The Fantastic Stories of August Derleth: 1926

This post is brought to you by The Book of the Black Sun II: The Book Collector by G. W. Thomas. Since H. P. Lovecraft and his friends played at the game that was the Cthulhu Myths, writers have wanted to put their own spin on the canon. G. W. Thomas does this by writing in a 1950s Noir style with his Book Collector stories. The first person narrative is not unfamiliar to Mythos fans, since many of the best stories were written as letters or other epistolary pieces, so Thomas is in good company. What makes these stories different is that each tale has a running clock. The Book Collector must find and retrieve a stolen or lost tome before his twenty-four hours are up. And that tome is always…The Book of the Black Sun.

I have found August Derleth’s work fascinating, even without the Lovecraft connection. He wrote over a hundred stories for Weird Tales. There are very few authors who can claim more — only Seabury Quinn. (For more on the most prolific writers in WT, go here.) Quinn and Derleth share more than big numbers. Both were fans of classic Horror authors and knew a thing or two about occult matters as a source for stories. While Quinn remained purely American, it is pretty obvious Augie Derleth wished he was English. So much of what he wrote, in Horror and his Solar Pons/Sherlock Holmes pastiches, exude a love of Britannia. (Lovecraft shared this Anglophilia, as well.)

I thought it might be fun to trace the entire scope of Derleth’s Horror works year by year. I attempted and rejected something of sort with Arthur J. Burks, but Burks proved to be too catholic in his genre choices. He was first and foremost a writer of airplane stories. Derleth, if you look at his output, is either a ghost story writer or a Mystery writer. In this way, Derleth may have been a bigger influence to me than Lovecraft was.

So let’s go to Sauk City, Wisconsin in the late 1920s to find a young man of seventeen selling his first story to Weird Tales. He isn’t working alone, for with his second sale he has become a partner in a duo. August Derleth and Marc R. Schorer sold their first collaboration in the same year, also to Weird Tales. The two would go onto write twenty-seven stories together. In Colonel Markesan and Less Pleasant People (1966) Derleth describes the office the two rented for their writing work:

…Though both our homes were in Sauk City, we chose not to work in them but to rent what had once been a summer cottage on the village’s main street, just north of the business section, in a relatively quiet zone on the west bank of the Wisconsin. Into this cottage we moved typewriters and all the paraphernalia incidental to writing…while it fronted on a thoroughfare constantly in movement, it opened at the rear upon tranquility itself — the Wisconsin flowing past, the hills of the moraine across the river to the east with grazing cattle to complete the pastoral scene.

The interior of the cottage was rather spare; it consisted primarily of one large room–the only room we used, which was furnished with two small tables, for our typewriters, two chairs, and a lounge for that one of us who tired first. The lounge, it must be admitted, was little used, though the windows to the east–and a little porch along the east wall–were very much in use for the day-dreaming so vital to the mood and conditions of creative work.

After this lengthy description, we learn how they worked together:

It was seldom necessary, as events turned out, to work side by side, for all that the project was a full-fledged collaboration. One of us found it wise to supplement his income by working part of the summer in the local canning factory, and write therefore in the evening hours of each day, when, for a brief time we were together long enough to plan the next day’s work. This was a long enough time to decide on theme and setting, for the method of work was this — the basic outline for each story was set down by Derleth, the entire first draft then written by Schorer, a final revision made by Derleth. Thus, when Mark Schorer came to write each morning (while Derleth was off to the factory), he found an outline for the day’s story beside the typewriter, and got to work writing that story–sometimes, in the case of a relatively short tale, in one day, sometimes in two or even three; when Derleth in turn showed up in these creative precincts each evening, he went over the manuscript, sometimes rewriting, sometimes simply retyping selected pages or paragraphs; and prepared the story for submission–usually to Weird Tales or Strange Tales, and rounded out the evening by outlining the next story to be done.

I have arranged stories by publication date, not necessarily writing date. For example, Derleth wrote “Mr. Ames’ Devil” in 1926 but it wouldn’t see print until Fantastic Adventures, August 1942. As this tale has more to do with Ray A. Palmer, the editor that bought it, we’ll discuss it in 1942.

Like many Weird Tales authors, Derleth wrote a few letters first before trying a submission. He had three in 1926, typical fan letters with comments on stories and issues. His love for the work of H. P. Lovecraft is evident from the very beginning.

Letter, February 1926 he asks for more Lovecraft and David Baxter (who?). He likes Frank Owen and Greye La Spina and wants more ghost stories. He specifically requests a reprint of Algernon Blackwood’s “The Willows”.

Letter, March 1926 this time as August Derleth Jr., AD picks Lovecraft’s “The Tomb” as number one in that issue. “The sheer beauty of words, without considering the excellent theme, in my estimation, is a second Poe.” (What more fitting words from the man who will publish Lovecraft in hard cover in 1939?) He also mentions Arthur J. Burks and H. G. Wells.

