Lovecraft and Houdini: Speculation

Fear not, Gentle Readers, Chrispy is still mulling over and searching for new tidbits on Lovecraft, Houdini, and whether HPL was an active or passive means for Houdini tobreak the tethers of spiritualists.

Houdini did not go after Mom and Pop spiritualists. He seemed to feel that they were misguided, but relatively harmless. Maybe Houdini would have chuckled at Art Bell and George Noory's nightly revelations ? However, he was furious at "Spiritualists" who bilked people out of millions by preying on their need to have closure with departed loved ones. These were literally crime rings, and suckered in luminaries and commoners alike. To those Houdini (and Lovecraft) had nothing but hate and a lust to destroy and undo.

I think we have seen that Lovecraft, through Henneberger and maybe Eddy, had several years of contact with Houdini. The climax was a major expose The Cancer of Superstition. This was an Eddy commission, but Houdini had to have seen the power of Lovecraft (already the whispers of "the new Poe" had started) on a book of this magnitude. In fact, had Houdini lived and the book published, Lovecraft could have been catipulted to the fame he deserved in his lifetime. It certainly would have been a New York Times best seller, and the men associated with it would have been rewarded, Houdini was generous to his friends as to a fault.

I think that HPL was a passive and not an active means to Houdini's end - at least I do not yet see a smoking gun.

OK, well leave it there for now. Stay tuned, I have much more to copy for you to read.