The Dark Eidolon and Other Fantasies (45 page)

2
. For Thule, see note
3
to “Ubbo-Sathla”; for Mu, see note
2
to “The Uncharted Isle.”

3
. For Lemuria, see note
1
to “The Tale of Satampra Zeiros.”

4
. HPL had queried CAS as to the apparent redundancy of the phrase
volumes and books,
to which CAS replied: “This was a deliberate Latinism, since I used
volumes
in the very special sense of
rolls
or
scrolls
” (letter to HPL, [c. early April
1932
];
SL
175
).

THE MAZE OF THE ENCHANTER

This story was written in September
1932
; it was originally titled “The Maze of Mool Dweb.” CAS thought highly of the story but was not sanguine about its chances of acceptance by Farnsworth Wright of
Weird Tales:
“[the story] is ultra-fantastic, full-hued and ingenious, with an extra twist or two in the tail for luck. Probably, however, he [Wright] will think the style too involved for the semi-illiterates to whom he is catering” (letter to August Derleth, September
11
,
1932
;
SL
188
). CAS was right; Wright rejected the story because it was “too poetic and finely phrased” (letter to August Derleth, September
20
,
1932
;
SL
190
). CAS then sent it to the
Argosy,
but it was rejected. He contemplated retitling it “The Enchanter's Maze” and renaming the protagonist as Maal Dweb. Ultimately he titled it “The Maze of the Enchanter” and published it in
The Double Shadow and Other Fantasies
(
1933
). This version was anthologized in
Today's Literature,
ed. Dudley Chadwick Gordon, Vernon Rupert King, and William Whittingham Lyman (New York: American Book Co.,
1935
). But CAS still hoped for professional publication of the story. In
1937
he radically rewrote it, cutting out about one thousand words and toning down much of the exotic language; he then submitted it to
Esquire,
which published the occasional weird tale (his friend Donald Wandrei had landed some stories there), but editor Arnold Gingrich rejected it. Finally,
Weird Tales
accepted this abridged version and published it as “The Maze of Maal Dweb”; this version was reprinted in
OST.
The present text (reprinted from
CF
4
) follows that of
The Double Shadow and Other Fantasies.

1
.
odalisque:
a female slave or concubine in an Ottoman harem. The term is French and derived from the Turkish
odalik.

2
. In Greek myth, Laocoön was a Trojan priest who warned his people about accepting the Trojan horse presented as a gift by the Greeks. In Virgil's
Aeneid,
he utters the memorable line:
Timeo Danaos et dona ferentes
(
2
.
49
; “I fear the Greeks, even when bearing gifts”). In vengeance, one of the Greek gods (either Athena or Apollo or Poseidon) sent two serpents from the sea to kill Laocoön and his two sons. CAS's wording evokes the celebrated Roman sculpture, “Laocoon and His Sons” (circa
25
BCE
; now in the Vatican), depicting Laocoön and his sons wrestling painfully with the serpents.

3
.
gamboge-yellow:
gamboge is a resin found in trees of the genus
Garcinia.
It is used to produce a saffron-colored dye, chiefly used for the robes of Buddhist monks.

4
. By capitalizing the word, CAS appears to refer to the Roman god Terminus, who protected boundary markers. These boundary markers (
termini
) were frequently topped with a bust of the god.

GENIUS LOCI

This story was completed on September
26
,
1932
. CAS was dubious as to its sales potential: after outlining the plot in detail, he wrote to August Derleth (September
28
,
1932
): “It was all damnably hard to do, and I am not certain of my success. I am even less certain of being able to sell it to any editor—it will be too subtle for the pulps, and the highbrows won't like the supernatural element. Oh, hell . . .” (
SL
192
). But in fact, Farnsworth Wright of
Weird Tales
accepted it readily, and it appeared in the June
1933
issue. It was subsequently reprinted in
GL
and
CF
4
.

CAS apparently drew on actual folklore in conceiving the quasi-vampiric qualities of the genius loci (Latin for the “spirit of the place”). In one of his favorite books, Montague Summers's
The Vampire: His Kith and Kin
(
1928
), we find the following: “In [China] wills-o'-the-wisp are thought to be an unmistakeable sign of a place where much blood has been shed . . . and all mists and gaseous marsh-lights are connected with the belief in vampires and spectres which convey disease. Since the effluvia, the vapour and haze from a swamp or quaggy ground are notoriously unhealthy and malarial fevers result in delirium and anaemia it may be that in some legends the disease has been personified as a ghastly creature who rides on the infected air and sucks the life from his victim” (New Hyde Park, NY: University Books,
1960
,
198
).

1
. Joaquin Sorolla y Bastida (
1863
–
1923
), Spanish painter of landscapes, portraits, and historical scenes.

2
. On CAS's attitude toward “material science,” see note
2
to “The City of the Singing Flame.” The letter quoted there continues as follows: “If ever I have the leisure and opportunity, I intend some first-hand investigation of obscure phenomena. Enough inexplicable things have happened in my own experience to make me wonder. I am pretty sure that I saw apparitions in my childhood; one instance remaining especially vivid in memory. The phantasm was that of a bowed and muffled woman, weeping or at least sorrow-stricken, which appeared one night in a corner of my bedroom in an old house which my parents had rented for several months. It certainly left an eerie impression. Another queer happening, of a totally different kind, occurred four or five years ago. A woman-friend and I were out walking one night in a lane near Auburn, when a dark, lightless and silent object passed over us against the stars with projectile-like speed. The thing was too large and swift for any bird, and gave precisely the effect of a
black
meteor. I have often wondered what it was” (
SL
236
–
37
).

