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78-511: August William Derleth (February 24, 1909 – July 4, 1971) was an American writer and anthologist. He was the first book publisher of the writings of H. P. Lovecraft . He made contributions to the Cthulhu Mythos and the cosmic horror genre and helped found the publisher Arkham House (which did much to bring supernatural fiction into print in hardcover in the US that had only been readily available in

156-555: A Bachelor of Arts degree in English from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 1977. She became majority stockholder, President, and CEO of Arkham House in 1994. She remained in that capacity until her death. She was known in the community as a naturalist and humanitarian. April died on March 21, 2011. In 1960, Derleth began editing and publishing a magazine called Hawk and Whippoorwill , dedicated to poems of man and nature. Derleth died of

234-475: A Scribners' novel of which The Chicago Sun wrote: "Structurally it has the perfection of a carved jewel...A psychological novel of the first order, and an adventure tale that is unique and inspiriting." In November 1945, however, Derleth's work was attacked by his one-time admirer and mentor, Sinclair Lewis. Writing in Esquire , Lewis observed, "It is a proof of Mr. Derleth's merit that he makes one want to make

312-441: A background element. Lovecraft himself humorously referred to his Mythos as "Yog Sothothery" (Dirk W. Mosig coincidentally suggested the term Yog-Sothoth Cycle of Myth be substituted for Cthulhu Mythos ). At times, Lovecraft even had to remind his readers that his Mythos creations were entirely fictional. The view that there was no rigid structure is expounded upon by S. T. Joshi , who said Lovecraft's imaginary cosmogony

390-660: A cabin, writing Gothic and other horror stories and selling them to Weird Tales magazine. Derleth won a place on the O'Brien Roll of Honor for Five Alone , published in Place of Hawks , but was first published in Pagany magazine. As a result of his early work on the Sac Prairie Saga , Derleth was awarded the prestigious Guggenheim Fellowship; his sponsors were Helen C. White , Nobel Prize-winning novelist Sinclair Lewis and poet Edgar Lee Masters of Spoon River Anthology fame. In

468-654: A decade, an active supporting group was the Praed Street Irregulars, patterned after the Baker Street Irregulars . In 1946, Conan Doyle's two sons made some attempts to force Derleth to cease publishing the Solar Pons series, but the efforts were unsuccessful, and were eventually withdrawn. Derleth's mystery and detective fiction also included a series of works set in Sac Prairie and featuring Judge Peck as

546-587: A heart attack on July 4, 1971, and is buried in St. Aloysius Cemetery in Sauk City. The U.S. 12 bridge over the Wisconsin River is named in his honor. Derleth was Roman Catholic . In Derleth's biography, Dorothy M. Grobe Litersky stated that Derleth was bisexual, and maintained long-term romantic relationships with both men and women. This assertion has not been verified; no names were given of these romantic partners (in

624-405: A life of their own beyond the pages of Lovecraft's works. According to author John Engle, "The very real world of esoteric magical and occult practices has adopted Lovecraft and his works into its canon, which have informed the ritual practices, or even formed the bedrock, of certain cabals and magical circles". The Cthulhu Mythos of H. P. Lovecraft is considered to have been highly influential for

702-521: A million words yearly, very little of it pulp material." In 1948, he was elected president of the Associated Fantasy Publishers at the 6th World Science Fiction Convention in Toronto . He was married April 6, 1953, to Sandra Evelyn Winters. They divorced six years later. Derleth retained custody of the couple's two children, April Rose Derleth and Walden William Derleth . April earned

780-546: A primarily digital news operation while continuing to publish a weekly tabloid in print. Its weekly print publication is delivered with the Wisconsin State Journal on Wednesdays and distributed in racks throughout Madison. The Capital Times began publishing as an afternoon daily on December 13, 1917, competing directly with the Wisconsin State Journal . The Cap Times ' founder, William T. Evjue , previously served as managing editor and business manager of

