opening statement with unexplained sound

"Whether the dreams brought on the fever or the fever brought on the dreams Walter Gilman did not know. Behind everything crouched the brooding, festering horror of the ancient town, and of the mouldy, unhallowed garret gable where he wrote and studied and wrestled with figures and formulae when he was not tossing on the meagre iron bed. His ears were growing sensitive to a preternatural and intolerable degree, and he had long ago stopped the cheap mantel clock whose ticking had come to seem like a thunder of artillery. At night the subtle stirring of the black city outside, the sinister scurrying of rats in the wormy partitions, and the creaking of hidden timbers in the centuried house, were enough to give him a sense of strident pandemonium. The darkness always teemed with unexplained sound—and yet he sometimes shook with fear lest the noises he heard should subside and allow him to hear certain other, fainter, noises which he suspected were lurking behind them." ( full text at the lovecraft archive )

h.p.lovecraft, dreams in the witch house.

 

Posted with Blogsy

freakish curvatures

a demonstration of the kinship of higher mathematics to certain crochet doilies.

''he was getting an intuitive knack for solving reimannian equations, and astonished professor upham by his comprehension of fourth-dimensional and other problems which had floored the rest of the class. one afternoon there was a discussion of possible freakish curvatures in space, and of theoretical points of approach or even contact between our part of the cosmos and various other regions as distant as the farthest stars or the transgalatic gulfs themselves ...

''gilman's handling of this theme filled everyone with admiration, even though some of his hypothetical illustrations caused an increase in the always plentiful gossip about his nervous and solitary eccentricity. what made the students shake their heads was his sober theory that a man might--given mathematical knowledge admittedly beyond all likelihood of human acquirement--step deliberately from earth to any other celestial body which might lie at one of an infinity of specific points in the cosmic pattern.

''such a step he said would require only two stages; first, a passage out of three dimensional sphere we know, and second, a passage back to the three-dimensional sphere at another point, perhaps one of infinite remoteness. ... gilman could not be very clear about his reasons for this last assumption, but his haziness here was more than overbalanced by his clearness on other complex points. professor upham especially liked his demonstration of the kinship of higher mathematics to certain phases of magical lore transmitted down the ages from an ineffable antiquity--human or prehuman--whose knowledge of the cosmos and its laws was greater than ours.''

h.p.lovecraft, the dreams in the witch house.

grey jenkin

more rumors at ronapondick.


''the small, furry, sharp-toothed thing which haunted the mouldering structure and the town and nuzzled people curiously in the black hours before dawn...descriptions of the darting little furry object which served as the familiar were so painfully realistic despite their incredible details...that object-no larger than a good sized rat and quaintley called by the towns people "brown jenkin"--seemed to have been the fruit of a remarkable case of sympathetic herd delusion, for in 1692 no less than eleven persons had testified to glimpsing it...(that was in 1692--the gaoler had gone mad and babbled of a small white fanged furry thing)...there were recent rumors too,...witnesses said it had long hair and the shape of a rat, but that its sharp-toothed, bearded face was evilly human while its paws were like tiny human hands.''


h.p.lovecraft, the dreams in the witch house.

he was-nor was-it was-was it-indeed was

witch house at archithings.net

''he was in the changeless legend haunted city of arkham, with its clustering gambrel roofs that sway and sag over attics where witches hid from the king's men in the dark olden days of the province ...

''nor was any spot in that city more steeped in macabre memory than the gable room which harboured him--for it was this house and this room which likewise had harboured old keziah mason, ... she had told judge hathorne of lines and curves that could be made to point out directions leading through walls of space to other spaces beyond, ... then she had drawn those devices on the walls of her cell and vanished.

