The Ancestral Doom of Ill-Fated Forefathers

Exploring sorcerers in the work of Lovecraft and Bloch

There is something particularly unnerving about finding a portrait of an all but forgotten ancestor hidden behind a wall, or a coffer of antiquarian documents spelling doom for the unlucky soul who happens upon them — something that elicits a sense of futility, fate, and the horror of a history which repeats itself endlessly despite characters’ best efforts to resist it. This theme of family secrets and ancestral curses is undoubtedly a popular one in weird fiction and horror, central to the work of Lovecraft and many of his contemporaries. Recently, I reread Robert Bloch’s “The Curse of the House” (1939) and made note of several similarities between this story and Lovecraft’s The Case of Charles Dexter Ward. As far as Bloch stories go, I think this is a criminally underrated one, truly unique in that it twists the classic haunted house trope in a delightfully madness-inducing way.

Both works center around nefarious sorcerers: Brian Droome of Edinburgh, Scotland and Joseph Curwen of Massachusetts. Droome descends from twelve generations of wizards partaking in clandestine, black magic rituals, while Curwen is the distant ancestor of Charles Dexter Ward, who has summoned his kin to restore him to his earthly state. Droome and Curwen have particularly detestable characterizations, and both are ultimately slain, yet their corrupt spirits linger on, awaiting the day to unleash vengeance upon the world. Part of what makes them so despicable is their connection to human sacrifice and slavery — very real occurrences in history that can easily evoke terror from our modern vantage of the world. Indeed, if we were to go back in time like in Clark Ashton Smith’s “The Chain of Aforgomon,” and observe our primitive ancestors engaged in these sort of acts, it would be a very chilling sight.

Let’s take a look at the way each sorcerer is described.

“Joseph Curwen, as revealed by the rambling legends embodied in what Ward heard and unearthed, was a very astonishing, enigmatic, and obscurely horrible individual.” -H.P. Lovecraft

“Brian Droome. Swarthy bearded, burning-eyed! Unforgettable! His personality was as compelling as a serpent’s — and as evil.” -Robert Bloch

Both authors make a strong impression with these initial descriptions. Lovecraft uses a single sentence, interrupted by a rather lengthy clause to establish the mystery and uncertainty surrounding Curwen’s personhood. He then uses vowel alliteration in choosing the following adjectives which almost seems to give the sentence a musical ring to it. Just adding that adverb “obscurely” makes the following adjective “horrible” all the more potent. I love to use these sorts of adverbs in my own writing: “singularly symmetrical; conspicuously evil.”

Bloch’s description, on the other hand, is rather disjointed in comparison. It has a completely different rhythm to it, and employs the use of incomplete sentence fragments. When I teach academic writing, I am always reminding students to avoid these types of fragments, but in a creative writing context, they can be powerful tools. I love the simile he uses here, one that requires a bit of extra thought. Serpents aren’t very compelling to most, after all. Writers can have great fun experimenting with these kinds of comparisons.

Here are two more great descriptions.

“There seemed to lurk in his bearing some cryptic, sardonic arrogance, as if he had come to find all human beings dull through having moved among stranger and more potent entities.” -H.P. Lovecraft

“And yet, he was not a silent man, he could talk a blue streak, and was remarkably well-informed and well-educated — in a word, cultured. But he was not civilized. Brian Droome was a pagan, and when he spoke of his beliefs he had the trusting manner of a fearless child.” -Robert Bloch

In addition to the similarities between the sorcerers themselves, the location of their sorceries is also quite significant. The Droome House in Edinburgh is described as being the “incarnate” of twelve generations of sorcerers. Originally built by Cornac Droome in 1561, it stands upon a site of ancient Druidic stones which form the foundation of the cellar. Droome also tells the protagonist Will Banks, that the house was not built but rather “accumulated.” He says that the house was built “downward” in that more subterranean levels were added below the original cellar. Like Joseph Curwen’s Pawtuxet farmhouse, there are many secret corridors and passageways where abominable rituals and sacrifices have taken place.

In fact, one of the most frightening parts of The Case of Charles Dexter Ward for me is the “negotiation scenes” between Curwen/Ward and these resurrected corpses of long dead denizens of previous centuries, who he interrogates to reveal the secret knowledge that they have taken with them to the grave. Just look at this amazing sentence describing the voices heard in the chambers of Curwen’s necromancy:

“After that date, however, they assumed a very singular and terrible cast as they ran the gamut betwixt dronings of dull acquiescence and explosions of frantic pain or fury, rumblings of conversations and whines of entreaty, pantings of eagerness and shouts of protest.”

There is some beautiful symmetry in this sentence. Each set of descriptions follows the same pattern of a preceding -ing noun, the conjunction “and,” and the secondary, conceptually polar idea. Lovecraft was really fond of using these elongated types of pairings. The sentence is also a classic example of dropping the final “and” in a list formation. And what’s more, it really illustrates the terror of this scene. Resurrected corpses and spirits seem frightening enough, but no, these entities are tortured and slain once again by Curwen! Could this be allegorical somehow, such as the way we are often prying into dark secrets of the past that are perhaps better left undisturbed? Or maybe it is the way that powerful figures often try to rewrite history to their own advantage. Curwen is certainly the incarnate of evil here, and rather sadistic in nature, because sometimes it seems he interrogates these beings just for the sake of his own pleasure.

For both stories, however, it is not the house that is haunted necessarily, but the whole aura of mystique surrounding the two sorcerers and their kin. Part of what makes Bloch’s story so unique is that even when the Droome house is destroyed, it continues to maintain a presence in the reality of the observer. The story is thus heavily intertwined with a psychological aspect, as the doctor who attends Banks, diagnoses him with madness resulting from a guilty conscience. Both Will Banks and Charles Dexter Ward are indeed plagued by madness — their interest in the occult has led to dire consequences, awakening the malevolent spirits of once slain sorcerers.

Overall, two of my favorite horror writers of all time! What are your favorite works by H.P. Lovecraft and Robert Bloch?