for the 18th century was the code of a gentleman

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