Scans_Daily

If that was condescending, I apologize. That wasn't my intent.

My remarks were about not "shutting off" the brain. It is my opinion that cases like this must be approached with an open mind. If HPL was just some simple tract writer with an axe to grind, then you wouldn't be hearing from me about it. But it's not that simple.

You have to examine the books you read, the writers you love, the history behind them. The history of the era that gave birth to them. HPL for example had probably the darkest worldview you'd ever encounter. His entire life was wrapped in fatalism and nihilism. His entire worldview was rooted in fear. Fear of everything. The entire world was his "Other". Cloistered, sheltered and sick and almost completely disconnected from the human race. A sad, sick and brilliant man. Worthy of examination and thought.

And here's why. You say you have never read Lovecraft but in a way you have. He created and pushed so many of the tropes in sci-fi/horror/fiction that in the indirect way, you have read a lot of Lovecraft.

That's why the questions should never be settled, the discussion never cease and the book never stop being read.