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

Lovecraft himself did not get a chance to say anything in public on the subject until about 1915. About this time he discovered in the amateur world an ardent colleague in the fight against the demon rum—Andrew Francis Lockhart of Milbank, South Dakota. An article entitled ‘More Chain Lightning’ (United Official Quarterly, October 1915) is a paean to Lockhart’s efforts in the cause of temperance.

In spite of the fact that prohibition was very unpopular in Rhode Island, it is not at all surprising that Lovecraft would have become converted to temperance, for the movement had strong class- and race-conscious overtones; as one historian notes, it was led by ‘old stock, Protestant middle-class Americans’²¹ who were repelled by what they considered the excessive drinking habits of immigrants, particularly Germans and Italians.

One has to wonder why Lovecraft became so obsessed with temperance. He himself was fond of declaring that ‘I have never tasted intoxicating liquor, and never intend to’.²² When he remarks that ‘I am nauseated by even the distant stink of any alcoholic liquor’,²³ one is reminded of his extreme aversion to seafood, and cannot help wondering whether some event in infancy or boyhood triggered this severe physiological and psychological response. We know nothing of the drinking habits of Lovecraft’s immediate family; even for his father, whatever other sins he may have committed, we have no evidence of any inclination toward imbibing. It would, therefore, be irresponsible and unjust to make any conjectures on the subject. What must be said is that the cause of temperance is the only aspect of social reform for which Lovecraft showed any enthusiasm in his earlier years—an enthusiasm seemingly out of keeping with the ‘cosmic’ philosophy he had already evolved, which led him outwardly to maintain a perfect indifference to the fate of the ‘flyspeck-inhabiting lice’²⁴ on this globe.

Lovecraft himself claimed that among the great benefits he derived from amateurdom was the association of sympathetic and likeminded (or contrary-minded) individuals. For one who had been a virtual recluse during the 1908–13 period, amateur journalism allowed Lovecraft a gradual exposure to human society—initially in an indirect manner (via correspondence or discussions in amateur papers), then by direct contact. It would take several years for him to become comfortable as even a limited member of human society, but the transformation did indeed take place; and some of his early amateur associates remained for the rest of his life his closest friends.

Perhaps the three closest colleagues in Lovecraft’s early amateur period were Maurice W. Moe, Edward H. Cole, and Rheinhart Kleiner. Moe (1882–1940) was a high school teacher at Appleton High School in Appleton, Wisconsin (later at the West Division High School in Milwaukee) and one of the giants of the amateur world at the time, even though he held relatively few offices. His religious orthodoxy was a constant source of friction with Lovecraft, and it may have helped to develop and refine Lovecraft’s own hostility to religion. None of the withering polemics on religion to which Lovecraft treated Moe in his letters seems to have had any effect on their recipient.

Edward H. Cole (1892–1966) was also a well-respected amateur, but he was a staunch supporter of the NAPA and inflexibly hostile to the UAPA. He was Official Editor of the NAPA for 1911–12 and President for 1912–13. His journal, the Olympian, is one of the jewels of amateur literature in both contents and typography, even though it lapsed after 1917 and would not resume for two decades. Cole was one of the first amateurs, aside from the members of the Providence Amateur Press Club, whom Lovecraft met. He resided in various Boston suburbs, and attended a meeting of the club in North Providence in late November 1914. Cole became a close correspondent of Lovecraft, who in later years would always look him up when he went to Boston. In spite of his prejudice against the UAPA, Cole in 1917 married Helene E. Hoffman (who had been President of the UAPA in the 1913–14 term, the period when Lovecraft joined) and allowed himself to appear on the UAPA membership list. Lovecraft’s early letters to Cole are very stiff and formal, but eventually he unwinds and becomes less self-conscious.

Rheinhart Kleiner (1892–1949) of Brooklyn came in touch with Lovecraft when he received the first issue of the Conservative in late March 1915. An immediate and voluble correspondence sprang up, and Kleiner of course sent Lovecraft copies of his own sporadic amateur paper, the Piper. The two first met on 1 July 1916, when Kleiner and some others were passing through Providence on the way to the NAPA convention in Boston. Thereafter—especially when Lovecraft himself lived in Brooklyn in 1924–26—he and Kleiner would form a strong bond of friendship.