“Lazarus” (1906) by Leonid Nikolaievich Andreyev

The question came up when talking with Monica Wasserman: What Russian authors had H. P. Lovecraft read, and when had he read them? The question arose in part from a comment that Sonia H. Davis, Lovecraft’s former wife, whose autobiography Two Hearts That Beat As One Monica had edited, had made in a letter to August Derleth:

Also, I forgot to state in my story that it was I would introduced H.P. to the Russian writers, and even sent him a short review of one of Gorky’s short stories “Chelcash” [sic] which was very much influenced by Nietzsche, as were some of Jack London’s stories.

Sonia Davis to August Derleth, 6 Jul 1967, MSS. Wisconsin Historical Society

Russian literature entered a golden age in the early 19th century, and several authors became internationally renowned, with their work translated into many European languages, including English. Sonia was a Jewish emigre from Ukraine (then part of the Russian Empire); she had left when she was seven years old, and was not fluent in Russian, but read Russian authors in English translation. That letter excerpt to Derleth suggests that perhaps she introduced Lovecraft to Russian authors, or at least encouraged him to read them. In fact, in the one surviving letter we have from Sonia to Howard, she discusses Nietzsche in regards to Maxim Gorky “Chelkash” (1895), as well as Leo Tolstoy, and reads in part:

Gorky, the Russian tramp author, risen through strife, amid poverty and ignorance, under the oppression and suppression of recent Czaristic Russia, created a character in his admirable short stories, one “Chelkash”. In this unique individual he incarnates the scums and the dregs, the flotsam and jetsam, of the lowest “basyak” translated, would be the equivalent of the most sordid tramp-hobo-bandit. A pirate whose composition embraces a quality of strength, a mental and psychological power and vigor, at once of a deity and satan combined. […]

One evening a few years ago, I went to Carnegie Hall to hear the son of the great Tolstoi. I was eager to hear of him from one who was at once his son, friend and exponent. You may imagine my disappointment when I found him to be a mediocre individual with nothing more striking and original to offer than the proper usage of words and phrases, with quotations interspersed; without casting one ray of light upon Tolstoi other than had already been gleaned from his books and biographies.

Sonia H. Greene to H. P. Lovecraft, 1 Aug 1921, Miscellaneous Letters 176-177

To come to any conclusions, however, would require a trawl through the length and breadth of Lovecraft’s published letters and essays to scour for any reference to Russian authors or works, to see what Lovecraft read and when. Naturally, I promised Monica I’d do it the next time I had occasion to sift through the letters. The earliest reference is in a letter to August Derleth:

Your recent book bargains all sound very fortunate, & I hope their digestion may prove altogether pleasant & culturally profitable. I read “Anna Kareinina” years ago, but can’t say I cared greatly for that or for anything of Tosltoi’s. To my mind, Tolstoi is sickeningly mawkish & sentimental, with an amusingly disproportionate interest in things social and ethical. Of course, that is typical in a way of all Slav literature; but other Russian authors show far less of this sloppiness in proportion to their genius & insight into character. If you want Russia at its best, try Dostoievsky, whose “Crime & Punishment” is a truly epic achievement.

H. P. Lovecraft to August Derleth, 11 Jan 1927, Essential Solitude 1.62

When and where Lovecraft did this reading-up of Anna Karenina (1878), Crime and Punishment (1868), or other works is unclear; if it was “years ago” in 1927, that might put it during or even before Lovecraft’s marriage and New York period (1924-1926), during the time when he and Sonia were essentially courting (1921-1923)—but that is supposition; I haven’t found any earlier references. It isn’t even clear if Lovecraft read Crime and Punishment in its entirety; his library contained The Lock and Key Library: Classic Mystery and Detective Stories (1909), which Lovecraft leaned heavily on when writing “Supernatural Horror in Literature” (1927), and which published excerpts from Crime and Punishment, so that might be all that Lovecraft had read.

