Letters to Hyman Bradofsky and Others

H. P. Lovecraft’s literary career ended very much the way it began-with amateur journalism. In 1914, he had entered the United Amateur Press Association and gained lifelong friends and a renewed will to live and write. In 1930, Lovecraft’s attendance at the annual convention of the National Amateur Press Association led to a renewed interest in the multifarious issues agitating amateurdom at that time. Encouraged by a new colleague, Helm C. Spink, Lovecraft took on the role of poetry critic for the NAPA’s Bureau of Critics. Hyman Bradofsky, whose Californian allowed an unprecedented amount of space for lengthy contributions, persuaded Lovecraft to write numerous articles and to steer other amateurs in Bradofsky’s direction. Lovecraft then became embroiled in heated controversies and feuds, many of them revolving around the argumentative Ralph W. Babcock. This volume also includes substantial letters to devotees of weird fiction, including Richard Ely Morse, Margaret Sylvester, John J. Weir, and a pair of brilliant weird artists, Virgil Finlay and Frank Utpatel. As in previous volumes in this series, all letters have been meticulously edited and thoroughly annotated. The appendix includes a generous array of poetry by Morse along with other materials that shed light on all the issues discussed here.