''old keziah he reflected might have had excellent reasons for living in a room with peculiar angles for was it not through certain angles that she claimed to have gone outside the boundaries of the world of space as we know it? ... he knew his room was in the old witch house ... that, indeed was why he had taken it ...''

h.p.lovecraft, the dreams in the witch house.

the goody fowler sisters

image from h.p.lovecraft archive.

my dear little grandchildren:-
598 angell street
providence, r.i.
may 1, 1923

''arrived in salem, i stroll'd a while through the venerable streets, and finally embark'd for danvers--call'd "salem-village" in the 17th century, and forming the seat of most of the witch-craft cases of 1692. ... i beheld the tall chimney and ivy'd walls of a splendid brick house of later colonial design, and espy'd a sign which proclaim'd it open for publick inspection ... inform'd by the sign that this was the capt. samuel fowler house, built 1809, accessible for eight-pence, and the property of the society for the preservation of new-england antiquities, i loudly sounded the knocker and awaited developement, nothing develop'd, i then knock'd at the side door, but with equal futility. then i noted a door half open in a miserable "ell" at the back of the house; and believing the place tenanted, made a third trial there. ....

''my summons was answer'd simultaneously by two of the most pitiful and decrepit--looking persons imaginable--hideous old women more sinister than the witches of 1692 ... the smaller, and probably older of the two spoke first--in a hoarse rattleing voice that dimly suggested death, ... if however their weird aspect and hideous squalor were sinister; what can one say of the contrast involv'd when the guttural salutation to the speaker became intelligible? for despite the omnipresent evidence of a slatternly decadence beyond words, this ancient witch was mumbling forth a courtly and aristocratic welcome, in language and accents beyond question bespeaking the gentlest birth and proudest cultivation! ...

''yes--it was the old, old new-england story of family decay and aristocratic pauperism ... these tatter'd ancients were the misses fowler, own grand daughters of the proud seafarer and fighter who in his dashing prime had built that house for the comfort, dignity, and splendour of his descendents. ... the great-grandmother of these poor relics was that sprightly mrs. page who, at the time of the colonial tea agitation, serv'd her guests with the beverage on the roof after her husband had forbidden her to serve it under his roof.''

yr. most aff: ancestor and obt: servt: grandpa theobald.

h.p.lovecraft, selected letters.

starry tea set via notcothulhu.

which came first ...

'' whether the dreams brought on the fever or the fever brought on the dreams walter gilman did not know ... possibly gilman should not have studied so hard. non euclidean calculus and quantum physics are enough to stretch any brain; and when one mixes them with folk lore, ... one can hardly expect to be wholly free from mental tension ...

'' the professors at miskatonic had urged him to slacken, and had voluntarily cut down his courses at several points. moreover they had stopped him from consulting the dubious old books on forbidden secrets that were kept under lock and key in a vault at the university library ...

'' the touch of brain fever and the dreams began in febuary ... about this period his inability to concentrate on his formal studies worried him considerably, his apprehensions about the mid-year examinations being very acute ...

'' the dreams were wholly beyond the pale of sanity, and gilman felt they must be a result, jointly, of his studies in mathematics and in folklore ... he had been thinking too much about the vague regions which his formulae told him must lie beyond the three dimensions we know, ...

'' gilmans dreams consisted largely in plunges through limitless abysses of inexplicably colored twilight ... he did not walk or climb fly, or swim, crawl or wriggle ... the abysses were by no means vacant, being crowded with indescribably angled masses of alien hued substance, some of which appeared to be organic while others appeared to be inorganic ... all the objects--organic and inorganic alike--were totally beyond description or even comprehension. ...

'' in the deeper dreams everything was likewise more distinct and gilman felt that the twilight abysses around him were those of the fourth dimension. ''

h.p.lovecraft, the dreams in the witch house.

hypothetical illustrations

''he was getting an intuitive knack for solving reimannian equations, and astonished professor upham by his comprehension of fourth-dimensional and other problems which had floored the rest of the class. one afternoon there was a discussion of possible freakish curvatures in space, and of theoretical points of approach or even contact between our part of the cosmos and various other regions as distant as the farthest stars or the transgalatic gulfs themselves ...

