ON FOLKLORIC SOURCES OF “PICKMAN’S MODEL” BY H.P. LOVECRAFT

Authors

  • Mikhail F. Vasiliev St. Petersburg State University

Abstract

DOI 10.18522/1995-0640-2022-4-146-156

British lower mythology’s influence on H.P. Lovecraft works is understudied. Based on material from a short story “Pickman’s Model” we may trace a number of distinct isomorphisms between the “ghouls” in the story and the supernatural people of fairies in British folklore, such as stealing and changing babies, therianthropy, connections with netherworld and timelessness, social parasitism and links with the activity of witches. The last point is especially interesting in terms of M. Murray’s outdated anthropological theories, highly favoured by Lovecraft. Beyond that, the problems of horror poetics raised in the story harmoniously intertwine with fairies’ role as tutors and inspirers of art. Thus the choice of folkloric material is vital for the story’s goals and poetics.

Keywords: H.P. Lovecraft, M. Murray, horror, fairies, witches, folklore, mimesis

Author Biography

Mikhail F. Vasiliev , St. Petersburg State University

post-graduate student, Faculty of Philology, Department of the History of Foreign Literature

ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1961-4489

Published

2022-12-27

How to Cite

Vasiliev М. Ф. . (2022). ON FOLKLORIC SOURCES OF “PICKMAN’S MODEL” BY H.P. LOVECRAFT. Proceedings of Southern Federal University. Philology, 26(4), 146–156. Retrieved from https://philol-journal.sfedu.ru/index.php/sfuphilol/article/view/1787

Issue

Vol. 26 No. 4 (2022)

Section

LITERATURE STUDY

License

Copyright (c) 2022 Mikhail F. Vasiliev

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.

Authors who publish with this journal agree to the following terms:

  1. Authors retain copyright and grant the journal right of first publication with the work simultaneously licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution License that allows others to share the work with an acknowledgement of the work's authorship and initial publication in this journal.
  2. Authors are able to enter into separate, additional contractual arrangements for the non-exclusive distribution of the journal's published version of the work (e.g., post it to an institutional repository or publish it in a book), with an acknowledgement of its initial publication in this journal.
  3. Authors are permitted and encouraged to post their work online (e.g., in institutional repositories or on their website) prior to and during the submission process, as it can lead to productive exchanges, as well as earlier and greater citation of published work (See The Effect of Open Access).