Baranger's Outstanding Lovecraft Editions

The covers of the folio editions of Lovecraft's The Call of Cthulhu and At the Mountains of Madness.  I placed S.T. Joshi's excellent biography in the shot as well so you can get a sense of the size of these marvelous editions.  The biography is about the size of a standard book.

The back covers of the hardbound books reveal examples more superb illustrations.

My recent reading of “The Shadow Out of Time” motivated me to explore YouTube with Lovecraft in mind.  As I mentioned in my review of that outstanding short story, the amount of Lovecraftian content has exploded on that platform over the past few years.  Lovecraft seems to be more popular now than ever before.

In viewing various content I came across a channel by a Lovecraft fan that looks like it is fun for its creator but it did not impress me that much.  I watched two or three episodes before moving on to more satisfying offerings by others.  But, in one episode this guy reveal his prized editions of Lovecraft works.  All were impressive but a new series of folio format art books featuring Lovecraft's work bowled me over.  I had to own these, so I bought them, in spite of my low capacity for shelf space.

They are produced by Francois Baranger, a French illustrator.  The editions came out in French first, then with the English translation.  The Call of Cthulhu was first published in 2017, with the English edition following just last year.  It was auspicious that I even discovered their existence, randomly watching some obscure person's YouTube channel, but, hey, that's how discoveries happen.

 

The opening page of The Call of Cthulhu.

Local authorities approach an isolated region of Louisiana where supposed cultish rites are being enacted.

 

The horrific scene of the cult ritual is spectacularly depicted by Baranger.

One of the more atmospheric and sensational illustrations of the story.  Cthulhu is in the distance surrounded by its minions.

The impact and magnitude of all these horrible revelations takes its toll on our narrator.  Baranger captures the existential dread of Lovecraft's story in fine detail.

At the Mountains of Madness accompanies Cthulhu in two volumes.  It is actually more than twice the short story's length but Baranger managed to produce each volume in 60 exquisitely immense heavy quality paper.  The font is in varying sizes to suit the artist but most of it is fairly modest though easily readable, about what you find in a typical news magazine.  A lot of words are packed into the Mountains of Madness editions, but so are some incredible illustrations.

Baranger superbly captures the atmospheric nature of Lovecraft's tales with illustrations that use shadow and color to great effect, offering nuances in the compositions that give the reader a feel for what it was like to live in the 1920's and 30's, when the bulk of Lovecraft's work is set.

Far from calling attention to itself or from detracting from the prose, the illustrations expand the reader's appreciation for Lovecraft's work.  The depiction of Ctuhlhu is exactly how I have envisioned the gigantic monster and yet Baranger masterfully does not show you everything in its entirety, though you definitely sense the monster's enormity.  There is enough there to capture the essence of the story and augment the tale with visual interpretations that are revealing and yet restrained in the manner of Lovecraft's prose.  

The illustrations are perfectly detailed where needed.  They capture accurate perspectives of what is happening in the story and yet are still ruminating and ambiguous where needed.  The artist's work does not just illustrate the narrative.  I was astonished to what degree it enhanced it by being so true to the spirit and tone of Lovecraft's vision.  This is what Peter Jackson did for The Lord of the Rings, except in this case, nothing is edited out of the story.  You get it all, marvelously illustrated.  Baranger is channeling Lovecraft in the art of these books.    

Part of the appeal of At the Mountains of Madness is its epic, adventure quality.

A "dissection" is performed on a gruesome "specimen" discovered by the research team.

The small airplane (lower right) approaches the incredible ancient city of unknown origins situated in Antarctica.

The books receive fantastic reviews on Amazon.  Five-star ratings are extremely rare.  This edition of The Call of Cthulhu gets a 4.7 star rating overall with more than 1,100 reviews.  Apparently, a lot of people are buying Baranger's work.  93% of them give the hardbound folio four stars or more.  For At the Mountains of Madness both volumes get 4.8 stars, which is as high as any type of product I've seen on the site. 95% of buyers give each volume four stars or higher.

The criticism most common among those giving the books lesser ratings pertains to book damage in delivery and Amazon not packaging them adequately.  I was only slightly worried about my investment.  I deduced that buying all three at once would help them reinforce one another.  That worked but I can honestly say the packaging was sub-par anyway.  I am lucky all three volumes aren't dented along the edges or corners.  But they survived in excellent shape.

I suppose these are the corrected translations rather than some slightly erroneous versions out there in the public domain.  I did not notice any paragraphing differences compared with Joshi's revised editions.  If the text in this  The Call of Cthulhu contains omissions or other mistakes I did not notice it upon this reading.
 

I have read this story probably two dozen times before in my life, though mostly in slightly flawed versions.  It is a staple of my literary interest.  But, I have never read it the way I just did accompanied by Baranger's simply brilliant work.  I was paying more attention to the intricacies and feel of his illustrations.  They were the perfect companion for this time through the tale.  What a rewarding experience!

 

As Guillermo Del Toro struggles to move forward with his film adaptation of At the Mountain of Madness (see here and here and here; check out an early draft of the screenplay here), I now have an excellent alternative until that film is finally produced - or isn't.  These illustrations allow me to enter the epic story visually in a way that was heretofore inadequate or impossible.

Baranger's work on Lovecraft is instantly one of the most treasured published items I own in my library.  They rank there beside my 1984 red leather slipcase hardbound edition of The Lord of the Rings and my wonderful boxed six volume paperback set of Proust's great novel.  It compares with my art books on Renoir and Richter among many others.  They are a treasure.

With them, Lovecraft has been given the direct, respectable treatment that is all too lacking today.  Something that accentuates the brilliance of his writing while simultaneously giving us a fresh vision of it that is altogether fulfilling.  The Dunwich Horror is already available in French.  Hopefully, the translation will follow this year.  I can't wait to add to this extraordinary collection.  Keep up the spectacular work my newfound French friend! 

 

Another wonderful atmospheric rendering of Lovecraft's fantastical vision.

The editions are scattered with commonplace items from the 1920's and 30's which ground the illustrations in reality.  This serves to make the more horrific aspects of the artwork all the more shocking and awe-inspiring.

Two major characters overlook the vast ruins that are millions of years old.

They escape by plane, the narrator swears he will never return to the horror of the place and fears what future expeditions might unknowingly summon from the depths of time.