''gilman's handling of this theme filled everyone with admiration, even though some of his hypothetical illustrations caused an increase in the always plentiful gossip about his nervous and solitary eccentricity. what made the students shake their heads was his sober theory that a man might--given mathematical knowledge admittedly beyond all likelihood of human acquirement--step deliberately from earth to any other celestial body which might lie at one of an infinity of specific points in the cosmic pattern.

''such a step he said would require only two stages; first, a passage out of three dimensional sphere we know, and second, a passage back to the three-dimensional sphere at another point, perhaps one of infinite remoteness. ... gilman could not be very clear about his reasons for this last assumption, but his haziness here was more than overbalanced by his clearness on other complex points. professor upham especially liked his demonstration of the kinship of higher mathematics to certain phases of magical lore transmitted down the ages from an ineffable antiquity--human or prehuman--whose knowledge of the cosmos and its laws was greater than ours.''

h.p.lovecraft, the dreams in the witch house.

keziah mason

''in the changeless, legend haunted city of arkham, with its clustering gambrel roofs that sway and sag over attics where witches hid from the kings men in the dark ... which had likewise harbored old keziah mason, whose flight from salem gaol at the last no one was ever able to explain. ... there was much in the essex county records about keziah mason's trial, and what she had admitted under pressure to the court of oyer and terminer ... she had told judge hathorne of lines and curves that could be made to point out directions leading through the walls of space to other spaces beyond, ... then she had drawn those devices on the walls of her cell and vanished.''

h.p.lovecraft, the dreams in the witch house.

et in arkham ego

'' he was in the changeless legend haunted city of arkham, with its clustering gambrel roofs that sway and sag over attics where witches hid from the king's men in the dark olden days of the province ...


'' nor was any spot in that city more steeped in macabre memory than the gable room which harboured him--for it was this house and this room which likewise had harboured old keziah mason, ... she had told judge hathorne of lines and curves that could be made to point out directions leading through walls of space to other spaces beyond, ... then she had drawn those devices on the walls of her cell and vanished ...


'' old keziah he reflected might have had excellent reasons for living in a room with peculiar angles for was it not through certain angles that she claimed to have gone outside the boundaries of the world of space as we know it? ... he knew his room was in the old witch house ... that, indeed was why he had taken it ...


'' gilman's room was of good size but queerly irregular shape the north was standing perceptibly inward from the outer to the inner end, while the low ceiling slanted gently downward in the same direction ... there was no access--to the space which must of existed between the slanting wall and straight outer wall on the houses north side, ...


'' the curious angles of gilmans room had been having a strange, almost hypnotic effect on him ... he had found himself staring more and more intently at the corner where the down-slanting cieling met the inward-slanting wall ... his absorption in the irregular walls and cieling of this room increased, for he began to read into the odd angles a mathematical signifigance. ''

h.p.lovecraft, dreams in the witch house.

i: a book by john modrow containing some cautionary advice on staring too intently at the cracks in the cieling, peeling paint, and strange angles of your room.
ii:witch house k in sapporo by sekkei-sha
ii: witch house in argentina.

brown jenkin

"the small, furry, sharp-toothed thing which haunted the mouldering structure and the town and nuzzled people curiously in the black hours before dawn...descriptions of the darting little furry object which served as the familiar were so painfully realistic despite their incredible details...that object-no larger than a good sized rat and quaintley called by the towns people "brown jenkin"--seemed to have been the fruit of a remarkable case of sympathetic herd delusion, for in 1692 no less than eleven persons had testified to glimpsing it...(that was in 1692--the gaoler had gone mad and babbled of a small white fanged furry thing)...there were recent rumors too,...witnesses said it had long hair and the shape of a rat, but that its sharp-toothed, bearded face was evilly human while its paws were like tiny human hands." h.p.lovecraft, the dreams in the witch house.