“The most merciful thing in the world, I think, is the inability of the human mind to correlate all its contents. We live on a placid island of ignorance in the midst of black seas of infinity, and it was not meant that we should voyage far. The sciences, each straining in its own direction, have hitherto harmed us little; but some day the piecing together of dissociated knowledge will open up such terrifying vistas of reality, and of our frightful position therein, that we shall either go mad from the revelation or flee from the deadly light into the peace and safety of a new dark age.”
-H.P. Lovecraft, The Call of Cthulhu
At it’s very core, cosmicism is this quote. Cosmicism is a literary philosophy that consists of a number of bleak themes, most prominently the insignificance of humanity in the grand scheme of intergalactic existence. Does it seem to you, dear reader, like this theme is used heavily in the works of my beloved H.P. Lovecraft? Well it is, and that’s because he coined the term. Cosmicism didn’t exist before Lovecraft, and it is the reason I like his work so much. I am in love with this theme, and indeed this course is titled “Cosmic Horror in Writing and Music.” The stories that I read and watched this week I feel were a great way to be introduced to the topic.
First this week, I read The Call of Cthulhu by H.P. Lovecraft. The quote that I opened with is from this story, and indeed this story is his most famous. If any piece of the Cthulhu Mythos that Lovecraft created is common knowledge, it would be Cthulhu (depicted at the bottom of this post). It’s even named after Cthulhu. His image is iconic, terrifying, and inspiring to those with an interest in the horror genre. The Call of Cthulhu is an account written in first person by Francis Wayland Thurston, who has discovered the notes of his late uncle, George Gammell Angell. The story is told in three parts, and sees Thurston uncover and connect bits of terrifying information about a great terror that sleeps under the sea, destined to be awoken and to take over the world in an apocalyptic event. By piecing together information about creative types having similar disturbing dreams, different people’s knowledge of evil cults that worship strange idols depicting Cthulhu, and a newspaper article about a strange ship, Thurston realizes that Cthulhu was awake for a very brief period of time. The story ends with Thurston concerned for his safety, as he suspects that the deaths of his uncle and the lone survivor of the group of sailors that mistakenly woke Cthulhu up were not accidents, but assassinations by the evil Cthulhu Cult.
The story is heavily imbued with the theme of cosmicism. The quote from the start of this post is how the story begins, and the ending implies that when you go looking, you’ll find things that you aren’t supposed to which will ultimately lead to a realization that humans are insignificant creatures. An incredibly cohesive short story with very pronounced themes and detailed writing. A staple for anyone that is interested in the idea of cosmicism.
Secondly, I read The Library of Babel by Jorge Luis Borges. Though it is a supremely short story (about 10 pages in length), it is incredibly dense and filled with metaphor that requires some serious thought to make any sense. I found myself reading this story several times, but ultimately, I believe that I understand. The story is told in complete metaphor. The opening sentence is: “The universe (which others call the Library) is composed of an indefinite, perhaps infinite, number of hexagonal galleries, with enormous ventilation shafts in the middle, encircled by low railings.” Right away, you know that this story is completely separated from anything close to being grounded in reality. The story is written by a man that has lived a long life in the library and is about to die. He tells us many facts about the library. He says that humans (called librarians) used to be far more abundant, but suicide and disease has destroyed the population, and soon humans will be extinct (though the library will remain forever). He stresses constantly the fact that the library is composed of countless books, all of which are completely unique. Books are made up of a combination of 25 characters (a 22-letter alphabet, a space, a period, and a comma), and most are completely incomprehensible. Every time he brought it up I had to sit and think for a minute before I realized truly how massive the library would be if it contained every possible combination of characters in book form.
In the story, the narrator tells tales of many groups of people with different goals and their futile efforts to find meaning in the library. There are people that were given hope by the fact that somewhere out there, there is a book that contains the answer to the meaning that they have been trying to find. This is referred to as a person’s “vindication,” thought the narrator quickly points out that the likelihood of anyone finding a fully comprehensible book, let alone the one that they seek, is basically absolute 0. The story ultimately ends with this: “It is not illogical, I say, to think that the world is infinite. Those who judge it to be limited, postulate that in remote places the corridors and stairs and hexagons could conceivably cease-a manifest absurdity. Those who imagined it to be limitless forget that the possible number of books is limited. I dare insinuate the following solution to this ancient problem: The Library is limitless and periodic. If an eternal voyager were to traverse it in any direction, he would find, after many centuries, that the same volumes are repeated in the same disorder (which repeated, would constitute an order: Order itself). My solitude rejoices in this elegant hope.” It’s a heavy topic that basically can be directly applied to our knowledge of the vast emptiness of space. It is something I believe that every human thinks about at least a few times in their life, and it is a thought that has made me feel utterly small and insignificant. And that right there is cosmicism! A brilliant short story about the insignificance of the human race in the vastness of the library (the universe). It will be on my mind for weeks, if not months…
The film that I watched this week was The Void (2017). In a way, it is the only reason I’m watching films for this quarter. I was so interested in it, that I just had to make it a part of my academic curriculum. It’s a scary movie that exists in the same sphere as last weeks In the Mouth of Madness. It is another film that borrows so heavily from H.P. Lovecraft that it might as well be one of his stories, without actually being a direct adaptation of one. In fact, there are very few true adaptations of his work. It’s a strange phenomenon, and I’m sure there’s some reason for it, but I do not know it and that’s not the point. The point is, The Void is chalk full of spooky imagery, and its ambiguity about the eponymous void is what really causes the cosmicism to shine through. It is about a group of people that end up in a partially burnt out hospital at night as it becomes surrounded by a mysterious cult, cloaked in white robes with black triangles painted on the face. Scary things start happening, and as fate would have it, the head doctor in the hospital was the cult leader all along! He was so distraught about the death of his daughter, that he began to look for ways to bring her back. Supposedly this led him to the power of the void or whatever may lurk within.
The main cosmic takeaways, unlike the void itself, are not shrouded in much mystery, in fact they are the focus of the film. The focus of the film is that humans are generally unaware of the greater powers in the universe, and: “You’d be surprised at the things you find when you go looking…” This is a quote from the doctor/cult leader, that basically sums it up. The ending sees the main character and his wife both stranded in the dark, menacing landscape that is the void, with a giant, mysterious black pyramid hovering over their heads. The unsettling ambiguity really gets to me, and it’s why I’m such a fan of this particular theme.
This week, I have actually had some difficulty writing my song. Since cosmicism is fairly abstract, I found it difficult to write about without using a different horror theme as a frame to deliver the message. I wanted to refrain from doing that though, because I don’t want to take away ideas from my other weeks songs. That being said, I’m pretty sure I have it. Cosmicism is all about feeling small and horrifically insignificant. I had the idea to write a song as a conversation between some kind of alien, higher power, or demon and a foolish human that has summoned them in an attempt to harness power that they really don’t understand. Cosmicism also has a lot to do with the termination of those that learn too much, probably because death is scary to us as conscious beings, and death in a sense is the ultimate unknown. I have been trying my best to write this song, and while it may be late due to it being a little abstract, I am incredibly excited to finish it. I promise I won’t try to harness any ancient power to give me ideas though. Probably…
