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The Music of Erich Zann
A university student is forced to take the only lodging he can afford, in an almost empty building in a strange part of the city. One of the few other tenants plays strange melodies never heard before.
26 pages, Kindle Edition
First published March 1, 1922
About the author
H.P. Lovecraft
4,568 books18k followersHoward Phillips Lovecraft, of Providence, Rhode Island, was an American author of horror, fantasy and science fiction.
Lovecraft's major inspiration and invention was cosmic horror: life is incomprehensible to human minds and the universe is fundamentally alien. Those who genuinely reason, like his protagonists, gamble with sanity. Lovecraft has developed a cult following for his Cthulhu Mythos, a series of loosely interconnected fictions featuring a pantheon of human-nullifying entities, as well as the Necronomicon, a fictional grimoire of magical rites and forbidden lore. His works were deeply pessimistic and cynical, challenging the values of the Enlightenment, Romanticism and Christianity. Lovecraft's protagonists usually achieve the mirror-opposite of traditional gnosis and mysticism by momentarily glimpsing the horror of ultimate reality.
Although Lovecraft's readership was limited during his life, his reputation has grown over the decades. He is now commonly regarded as one of the most influential horror writers of the 20th Century, exerting widespread and indirect influence, and frequently compared to Edgar Allan Poe.
See also Howard Phillips Lovecraft.
— Wikipedia
Lovecraft's major inspiration and invention was cosmic horror: life is incomprehensible to human minds and the universe is fundamentally alien. Those who genuinely reason, like his protagonists, gamble with sanity. Lovecraft has developed a cult following for his Cthulhu Mythos, a series of loosely interconnected fictions featuring a pantheon of human-nullifying entities, as well as the Necronomicon, a fictional grimoire of magical rites and forbidden lore. His works were deeply pessimistic and cynical, challenging the values of the Enlightenment, Romanticism and Christianity. Lovecraft's protagonists usually achieve the mirror-opposite of traditional gnosis and mysticism by momentarily glimpsing the horror of ultimate reality.
Although Lovecraft's readership was limited during his life, his reputation has grown over the decades. He is now commonly regarded as one of the most influential horror writers of the 20th Century, exerting widespread and indirect influence, and frequently compared to Edgar Allan Poe.
See also Howard Phillips Lovecraft.
— Wikipedia
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 310 reviews
March 8, 2020
This has always been one of the Lovecraft tales I liked best, and I recently learned that it was the only story of Lovecraft’s that Robert Aickman—the English master of modern terror—liked at all. I can see why. Aickman favored obliqueness and indirection in his tales of the uncanny, and for once, in “Eric Zann,” Lovecraft does too, producing a small, understated tale of horror that keeps the adjectives and exclamation points at a minimum, and let’s the reader scare himself.
“The Music of Eric Zann,” first published in National Amateur (1922), is about a university student who becomes intrigued by his fellow tenant, eccentric old cellist Eric Zann, who plays strange discordant music late at night. The old man, after much reluctance, allows the young man to listen, but the music he plays for him is not the same stuff he plays when alone. Finally, one night, he does play his secret music, and the university man learns, to his horror, who and what Zann plays the music for.
I like the entire story, but perhaps my favorite part is the beginning, with the nightmarish, distorted description of the decrepit old street (presumably in Paris) where the narrator lives. Although I cannot prove Lovecraft ever saw it, I suspect this passage owes something to the classic German film The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, which was released in the United States more than six months before Lovecraft composed his tale:
I have never seen another street as narrow and steep as the Rue d’Auseil. It was almost a cliff, closed to all vehicles, consisting in several places of flights of steps, and ending at the top in a lofty ivied wall. Its paving was irregular, sometimes stone slabs, sometimes cobblestones, and sometimes bare earth with struggling greenish-grey vegetation. The houses were tall, peaked-roofed, incredibly old, and crazily leaning backward, forward, and sidewise. Occasionally an opposite pair, both leaning forward, almost met across the street like an arch; and certainly they kept most of the light from the ground below. There were a few overhead bridges from house to house across the street.
The inhabitants of that street impressed me peculiarly. At first I thought it was because they were all silent and reticent; but later decided it was because they were all very old....
