A Goodreads user
asked
Matt Ruff:
Your book uses the Lovecraft mythos, but veers far from the tone of Lovecraft. Was that a conscious decision?
Matt Ruff
The initial inspiration for Lovecraft Country wasn’t Lovecraft or the Mythos, but TV shows like The X-Files and Kolchak: the Night Stalker, where a recurring cast of characters have a series of paranormal adventures. The twist was that instead of having my protagonists be white FBI agents in the 1990s or a white reporter in the 1970s, I decided to make it about a black family in Chicago in the 1950s who owned a travel agency and published a fictional version of the Negro Motorists Green Book; and in addition to their supernatural adventures they’d also be dealing with the realities of life in the Jim Crow era.
Lovecraft came into it because I needed a thematic bridge between paranormal horror and the more mundane terrors of racism, and Lovecraft, being both a hugely important horror writer and an avid white supremacist, was perfect for that. Of course once I’d named the story after him it was natural to bring in additional Lovecraftian elements, such as the white sorcerers’ cabal in New England, the “shoggoth,” and the suspiciously Necronomicon-like Book of Names. But my intention was never to focus solely on Lovecraft or to mimic his tone – rather, I wanted to explore a wide variety of pulp fiction styles and tropes, from horror, to science fiction, to fantasy.
Lovecraft came into it because I needed a thematic bridge between paranormal horror and the more mundane terrors of racism, and Lovecraft, being both a hugely important horror writer and an avid white supremacist, was perfect for that. Of course once I’d named the story after him it was natural to bring in additional Lovecraftian elements, such as the white sorcerers’ cabal in New England, the “shoggoth,” and the suspiciously Necronomicon-like Book of Names. But my intention was never to focus solely on Lovecraft or to mimic his tone – rather, I wanted to explore a wide variety of pulp fiction styles and tropes, from horror, to science fiction, to fantasy.
More Answered Questions
Stephanie
asked
Matt Ruff:
I’m very intrigued by your response to the TV series adaptation. I have said many times,”But the book was so much better!” With Lovecraft Country, I can’t wait for the next episode. Even though elements and details and order have changed somewhat, it is a beautiful adaptation of your work. Why do you think as readers we are often reluctant to embrace a film adaptation of a favorite book not 100% faithful to the book?
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