ENG 3407, Gothic Lit, Fall 2019

“There were the Great Old Ones that had filtered down from the stars when earth was young-the beings whose substance an alien evolution had shaped and whose powers were such a this planet had never bred. And to think that only the day before Danforth and I had actually looked upon fragments of their millennially fossilized substance….and that poor Lake and his party had seen their complete outlines…”

This paragraph connects to Bram Stoker’s “Dracula” and his description of the origins of count Dracula. Dracula was the one that fought against the Turks in a bloody battle with great strength and tenacity brining victory to his people. Such strength and power was not seen by anyone and perceived as supernatural given to him by a higher being.

What kind of attitude does Dyer take towards the Elder things( disgust, admiration)

“when Danforth and I saw the freshly glistening and reflectively iridescent
black slime which clung thickly to those headless bodies and stank obscenely with that new unknown odour whose cause only a diseased fancy could envisage—clung to those bodies and sparkled less voluminously on a smooth part of the accursedly re-sculptured wall in a series of grouped dots—we understood the quality of cosmic fear to its uttermost
depths. It was not fear of those four missing others”

At the mountains of Madness , this part of the passage shows abjection. Dyer looks at the body in disgust  and had the look of a un-dead corpse with black slime and some form of dots which indicate that the creature had some sort infectious disease. This passage gives clue where in the tunnel the other crew member went missing and now to see all that headless bodies that are decaying and has a stank waste. Dyer shows a form of hesitation as he observes the madness that is in front of him. This Gothic space as Lovecraft describes as a tunnel as vaulted and arch passage ways  that are dark and  cold.

“The fact that they covered their vertically inhumed dead with five-pointed inscribed mounds set up thoughts in Danforth and me which made a fresh pause and recuperation necessary after the sculptures revealed it. The beings multiplied by means of spores—like vegetable pteridophytes, as Lake had suspected—but, owing to their prodigious toughness and longevity, and consequent lack of replacement needs, they did not encourage the large-scale development of new prothallia except when they had new regions to colonize”

What is the significance of the five-pointed shape?

This five pointed shape signifies protection and strength.  With these long sharp spikes if anyone decided to attack them it is likely impalement would follow. The life form uses this shape to keep out all those that may come trying to conquer the life and world they have built. This also shifts the point of view from being one of taking over a civilization to being frightened of this civilization because they will not go down without a fight, they are prepared to fight to the death. In fact it shows these travelers that their attempt to take over will not be easy, actually it will not be possible. This discovery that the narrator and his Colleagues thought would be as simple as planting a flag and taking over has been met with spikes that could end their very existence.

One reading that I believe this connects to is Dracula. The count takes over a ship draining it’s sailors one by one on his way to the new land he hopes to build his growing civilization. But he is met with warriors who are ready to fight him to the death. Van Helsing, Jonathan, Mina and Quincy meet him at his destination in order to stop him from hurting anymore people. The threat on their civilization like that of the life form in The Mountains of Madness become one in the same. They are not willing to just let someone come along and plant a flag. They do not believe in letting The Count destroy everything that has been built with the hands of this community. Using not only themselves as a symbol of this but also the knife that is used to aide in ending The Count’s life. Therefore ending the threat of a hostile take over.

a) the scene where Dyer + Danforth are being chased by a Shoggoth

Quote: “So we glanced back—simultaneously, it would appear; though no doubt the incipient motion of one prompted the imitation of the other. As we did so we flashed both torches full strength at the momentarily thinned     mist; either from sheer primitive anxiety to see all we could, or in a less primitive but equally unconscious effort to dazzle the entity before
we dimmed our light and dodged among the penguins of the labyrinth centre ahead. Unhappy act! Not Orpheus himself, or Lot’s wife, paid much more dearly for a backward glance. And again came that shocking, wide-ranged piping—“Tekeli-li! Tekeli-li!” I might as well be frank—even if I cannot bear to be quite direct—in stating what we saw; though at the time we felt that it was not to be admitted even to each other. The words reaching the reader can never even suggest the awfulness of the sight itself. It crippled our consciousness so completely that I wonder we had the residual sense to dim our torches as planned, and to strike the right tunnel toward the dead city. Instinct alone must have carried us through—perhaps better than reason could have done; though if that was what saved us, we paid a high price”.

My take on it all: The shoggots are these black bubbly creatures with eyes and tentacles that they can expand to however long they want to. I tried to capture the faces of the characters, to show how frightened they were. This is the perfect example of the fantastic hesitation and terror because they know what these creatures are capable of doing so far so what could this mean? Are they going to escape this god forsaken place or are they going to die like lake and his men?