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"H. P. Lovecraft has come to be recognised as the leading author of supernatural fiction in the twentieth century. But how did a man who died in poverty, with no book of his stories published in his lifetime, become such an icon in horror literature? S. T. Joshi, the leading authority on Lovecraft, has traced in detail the course of Lovecraft's life, spent largely in Providence, Rhode Island, and has shown how Lovecraft was engaged in the political, economic, social, and intellectual currents of his time, and how his developing thought informed his fiction and other writings. Lovecraft's reaction to World War I, the Jazz Age, and the Depression, as well as to literary modernism and scientific advance, markedly affected his thought and work, so that by the end of his life he had become both a 'mechanistic materialist' and a 'cosmic regionalist' who looked to his New England heritage as a bulwark against the meaninglessness of a godless cosmos. It was the wonder and terror of that cosmos that Lovecraft depicted, with poetic grandeur, in his work." --Book Jacket.
Winchester, a remote hilltop region of dense forests, rocky ledges, and fast-moving streams, was a wilderness when first organized in 1771. Cattle enjoyed the region's abundant grasses, and as a result, a large dairy industry emerged, evident from the tons of cheese shipped to distant markets by the 1850s. Winsted, a borough in the valley below Winchester, was incorporated in 1858 and developed into an industrial giant by the 1870s. Its strategic location on coursing streams and two extensive railroad lines enabled Winsted to manufacture and export a wide variety of goods, ranging from caskets to clocks and silk threads to wool socks. Breathtaking vistas beckoned tourists to Highland Lake, the area's recreational attraction, where they swam, sailed, and enjoyed Electric Park, referred to as "Little Coney Island." Through vintage images captured by professional photographers, Winsted and Winchester portrays the growth and transition of these communities from 1870 to 1920-- a time that was quickly lost to modernity.
Reprint of the original, first published in 1875.
John DigbyÕs fourteen tales in Me and Mr Jiggs are riveting, risquZ, and hilarious. The setting is the bombed-out London that Digby had known as a child growing up in the aftermath of World War II. These tales are told in Cockney rhyming slang, which gives the writing a unique verve, freshness, and charm. Mr. Jiggs, the silent friend of the narrator, paradoxically prompts the telling of scandalous anecdotes about people passing by. Despite the unique place and time, the experiences are timeless expressions of human nature. DigbyÕs stories are seductive; they lure you into an enticing world where at every turn the marvelous is revealed through seemingly ordinary lives.