A review I originally wrote as an assignment for English class. I wanted to share it.
'Herbert West - Reanimator'
By H. P. Lovecraft
Published by Orion Books (2008)
Originally Published by Home Brew (1922)
Told from the viewpoint of an unnamed narrator throughout, 'Herbert West - Reanimator' begins with a chilling introduction.
"Of Herbert West, who was my friend in college and in other life, I can speak only with extreme terror. This terror is not due altogether to the sinister manner of his recent disappearance, but was engendered by the whole nature of his life-work, and first gained it's acute form more than seventeen years ago, when we were in the third year of our course at the Miskatonic University medical school in Arkham."
This short story by renowned horror fiction writer H. P. Lovecraft is written as an account of a medical school student who went to medical school with a notorious doctor named Herbert West, who has disappeared. This notoriety is due to the morbid experiments Dr. West performs on dead animals, with a new reagent he has invented, in an effort to reanimate the dead. Ultimately, he believes that he can find a way to perfectly bring a dead human being back to life, essentially cheating death. And so, that is what the account of the unnamed medical student tells of - The madness of Dr. West and his ungodly goal to find the perfect dead body to experiment on, and successfully bring back to life, which is something that has had considerable trouble with in his previous 'experiments'.
Originally serialized into six parts and published in Home Brew magazine in 1922, 'Herbert West - Reanimator' was written by Lovecraft as a parody of Frankenstein and also because he was in need of money. He considered the story himself to be "Drivel written for the masses" and was generally unhappy with the work, only writing it because he was being paid $5 for each installment. He was required to write unlike his normal style, ending each installment of the story with a cliffhanger, and beginning each installment with a recap of the last. Anyone who has read Lovecraft's work before will notice that it is, indeed, unlike his usual style. Some of his other stories such as 'In The Vault' and 'The Outsider' follow a single character and something that they must overcome at all odds, and end with an almost expected, but otherwise anticipated twist or discovery, unlike what's found in 'Herbert West - Reanimator' where two characters experience a multitude of frightening events that are all contained within one large experience.
The mad Herbert West is easily a most admirable character, despite his fascination with death and his perverse, morbid experiments, he is fantastically described as a "small, slender, spectacled youth with delicate features, yellow hair, pale blue eyes and a soft voice", his image juxtaposing against the West that we become accustomed to as not a fragile man of science, but a delusional madman. It would be wrong to call him a failure, though, as his reagent does work, just not as he had wished. He creates grotesque monstrosities of the corpses he experiments on, indescribable in any word other than 'zombie'. These monsters terrorize him and the town of Arkham. But Dr. West does not give up his efforts to defeat death and considers these 'zombies' as nothing more than progress. Though his arrogance and disrespect for life and death may prove to be his undoing.
Wonderfully imagined and far ahead of its time, 'Herbert West - Reanimator' is an enjoyable and frightening short story which shows that tampering with the laws of life and death is something best left not in the hands of a scientist, or even mankind at all. In contrast with the rest of Lovecraft's work, Reanimator sticks out like a sore thumb. It is unlike his usual style and that is quite noticeable. But it still manages to deliver the horror and fear that is associated with his other work.
Read by someone who does not normally read or appreciate the horror genre, 'Herbert West - Reanimator' will be strange to them and something they wouldn't normally be seen reading. On the other hand, to someone who loves to read horror stories and may have read some of Lovecraft's literary work before, I recommend it to them, since that is who it was written for - Someone who enjoys being frightened.
'Herbert West - Reanimator'
By H. P. Lovecraft
Published by Orion Books (2008)
Originally Published by Home Brew (1922)
Told from the viewpoint of an unnamed narrator throughout, 'Herbert West - Reanimator' begins with a chilling introduction.
"Of Herbert West, who was my friend in college and in other life, I can speak only with extreme terror. This terror is not due altogether to the sinister manner of his recent disappearance, but was engendered by the whole nature of his life-work, and first gained it's acute form more than seventeen years ago, when we were in the third year of our course at the Miskatonic University medical school in Arkham."
This short story by renowned horror fiction writer H. P. Lovecraft is written as an account of a medical school student who went to medical school with a notorious doctor named Herbert West, who has disappeared. This notoriety is due to the morbid experiments Dr. West performs on dead animals, with a new reagent he has invented, in an effort to reanimate the dead. Ultimately, he believes that he can find a way to perfectly bring a dead human being back to life, essentially cheating death. And so, that is what the account of the unnamed medical student tells of - The madness of Dr. West and his ungodly goal to find the perfect dead body to experiment on, and successfully bring back to life, which is something that has had considerable trouble with in his previous 'experiments'.
Originally serialized into six parts and published in Home Brew magazine in 1922, 'Herbert West - Reanimator' was written by Lovecraft as a parody of Frankenstein and also because he was in need of money. He considered the story himself to be "Drivel written for the masses" and was generally unhappy with the work, only writing it because he was being paid $5 for each installment. He was required to write unlike his normal style, ending each installment of the story with a cliffhanger, and beginning each installment with a recap of the last. Anyone who has read Lovecraft's work before will notice that it is, indeed, unlike his usual style. Some of his other stories such as 'In The Vault' and 'The Outsider' follow a single character and something that they must overcome at all odds, and end with an almost expected, but otherwise anticipated twist or discovery, unlike what's found in 'Herbert West - Reanimator' where two characters experience a multitude of frightening events that are all contained within one large experience.
The mad Herbert West is easily a most admirable character, despite his fascination with death and his perverse, morbid experiments, he is fantastically described as a "small, slender, spectacled youth with delicate features, yellow hair, pale blue eyes and a soft voice", his image juxtaposing against the West that we become accustomed to as not a fragile man of science, but a delusional madman. It would be wrong to call him a failure, though, as his reagent does work, just not as he had wished. He creates grotesque monstrosities of the corpses he experiments on, indescribable in any word other than 'zombie'. These monsters terrorize him and the town of Arkham. But Dr. West does not give up his efforts to defeat death and considers these 'zombies' as nothing more than progress. Though his arrogance and disrespect for life and death may prove to be his undoing.
Wonderfully imagined and far ahead of its time, 'Herbert West - Reanimator' is an enjoyable and frightening short story which shows that tampering with the laws of life and death is something best left not in the hands of a scientist, or even mankind at all. In contrast with the rest of Lovecraft's work, Reanimator sticks out like a sore thumb. It is unlike his usual style and that is quite noticeable. But it still manages to deliver the horror and fear that is associated with his other work.
Read by someone who does not normally read or appreciate the horror genre, 'Herbert West - Reanimator' will be strange to them and something they wouldn't normally be seen reading. On the other hand, to someone who loves to read horror stories and may have read some of Lovecraft's literary work before, I recommend it to them, since that is who it was written for - Someone who enjoys being frightened.
