We’re back and we’re enjoying a nice seaside holiday. Of course, when most people talk about the seaside, they mean the bit that’s on land. Somehow, we’ve ended up in the wetter part. Maybe that’s more technically landside. Human languages are messy things. Regardless, it’s everything we could have asked for: cold, murky, and filled with terrifying creatures. If Lovecraft taught us anything, however, it’s that this nice section of seabed could be forced to the surface at any moment. We’ll just have to enjoy its benthic charms while we can.

Main Topic: The Ocean in Call of Cthulhu

The ocean and its horrors play a huge role in Lovecraft’s fiction and, by extension, in Call of Cthulhu. With entities such as Cthulhu, Dagon and the Deep Ones, and locations like R’lyeh and Y’ha-nthlei, Lovecraft placed many of his most memorable creations deep below the waves. So how can we make use of the ocean in Call of Cthulhu? What inspiration can we take from nature and folklore? And what memorable scenarios are there that use the ocean as their setting?

Links

Things we mention in this episode include:

The Ocean in Lovecraft

• “Dagon” by HP Lovecraft
• Atlantis
• Theosophy
• Graham Hancock
• I Watched Ancient Apocalypse So You Don’t Have To
• “The Temple” by HP Lovecraft
• “The Strange High House in the Mist” by HP Lovecraft
• Nodens
• “The Horror at Martin’s Beach” by Sonia Greene and HP Lovecraft
• Fear’s Sharp Little Needles
• “The Call of Cthulhu” by HP Lovecraft
• Cthulhu
• The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath by HP Lovecraft
• “The Shadow Over Innsmouth” by HP Lovecraft
• At the Mountain of Madness by HP Lovecraft
• The Man From Atlantis
• “Out of the Aeons” by HP Lovecraft for Hazel Heald
• “The Night Ocean” by RH Barlow with HP Lovecraft
• Humanoids From the Deep (1980)
• The Horror in the Museum and Other Revisions by HP Lovecraft
• Blue Velvet (1986)

Inspirations from Nature and Folklore

• Survive The Savage Sea by Dougal Robertson
• Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe
• Lord of the Flies by William Golding
• Cast Away (2000)
• Yonaguni monument
• Baltic Sea anomaly
• Edgar Cayce
• Bimini Road
• Kraken
• Ninth wave superstition
• The Ninth Wave by Kate Bush
• Lamprey
• Hagfish
• Mermaid’s purse
• “Bleak Prospect” from Nameless Horrors
• Nudibranch

The Ocean in Call of Cthulhu

• Vampire: the Requiem
• Flood myths
• Doggerland
• “Sound of the Sea” by Philip G Orth
• “Do Not Call Up That Which You Cannot Put Down” from Fear’s Sharp Little Needles
• “The Mauretania“ by MB Willner
• “The Transatlantic Terror” by Jon Hook
• Seth Skorkowsky’s review
• “Waiting For the Hurricane” from Pulp Cthulhu
• “The Blue” from The Blasphemous Tome issue 7
• “Slow Boat to China” from Pulp Cthulhu
• Masks of Nyarlathotep
• Alone Against the Tide
• “The Derelict” from Petersen’s Abominations
• “City in the Sea” from Cthulhu Now

• “Grace Under Pressure”
• Concrete Cow
• “Full Fathom Five” by Paul Fricker
• Moby-Dick by Herman Melville
• Master and Commander (2003)
• The Abyss (1989)
• DeepStar Six (1989)
• Underwater (2020)
• The Witch (2015)
• Sea Devils
• Secrets of Japan
• The Rig (2023)
• “Mohole” from Petersen’s Abominations
• Project Mohole
• “The Love of Money” for The Esoterrorists
• The Devil’s Hole

News

Paul at Chaosium Con 2024

Paul will be attending Chaosium Con 2024 in Michigan between 18-24 April. Do stop by the Chaosium stand and say hi. There will also be a large contingent from Ain’t Slayed Nobody attending, so please say howdy to them too.

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