June 19, 2019
Great eerie story here! A first person narrator is listening to a viol player who's playing very strange notes and music. He tries to befriend with the sinister chap and finds himself in a very uncanny surrounding full of bizarre sounds and effects. What is going on in his room? Why does he never again find this house in Rue d'Auseil after he fled it in horror? Classic Lovecraft and a very mysterious dark story here. Highly recommended!
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June 5, 2020
The Music of Erich Zann - subtle, enigmatic, philosophic, among the finest tales penned by author H. P. Lovecraft, a well crafted work of literature that must be read with care in order to extract that special Lovecraft nectar contained therein.
The tale is short; ever single sentence counts. As enticement for you to set twenty minutes aside to read (or listen to an audio book available on You Tube), I'll offer seven Erich Zann snapshots - each of my comments linked to a direct quote:
"But that I cannot find the place again is both singular and perplexing; for it was within a half-hour’s walk of the university and was distinguished by peculiarities which could hardly be forgotten by anyone who had been there. I have never met a person who has seen the Rue d’Auseil." --------- Our narrator is a student studying metaphysics at the local university. The story unfolds as he reflects back on the very strange happenings in and around where he took up residence - in an upper story flat along the Rue d'Auseil.
"The houses were tall, peaked-roofed, incredibly old, and crazily leaning backward, forward, and sidewise. Occasionally an opposite pair, both leaning forward, almost met across the street like an arch." --------- Where do we draw the line between realism and the fantastic? The buildings as described bring to mind the impossible geometry and architecture depicted by artist M.C. Escher. If the student perceived, truly perceived the preposterous bends in the houses, he would be alerted that something most definitely is off, a law of nature violated. Seen in this way, the music of Erich Zann would be an extension of the street's freakishness.
"Thereafter I heard Zann every night, and although he kept me awake, I was haunted by the weirdness of his music. Knowing little of the art myself, I was yet certain that none of his harmonies had any relation to music I had heard before; and concluded that he was a composer of highly original genius. The longer I listened, the more I was fascinated, until after a week I resolved to make the old man’s acquaintance."---------- Weirdness of the music. First off, a viol is a renaissance instrument with frets like a guitar and strings like a violin or viola or cello. However, with a viol, the musician holds the bow in an underhanded position. Here’s a musician playing bass viol – notice the viol itself held by the inner legs (no cello peg), hand position on the bow and the guitar-like frets: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z7S07... The viol also comes in different sizes - here's the smaller treble viol: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hqxlf... and here's a viol consort: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-_E87...
Upon hearing the music of Erich Zann, the student desires to not only meet the old man but receive an invitation to come up to his attic room to watch him play.
“He was a small, lean, bent person, with shabby clothes, blue eyes, grotesque, satyr-like face, and nearly bald head” ---------- In classic H.P. Lovecraft fashion, Erich Zann’s presence mirrors the oddness and quirkiness of the street and his music. As we read further we can infer Zann’s grotesque, satyr-like face just might be the influence, at least in part, of a mysterious force pressing in on him.
“He did not employ the music-rack, but offering no choice and playing from memory, enchanted me for over an hour with strains I had never heard before; strains which must have been of his own devising. To describe their exact nature is impossible for one unversed in music. They were a kind of fugue, with recurrent passages of the most captivating quality, but to me were notable for the absence of any of the weird notes I had overheard from my room below on other occasions.” ----------- That is strange – the music of Erich Zann is different depending on where a listener is positioned in relationship to the musician. Is this a similar phenomenon to the pitch of a train’s whistle changing as the train moves down the track? But Erich Zann always plays his music in the same room. The mystery deepens.
“As he did this he further demonstrated his eccentricity by casting a startled glance toward the lone curtained window, as if fearful of some intruder.” --------- Ah, the student is given a glimpse of what truly might be happening – an unseen something, a not-easily defined force could be working in opposition to Erich Zann and his music.
