August Derleth

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Template:Cleanup-date August William Derleth (February 24 1909 – July 4 1971) was an American writer and anthologist.

1 Life
2 Bibliography
3 External links

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Life

The son of William Julius Derleth and his wife Rose Louise Volk, he grew up in Sauk City, Wisconsin. At the age of 16, he sold his first story to Weird Tales magazine. Derleth wrote all throughout his four years at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and received a B.A. in 1930. During this time he served briefly as editor of Mystic Magazine.

In the mid-1930s he organised a Ranger's Club for young people, served as clerk and president of the local Board of Education, served as a parole officer, organised a local Men’s Club and a Parent-Teacher Association. He also lectured in American Regional Literature at the University of Wisconsin.

Derleth was a contemporary and friend of H. P. Lovecraft — when Lovecraft wrote about "le Comte d'Erlette" in his fiction it was in homage to Derleth. After Lovecraft's death he took a number of that author's unfinished stories and rewrote or finished them for publication in Weird Tales and later in book form. In the process, he invented the term Cthulhu Mythos to describe the invented mythology that seemed to lie behind much of Lovecraft's fiction. Derleth codified the Mythos to bring it more in line with his own Christian conception of the battle between good and evil and, as other authors had done before him, added new gods and creatures to the stories.

When Lovecraft died in 1937, Derleth and Donald Wandrei put together a collection of that author's stories and tried to get them published. With existing publishers showing little interest, they founded Arkham House in 1939 to do it themselves. The name of the company comes from Lovecraft's fictional town of Arkham, Massachusetts, which featured in many of his stories.

In 1939 Arkham House published The Outsider and Others, a huge collection that contained most of Lovecraft's short stories then known to exist. Derleth and Wandrei soon decided to expand Arkham House and began a regular publishing schedule after its second book, Someone in the Dark in 1941, a collection of some of Derleth's own horror stories.

In 1941 he became literary editor of The Capital Times newspaper in Madison, a post he held until his resignation in 1960.

Derleth was married April 6 1953 to Sandra Evelyn Winters, and they were divorced six years later in 1959. He retained custody of their two children, April Rose and Walden William. In 1960, Derleth began editing and publishing a magazine called Hawk and Whippoorwill, dedicated to poems of man and nature.

He died on July 4 1971 and is buried in St. Aloysius Cemetery, Sauk City, Wisconsin.

Derleth wrote more than 150 short stories and more than 100 books during his lifetime. Included among that number were several novels about a British detective named Solar Pons, who was quite similar in many respects to Sherlock Holmes. Derleth, however, lacked the knowledge to make the details of those stories authentic, as he had never been to England. He also wrote under the pseudonyms Stephen Grendon, Kenyon Holmes and Tally Mason.

Derleth's papers were donated to the Wisconsin Historical Society in Madison. They have been organized by the State Archives that is located there.

