Moving Past Lovecraft: New Visions of the Weird (NeMLA 2025)

Academic discussions of weird fiction today are dominated by HP Lovecraft. This makes some sense, considering he promoted the term and is perhaps the name most associated with it. Yet, the weird existed long before Lovecraft and has been prolifically mutating since his death in 1937. Writers like Thomas Ligotti and Caitlín Kiernan have welcomed Lovecraft’s influence and moved on, while many others have cut their own strange paths without him. The “New Weird” emerged in the 1990’s as flagship of all things weird, and shortly after others – like Victor LaValle, Matt Ruff, and N. K. Jemisin – actively took up Lovecraft’s prejudices in order to subvert them. Recent motions toward a “global weird fiction” have begun to explore other language and national literatures for alternate visions of the weird. In his own essay on weird fiction, Lovecraft identifies many of his own weird precursors, but neglects to mention many others who would easily fit the bill. While he is certainly an important contributor to weird fiction, his great influence has had the unfortunate effect of blinding us to many other weird writers and, just as critically, other branches of the weird. The aim of this session is to move beyond Lovecraft. The point is not to deny Lovecraft a seat at the table, but, as Jeff Vandermeer writes, to “see Lovecraft with clear eyes and to acknowledge that weird fiction should not and simply cannot begin and end with one vision, created by a man who passed away in 1937.” The Lovecraftian weird has ironically become a well charted territory, but what of other weird fictions? In an effort to spur another revolution in the genre of weird fiction, this session welcomes work that addresses weird fiction after, before, or without Lovecraft.