858-409: A problem facing the newspaper industry in general and afternoon dailies in particular), the paper announced it would cease daily print publication after April 26, 2008. From that point, it would focus on digital delivery at captimes.com as well as publish a widely distributed weekly print edition. The Capital Times appears weekly in a tabloid format (moving from its long-time broadsheet style) that

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936-651: A sort of fire elemental when a fan, Francis Towner Laney, complained that he had neglected to include the element in his schema. Laney, the editor of The Acolyte , had categorized the Mythos in an essay that first appeared in the Winter 1942 issue of the magazine. Impressed by the glossary, Derleth asked Laney to rewrite it for publication in the Arkham House collection Beyond the Wall of Sleep (1943). Laney's essay ("The Cthulhu Mythos")

1014-552: A story told "with tenderness and charm", while the Chicago Tribune concluded: "It's as though he turned back the pages of an old diary and told, with rekindled emotion, of the pangs of pain and the sharp, clear sweetness of a boy's first love." Helen Constance White, wrote in The Capital Times that it was "...the best articulated, the most fully disciplined of his stories." These were followed in 1943 with Shadow of Night ,

1092-502: A struggle between good and evil, nevertheless the basis of Derleth's systemization are found in Lovecraft. He also suggests that the differences can be overstated: Derleth was more optimistic than Lovecraft in his conception of the Mythos, but we are dealing with a difference more of degree than kind. There are indeed tales wherein Derleth's protagonists get off scot-free (like "The Shadow in

1170-450: A study of his serious virtues. If he could ever be persuaded that he isn't half as good as he thinks he is, if he would learn the art of sitting still and using a blue pencil, he might become twice as good as he thinks he is – which would about rank him with Homer." Derleth good-humoredly reprinted the criticism along with a photograph of himself sans sweater, on the back cover of his 1948 country journal: Village Daybook . A lighter side to

1248-500: A workable framework emerges that outlines the entire "pantheon"—from the unreachable "Outer Ones" (e.g., Azathoth , who occupies the centre of the universe) and "Great Old Ones" (e.g., Cthulhu, imprisoned on Earth in the sunken city of R'lyeh ) to the lesser castes (the lowly slave shoggoths and the Mi-Go ). David E. Schultz said Lovecraft never meant to create a canonical Mythos but rather intended his imaginary pantheon to serve merely as

1326-503: Is a weekly newspaper published Wednesday in Madison, Wisconsin , by The Capital Times Company. The company also owns 50 percent of Capital Newspapers , which now does business as Madison Media Partners. The other half is owned by Lee Enterprises (NYSE: LEE). The Capital Times formerly published paper editions Mondays through Saturdays. The print version ceased daily (Monday–Saturday) paper publication with its April 26, 2008 edition. It became

1404-586: Is included with the Wisconsin State Journal and distributed free at newsstands in the Madison area. The move gained national attention as it involved a prominent daily newspaper shifting to full-time electronic news distribution while at the same time keeping a traditional (albeit non-daily) newspaper format. As part of the move, The Capital Times saw its staff reduced over time from about 64 to 20 positions. Capital Times executive editor Paul Fanlund took

1482-457: Is set in Sac Prairie of the 1920s and can thus be considered in its own right a part of the Sac Prairie Saga , as well as an extension of Derleth's body of mystery fiction. Robert Hood, writing in the New York Times said: "Steve and Sim, the major characters, are twentieth-century cousins of Huck Finn and Tom Sawyer; Derleth's minor characters, little gems of comic drawing." The first novel in

1560-632: The St. Louis Dispatch concluded, "Derleth has achieved a kind of prose equivalent of the Spoon River Anthology ." In the same year, Evening in Spring was published by Charles Scribners & Sons. This work Derleth considered among his finest. What The Milwaukee Journal called "this beautiful little love story", is an autobiographical novel of first love beset by small-town religious bigotry. The work received critical praise: The New Yorker considered it

