The Temple of Dagon

I like it, but I always hated the ending. It just reeks of an avoidable deus ex machina, surely he could have come up with a better way to finish after realising the man's intent.

Jesus Prime wrote:I like it, but I always hated the ending. It just reeks of an avoidable deus ex machina, surely he could have come up with a better way to finish after realising the man's intent.

I think the ending is perfect. What Lovecraft is suggesting is that when he noticed the splattered blood he knew what was coming next. Realizing the old man was far more powerful than he, and being a gentleman disinclined toward violence, he merely closed his eyes waiting for the old man's death blow, making it analogous to the thunderstorm raging outside. "I did not shriek or move, but merely shut my eyes. A moment later came the titanic thunderbolt of thunderbolts; blasting that accursed house of unutterable secrets and bringing the oblivion which alone saved my mind." -The Picture In The House

He apparently let the old kill him so as to put an end to his terror stricken state, since there's no more to the text, and the old man is'nt gonna let his secret out. Cowardly? Lovecraft loved to convey an intensity of fear, loathing, and terror that by its all consuming effect on the individual superseded their reasoning.

The only inexplicable aspect to the ending of the story "really" is how could he have told it? Being murdered by the old man an all.

This is also one of the first Lovecraft stories I'd read. I really like the ending too, it's very shocking upon first reading the story, and that's precisely what Lovecraft intended.

He wasn't murdered, he was saved when lightning struck the house. I take "bringing the oblivion which alone saved my mind" to mean he was saved--by unconsciousness--from tumbling into insanity.

The penultimate paragraph sheds a little more light on what happened:

"The interruption was not produced by my fright, nor by the rapidly increasing storm amidst whose fury I was presently to open my eyes on a smoky solitude of blackened ruins."

E.A. Lovecraft,

Thank you EA, it's been a while since I've read the story, but for some reason (maybe my first impressions from many years ago) I never remembered reading that paragraph.

Oops! God that's bad!

Your remonstration is flawless my good man!

I'll most certaintly have to re-acquaint myself with all my Lovecraft tomes.

My first was "Dagon", which is still one of my favourites.

Dagon was also one of the first I'd read. Excellent story.

I think I typed that reply into the wrong thread or something... Did Carmine Doll not have a post before mine?

Erich Zann wrote:

Jesus Prime wrote:I like it, but I always hated the ending. It just reeks of an avoidable deus ex machina, surely he could have come up with a better way to finish after realising the man's intent.

I think the ending is perfect. What Lovecraft is suggesting is that when he noticed the splattered blood he knew what was coming next. Realizing the old man was far more powerful than he, and being a gentleman disinclined toward violence, he merely closed his eyes waiting for the old man's death blow, making it analogous to the thunderstorm raging outside. "I did not shriek or move, but merely shut my eyes. A moment later came the titanic thunderbolt of thunderbolts; blasting that accursed house of unutterable secrets and bringing the oblivion which alone saved my mind." -The Picture In The House

He apparently let the old kill him so as to put an end to his terror stricken state, since there's no more to the text, and the old man is'nt gonna let his secret out. Cowardly? Lovecraft loved to convey an intensity of fear, loathing, and terror that by its all consuming effect on the individual superseded their reasoning.

The only inexplicable aspect to the ending of the story "really" is how could he have told it? Being murdered by the old man an all.

This is also one of the first Lovecraft stories I'd read. I really like the ending too, it's very shocking upon first reading the story, and that's precisely what Lovecraft intended.

Heh, that was my initial impression as well! I thought that the crashing sound of thunder had drowned out the old man killing him, and that his murder saved his mind from insanity.

That would've been a much better ending that the apparent correct one. Ah well, c'est la ve.

That's all well and good, but it doesn't jive well with a past tense first person narrative - which creates the assumption that the narrator has survived it all.

Jesus Prime wrote:That's all well and good, but it doesn't jive well with a past tense first person narrative - which creates the assumption that the narrator has survived it all.

This is true. And it did leave me very confused at the end of the story.

The obvious solutions would have been - A) Different ending, e.g. killing the old man and scarpering; or B) Third person narrative.

Jesus Prime wrote:The obvious solutions would have been - A) Different ending, e.g. killing the old man and scarpering; or B) Third person narrative.

Or maybe his corpse was writing it.


Hey! It is Lovecraft!

Essential salts...

mmmm... salty...

Don't eat them!