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Bibliography

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Short fiction

The Lurker at the Threshold|Billington's Wood (unknown) with H.P. Lovecraft
The Gorge Beyond Salapunco (unknown)
The House of Curwen Street (unknown)
The Lurker at the Threshold|Manuscript of Stephen Bates (unknown) with H.P. Lovecraft
The Lurker at the Threshold|Narrative of Winfield Phillips (unknown) with H.P. Lovecraft
Bat's Belfry (1926)
The Coffin of Lissa (1926)
The Devil's Pay (1926)
The Elixir of Life (1926) with Marc R. Schorer
The Marmoset (1926) with Marc R. Schorer
The Black Castle (1927) with Marc R. Schorer
The Night Rider (1927)
The River (1927)
The Sleepers (1927)
The Turret Room (1927)
The Conradi Affair (1928) with Carl W. Ganzlin
The Owl on the Moor (1928) with Marc R. Schorer
The Philosophers' Stone (1928)
Riders in the Sky (1928) with Marc R. Schorer
The Statement of Justin Parker (1928)
The Tenant at Number Seven (1928)
The Tenant (1928)
The Three-Storied House (1928)
"Melodie in E Minor" (1929)
The Deserted Garden (1929)
A Dinner at Imola (1929)
He Shall Come (1929)
The House on the Highway (1929)
The Inheritors (1929)
An Occurrence in an Antique Shop (1929)
Old Mark (1929)
Scarlatti's Bottle (1929)
"Just a Song at Twilight" (1930)
Across the Hall (1930)
The Lilac Bush (1930)
A Matter of Sight (1930)
Mrs. Bentley's Daughter (1930)
The Pacer (1930) with Marc R. Schorer
The Pacer (1930)
The Portrait (1930)
The Whistler (1930)
The Bridge of Sighs (1931)
The Captain Is Afraid (1931)
Prince Borgia's Mass (1931)
The Bishop Sees Through (1932)
In the Left Wing (1932) with Mark Schorer
The Lair of the Star-Spawn (1932) with Mark Schorer
Laughter in the Night (1932) with Mark Schorer
Red Hands (1932) with Mark Schorer
The Shadow on the Sky (1932)
The Sheraton Mirror (1932)
Those Who Seek (1932)
Birkett's Twelfth Corpse (1933)
The Carven Image (1933) with Mark Schorer
An Elegy for Mr. Danielson (1933)
Nellie Foster (1933)
The Return of Andrew Bentley (1933) with Mark Schorer
The Thing that Walked on the Wind (1933)
The Vanishing of Simmons (1933)
The White Moth (1933)
A Cloak From Messer Lando (1934)
Colonel Markesan (1934) with Mark Schorer
Feigman's Beard (1934)
A Matter of Faith (1934) with Mark Schorer
The Metronome (1934)
Wild Grapes (1934)
Mr. Berbeck Had a Dream (1935)
Muggridge's Aunt (1935)
Death Holds the Post (1936) with Mark Schorer
Lesandro's Familiar (1936)
The Return of Sarah Purcell (1936)
The Satin Mask (1936)
The Telephone in the Library (1936)
They Shall Rise (1936) with Mark Schorer
The Woman at Loon Point (1936) with Mark Schorer
Glory Hand (1937)
McGovern's Obsession (1937)
The Panelled Room (1937)
The Shuttered House (1937)
The Wind from the River (1937)
Three Gentlemen in Black (1938)
Logoda's Heads (1939)
Mrs. Elting Does Her Part (1939)
The Second Print (1939)
Spawn of the Maelstrom (1939) with Mark Schorer
The Vengeance of Ai (1939) with Mark Schorer
The Return of Hastur (1939)as August W. Derleth
The Drifting Snow (1939)as Stephen Grendon
After You, Mr. Henderson (1940)
Bramwell's Guardian (1940)
The Sandwin Compact (1940)
"Come to Me!" (1941)
Altimer's Amulet (1941)
Beyond the Threshold (1941)
Compliments of Spectro (1941)
Ithaqua (1941)
Here, Daemos! (1942)
Lansing's Luxury (1942)
Mrs. Corter Makes Up Her Mind (1942)
Headlines for Tod Shayne (1942)as August W. Derleth
Mr. Ames' Devil (1942)as August W. Derleth
Baynter's Imp (1943)
McElwin's Glass (1943)
No Light for Uncle Henry (1943)
A Thin Gentleman with Gloves (1943)