1638-530: The Sac Prairie Saga and the Wisconsin Saga . He also wrote history; arguably most notable among these was The Wisconsin: River of a Thousand Isles , published in 1942. The work was one in a series entitled "The Rivers of America", conceived by writer Constance Lindsay Skinner during the Great Depression as a series that would connect Americans to their heritage through the history of the great rivers of

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1716-512: The Sac Prairie Saga is a series of quasi-autobiographical short stories known as the "Gus Elker Stories", amusing tales of country life that Peter Ruber , Derleth's last editor, said were "...models of construction and...fused with some of the most memorable characters in American literature." Most were written between 1934 and the late 1940s, though the last, "Tail of the Dog", was published in 1959 and won

1794-525: The Scholastic Magazine short story award for the year. The series was collected and republished in Country Matters in 1996. Walden West , published in 1961, is considered by many Derleth's finest work. This prose meditation is built out of the same fundamental material as the series of Sac Prairie journals, but is organized around three themes: "the persistence of memory...the sounds and odors of

1872-470: The State Journal , a paper that had been a supporter of the progressive Robert La Follette , whom Evjue considered a hero. When La Follette began publicly opposing World War I, the pro-war State Journal abandoned La Follette. In response, Evjue abandoned the State Journal and formed his own newspaper, The Capital Times , one that would reflect the progressive views he espoused. The newspaper's motto

1950-478: The University of Wisconsin , where he received a B.A. in 1930. During this time he also served briefly as associate editor of Minneapolis-based Fawcett Publications Mystic Magazine . Returning to Sauk City in the summer of 1931, Derleth worked in a local canning factory and collaborated with childhood friend Mark Schorer (later Chairman of the University of California, Berkeley English Department). They rented

2028-458: The speculative fiction genre. It has been called "the official fictional religion of fantasy, science fiction, and horror, a grab bag for writers in need of unthinkably vast, and unthinkably indifferent, eldritch entities". Sollasina cthulhu , an extinct ophiocistioid echinoderm , is named after the Cthulhu Mythos. The Capital Times The Capital Times (or Cap Times )

2106-414: The "Dunsanian" (written in a similar style as Lord Dunsany ), " Arkham " (occurring in Lovecraft's fictionalized New England setting), and "Cthulhu" (the cosmic tales) cycles. Writer Will Murray noted that while Lovecraft often used his fictional pantheon in the stories he ghostwrote for other authors, he reserved Arkham and its environs exclusively for those tales he wrote under his own name. Although

2184-509: The American Novel , "What Mr. Derleth has that is lacking...in modern novelists generally, is a country. He belongs. He writes of a land and a people that are bone of his bone and flesh of his flesh. In his fictional world, there is a unity much deeper and more fundamental than anything that can be conferred by an ideology. It is clear, too, that he did not get the best, and most fictionally useful, part of his background material from research in

2262-606: The American writers of distinction." Derleth's first novel, Still is the Summer Night , was published two years later by the famous Charles Scribners' editor Maxwell Perkins , and was the second in his Sac Prairie Saga. Village Year , the first in a series of journals – meditations on nature, Midwestern village American life, and more – was published in 1941 to praise from The New York Times Book Review : "A book of instant sensitive responsiveness...recreates its scene with acuteness and beauty, and makes an unusual contribution to

2340-458: The Americana of the present day." The New York Herald Tribune observed that "Derleth...deepens the value of his village setting by presenting in full the enduring natural background; with the people projected against this, the writing comes to have the quality of an old Flemish picture, humanity lively and amusing and loveable in the foreground and nature magnificent beyond." James Grey, writing in

2418-893: The Attic", "Witches' Hollow", or "The Shuttered Room"), but often the hero is doomed (e.g., "The House in the Valley", "The Peabody Heritage", "Something in Wood"), as in Lovecraft. And it must be remembered that an occasional Lovecraftian hero does manage to overcome the odds, e.g., in "The Horror in the Museum", "The Shunned House", and 'The Case of Charles Dexter Ward'. Derleth also treated Lovecraft's Great Old Ones as representatives of elemental forces, creating new fictional entities to flesh out this framework. Such debates aside, Derleth's founding of Arkham House and his successful effort to rescue Lovecraft from literary oblivion are widely acknowledged by practitioners in

