Friday, December 28, 2007

T Peter Park's recollection of 1958 Fresco Seminar Booklet

I myself ordered a copy of that 1958 HPL issue of FRESCO a long, long time ago, back in 1959 or 1960, after seeing it advertised or reviewed in one of the science-fiction magazines at the time. I know I had it and often referred to it for many years, but I have no idea where it might now be amongst all my old books, papers, and magazines. David H. Keller's "Shadows Over Lovecraft." I remember, was a rather thorough inquiry into HPL's medical history, concluding that HPL probably did not contract hereditary syphilis or paresis from his father, and noting that HPL was finally felled by two real-life demons never mentioned in his stories--cancer and Bright's Disease. Samuel Loveman's "Lovecraft As a Conversationalist," I think, might have described the only time in his life when HPL got slightly tipsy, as a result of somebody at a party surreptitiously slipping some booze into his Coke or iced tea. Loveman's essay, too, I recall, mentioned HPL's Latinate nickname for him, "Samuelus."

{The mention of Bright's disease by Keller clears up a big mystery for me. Sam Moskowitz, in a preface of an anthology, mentioned this and I never knew where the idea came from. - CP}

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