A Wig for Miss DeVore (1943)
No Light for Uncle Henry (1943) as August W. Derleth
The Dweller in Darkness (1944)
Lady Macbeth of Pimley Square (1944)
Pacific 421 (1944)
The Trail of Cthulhu (1944)
A Gentleman from Prague (1944)as Stephen Grendon
Carousel (1945)
The God-Box (1945)
The Inverness Cape (1945)
The Lost Day (1945)
Mrs. Lannisfree (1945)
The Watcher from the Sky (1945)
Alannah (1945) as Stephen Grendon
A Collector of Stones (1946)
Pikeman (1946)
Dead Man's Shoes (1946)as Stephen Grendon
The Occupant of the Crypt (1947) with Mark Schorer
The Churchyard Yew (1947)as Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu
Bishop's Gambit (1947)as Stephen Grendon
The Extra Passenger (1947)as Stephen Grendon
The Ghost Walk (1947)as Stephen Grendon
Mr. George (1947)as Stephen Grendon
Parrington's Pool (1947)as Stephen Grendon
A Little Knowledge (1948)
The Lonesome Place (1948)
Saunder's Little Friend (1948)
Something in Wood (1948)
The Whippoorwills in the Hills (1948)
Blessed Are the Meek (1948) as Stephen Grendon
Mara (1948) as Stephen Grendon
The Night Train to Lost Valley (1948) as Stephen Grendon
The Tsanta in the Parlor (1948) as Stephen Grendon
The Tsantsa in the Parlor (1948) as Stephen Grendon
The Wind in the Lilacs (1948) as Stephen Grendon
Kingsridge 214 (1949)
The Slayers and the Slain (1949)
The Testament of Claiborne Boyd (1949)
Twilight Play (1949)
Balu (1949) as Stephen Grendon
The Blue Spectacles (1949) as Stephen Grendon
Mrs. Manifold (1949) as Stephen Grendon
Open, Sesame! (1949) as Stephen Grendon
The Song of the Pewee (1949) as Stephen Grendon
The Closing Door (1950)
The Fifth Child (1950)
The Island Out of Space (1950)
The Ormolu Clock (1950)
Potts' Triumph (1950)
A Room in a House (1950)
The Man on B-17 (1950) as Stephen Grendon
The Keeper of the Key (1951)
A Knocking in the Wall (1951)
The Man Who Rode the Saucer (1951)
The Other Side of the Wall (1951)
Something from Out There (1951)
"Who Shall I Say is Calling?" (1952)
The Black Island (1952)
The Lost Path (1952)
McIlvaine's Star (1952)
The Night Road (1952)
The Place of Desolation (1952)
"Sexton, Sexton, in the Wall" (1953)
The Adventure of the Snitch in Time (1953) with Mack Reynolds
Century Jumper (1953)
A Corner for Lucia (1953)
The Detective and the Senator (1953)
The Disc Recorder (1953)
The Ebony Stick (1953)
The House in the Valley (1953)
Invaders from the Microcosm (1953)
The Maugham Obsession (1953)
A Traveler in Time (1953)
Mark VII (1954)
The Mechanical House (1954)
The Penfield Misadventure (1954)
The Place in the Woods (1954)
The Remarkable Dingdong (1954)
The Survivor (1954) with H.P. Lovecraft
Thinker, Mark VII (1954)
The Adventure of the Ball of Nostradamus (1955) with Mack Reynolds
The Dark Boy (1956)
The Ancestor (1957) with H.P. Lovecraft
The Lamp of Alhazred (1957) with H.P. Lovecraft
The Martian Artifact (1957)
The Peabody Heritage (1957) with H.P. Lovecraft
The Seal of R'lyeh (1957)
Halloween for Mr. Faulkner (1959)
Lovecraft and "The Pacer" (excerpt) (1959)
The Shuttered Room (1959) with H.P. Lovecraft
Miss Esperson (1962)as Stephen Grendon
The Adventure of the Intarsia Box (1964)
By Rocket to the Moon (1965)
The Dark Brotherhood (1966) with H.P. Lovecraft
Ferguson's Capsules (1966)
The Horror from the Middle Span (1967) with H.P. Lovecraft
The House in the Oaks (1971) with Robert E. Howard
Innsmouth Clay (1971) with H.P. Lovecraft
The Figure with the Scythe (1973) with Mark Schorer
The Watchers Out of Time (1974) with H.P. Lovecraft
An Eye for History (1975)
Protoplasma (1975)