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2496-516: The Earth and have since fallen into a deathlike sleep. While these monstrous deities were present in almost all of Lovecraft's published work (his second short story " Dagon ", published in 1919, is considered the start of the Mythos), the first story to really expand the pantheon of Great Old Ones and its themes is " The Call of Cthulhu ", which was published in 1928. Lovecraft broke with other pulp writers of

2574-695: The Foundation's history, proceeds from Evjue's bequest "must go to organizations that best exemplify the beliefs that he championed during his lifetime, causes that could improve the quality of life for all the people in the Dane County area." Accordingly, this bequest (initially valued at $ 13,450) makes the Evjue Foundation a major shareholder of The Capital Times Company. The foundation has donated more than $ 70 million since its inception. On February 7, 2008, with The Capital Times facing declining circulation (

2652-508: The Mythos by including any passing reference to another author's story elements by Lovecraft as part of the genre. Just as Lovecraft made passing reference to Clark Ashton Smith's Book of Eibon , Derleth in turn added Smith's Ubbo-Sathla to the Mythos. Derleth also attempted to connect the deities of the Mythos to the four elements (air, earth, fire, and water), creating new beings representative of certain elements in order to legitimize his system of classification. He created "Cthugha" as

2730-460: The Mythos was not formalized or acknowledged between them, Lovecraft did correspond, meet in person, and share story elements with other contemporary writers including Clark Ashton Smith , Robert E. Howard , Robert Bloch , Frank Belknap Long , Henry Kuttner , Henry S. Whitehead , and Fritz Leiber —a group referred to as the "Lovecraft Circle". For example, Robert E. Howard's character Friedrich Von Junzt reads Lovecraft's Necronomicon in

2808-409: The Mythos. Authors of Lovecraftian horror in particular frequently use elements of the Cthulhu Mythos. In his essay "H. P. Lovecraft and the Cthulhu Mythos", Robert M. Price described two stages in the development of the Cthulhu Mythos. Price called the first stage the "Cthulhu Mythos proper". This stage was formulated during Lovecraft's lifetime and was subject to his guidance. The second stage

2886-455: The UK). Derleth was also a leading American regional writer of his day, as well as prolific in several other genres, including historical fiction , poetry , detective fiction , science fiction , and biography . Notably, he created the fictional detective Solar Pons , a pastiche of Arthur Conan Doyle 's Sherlock Holmes . A 1938 Guggenheim Fellow , Derleth considered his most serious work to be

2964-570: The ambitious Sac Prairie Saga , a series of fiction, historical fiction, poetry, and non-fiction naturalist works designed to memorialize life in the Wisconsin he knew. Derleth can also be considered a pioneering naturalist and conservationist in his writing. The son of William Julius Derleth and Rose Louise Volk, Derleth grew up in Sauk City, Wisconsin . He was educated in local parochial and public high school. Derleth wrote his first fiction at age 13. He

3042-547: The central character. Derleth wrote many and varied children's works, including biographies meant to introduce younger readers to explorer Jacques Marquette , as well as Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau . Arguably most important among his works for younger readers, however, is the Steve and Sim Mystery Series, also known as the Mill Creek Irregulars series. The ten-volume series, published between 1958 and 1970,

3120-491: The company derived from Lovecraft's fictional town of Arkham , Massachusetts , which features in many of his stories. In 1939, Arkham House published The Outsider and Others , a huge collection that contained most of Lovecraft's known short stories. Derleth and Wandrei soon expanded Arkham House and began a regular publishing schedule after its second book, Someone in the Dark , a collection of some of Derleth's own horror stories,