“He was trying to make a noise; to ward something off or drown something out—what, I could not imagine, awesome though I felt it must be. The playing grew fantastic, delirious, and hysterical, yet kept to the last the qualities of supreme genius which I knew this strange old man possessed. . . . At this juncture the shutter began to rattle in a howling night-wind which had sprung up outside as if in answer to the mad playing within. Zann’s screaming viol now outdid itself, emitting sounds I had never thought a viol could emit.”--------- What's happening? Is this the power of a black hole-like fourth dimension pressing down on both the music and Erich Zann? Is Erich Zann’s playing keeping some diabolical force at bay, hampering its influence, preventing it from overtaking our vulnerable three-dimensional world?
A concluding observation: How clear is the student's perception? Is he predisposed to distorting what he sees and hears? Does he take great abnormalities and reduce them to fit within his manageable, limited categories? Think of his reaction to those M.C. Escher-like distortions. Are we, in turn, much like the student in reducing our world? Reflect on this question as you read an excerpt from a novel, Robert Sheckley's Mindswap, where the same question is examined:
'However, under the continued and unremitting impact of the unknown, even the analogizing faculty can become distorted. Unable to handle the flood of data by the normal process of conceptual analogizing, the subject becomes victim to perceptual analogizing. This state is what we call "metaphoric deformation". The process is also known as "Panzaism". Does that make it clear?'
'No,' Marvin said. 'Why is it called "Panzaism"?'
'The concept is self-explanatory,' Blanders said. 'Don Quijote thinks the windmill is a giant, whereas Panza thinks the giant is a windmill. Quijotism may be defined as the perception of everyday things as rare entities. The reverse of that is Panzaism, which is the perception of rare entities as everyday things.'
May 28, 2017
A Lovecraft BR with great GR dweller, Craig :)
A nice story, proper scary atmosphere, with a hint of madness.
I'm struggling with my reads and I feel that Lovecraft is not getting proper attention from me as it should. I'm putting Lovecraft on hold for a bit. Sorry Craig.
Note to self:
A nice story, proper scary atmosphere, with a hint of madness.
I'm struggling with my reads and I feel that Lovecraft is not getting proper attention from me as it should. I'm putting Lovecraft on hold for a bit. Sorry Craig.
Note to self:
December 18, 2016
I have a confession.
When I read H.P. Lovecraft I narrate the story in the voice of Jude Law as Lemony Snicket.
All the more evident here reading The Music of Erich Zann, Lovecraft’s 1922 short story about a student who takes lodging in a weird part of the city and hears, not banjo music, but the haunting chords of the violin.
Very Lovecraft. Scary, creepy, gothic – full of the unmentionable, unknowable and unspeakable.
Horror.
Jude Law channeling Marlin Brando quoting Conrad.
“the horror, the horror”
The thirty-one year old Lovecraft was in good form describing this Frankensteinesque setting with Dostoyevskian themes. Lovecraft’s protagonist hears strange violin music in the night and investigates to find a weird old musician, unable to communicate except for written messages in French and German and through his odd playing.
The Rue d’Auseil is a setting particularly Lovecraftian - dark and twisted and mysterious, really more surrealistic than genuinely described, almost reminiscent of Kafka.
Like much of Lovecraft’s work this is memorable not so much for the plot, but for the mood and atmosphere he creates.
When I read H.P. Lovecraft I narrate the story in the voice of Jude Law as Lemony Snicket.
All the more evident here reading The Music of Erich Zann, Lovecraft’s 1922 short story about a student who takes lodging in a weird part of the city and hears, not banjo music, but the haunting chords of the violin.
Very Lovecraft. Scary, creepy, gothic – full of the unmentionable, unknowable and unspeakable.
Horror.
Jude Law channeling Marlin Brando quoting Conrad.
“the horror, the horror”
The thirty-one year old Lovecraft was in good form describing this Frankensteinesque setting with Dostoyevskian themes. Lovecraft’s protagonist hears strange violin music in the night and investigates to find a weird old musician, unable to communicate except for written messages in French and German and through his odd playing.
The Rue d’Auseil is a setting particularly Lovecraftian - dark and twisted and mysterious, really more surrealistic than genuinely described, almost reminiscent of Kafka.
Like much of Lovecraft’s work this is memorable not so much for the plot, but for the mood and atmosphere he creates.
