It was of this place that Abdul Alhazred, the mad poet, dreamed on the night before he sang his unexplainable couplet:
That is not dead which can eternal lie,
And with strange aeons even death may die.
-H.P. Lovecraft, The Nameless City, 1921

Clearly, the literary works of H.P. Lovecraft (1890-1937) have provided inspiration for many of my drawings, and this one is no exception. If you know anything about Lovecraft’s stories, you’re no doubt familiar with the mad poet, Abdul Alhazred. For those unfamiliar, he’s the one responsible for writing the infamous Necronomicon, the apocryphal “Book of the Dead.” This forbidden tome tells of the race of insane elder gods who once ruled the earth---and who will on some very dark day return…

I thought it would be fun to see what would happen if Abdul Alhazred actually read the very book he was writing (receiving???).

Charcoal on paper, 2011