3198-454: The country...and Thoreau's observation that the 'mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation. ' " A blend of nature writing, philosophic musings, and careful observation of the people and place of "Sac Prairie". Of this work, George Vukelich, author of "North Country Notebook", writes: "Derleth's Walden West is...the equal of Sherwood Anderson's Winesburg,Ohio , Thornton Wilder's Our Town , and Edgar Lee Masters' Spoon River Anthology ." This

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3276-411: The funding from his Guggenheim Fellowship to bind his comic book collection, most recently valued in the millions of dollars, rather than to travel abroad as the award intended.). Derleth's true avocation , however, was hiking the terrain of his native Wisconsin lands, and observing and recording nature with an expert eye. Derleth once wrote of his writing methods, "I write very swiftly, from 750,000 to

3354-462: The genre. While Derleth considered his work in this genre less important than his most serious literary efforts, the compilers of these four anthologies, including Ramsey Campbell, note that the stories still resonate after more than 50 years. In 2009, The Library of America selected Derleth's story The Panelled Room for inclusion in its two-century retrospective of American Fantastic Tales. Derleth also wrote many historical novels, as part of both

3432-415: The horror field as seminal events in the field. For instance, Ramsey Campbell has acknowledged Derleth's encouragement and guidance during the early part of his own writing career, and Kirby McCauley has cited Derleth and Arkham House as an inspiration for his own anthology Dark Forces . Arkham House and Derleth published Dark Carnival , the first book by Ray Bradbury , as well. Brian Lumley cites

3510-482: The idea that the Cthulhu Mythos essentially represented a struggle between good and evil. Derleth is credited with creating the "Elder Gods". He stated: As Lovecraft conceived the deities or forces of his mythos, there were, initially, the Elder Gods.... These Elder Gods were benign deities, representing the forces of good, and existed peacefully...very rarely stirring forth to intervene in the unceasing struggle between

3588-664: The importance of Derleth to his own Lovecraftian work, and contends in a 2009 introduction to Derleth's work that he was "...one of the first, finest, and most discerning editors and publishers of macabre fiction." Important as was Derleth's work to rescue H.P. Lovecraft from literary obscurity at the time of Lovecraft's death, Derleth also built a body of horror and spectral fiction of his own; still frequently anthologized. The best of this work, recently reprinted in four volumes of short stories – most of which were originally published in Weird Tales , illustrates Derleth's original abilities in

3666-460: The interest of privacy according to Litersky), and no evidence or acknowledgement of Derleth having a bisexual or homosexual orientation has ever been found in his personal correspondence. Derleth wrote more than 150 short stories and more than 100 books during his lifetime. Derleth wrote an expansive series of novels, short stories, journals, poems, and other works about Sac Prairie . Derleth intended this series to comprise up to 50 novels telling

3744-453: The journey and see his particular Avalon: The Wisconsin River shining among its islands, and the castles of Baron Pierneau and Hercules Dousman. He is a champion and a justification of regionalism. Yet he is also a burly, bounding, bustling, self-confident, opinionated, and highly-sweatered young man with faults so grievous that a melancholy perusal of them may be of more value to apprentices than

3822-608: The key to the origin of the 'Derleth Mythos'. For in At the Mountains of Madness is shown the history of a conflict between interstellar races, first among them the Elder Ones and the Cthulhu-spawn." Derleth said Lovecraft wished for other authors to actively write about the Mythos as opposed to it being a discrete plot device within Lovecraft's own stories. Derleth expanded the boundaries of

3900-566: The library; like Scott, in his Border novels, he gives, rather, the impression of having drunk it in with his mother's milk." Jim Stephens, editor of An August Derleth Reader , (1992), argues: "what Derleth accomplished....was to gather a Wisconsin mythos which gave respect to the ancient fundament of our contemporary life." The author inaugurated the Sac Prairie Saga with four novellas comprising Place of Hawks , published by Loring & Mussey in 1935. At publication, The Detroit News wrote: "Certainly with this book Mr. Derleth may be added to