January 10, 2018
I'm tickled to say that this 1922 horror short story by H.P. Lovecraft doesn't use the word "eldritch," not even once. It does, however, have insane viol playing, the "blackness of space illimitable," and a strange, narrow street in Paris that, even though the narrator once lived there, can never be found again.
I'm just a dabbler with the horror genre generally and Lovecraft in particular, but this was a creepily enjoyable story. Read it free online here at the H.P. Lovecraft website.
Full review to come.
I'm just a dabbler with the horror genre generally and Lovecraft in particular, but this was a creepily enjoyable story. Read it free online here at the H.P. Lovecraft website.
Full review to come.
December 22, 2020
"Aunque su música me mantenía despierto, había algo extraño en ella que me turbaba. No obstante ser yo escasamente conocedor de aquel arte, estaba convencido de que ninguna de sus armonías tenía nada que ver con la música que había oído hasta entonces, de lo que deduje que tenía que tratarse de un compositor de singular talento. Cuanto más la escuchaba más me atraía aquella música"
"Una noche, mientras escuchaba desde la puerta, oí al chirriante violín dilatarse hasta producir una caótica babel de sonidos, un pandemonio que me habría hecho dudar de mi propio juicio si desde el otro lado de la atrancada puerta no me hubiera llegado una lastimera prueba de que el horror era auténtico: el espantoso e inarticulado grito que sólo la garganta de un mudo puede emitir, y que sólo se alza en los momentos en que la angustia y el miedo son más irresistibles"
Un extraño y sombrío lugar en el que mora un misterioso músico. Sonidos y músicas inimaginables que se escuchan en la noche.
Este lugar parece estar mas aya de la realidad que conocemos y ser una especie de portal para seres que acechan desde otros planos, y la música por mas extraña que parezca es lo único que los mantiene controlados.
Un relato bastante sutil, mas apelando a la imaginación que a las descripciones...raro para Lovecraft cuando trataba "estos asuntos cósmicos/dimensionales".
El misterio, la ambientación y lo sonoro son los pilares de la historia.
"Una noche, mientras escuchaba desde la puerta, oí al chirriante violín dilatarse hasta producir una caótica babel de sonidos, un pandemonio que me habría hecho dudar de mi propio juicio si desde el otro lado de la atrancada puerta no me hubiera llegado una lastimera prueba de que el horror era auténtico: el espantoso e inarticulado grito que sólo la garganta de un mudo puede emitir, y que sólo se alza en los momentos en que la angustia y el miedo son más irresistibles"
Un extraño y sombrío lugar en el que mora un misterioso músico. Sonidos y músicas inimaginables que se escuchan en la noche.
Este lugar parece estar mas aya de la realidad que conocemos y ser una especie de portal para seres que acechan desde otros planos, y la música por mas extraña que parezca es lo único que los mantiene controlados.
Un relato bastante sutil, mas apelando a la imaginación que a las descripciones...raro para Lovecraft cuando trataba "estos asuntos cósmicos/dimensionales".
El misterio, la ambientación y lo sonoro son los pilares de la historia.
January 11, 2018
The Music of Erich Zann is a beautiful story of an unnamed narrator who as a student discovered the beauty and dread of the music of Erich Zann.
The story is told years later after a long and unsuccessful search for a strange street where the narrator lived for a while when he was a student. The Rue d’Auseil consists of stairs and the houses don't look like ordinary houses since they lean this way or that.
While living there, he hears his upstairs neighbour playing his viol. The melodies are different in the nights. Somehow he manages to get himself invited by his neighbour and he soon realizes that maybe his curiosity isn't a good thing. His neighbour plays as if his life depends on it.
You can expect the usual themes and symbols, the main one being fear of the unknown, followed by inevitable theme of forbidden knowledge (what is behind Zann's curtains) and madness.
Zann writes his explanation on a piece of paper. I don't know whether to be angry, desperate or to applaud to what Lovecraft does with it.
September 2, 2014
Anyone who ever thought or believed that Lovecraft was a bad writer needs to read "The Music of Erich Zann" immediately. It's brief, but I believe it is Lovecraft's masterpiece. It's a perfect story and has none of the "purple prose" problems that Lovecraft's detractors harp upon. In fact, I think the story blows anything that Poe wrote out of the water and is surely one of the best, most ideal weird tales ever written.
