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Howard Phillips (H. P.) Lovecraft was a pioneer in horror and science fiction, and his impact on 20th-century American fiction is immeasurable. As such a prominent individual, critics are often willing to attribute horrible ideas to him, and some have begun to declare that he promoted eugenics.

His iconic description of cosmic horror, the vast terror lurking just below the surface of reality, has left an impression on many, but he was neither an advocate for evil in any form nor one who dwelled on it. Instead, he often used his works to condemn those who would abuse science and technology, warning that such careless action would lead only to destruction.

Of these abuses of science, Lovecraft was particularly worried by the eugenics movement and the attempt by a vocal fringe to advocate for genetic purity and ethnic cleansing. However, that did not stop a claim from being spread suggesting the contrary.

Silvia Moreno-Garcia, in her Master’s Thesis for the University of British Columbia (Magna Matter: Women and Eugenic Thought in the Work of H.P. Lovecraft), posits in her abstract:”Lovecraft’s women embody the worries of miscenegenation<sic>, show the results of the unfit giving birth, and ultimately showcase the collapse of society under the weight of the monstrous Others.”

Unfortunately, every example Moreno-Garcia provides actually shows the dangers of eugenics, not the reverse. The degeneration of the human race in multiple Lovecraft stories is based on genetic isolation (or the lack of “miscegenation” aka mix-racial coupling) through an attempt at purity, which leads to the opposite effect than that promoted by his contemporaries.

Though “pure,” these characters are incapable of recognizing that they are physical and morally deformed. They are no longer “human,” but they have no ability to recognize this decay. The irony of life, as Lovecraft embraced, is that those who seek to de-humanize others by deeming them inferior are the ones who give up their humanity.

Degeneration Caused by “Purity”

Moreno-Garcia’s central example is Lavinia Whateley from “The Dunwich Horror” (1928). She claims, “Lavinia is unmarried and thus a single mother, the identity of the child’s father being unknown” (pp. 38-39).

Instead of the “father being unknown,” the father was well-known (as revealed at the end of the story) and represents the genetic isolation of the mother (Lavinia) to ensure that no other human DNA contaminates the attempt at a pure strain. Lavinia, herself, was a product of “two centuries of Whateleys” that lead to her line of “decadent Whateleys” (the pure bloods). In direct contrast, the “undecayed Whateleys” live in town and mix with others. Not only do the “decadent” Whateleys exhibit biological deformities, they are also “half-insane” and practice evil magic.

However, Moreno-Garcia argues, “Not only is Lavinia unable to care properly for a home, evidence by her poor sanitation standards, but she unable <sic> to take control of Wilbur. Womanhood and motherhood are regarded as principles of order by eugenicists, but Lavinia cannot fulfill the eugenicist ideals of womanhood” (p. 40).

Moreno-Garcia misidentifies the decay of the “decadent Whateleys” as justification for eugenics, but the Whateleys represent the opposite. It was through an attempt at genetic purity that they refused to interact with (and presumably breed with) outsiders, and their pursuit led to them making a literal deal with the devil. If anything, their decay reveals that the attempt by eugenics can never lead to their desired genetic perfection.

Lovecraft made this inevitable irony of eugenics clear in a letter to Natalie Wooley in 1934:

Wiggam, like Prof. J. B. S. Haldane, believes that much will be done in future toward the artificial development of Homo sapiens, but I doubt very much whether such development can ever reach more than a tiny fraction of the extremes they postulate. In the first place, the complexity of the laws governing organic growth is enormous—so enormous that the number of unknown factors must always remain hopelessly great. We can discover & apply a few biological principles—but the limit of effectiveness is soon reached. For example—despite all the advances in endocrinology & all the experiments in glandular rejuvenation, there is no such thing as a permanent or well-balanced staving-off of senescence & dissolution….

What is more—there really is no one idea of racial excellence. Even if the principle of eugenic control were accepted by a nation, there would remain a constant struggle among various factions advocating different goals of development. One group would advocate the cultivation of this or that group of emotions, or the establishment of this or that blood mixture, while another would campaign ceaselessly for a directly opposite result.

(Lovecraft to Wooley, 22-Nov-1934, Letters to Robert Bloch & Others 197-199)

Lovecraft pinpoints the inherent subjective nature of the eugenics movement and its ultimate contradiction. In “The Dunwich Horror,” each of the “decadent Whateleys” believe that they can achieve genetic purity through the inherent superiority of their own stock. This is true for most of the degenerate people in Lovecraft’s stories.

This is similar to the argument made by modern anti-eugenicist activist, Edwin Black. In War Against the Weak, Black deemed the whole field of eugenics as “pseudo-science” because what is deemed genetic “improvement” is rarely an improvement. Lovecraft and Black differ only in Lovecraft’s unwillingness to ever see science as a possible solution to any problem, real or imaginary.

