Departing the place once familiar: Lovecraft's eco-weird thought

This chapter will foreground a sense of place as a fundamental aspect of H.P. Lovecraft's fiction and will argue that the eco-weird is implicit in his writings. It first shows how a sense of place, rooted in Providence, Rhode Island, is fundamentally important for Lovecraft's fictional worlds. Next, it argues that this sense of place has significant impacts on Lovecraft's environmental thought and his racist beliefs, as seen most significantly in the way that Lovecraft's fiction changes after his time in New York. Finally, it argues that the eco-weird provides a set of analytical tools that help to challenge Lovecraft's racism and offer a more nuanced reading of his fiction. The chapter ends with an analysis of Lovecraft's short story, "The Colour out of Space," to show that the weird offers an opportunity to depart the familiar and to thus challenge the standards of normalcy rooted in his sense of place and on display in his fiction.