Do yourself a favor and read it now if you haven't already.
Do yourself a favor and read it now if you haven't already.
June 13, 2017
This one is another good creeper by Lovecraft.
July 5, 2016
I love Lovecraft. OK. I know it's hopelessly cliche but I love his overly descriptive lushly rich prose. I remember reading this story before - it concerns a musician who sequestered away in a dusty poky old attic maniacally playing his violin. Lovecraft is an exceptional short story writer - he manages to creative evocative and richly decadent yet bizarrely antiquated settings seemingly effortlessly...
"I have never seen another street as narrow and steep as the Rue d’Auseil. It was almost a cliff, closed to all vehicles, consisting in several places of flights of steps, and ending at the top in a lofty ivied wall. Its paving was irregular, sometimes stone slabs, sometimes cobblestones, and sometimes bare earth with struggling greenish-grey vegetation. The houses were tall, peaked-roofed, incredibly old, and crazily leaning backward, forward, and sidewise. Occasionally an opposite pair, both leaning forward, almost met across the street like an arch; and certainly they kept most of the light from the ground below. There were a few overhead bridges from house to house across the street"
There's a sense of overwhelming otherwordly menace (of course) and strange angles concealing hidden dimensions (Lovecraft seems obsessed with strange architecture x weird mathematics functioning as portals) as the protagonist engages with the mad violinist in the attic, and the tension and atmosphere builds rapidly...
"There in the narrow hall, outside the bolted door with the covered keyhole, I often heard sounds which filled me with an indefinable dread—the dread of vague wonder and brooding mystery. It was not that the sounds were hideous, for they were not; but that they held vibrations suggesting nothing on this globe of earth, and that at certain intervals they assumed a symphonic quality which I could hardly conceive as produced by one player. Certainly, Erich Zann was a genius of wild power. As the weeks passed, the playing grew wilder, whilst the old musician acquired an increasing haggardness and furtiveness pitiful to behold"
The terrible blackness is never named but its presence is felt throughout this short story - there is always a sense of doom and dread, as it lures and threatens and sucks at the fabric of reality - warded off by the ghoulish howling of the violin. It is the unknown which is after all the most terrifying.
"I have never seen another street as narrow and steep as the Rue d’Auseil. It was almost a cliff, closed to all vehicles, consisting in several places of flights of steps, and ending at the top in a lofty ivied wall. Its paving was irregular, sometimes stone slabs, sometimes cobblestones, and sometimes bare earth with struggling greenish-grey vegetation. The houses were tall, peaked-roofed, incredibly old, and crazily leaning backward, forward, and sidewise. Occasionally an opposite pair, both leaning forward, almost met across the street like an arch; and certainly they kept most of the light from the ground below. There were a few overhead bridges from house to house across the street"
There's a sense of overwhelming otherwordly menace (of course) and strange angles concealing hidden dimensions (Lovecraft seems obsessed with strange architecture x weird mathematics functioning as portals) as the protagonist engages with the mad violinist in the attic, and the tension and atmosphere builds rapidly...
"There in the narrow hall, outside the bolted door with the covered keyhole, I often heard sounds which filled me with an indefinable dread—the dread of vague wonder and brooding mystery. It was not that the sounds were hideous, for they were not; but that they held vibrations suggesting nothing on this globe of earth, and that at certain intervals they assumed a symphonic quality which I could hardly conceive as produced by one player. Certainly, Erich Zann was a genius of wild power. As the weeks passed, the playing grew wilder, whilst the old musician acquired an increasing haggardness and furtiveness pitiful to behold"
The terrible blackness is never named but its presence is felt throughout this short story - there is always a sense of doom and dread, as it lures and threatens and sucks at the fabric of reality - warded off by the ghoulish howling of the violin. It is the unknown which is after all the most terrifying.
October 26, 2023
Mediocre story that could’ve been told more engagingly.
May 21, 2021
¿Cómo reseñar un cuento tan breve siendo esta, como es, mi primera incursión en la obra del autor? No estoy capacitado para ello y, por tanto, no lo voy a hacer. Lo que sí puedo es asegurar que no va a ser la última, porque puedo contar con los dedos de una mano las veces que un escrito tan breve (a mi, que particularmente no me resulta fácil disfrutar los relatos por norma general) me ha agradado tanto. En su simpleza radica su brillantez, y en su misterio su encanto.