The first bit of Russian literature that we know Lovecraft read, and which we can say definitively when he read it, was in the oddest of places: the March 1927 Weird Tales. Editor Farnsworth Wright had instituted a feature of weird fiction reprints, including foreign language works translated into English. Eric Williams, who edited Night Fears: Weird Tales… in Translation (2023) notes:

During Wright’s sixteen years as editor, at least forty-eight translations were published in Weird Tales, a surprising amount of material for which there is no real precedent in the pulps. And while that’s only a fraction overall of the stories in Weird Tales, an important point bears repeating: they were never isolated or categorized apart from the main body of work in the magazine. There was no Weird Translations section, for instance; rather, they were either presented as “classics” and “reprints” or, equally common, they were simply another weird story, fully integrated into the issue right alongside the most recent work for Greye la Spina or Seabury Quinn. (xix-xx)

Such was very much the case with “Lazarus” (original title: “Елеазар”) by Leonid Nikolaievich Andreyev (Леони́д Никола́евич Андре́ев), with the only indication it was something out of the ordinary story being the asterisk that it was “translated from the Russian.” The translator is not credited; the story had previously been translated and published in English in 1918, translated by Abraham Yarmolinsky, and reprinted in Famous Modern Ghost Stories (1921). A comparison between the 1921 anthology and 1927 Weird Tales texts shows a few differences in specific wording, but the two texts are so close that any such changes are probably due to Farnsworth Wright’s editorial hand. Lovecraft, for his part, was appreciative:

 […] I was glad to see “Lazarus” in this issue. It certainly gives the vague horror of beyond & outside in a way which few can achieve.

H. P. Lovecraft to Clark Ashton Smith, 18 Feb 1927, Dawnward Spire, Lonely Hill 122

“Lazarus” concerns the Biblical character of Lazarus of Bethany, who according to the Gospel of John had been resurrected from death by Jesus Christ. Andreyev does not depict Jesus or deal with the episode of resurrection itself, but rather the aftermath. Lazarus, who had died, is now among the living again, still bloated with the corruption of four days’ decomposition, and with the haunted stare of someone who has seen what awaits “yonder.” A newer translation might use the word “beyond,” but the meaning is the same as when Shakespeare wrote: “The undiscovered country from whose bourn no traveller returns.” (Hamlet Act Three, Scene One).

Except Lazarus did return.

While the Lazarus of the story does not echo the post-resurrection career of Lazarus of Bethany in Christian traditions, Andreyev may have been inspired by Orthodox Christianity’s later depictions, which said that after his resurrection Lazarus never smiled, which worked themselves into folk traditions. Lovecraft, who seemed largely ignorant of the specifics of Orthodox Christianity, probably knew nothing of this.

Yet it is easy to see how Lovecraft might have enjoyed this story on its own merits, shorn of any cultural context. Andreyev grounds the setting in the Roman Empire after the death of Christ, and depicts the Romans largely as Lovecraft would have enjoyed them, with their dignity, courage, pride, and power. The terrible effect of meeting Lazarus’ eyes engenders a feeling of alienation worthy of “The Outsider,” and for all the supernatural nature of the aftermath, it is not grounded in traditional Western European depictions of the afterlife. Indeed, there is an almost rationalist and scientific element to it, a genuine glimpse of ineffable truth.

But before long the sage felt that the knowledge of horror was far from being the horror itself, and that the vision of Death was not Death. And he felt that wisdom and folly are equal before the face of Infinity, for infinity knows them not. And it vanished, the dividing-line between knowledge and ignorance, truth and falsehood, top and bottom, and the shapeless thought hung suspended in the void

Lovecraft’s friend Frank Belknap Long, Jr. would list “Lazarus” at the top of his twenty-eight best tales of supernatural horror (Miscellaneous Letters 515). The same year, Lovecraft noted he was glad to see the story reprinted in the anthology Beware After Dark (1929), edited by T. Everett Harré (Miscellaneous Letters 516-517); Lovecraft was himself included in this anthology with “The Call of Cthulhu.”

