THE DEEP ONES: "The Graveyard Rats" by Henry Kuttner

"The Graveyard Rats" by Henry Kuttner.

Discussion begins May 1, 2024.

First published the March 1936 issue of Weird Tales.



BIBLIOGRAPHY

https://isfdb.org/cgi-bin/title.cgi?68321

SELECTED PRINT VERSIONS

Zombies! Zombies! Zombies!
Henry Kuttner Masters of the Weird Tale
Devils & Demons: A Treasury of Fiendish Tales Old & New
The Graveyard Reader

ONLINE VERSIONS

https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/The_Graveyard_Rats
https://www.fadedpage.com/books/20201240/html.php

ONLINE AUDIO VERSIONS

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DpgqcmuigU8
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p7RNBpwH9jc

MISCELLANY
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Kuttner
https://www.centipedepress.com/authors/kuttner.html
https://www.flapperpress.com/post/weird-tales-wedding-bells-the-story-of-henry-k...
https://darkworldsquarterly.gwthomas.org/henry-kuttner-part-1-1936-1939/
https://tinyurl.com/jum27fcv

I've got this in Weird Tales: Seven Decades of Terror.

Time and energy for the Deep Ones has been scarce lately, but I did get around to reading this y’dy.

That is one nasty piece of work! Utterly claustrophobic and gruesome. What's not to love? It's like a blueprint for any number of the 1950's horror comics that caused so much upheaval. I have it in the three non-zombie volumes listed above.

Speaking of zombies, the ambulatory corpse was about the only element of the tale that actually surprised me, but I'm not sure it added very much to the story.

The claustrophobic underworld was very well evoked, though. This was Kuttner's first commercial sale, so he started out strong.

Did Cotton Mather really hunt down the evil cults that worshipped Hecate and the dark Magna Mater? It sounds as if Kuttner (for the purposes of this story at least) had bought into the theories of Margaret Murray (The Witch-cult in Western Europe, etc.). It does do the job of setting up the supernatural elements of the story and gives a Lovecraftian atmosphere to what's in essence an EC Comics tale of poetic or perhaps cosmic justice.

On that last point, the story does indeed strike as a blurprint for the 1950s horror comics but I assume it also looks backwards to earlier stories in the pulps. I don't know the broad field well enough to even hazard a guess, although I of course know Lovecraft's early lurid stories ("Herbert West", "The Lurking Fear", and "The Loved Dead".

Definitely craftsman-like work for a first sales, but, for me, it had a lesser effect than I expected, a bit dry. For my tastes, it could have used a few more sensory details and more on Masson's state of mind.

This gets reprinted in Mythos anthologies, but I don't see much connection apart from the Salem setting. Perhaps it was inspired by "Pickman's Model" since I got the suggestion of ghouls in the tunnels.

>5 AndreasJ: Yes, the zombie/ambulator corpse was a surprise.

>6 housefulofpaper:

Lovecraft also references Murray's ideas at various points. Pseudohistorical as they be, their utility for the weird fictioneer is fairly obvious, so I'm sure the there are further examples.

It was adapted in 2022 for Guillermo del Toro's Cabinet of Curiosities. Anyone happen to see it?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uQQxwgbUSqg