“Bat’s Belfry” (Weird Tales, May 1926), the first story, is a series of letter from Sir Harry Everett to his friend Marc (note the spelling!). Everett purchases a manor house in the English country and is charmed by its similarities to the setting of The Hound of the Baskervilles. (His first Holmesian reference!) In the house, which is named ‘Bat’s Belfry’, he discovers a trove of strange books from the previous owner, the Baronet Lohrville. Everett is interested in sorcery and witchcraft so he finds the sinister books to his liking. Lohrville’s reputation is dark, with hints that he may have taken and killed local children.

Sir Harry has two other men living with him: Mortimer (another Holmesian bit), his cook, and Leon, his valet. Mortimer complains of bats in the cellar. Later, the men discover that no light will remain lit in the dank chamber. Even a flashlight, which works, gives off poor light. But bats and lights are the least of their worries. The men begin having similar dreams about girls or an old man who kisses their neck for an hour at a time. They all feel ill the next day.

The next night, Leon, who is Catholic, puts holy water on his neck and is spared the nightmares. Unfortunately, he runs out of the liquid and later breaks his little vial, dooming the men to more nightmares. Mortimer runs away after seeing the ghostly old gentleman while awake. Leon flees too, leaving Everett to face the terrors alone. He does this armed with a copy of The Book of Thoth that he finds hidden under the last step into the cellar. He also discovers a chamber filled with the skeletons of children. Using the book, he prepares sorcerous spells to drive out and defeat the vampires. His bad luck, he forgets to draw a protective circle around himself first. His body is found the next day. The story finishes with Everett’s description of how the vampires attack and gorge on him.

Thus we get the first Lovecraftian death description that makes some readers giggle with the silliness of it. I always thought HPL did this first with “The Diary of Alonzo Typer” with William Lumley (Weird Tales, February 1938) but Derleth did it twelve years sooner. This is one of the drawbacks of epistolary writing, how to continue the narrative during the action. A more seasoned writer might have avoided this. This laughable narration hasn’t stopped the story from being reprinted over fifteen times. Not back for a first go. (Henry Kuttner would pull off a similar coup with his first tale, “The Graveyard Rats” (Weird Tales, March 1936).

Letter, June 1926, again Derleth champions Lovecraft, “The Outsider” this time. He says it is better than Poe, which he has read all of his works except his letters. Other writers like Ray Cummings sing similar praises. Derleth would have been happy to see HPL’s story was voted number one for that issue.

“The Elixir of Life” (Weird Tales, July 1926) with Marc R. Schorer is a short tale about a sorcerer, Messer Girolani, in Italy in the age of the Borgias, who needs one element to finish a potion of immortality. His customer Duke di Sforza is impatient. That ingredient is the blood of a child. Girolani sends his servant, Nara, to kill the first opportune child he comes across. Only after di Sforza takes the potion does he learn it is his own son.

“The Devil’s Pay” (Weird Tales, August 1926) with Marc R. Schorer is another Italian tale set in Naples. The Duke of Venice seeks out a magician, Messer Duca, to pay for some sorcery to kill a rival. The black magic works and the Duke pays with gold. The magician warns him that Satan will also have to be paid with a soul. Later, the Duke, in his moment of triumph, trips on his robe and falls, breaking his neck. Satan collects his price. This tale, like “the Marmoset” and “The Elixir of Life” feels almost like a conte cruel, though all have some elements of magic.

“The Marmoset” (Weird Tales, September 1926) with Marc R. Schorer feels similar to the last one, with a man, Como, going to the home of Messer Marri for revenge. The wizard’s pet marmoset disarms the man, and the wizard torments him by suggesting he will make him take poison. Como escapes as Marri intends, for he has lied about the poison. Messer Como has a second stiletto hidden in his vest. He throws it as he flees, pinning the marmoset to the Marri’s chest.

“The Coffin of Lissa” (Weird Tales, October 1926) is a first person narration about a man placed inside the torture device known as The Coffin of Lissa. We get first hand notes on rats chewing off fingers and a coffin lid that slowly descends. This was part of a series of tales at WT that featured torture, along with H. Warner Munn’s “The Chain” (Weird Tales, April 1928) and George Fielding Eliot’s “The Copper Bowl” (Weird Tales, December 1928). Derleth’s tale channels Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Pit and the Pendulum” (1842).

Conclusion

The only story here to receive an illustration was the first. This was because the 1926 stories tend to be very short “Five -Minute Stories” as they were called. Only “Bat’s Belfry” is longer than 2000 words. Shorter tales is a mark of a beginning writer, which Derleth and Schorer certainly were at this time. As they gain experience, their tales will get longer and receive more artwork.

1926 was a good start with a classic vampire tale and four shorter pieces. Derleth has plenty of room to expand his talents though he would not give up writing shorter pieces even into the 1950s. As he expressed in his first letter, he was a fan of traditional ghost stories, which are not long as a rule. At this stage he has yet to attempt an actual Lovecraftian pastiche. That won’t become common until after 1939, when he needed to market Arkham House by providing new tales of the Lovecraftian type. “Bat’s Belfry”, though it feels like a Mythos tale, is probably based more on M. R. James who would provide HPL with many of his narrative devices.

Next time…1927 and More Weird Tales

Mythos Horror at RAGE m a c h i n e