3978-456: The mid-1930s, Derleth organized a Ranger's Club for young people, served as clerk and president of the local school board , served as a parole officer, organized a local men's club and a parent-teacher association . He also lectured in American regional literature at the University of Wisconsin and was a contributing editor of Outdoors Magazine . With longtime friend Donald Wandrei , Derleth founded Arkham House in 1939. Its initial objective

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4056-404: The nation. Skinner wanted the series to be written by artists, not academicians. Derleth, while not a trained historian, was, according to former Wisconsin state historian William F. Thompson , "...a very competent regional historian who based his historical writing upon research in the primary documents and who regularly sought the help of professionals... ." In the foreword to the 1985 reissue of

4134-595: The newspaper had a circulation of over 10,000 and the advertising boycott ended. In November 1927, the paper launched a Sunday edition. During the 1920s, The Capital Times co-owned the left-leaning magazine The Progressive along with the La Follette family. Fierce competition continued between the Wisconsin State Journal and The Capital Times until 1948 when the newspapers could not afford to replace their aging equipment. After years of attempting to scoop each other and competing for advertising and circulation,

4212-443: The newspapers entered into consolidation talks in the hope of maintaining both newspapers. After tense negotiations, Lee Enterprises , owner of the Wisconsin State Journal , and Evjue's Capital Times Company formed Madison Newspapers, Inc. (now Capital Newspapers ) on November 15, 1948, to operate both newspapers under joint agency . On February 1, 1949, the Wisconsin State Journal moved from afternoons to mornings and became

4290-441: The philosophy of cosmic indifferentism and believed in a purposeless, mechanical, and uncaring universe. Human beings, with their limited faculties, can never fully understand this universe, and the cognitive dissonance caused by this revelation leads to insanity, in his view. There have been attempts at categorizing this fictional group of beings. Phillip A. Schreffler argues that by carefully scrutinizing Lovecraft's writings,

4368-517: The post-World War I era, in the decades of the 1920s and 1930s. Though Derleth never wrote a Pons novel to equal The Hound of the Baskervilles , editor Peter Ruber wrote that "Derleth" produced more than a few Solar Pons stories almost as good as Sir Arthur's, and many that had better plot construction." Although these stories were a form of diversion for Derleth, Ruber, who edited The Original Text Solar Pons Omnibus Edition (2000), argued: "Because

4446-571: The powers of evil and the races of Earth. These powers of evil were variously known as the Great Old Ones or the Ancient Ones.... Price said the basis for Derleth's system is found in Lovecraft: "Was Derleth's use of the rubric 'Elder Gods' so alien to Lovecraft's in At the Mountains of Madness ? Perhaps not. In fact, this very story, along with some hints from "The Shadow over Innsmouth", provides

4524-569: The projected life-story of the region from the 19th century onwards, with analogies to Balzac 's Human Comedy and Proust 's Remembrance of Things Past . This, and other early work by Derleth, made him a well-known figure among the regional literary figures of his time: early Pulitzer Prize winners Hamlin Garland and Zona Gale , as well as Sinclair Lewis, the last both an admirer and critic of Derleth. As Edward Wagenknecht wrote in Cavalcade of

4602-491: The series, The Moon Tenders , does, in fact, involve a rafting adventure down the Wisconsin River , which led regional writer Jesse Stuart to suggest the novel was one that "older people might read to recapture the spirit and dream of youth." The connection to the Sac Prairie Saga was noted by the Chicago Tribune : "Once again a small midwest community in 1920s is depicted with perception, skill, and dry humor." Derleth

4680-572: The short story "The Children of the Night" (1931), and in turn Lovecraft mentions Howard's Unaussprechlichen Kulten in the stories "Out of the Aeons" ( 1935 ) and "The Shadow Out of Time" ( 1936 ). Many of Howard's original unedited Conan stories also involve parts of the Cthulhu Mythos. Price denotes the second stage's commencement with August Derleth, with the principal difference between Lovecraft and Derleth being Derleth's use of hope and development of

