The Call of Cthulhu

The cosmic horror story The Call of Cthulhu is one of Lovecraft’s most famous works. Written in the summer of 1926 and first published in the pulp magazine Weird Tales in February 1928, it is considered the cornerstone of the celebrated "Cthulhu Mythos", a mythopoeia and shared fictional universe expanded upon by Lovecraft and successors.

The story is a seminal work of cosmic horror, a subgenre that emphasizes the insignificance of humanity in the face of vast, ancient, and incomprehensible forces. Unlike traditional gothic horror, which often focuses on human-centric morality, ghosts, or demons, Lovecraft’s terror stems from the realization that the universe is cold, indifferent, and populated by entities that defy our understanding of physics and reality.