China Mieville on H.P. Lovecraft’s The Horror Of Red Hook

SFFaudio Online Audio

A short video of city lover China Mieville talking about H.P. Lovecraft’s The Horror Of Red Hook (which is set in New York City). Lovecraft didn’t like living in NYC.

Lovecraft spelled out his inspiration for The Horror At Red Hook in a letter to Clark Ashton Smith:

“The idea that black magic exists in secret today, or that hellish antique rites still exist in obscurity, is one that I have used and shall use again. When you see my new tale The Horror at Red Hook, you will see what use I make of the idea in connexion with the gangs of young loafers & herds of evil-looking foreigners that one sees everywhere in New York.” -from H. P. Lovecraft, Selected Letters Vol. 2

Lovecraft’s wife, Sonia Greene, wrote of her husband’s xenophobia:

“Whenever we found ourselves in the racially mixed crowds which characterize New York, Howard would become livid with rage. He seemed almost to lose his mind.”
-From Lovecraft: A Look Behind the Cthulhu Mythos

And here is a reading of the story itself…

Weird Tales January 1927The Horror Of Red Hook
By H.P. Lovecraft; Read by April Sadowski
1 |MP3| – Approx. 45 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]
Podcaster: Broken Sea Audio Productions
Podcast: October 2008
Red Hook is a mysterious slum in New York City, full of gangs, crime, and just perhaps a terrible cult. Detective Malone had a case that had tendrils extending into Red Hook. It seems that one Robert Suydam, a corpulent and scruffy recluse, has been looking younger, more radiant and prosperous. What does that have to do with the recent spate of kidnappings? First published in the January 1927 issue of Weird Tales.

[via Monster Rally, Ominvoracious, Wikipedia and BSAP]

Posted by Jesse Willis

Eldritch Dark: Clark Ashton Smith audio

SFFaudio Online Audio

Eldritch Dark - The Sanctum of Clark Ashton SmithBoyd Pearson’s Eldritch Dark is a website dedicated to Weird Tales author Clark Ashton Smith. Pearson calls Smith: “one of the greatest and least recognized literary talents of the 20th century.” Personally I’ve not read a word by the man – but, I may get around to it later this summer.

Pearson list some suggested readings for Smith virgins. It includes:

* Nyctalops (Poem) |MP3|

* The City of the Singing Flame (Short Story) |7 MP3s|

* The Hashish Eater -or- The Apocalypse of Evil (Poem) |7 MP3s|

I’m confident that some enterprising SFFaudio reader will make suitable HuffDuffer feeds out of some of these or the many other files found on the Eldritch Dark’s Spoken Word sub-page. Hint! Hint! Hint!

And please, whoever does it, can you kindly post links to those feeds into the comments section? We’ll all be the richer for it!

Posted by Jesse Willis

Starship Sofa podcast talks about Science Fiction’s authors and author/editors

SFFaudio Online Audio

Starship Sofa PodcastTony and Ciaran’s Starship Sofa podcast is chugging along, talking about Science Fiction in literate hour (or so) long chats. Below we’ve linked to the latest author and author/editor shows but you’ll also find email shows, shows on TV programmes and movies, a couple Christmas specials and even a theme show on religion in Science Fiction in their podcast feed. And if you surf over tho their website you’ll find the links to their older episodes too!

Recent shows author and author/editor shows:

Show #32: Classic Author: Jack Vance |MP3|
Show #33: Classic Author: Clark Ashton Smith |MP3|
Show #34: Classic Author: H.G. Wells |MP3|
Show #35: Classic Author: Charles Beaumont |MP3|
Show #37: Classic Author/Editor: John W. Campbell |MP3|
Show #38: Classic Author: Harry Harrison |MP3|
Show #39: Classic Author: Kurt Vonnegut Jr. |MP3|
Show #40: Classic Author/Editor: Frederick Pohl |MP3|
Show #41: Classic Author: Damon Knight |MP3|

To subscribe to the Starship Sofa podcast plug this feed into your podcatcher:

http://starshipsofa.libsyn.com/rss