4758-523: The sole newspaper published on Sunday in the partnership. The Capital Times continued to publish on weekday afternoons and Saturday mornings. Following the death of its founder, William T. Evjue, in 1970, his controlling interest in The Capital Times Company was transferred to The Evjue Foundation, established a few years earlier to make small donations to worthy causes. As explained in a section of The Capital Times ' website devoted to

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4836-471: The spirit and atmosphere with as much fidelity?" Queen adds, "his choice of the euphonic Solar Pons is an appealing addition to the fascinating lore of Sherlockian nomenclature." Vincent Starrett, in his foreword to the 1964 edition of The Casebook of Solar Pons , wrote that the series is "as sparkling a galaxy of Sherlockian pastiches as we have had since the canonical entertainments came to an end." Despite close similarities to Doyle's creation, Pons lived in

4914-418: The stories were generally of such high quality, they ought to be assessed on their own merits as a unique contribution in the annals of mystery fiction, rather than suffering comparison as one of the endless imitators of Sherlock Holmes." Some of the stories were self-published, through a new imprint called " Mycroft & Moran ", an appellation of humorous significance to Holmesian scholars. For approximately

4992-413: The time by having his main characters' minds deteriorate when afforded a glimpse of what exists outside their perceived reality. He emphasized the point by stating in the opening sentence of the story that "The most merciful thing in the world, I think, is the inability of the human mind to correlate all its contents." Writer Dirk W. Mosig noted that Lovecraft was a "mechanistic materialist" who embraced

5070-553: The title of editor and today is editor and publisher. Dave Zweifel became editor emeritus; Zweifel had been with the paper since 1962 and editor since 1983. While The Cap Times is vigorously progressive in its editorial voice, there is a firm demarcation between its opinion voices and its news reporters and editors. The two parts act separately. Since 2015, the Cap Times has hosted regular community events featuring live discussions about public affairs and cultural topics. Cap Times Talks,

5148-537: The work by The University of Wisconsin Press , Thompson concluded: "No other writer, of whatever background or training, knew and understood his particular 'corner of the earth' better than August Derleth." Additionally, Derleth wrote a number of volumes of poetry. Three of his collections – Rind of Earth (1942), Selected Poems (1944), and The Edge of Night (1945) – were published by the Decker Press , which also printed

5226-423: The work of other Midwestern poets such as Edgar Lee Masters . Derleth was also the author of several biographies of other writers, including Zona Gale , Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau . Cthulhu Mythos Richard L. Tierney , a writer who also wrote Mythos tales, later applied the term "Derleth Mythos" to distinguish Lovecraft's works from Derleth's later stories, which modify key tenets of

5304-581: Was a correspondent and friend of H. P. Lovecraft – when Lovecraft wrote about "le Comte d'Erlette" in his fiction , it was in homage to Derleth. Derleth invented the term "Cthulhu Mythos" to describe the fictional universe depicted in the series of stories shared by Lovecraft and other writers in his circle. When Lovecraft died in 1937, Derleth and Donald Wandrei assembled a collection of Lovecraft's stories and tried to get them published. Existing publishers showed little interest, so Derleth and Wandrei founded Arkham House in 1939 for that purpose. The name of

5382-781: Was a series of 70 stories in affectionate pastiche of Sherlock Holmes , whose creator, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle , he admired greatly. The stories feature a Holmes-styled British detective named Solar Pons , of 7B Praed Street in London. These included one published novel as well ( Mr. Fairlie's Final Journey ). The series was greatly admired by such notable writers and critics of mystery and detective fiction as Ellery Queen ( Frederic Dannay ), Anthony Boucher , Vincent Starrett , and Howard Haycraft . In his 1944 volume The Misadventures of Sherlock Holmes , Ellery Queen wrote of Derleth's "The Norcross Riddle", an early Pons story: "How many budding authors, not even old enough to vote, could have captured