When Moreno-Garcia refers to multiple instances in Lovecraft’s stories that depict rural populations succumbing to genetic deformity, she ignores that it is their isolation and unwillingness to mingle with outsiders that led to such problems. To her, the deformities are caused by the rare mingling of “outside” blood, such as Lavinia’s relationship with Outer God Yog-Sothoth, and there are no other possibilities.

However, late 19th and early 20th-century eugenicist focused on intelligence as proof to genetic superiority, and the Whateley family was highly intelligent. This was especially true of Wilbur, the son of Lavinia and Yog-Sothoth, who developed at an extremely fast rate.

Furthermore, Lovecraft is clear that the physical and moral deformities run in the Whateley genetic line long before any mingling of outsiders, and the addition of supernatural genetics would be more akin to achieving a mythical “superiority” of a particular race than not. It would be strange to infer that an Outer God, one of the supreme (yet malevolent) beings in the universe would be deemed “lesser” genetically and not be related to the eugenic ideal. Wilbur is smart and strong, yet he is clearly inhuman in a similar but more exaggerated nature than the other Whateleys.

Never is there a cosmopolitan community with such rampant genetic problems within Lovecraft’s works. The urban regions are bustling with different cultures and with open-minded scholars capable of understanding all aspects of knowledge. But few urban dwellers have exposure to the cosmic horror and they remain ignorant of the danger brewing in the outskirts of society. The Town of Arkham, with its Miskatonic University, is the central location for preventing the plans of evil cults, and scholars from the university end the threat unleashed during “The Dunwich Horror.” But it is still a town, not a city, so it is often plagued by darkness.

The mistake comes when Moreno-Garcia applies Lovecraft quotes that reveal that he may have held racist views, which allows her to infer that he wanted a genetic purity to avoid the “lesser” races. Often, these quotes are minor and from early musings, and they serve little to inform the latter stories. None of the quotes endorse the idea that Lovecraft would have supported eugenics or the prevention of non-Caucasians from reproducing.

Instead, Lovecraft makes it clear that the supposed “superiority” that can be obtained through natural and supernatural genetic manipulation only leads to degeneration and the risk to the whole human race (manifested as allowing evil monsters to enter into the world). Furthermore, each character that she uses in her examples demonstrates that it is the weariness of others that leads to true Otherness of the characters, not the opposite. If he held racist views, they were not strong enough for him to seek the systematic reproductive-purification through eugenics.

Science Can Only Lead to Evil

If Lovecraft’s subtle approach leaves the question unclear, he removes all doubt when he describes the lessons of the “Old Ones,” who were ultimately destroyed by their attempt at genetic manipulation in At the Mountains of Madness:

Another cause of the landward movement was the new difficulty in breeding and managing the shoggoths upon which successful sea-life depended. With the march of time, as the sculptures sadly confessed, the art of creating new life from inorganic matter had been lost; so that the Old Ones had to depend on the moulding of forms already in existence. On land the great reptiles proved highly tractable; but the shoggoths of the sea, reproducing by fission and acquiring a dangerous degree of accidental intelligence, presented for a time a formidable problem.

Written in 1931 and published in 1936, the novella coincidences with Lovecraft’s letter to Wooley, and it shares many similarities. The shoggoths were a genetic creation of the Old Ones, but they were ultimately unable to control their creation although they had “all the advances.” Their absolute faith in science failed them when they made a perfect creature that spiraled out of control, representing the danger of science without control or reason.

For Lovecraft, no one, no matter how advanced, has the ability to control the universe, and those who try only doom themselves. His stories reveal little difference between his view of science and mysticism, and they are often mingled in the pursuit of unleashing dark forces upon the world. Evil slumbers, waiting to be awakened, and it is only human ignorance and smallness that preserved them to this point.

However, Lovecraft knew that people too often want only power or knowledge, and they seek to better themselves at the cost of others. The Whateley family represents one such group, and they lost their humanity as a result. By focusing on such groups, Lovecraft turns the eugenicists upon themselves.

To claim that Lovecraft embraced or promoted eugenics is to completely misunderstand the purpose of his fiction. His works serve as a warning of the danger that comes from uncontrolled pursuits of knowledge. It does not matter if you seek it through magic, genetics, exploration, or technological advances in general, you will still end up destroying yourself (and possibly the rest of us) if you go too far.

Ultimately, Lovecraft’s works de-humanize the de-humanizers and Others those who seek to Other others. He attacks those who deemed themselves superior, often challenging those in power. However, this is not to say that there are no innocent victims. Instead, the strong and the weak often suffer, but the strong are those who hasten their own end.