Harold Farnese

A famous quote attributed to Lovecraft actually came from a letter by Farnese to August Derleth, "All my stories, unconnected as they may be, are based on the fundamental lore or legend that this world was inhabited at one time or another by another race who, in practising black magic, lost their foothold and were expelled, yet live on outside ever ready to take possession of this earth again." (1)

Harold Farnese (1885-1945) was a composer and, at the time of HPL's death, an Assistant Director of the Institute of Musical Art at Los Angeles wanted to set two of Lovecraft's Fungi from Yuggoth to music. These were Mirage and Elder Pharos. He'd seen them in Weird Tales February and March 1931.He did this, and then asked HPL to write the libretto of a musical drama - but HPL declined daunted at the task. (2)

Below is the Elegy For Lovecraft (1937) (3):

1. S T Joshi, H P Lovecraft In His Time: A Dreamer and A Visionary, Liverpool Press, 2001, p. 246.

2. Ibid. p. 321,3223.

3. Ebay offering, 2 January 2007.