What did Lovecraft not tell us about Dreamland?
H. P. Lovecraft wrote the first story that was part of his Dream Cycle of stories in 1918, which was entitled Polaris and it was published in December of 1920. This first story was followed by a series of stories all written from 1919 through 1922. He eventually picked up this setting in his unpublished during his lifetime The Dream Quest of Unknown Kadath which was started in 1926 and completed in 1927.
In these stories, he describes the setting of the Dream Lands, but not the mechanics of how this world worked and interacted with the Waking World.
He gave hints at who would enter Dream Land, those who were lonely, those who wished and yearned for another place, those who had not lost a sense of wonder and awe.
Lovecraft’s Waking World characters all seem to live in and around the New England states of the United States and they all came from about the same time frame, the early 1900’s.
How does this Dream Land work? Are there limits to what a Waking World Dreamer can do in to affect the environment of Dream Land? Clearly, not everyone in the Waking World goes to sleep at the same time how does that affect what is experienced in Dream Land? Would Dream Land of the 1920s be different from Dream Land experienced and created in some other time? If Dream Land is malleable to the Dreaming of Dreamers would someone from one culture create, see and experience the same Dream Land as someone from a different culture?
How long do the Dreamings of Dreamers last? Lovecraft hints at some Dreamers as being immortal, such as Kuranes. Does this make sense? Why and how could this be?
These are some of the questions I want to explore.
Now, those who came after Lovecraft and were inspired by this milieu and wished to add to it did not themselves add any explanation to the hows and whys of the workings of this setting. Gary Myers was the first in 1979 to add stories to the Dream Cycle in his collection The House of the Worm, in much the same tone as Lovecraft’s own stories. These stories were exclusively set in Dream Land without any reference to who in the Waking World was doing this Dreaming. These stories seem to involve not Waking World Dreamers but simply the inhabitants, the native humans of Dream Land.
Whereas the next author to venture into this setting was Brian Lumley in his Hero of Dreams series of books, first published in 1986. Lumley created his own characters David Hero and Eldin the Wanderer. These were two Waking World individuals who came into Dream Land. Lumley treats Dream Land as a sword and sorcery setting. He follows the mythos of Lovecraft adding some new characters but does not deviate from Lovecraft’s Dream Land. He continues with the idea that Waking World individuals can enter into Dream Land and become immortal, like Lovecraft’s Kuranes. However, no explanation is given for this outcome. Simply that Lovecraft did it, and that is just the way the physics of Dream Land have to work-period.
I want more. I want things to be fleshed out and explained. I want a world that makes sense with a work out rules of physics even if this is a fantasy. Thus, my books are different than all those that have come before.
I do work out the hows and whys. I do explain how things work. In these pages, I will elucidate my ideas.
In these stories, he describes the setting of the Dream Lands, but not the mechanics of how this world worked and interacted with the Waking World.
He gave hints at who would enter Dream Land, those who were lonely, those who wished and yearned for another place, those who had not lost a sense of wonder and awe.
Lovecraft’s Waking World characters all seem to live in and around the New England states of the United States and they all came from about the same time frame, the early 1900’s.
How does this Dream Land work? Are there limits to what a Waking World Dreamer can do in to affect the environment of Dream Land? Clearly, not everyone in the Waking World goes to sleep at the same time how does that affect what is experienced in Dream Land? Would Dream Land of the 1920s be different from Dream Land experienced and created in some other time? If Dream Land is malleable to the Dreaming of Dreamers would someone from one culture create, see and experience the same Dream Land as someone from a different culture?
How long do the Dreamings of Dreamers last? Lovecraft hints at some Dreamers as being immortal, such as Kuranes. Does this make sense? Why and how could this be?
These are some of the questions I want to explore.
Now, those who came after Lovecraft and were inspired by this milieu and wished to add to it did not themselves add any explanation to the hows and whys of the workings of this setting. Gary Myers was the first in 1979 to add stories to the Dream Cycle in his collection The House of the Worm, in much the same tone as Lovecraft’s own stories. These stories were exclusively set in Dream Land without any reference to who in the Waking World was doing this Dreaming. These stories seem to involve not Waking World Dreamers but simply the inhabitants, the native humans of Dream Land.
