The Evil Clergyman

Written by H. P. Lovecraft

Narrated by Matthew Schmitz

Brought to you by Altrusian Grace Media and narrated by Matthew Schmitz, and includes a fully immersive cinematic music score.

"The Evil Clergyman" is an excerpt from a letter written by American horror fiction writer H. P. Lovecraft in 1933. After his death, it was published in the April 1939 issue of Weird Tales as a short story. The letter, to his friend Bernard Austin Dwyer, recounted a dream that Lovecraft had had. Lovecraft frequently based stories on his dreams.

The story begins in the attic of an ancient house. The narrator’s companion refers to the former owner of the house and the presumably violent end that befell him. He advises the narrator not to stay after dark or touch anything, especially the small object on a table, which the companion seems to fear considerably.

The narrator is then left alone in the attic; he notes the many theological and classical books, and one bookshelf in particular containing books on magic. He feels a considerable curiosity for the forbidden object on the table. The narrator finds a strange flashlight-like device in his pocket that produces a peculiar violet glow. He attempts to illuminate the object on the table with this strange light, which he describes as being composed of particles. The object makes a crackling sound like a sparking vacuum tube, and takes on a pinkish glow with a vague white shape taking form from its center. The narrator, feeling that his surroundings are taking on strange new properties, realizes that he is not alone...

• Language: English
• Publisher: Altrusian Grace Media
• Release date: Feb 16, 2024
• ISBN: 9798868758713

H. P. Lovecraft

Renowned as one of the great horror-writers of all time, H.P. Lovecraft was born in 1890 and lived most of his life in Providence, Rhode Island. Among his many classic horror stories, many of which were published in book form only after his death in 1937, are ‘At the Mountains of Madness and Other Novels of Terror’ (1964), ‘Dagon and Other Macabre Tales’ (1965), and ‘The Horror in the Museum and Other Revisions’ (1970).