There’s an argument to be made that Andreyev might have been Lovecraft’s favorite Russian author, or at least, pretty high on the list. In 1936, when compiling a reading list for Anne Renshaw‘s textbook, he mentioned of the Russian authors:

The Russian literature of the nineteenth century includes some of the most poignantly powerful fiction ever written, but sometimes seems remote and alien o use because of its close involvement with the subtleties of the Slavic temperament. Forget the occasional touches which sound mawkish, hysterical, and oversubtilised to western ears, and try to appreciate the psychological power and ruthless emotional portrayal. Turgeniev’s Virgin Soil and Fathers and Sons have great charm despite some overlcolouring and artificial contrasts. Chekhov’s short stories are vigorous, while Tolstoi’s novels War and Peace, Anna Karenina, The Kreutzer Sonata, and others go deep into human emotions. Greatest of all the Russians, however, is Dostoyevsky, with his grim and tense novels Crime and Punishment, The Idiot, The Possessed, and The Brothers Karamazov. No one except Shakespeare can excel him in driving force of fancy and emotion. […]

The Spanish Ibañez (The Cathedral), the Italian D’Annunzio (The Flame of Life), the Swedish Selma Lagerlof (Gosta Berling), and the Norwegian Sigrid Undset (Kristin Lavrandatter—an important study in mediaeval life) seem assured of a permanent place in literature, while in Russia Andreyev (The Red Laugh, The Seven Who Were Hanged), Artzibashef (Sanine), and Gorki (Foma Fordyeff, The Lower Depths, Chelkash) have vigorously carried the tradition of deep psychological insight and savage, ruthless realism down to the present time.

H. P. Lovecraft, [Suggestions for a Reading Guide], Collected Essays 2.189, 190

Of these works, the only ones in Lovecraft’s library were copies of Andreyev’s novels The Seven That Were Hanged and The Red Laugh, and Tolstoy’s War and Peace—the latter of which was inherited from his father:

“War & Peace”, in two ample volumes, is among the paternally inherited section of my library; & upon your enthusastick endorsement I am almost tempted to consider its perusal. The fact that its text leaves are cut, plus the evidence supply’d by fly-leaves that were originally uncut, leads me to the conclusion that my father must have surviv’d a voyage thro’ it; tho’ it is possible that he merely amus’d himself o an evening by running a paper knife thro’ it. What I have read of Count Lyof Nikolaievitch’s work has not filled me with enthusiasm. Both in him, & in M. Dustyoffsky’s efforts, I have seem’d to discern an exaggeration of neurotic traits which, however true they may be for the bracycephalick, moody, & mercurial Slav, have not much meaning or relevance in connexion with the Western part of mankind. I will not deny the greatness of these authors in reflecting the environment around them—but I understand too little of that environment to appreciate its close pourtrayal. But since “War & Peace” is actually in the house, it is not impossible that I may at least begin it some day. (N. B. Having just taken a look at the size of the volumes, I’m not so sure!)

H. P. Lovecraft to Alfred Galpin, 27 Oct 1932, Letters to Alfred Galpin & Others 271-272

There are a few other scattered references to Russian authors in Lovecraft’s letters; Anton Chekov and Ivan Turgenev are in good place next to Leo Tolstoy, Fyodor Dostoevsky, and Maxim Gorky. (Helena Blavatsky may be considered a separate case, as her fiction is more along occult lines.) However, the references are few enough that it is difficult to say when exactly he read any particular work, or if he read it in its entirety, or what inspired him to pick up those books, be it Sonia’s encouragement or something else.

Lovecraft had his prejudices and held to certain stereotypes about Russians, but he was at least open-minded enough to actually read them; even if not all the works were entirely to his taste. Even dismissive as he was of what he considered the “moody & mercurial Slav,” Lovecraft had sufficient respect for Russian literature to acknowledge its power and influence…and if not all of it was to his tastes, it can honestly be said that Lovecraft read “Lazarus” in Weird Tales in 1927—and found it good.

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Bobby Derie is the author of Weird Talers: Essays on Robert E. Howard and Others and Sex and the Cthulhu Mythos.

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