5460-409: Was and continues to be "Wisconsin's Progressive Newspaper." Rumors were spread that the new newspaper was editorially pro-German because of Evjue's support for the anti-war La Follette. As a result, shortly after publishing the first issue, The Capital Times faced an advertising boycott . Evjue, resolved to beat the boycott, visited nearby communities selling $ 1 subscriptions. By the summer of 1919,

5538-677: Was essentially his own fiction; S. T. Joshi refers to the "posthumous collaborations" as marking the beginning of "perhaps the most disreputable phase of Derleth's activities". Dirk W. Mosig , S. T. Joshi, and Richard L. Tierney were dissatisfied with Derleth's invention of the term Cthulhu Mythos (Lovecraft himself used Yog-Sothothery ) and his presentation of Lovecraft's fiction as having an overall pattern reflecting Derleth's own Christian world view, which they contrast with Lovecraft's depiction of an amoral universe. However, Robert M. Price points out that while Derleth's tales are distinct from Lovecraft's in their use of hope and his depiction of

5616-460: Was followed eight years later by Return to Walden West , a work of similar quality, but with a more noticeable environmentalist edge to the writing, notes critic Norbert Blei . A close literary relative of the Sac Prairie Saga was Derleth's Wisconsin Saga , which comprises several historical novels. Detective fiction represented another substantial body of Derleth's work. Most notable among this work

5694-434: Was guided by August Derleth who, in addition to publishing Lovecraft's stories after his death, attempted to categorize and expand the Mythos. An ongoing theme in Lovecraft's work is the complete irrelevance of mankind in the face of the cosmic horrors that apparently exist in the universe. Lovecraft made frequent references to the " Great Old Ones ", a loose pantheon of ancient, powerful deities from space who once ruled

5772-677: Was interested most in reading, and he made three trips to the library a week. He would save his money to buy books (his personal library exceeded 12,000 volumes later on in life). Some of his biggest influences were Ralph Waldo Emerson 's essays, Walt Whitman , H. L. Mencken 's The American Mercury , Samuel Johnson 's The History of Rasselas, Prince of Abissinia , Alexandre Dumas , Edgar Allan Poe , Walter Scott , and Henry David Thoreau 's Walden . Forty rejected stories and three years later, according to anthologist Jim Stephens, he sold his first story, "Bat's Belfry", to Weird Tales magazine in 1926. Derleth wrote throughout his four years at

5850-537: Was later republished in Crypt of Cthulhu #32 (1985). In applying the elemental theory to beings that function on a cosmic scale (e.g., Yog-Sothoth ) some authors created a fifth element that they termed aethyr . A number of fictional cults dedicated to "malevolent supernatural entities" appear in the Cthulhu Mythos, the loosely connected series of horror stories written by Lovecraft and other writers inspired by his creations. These fictional cults have in some ways taken on

5928-523: Was never a static system but rather a sort of aesthetic construct that remained ever adaptable to its creator's developing personality and altering interests.... There was never a rigid system that might be posthumously appropriated..... The essence of the mythos lies not in a pantheon of imaginary deities nor in a cobwebby collection of forgotten tomes, but rather in a certain convincing cosmic attitude. Price said Lovecraft's writings could at least be divided into categories and identified three distinct themes:

6006-421: Was published in 1941. Following Lovecraft's death, Derleth wrote a number of stories based on fragments and notes left by Lovecraft. These were published in Weird Tales and later in book form, under the byline "H. P. Lovecraft and August Derleth", with Derleth calling himself a "posthumous collaborator". This practice has raised objections in some quarters that Derleth simply used Lovecraft's name to market what

6084-517: Was to publish the works of H. P. Lovecraft, with whom Derleth had corresponded since his teenage years. At the same time, he began teaching a course in American Regional Literature at the University of Wisconsin. In 1941, he became literary editor of The Capital Times newspaper in Madison , a post he held until his resignation in 1960. His hobbies included fencing, swimming, chess, philately and comic-strips (Derleth reportedly used

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