Whereas the next author to venture into this setting was Brian Lumley in his Hero of Dreams series of books, first published in 1986. Lumley created his own characters David Hero and Eldin the Wanderer. These were two Waking World individuals who came into Dream Land. Lumley treats Dream Land as a sword and sorcery setting. He follows the mythos of Lovecraft adding some new characters but does not deviate from Lovecraft’s Dream Land. He continues with the idea that Waking World individuals can enter into Dream Land and become immortal, like Lovecraft’s Kuranes. However, no explanation is given for this outcome. Simply that Lovecraft did it, and that is just the way the physics of Dream Land have to work-period.
I want more. I want things to be fleshed out and explained. I want a world that makes sense with a work out rules of physics even if this is a fantasy. Thus, my books are different than all those that have come before.
I do work out the hows and whys. I do explain how things work. In these pages, I will elucidate my ideas.
Lovecraft’s Dreamland and the idea of immortality
Lovecraft like many people seemed to have a fantasy wish or accept the fantasy wish of living forever – to find a way to escape and live on after one’s physical body dies. Many cultures have such a dream and wish and the many ideas of heaven and the afterlife is based on these desires.
Thus Lovecraft imagined that if you were a powerful Dreamer you could escape death and live on in Dreamland.
From Wikipediahttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kuranes
"Kuranes (also King Kuranes) is a fictional character in H. P. Lovecraft's Dream Cycle. He was introduced in the short story "Celephaïs" (1922) and also appeared in The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath (1926).
Kuranes was a great dreamer and made frequent visits to the Dreamlands. In the waking world, he was of landed gentry in Cornwall, but as his fortunes declined he retreated into fantasy and drug use, eventually dying impoverished and homeless. In his dreams, he created the city of Celephaïs, the valley of Ooth-Nargai, in which Celephaïs was situated, and presumably the cloud city of Serannian, which was connected with Celephaïs. After he died he became the king and chief god of Celephaïs. He didn't care for the pomp and grandeur of Dreamland court life, and preferred to live most of the time in a nearby area he created to resemble the house and land in Cornwall where he had lived as a boy.
He is the only dreamer who has gone to the outermost void "where no dreams reach", that is the court of Azathoth, and survived with both life and sanity intact."
Lovecraft had this mortal Dreamer obtain immortality in Dreamland.
Now Brian Lumley in his novel Hero of Dreams, 1986, W. Paul Ganley Publisher, imagines that his own two characters David Hero and Leonard Dingle, become immortal by escaping into Dreamland after they die in a car crash (pg. 34).
Now, I chose not to go down this path. My own Dreamland is rooted in the Waking World’s limitations of physics, chemistry and biology. Hence there are limits to what can be done in Dreamland. My novel explores the hows and whys of the workings of Dreamland. I try to explain how a Waking World Dreamer could affect the world of Dreamland and what are the limits of that power.
So, what if this idea of immortality?
Well, as Brian Lumley notes (pg. 35) ‘For as any dreamer can testify, dream-time passes very strangely—where entire adventures may take place in a single hour, and an hour itself lengthen to a week—so that a year in dreamland might easily pass between the closing of one’s eyes and their opening to a single morning’s sun in the waking world.’
This is very much how Lovecraft’s writings on Dreamland work. All or most of the novel of The Dream Quest of the Unknown Kadath seems to take place in one single night’s Dream for Randolph Carter.
So let me spin this out. If one Waking World night could be the equivalent of a year’s worth of experiences in Dreamland that would mean that in one single year, 365 nights, could be the equivalent of 365 years in Dreamland. If you did this for 10 years, that would be 3,650 years of Dreamland time. That would be virtual immortality by anyone’s measure. To the inhabitants of Dreamland a powerful dreamer such as the man who was known as King Kuranes could have lived for 3,650 or more years in Dreamland.
Using that mathematics then, if in the Waking World one could hypothesize that at the moment of dying a Dreamer could enter into Dreamland and spend years of Dreamland experiential time before that Waking World body ceased to power and keep the mind and body alive. Thus for the Dreamer they would experience immortality. Though for the inhabitants of Dreamland, there would come a day when that Dreamer would cease to be a presence in Dreamland.
One could imagine that Lumley’s character’s David Hero and Leonard Dingle had all the adventures contained in Lumley’s books between the moment of losing consciousness in the car crash to the moment when their physical bodies died in the Waking World.
That is the premises of my version of Dreamland as presented in my fantasy novels the first is Through the Gate of Dreams.
In my novels King Kuranes did seem to live for many long years in Dreamland starting with his first appearance in 1922 but eventually the Waking World Dreamer did die and thus King Kuranes ceased to be in Dreamland. As for Brian Lumley's characters, since my novels take place in 1979-1980 and Lumley's first Dreamland novel, Hero of Dreams, was published in 1986, then Lamont and Basha would not be able to encounter those characters yet.
