A Dreamer & A Visionary; H.P. Lovecraft in His Time

It was not required that amateur journalists produce their own journals. Indeed, no more than a fraction of the members ever did so, and some of these papers were extremely irregular. In most cases members would send contributions directly to editors of existing amateur journals or to two ‘Manuscript Bureaus’, one for the eastern part of the country, one for the western part; the managers of these bureaus would then dole out the manuscripts to journals in need of material. Individuals with printing apparatus were greatly in demand; indeed, NAPA was originally an organization not for disinterested littérateurs to excel in the art of self-expression but for youthful printers to practise the art of typography.

The literature produced by members varied widely in both content and quality: poetry, essays, fiction, reviews, news items, polemics, and every other form of writing that can fit into a small compass. If it is generally true that most of this material is the work of tyros—’amateurs’ in the pejorative sense—then it means only that amateur journalism was performing a sound if humble function as a proving-ground for writers. Some amateurs did in fact go on to publish professionally. And yet, Lovecraft was all too correct when, late in life, he summed up the general qualitative level of amateur work: ‘God, what crap!’¹

Each association held an annual convention—NAPA in early July, UAPA in late July—at which the officers for the next official year were elected. The chief offices were President, Vice-President, Treasurer, and Official Editor. Other offices—including the Department of Public Criticism—were filled by appointments by the President. With this elaborate hierarchy, it was no surprise that some members became only interested in attaining eminence in the organization by holding office, and that intensely bitter, personal, and vituperative election campaigns were held to ensure the victory of a given individual or faction. All this becomes particularly absurd when we realize how few individuals were involved in amateurdom at any given time. The November 1918 United Amateur lists only 247 active members; the November 1917 National Amateur lists 227 (many individuals belonged to both associations).

Amateur journalism was exactly the right thing for Lovecraft at this critical juncture in his life. For the next ten years he devoted himself with unflagging energy to the amateur cause, and for the rest of his life he maintained some contact with it. For someone so unworldly, so sequestered, and so diffident about his own abilities, the tiny world of amateur journalism was a place where he could shine. Lovecraft realised the beneficial effects of amateurdom when he wrote in 1921:

Amateur Journalism has provided me with the very world in which I live. Of a nervous and reserved temperament, and cursed with an aspiration which far exceeds my endowments, I am a typical misfit in the larger world of endeavour, and singularly unable to derive enjoyment from ordinary miscellaneous activities. In 1914, when the kindly hand of amateurdom was first extended to me, I was as close to the state of vegetation as any animal well can be … With the advent of the United I obtained a renewed will to live; a renewed sense of existence as other than a superfluous weight; and found a sphere in which I could feel that my efforts were not wholly futile. For the first time I could imagine that my clumsy gropings after art were a little more than faint cries lost in the unlistening void. (‘What Amateurdom and I Have Done for Each Other’)

To this analysis there is really very little to add, although a modicum of detail is necessary to flesh out the picture and to pinpoint exactly how this transformation occurred. As for what Lovecraft did for amateurdom, that too is a long story, and one worth studying carefully.

In 1914, when Lovecraft entered amateur journalism, he found two schisms that were creating much bad blood and using up valuable energy. The first was, of course, the split between the National and United Amateur Press Associations, which had occurred when the latter was founded in 1895. Some members did indeed belong to both associations; Lovecraft, although labelling himself repeatedly and ostentatiously a loyal ‘United man’, joined the National himself as early as 1917, and would later serve as interim president.