How it started 2

The biggest issue I came across while researching was the cross polleniation of the various writers. Lovecraft was a pen pal of Robert E. Howard, the author of the Conan series which incorporated similar gods such as Yag-Kosha with an eerily similar name to Yog-Sothoth. The pantheon is further befuddled by Clark Ashton Smith who added his Hyperborea (don't confuse with Robert Howard's Hyborian Age) stories. This spreading of ideas and authors causes the collection of gods and monsters to become confusing as to who belongs where and what. 

Another issue is the source authors are drawing from. Every author I've read draws from Lovecraft which is to be expected as he is the orginator. But no one seems to draw from Clark Ashton Smith or Ramsay Campbell. I understand the idea is to pull from the original source but Smith, Campbell, Dereleth, Carter, Kuttner, and Bloch all bring their own twist to the formula. I've read most of their works and they seem to go out of their way to try to adhere to Lovecraft as close as possible which makes it hard to differentiat the different sources. If someone said they were pulling from Smith rather than Cartrer, I'd have to take their word for it. The differences come from the works that weren't related to Lovecraft's original plan. And it's not just writers. Lovecraft has influenced my other favorite hobby: Video Games. There are hundreds of games based off of Lovecraft's works. In fact a whole category, Lovecraftian, is dedicated to Lovecraft on Steam. 

And that's part of my problem, I see people crediting Lovecraft but not the other writers. But I can't blame people for that. Many of the branch works aren't unique enough to differentiate from Lovecraft's works. In fact, many seem to want to add to the universe rather than branch out. And this is fine, but it ends up with their works muddied together into one unit. Maybe that's for the best since Carteriam or Smithiam doesn't roll off the tongue as well as Lovecraftian. Lovecraft owes his own unique name as thanks for his fame.

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