Or simply that my Dreamland is an a version of Dreamland separate from Lumley's. An alternative realm that is not the same as the one that Lumley is writing about. We travel on parallel paths. How you, my readers, want to consider all this is up to you.
Lovecraft like many people seemed to have a fantasy wish or accept the fantasy wish of living forever – to find a way to escape and live on after one’s physical body dies. Many cultures have such a dream and wish and the many ideas of heaven and the afterlife is based on these desires.
Thus Lovecraft imagined that if you were a powerful Dreamer you could escape death and live on in Dreamland.
From Wikipediahttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kuranes
"Kuranes (also King Kuranes) is a fictional character in H. P. Lovecraft's Dream Cycle. He was introduced in the short story "Celephaïs" (1922) and also appeared in The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath (1926).
Kuranes was a great dreamer and made frequent visits to the Dreamlands. In the waking world, he was of landed gentry in Cornwall, but as his fortunes declined he retreated into fantasy and drug use, eventually dying impoverished and homeless. In his dreams, he created the city of Celephaïs, the valley of Ooth-Nargai, in which Celephaïs was situated, and presumably the cloud city of Serannian, which was connected with Celephaïs. After he died he became the king and chief god of Celephaïs. He didn't care for the pomp and grandeur of Dreamland court life, and preferred to live most of the time in a nearby area he created to resemble the house and land in Cornwall where he had lived as a boy.
He is the only dreamer who has gone to the outermost void "where no dreams reach", that is the court of Azathoth, and survived with both life and sanity intact."
Lovecraft had this mortal Dreamer obtain immortality in Dreamland.
Now Brian Lumley in his novel Hero of Dreams, 1986, W. Paul Ganley Publisher, imagines that his own two characters David Hero and Leonard Dingle, become immortal by escaping into Dreamland after they die in a car crash (pg. 34).
Now, I chose not to go down this path. My own Dreamland is rooted in the Waking World’s limitations of physics, chemistry and biology. Hence there are limits to what can be done in Dreamland. My novel explores the hows and whys of the workings of Dreamland. I try to explain how a Waking World Dreamer could affect the world of Dreamland and what are the limits of that power.
So, what if this idea of immortality?
Well, as Brian Lumley notes (pg. 35) ‘For as any dreamer can testify, dream-time passes very strangely—where entire adventures may take place in a single hour, and an hour itself lengthen to a week—so that a year in dreamland might easily pass between the closing of one’s eyes and their opening to a single morning’s sun in the waking world.’
This is very much how Lovecraft’s writings on Dreamland work. All or most of the novel of The Dream Quest of the Unknown Kadath seems to take place in one single night’s Dream for Randolph Carter.
So let me spin this out. If one Waking World night could be the equivalent of a year’s worth of experiences in Dreamland that would mean that in one single year, 365 nights, could be the equivalent of 365 years in Dreamland. If you did this for 10 years, that would be 3,650 years of Dreamland time. That would be virtual immortality by anyone’s measure. To the inhabitants of Dreamland a powerful dreamer such as the man who was known as King Kuranes could have lived for 3,650 or more years in Dreamland.
Using that mathematics then, if in the Waking World one could hypothesize that at the moment of dying a Dreamer could enter into Dreamland and spend years of Dreamland experiential time before that Waking World body ceased to power and keep the mind and body alive. Thus for the Dreamer they would experience immortality. Though for the inhabitants of Dreamland, there would come a day when that Dreamer would cease to be a presence in Dreamland.
One could imagine that Lumley’s character’s David Hero and Leonard Dingle had all the adventures contained in Lumley’s books between the moment of losing consciousness in the car crash to the moment when their physical bodies died in the Waking World.
That is the premises of my version of Dreamland as presented in my fantasy novels the first is Through the Gate of Dreams.
In my novels King Kuranes did seem to live for many long years in Dreamland starting with his first appearance in 1922 but eventually the Waking World Dreamer did die and thus King Kuranes ceased to be in Dreamland. As for Brian Lumley's characters, since my novels take place in 1979-1980 and Lumley's first Dreamland novel, Hero of Dreams, was published in 1986, then Lamont and Basha would not be able to encounter those characters yet.
Or simply that my Dreamland is an a version of Dreamland separate from Lumley's. An alternative realm that is not the same as the one that Lumley is writing about. We travel on parallel paths. How you, my readers, want to consider all this is up to you.