THE DARK EIDOLON

This story was completed on December
23
,
1932
. A synopsis in the
Black Book
(item
10
) outlines the plot. CAS was proud of the result: “I have finished ‘The Dark Eidolon,' which ran upwards of
10
,
000
words, and have shipped it to [Farnsworth] Wright. It's a devil of a story, and if Wright knows his mandrakes, he certainly ought to take it on. If the thing could ever be filmed—and no doubt it could with a lot of trick photography—it might be a winner for diabolic drama and splendid infernal spectacles” (letter to August Derleth, December
24
,
1932
;
SL
198
). But Wright rejected the story, complaining that the latter third of the narrative was too drawn out. CAS made some unspecified revisions and cuts: he says only that the cuts “involved no sacrifice of incident, and really served to get rid of a few redundancies and leave more to the imagination” (letter to August Derleth, January
16
,
1933
; manuscript, Wisconsin Historical Society), but the resulting text is still in excess of ten thousand words. Wright accepted this version and published it in
Weird Tales
of January
1935
; it was reprinted in
OST
and
CF
4
. The original text does not appear to survive; the surviving typescript (JHL) is the revised text published by
Weird Tales.

1
. For Mu, see note
2
to “The Uncharted Isle.” For Poseidonis, see note
1
to “The Double Shadow.”

2
.
Canicule:
a variant of Canicula (“little dog”), an alternate name for Sirius, the brightest star in the constellation Canis Major.

3
. See note
1
to “The Maze of the Enchanter.”

4
. Naat is a region in Zothique discussed in the later tale “Necromancy in Naat” (
1935
;
CF
5
).

5
. An island that had earlier served as the setting for the tale “The Isle of the Torturers” (completed on July
31
,
1932
): “Uccastrog, which lay far to the east of Cyntrom, was commonly known as the Isle of the Torturers; and men said that all who landed upon it unaware, or were cast thither by the seas, were imprisoned by the inhabitants and were subjected later to unending curious tortures whose infliction formed the chief delight of these cruel beings” (
CF
5
.
67
).

6
.
guerdon:
reward, recompense. The archaic word was one much favored by GS in his poetry. See “The Guerdon of the Sun,” in
The House of Orchids and Other Poems
(
1911
).

7
. See note
1
to “The City of the Singing Flame.”

8
.
To pash
is an archaic verb meaning “to smash; to break into bits.”

9
. An
emmet
is an archaic term for an ant.

10
. CAS uses a succession of rare or archaic terms used in chemistry or alchemy: an
aludel
is a pear-shaped vessel; a
crucible
is a vessel made of a refractory substance and used for melting materials at high temperatures; an
athanor
is a digesting furnace used by alchemists; an
alembic
is an apparatus consisting of two vessels connected by a tube, and used for distillation.

11
.
leman:
an archaic term for a mistress or lover.

THE WEAVER IN THE VAULT

This was completed on March
15
,
1933
, but the genesis of the story may be much earlier. In early
1930
he mentioned a story idea titled “The Ghoul from Mercury” (letter to HPL, January
27
,
1930
;
SL
110
). A plot germ survives: “An entity like a gigantic fire-ball, from some alien planet, which devours the corpses in graveyards and morgues, and even breaks into the mummy-cases in museums” (
SS
156
). Later this idea was transferred to the realm of Zothique, as indicated in a plot synopsis in the
Black Book
(item
11
). The story was readily accepted by
Weird Tales,
where it appeared in the January
1934
issue, with an illustration by CAS. It was later reprinted in
GL
and
CF
4
.

1
.
syenite:
a coarse-grained igneous rock similar to granite.

2
.
fust:
the shaft of a column.

3
.
concamerated:
a word of two distinct meanings: either “arched or vaulted over” or “divided into rooms or chambers.” Probably the former meaning is intended here. See the later use of concameration (p.
204
).

XEETHRA

This story was begun in February
1934
and completed on March
21
. It is in some sense an elaboration of the prose poem “The Traveller” (
EC
), in which a “pilgrim” is on a quest to find “the city and the land of my former home.” A plot synopsis for “Xeethra” is found in the
Black Book
(item
34
), perhaps dating to
1932
. (Note also the epigraph to “The Dark Eidolon,” purporting to be from “The Song of Xeethra.”) The story was rejected by Farnsworth Wright of
Weird Tales
in early April
1934
, on the grounds that it was more a prose poem than a story. CAS, under the need to make an income from his stories, abridged the tale by about two thousand words, and this version landed with Wright, appearing in
Weird Tales
of December
1934
. It was subsequently reprinted in
LW
and
CF
5
. The present text derives from the original typescript, with some incorporation of apparently deliberate revisions from the revised typescript.

The story bears some resemblance to HPL's “The Quest of Iranon” (written in
1921
; first published in the
Galleon,
July/August
1935
). In that story, also set in a fantasy world, a “beggar's boy” named Iranon fancies himself a prince of Aira and undertakes an arduous quest to find that land; but when he comes upon an old acquaintance who makes it clear that Aira was merely a product of his wish-fulfillment fantasies, Iranon walks into a marsh and drowns himself. CAS asked HPL for the “re-loan” of the manuscript of “The Quest of Iranon” in April
1930
(
SL
111
) and reread the story in July.