October 18, 2022
An out-of-work philosopher (is there any other sort?) discovers a mute with a musical bent for defending against eldritch horrors of a cosmic persuasion. A defense that is weakening...
5 'Spooky,' stars.
5 'Spooky,' stars.
July 20, 2019
This is a short but very fullfilling tale. Scary, bleak and more realistic than I can take ;)
November 9, 2021
Unusually concise in expression and easy to follow for such a wordy guy like Lovecraft. While I love some of his more complex stories, this one stands out as one of my favorites of his. The atmosphere he creates and the way he goes into detail just enough as to force you to turn the gears of your imagination to complete the scenes is fascinating. The story follows the protagonist who can’t remember the location of a mysterious street he’s been on — Rue d’Auseil —, which “lay across a dark river bordered by precipitous brick blear-windowed warehouses and spanned by a ponderous bridge of dark stone.”
It was a shadowy street with very old houses and old, silent and reticent people, one of whom was a German viol-player called Erich Zann, who regularly played his instrument at night on the 5th floor of the tallest building in that street, in “a lofty and isolated garret room, whose single gable window was the only point on the street from which one could look over the terminating wall at the declivity and panorama beyond”.
His playing intrigued the protagonist, and from there on strange things started happening, of which I shall stay silent, as I’d prefer that you read it yourself, preferably with a Lovecraftian playlist on YouTube to complete the atmosphere (especially appropriate for this short story, as a lot of its horror and creepiness comes from sound descriptions and the intrinsic paranoia of the human mind).
It was a shadowy street with very old houses and old, silent and reticent people, one of whom was a German viol-player called Erich Zann, who regularly played his instrument at night on the 5th floor of the tallest building in that street, in “a lofty and isolated garret room, whose single gable window was the only point on the street from which one could look over the terminating wall at the declivity and panorama beyond”.
His playing intrigued the protagonist, and from there on strange things started happening, of which I shall stay silent, as I’d prefer that you read it yourself, preferably with a Lovecraftian playlist on YouTube to complete the atmosphere (especially appropriate for this short story, as a lot of its horror and creepiness comes from sound descriptions and the intrinsic paranoia of the human mind).
May 1, 2020
El grito de un mudo.
June 1, 2022
Seen performed as part of the Enable Us festival at Sheffield University Drama Studio, Gallery of Screams, performed by R.M. Lloyd Parry.
A very effective horror tale without a monster, building on the idea of the lost Rue D'Orsay and the high garret room that give the viol player a window into terrifying infinity.
A very effective horror tale without a monster, building on the idea of the lost Rue D'Orsay and the high garret room that give the viol player a window into terrifying infinity.
January 7, 2014
A strange, haunting, compelling story about a university student who discovers the music of Erich Zann. Appreciated Lovecraft's writing but I was left wanting more from the ending - a greater musical background may have enhanced my enjoyment of the story as well.
September 14, 2018
Scary music, an entertaining concept with dazzling prose and infinite possibilities, but still boils down to a story that is essentially about a bunch of spooky noises coming from instruments. Worth reading just for the prose honestly.
January 30, 2021
"Sería inútil intentar describir lo que tocó Eric Zann aquella espantosa noche. Era infinitamente más horrible que todo lo que había escuchado hasta entonces, pues ahora podía ver la expresión dibujada en su rostro..."
He empezado a leer a Lovecraft pues me lo recomendaron al ver en mi librero a Stephen King.
Le doy 3.5 me causo intriga y emoción el estarlo leyendo, no soy una experta lectora en Lovecraft, no puedo decir si sus historias son siempre así, pero el final me dejó algo confusa, aunque te lleva a plantear diferentes conclusiones y expandir tus horizontes de lo que se encuentra más allá de nuestra comprensión.
Una historia corta y enigmática, ¿para quien tocaba Zann? ¿es acaso su mutismo el que lo lleva a comunicarse con otros seres por medio de la música?
Al principio pensé que a seres de ultratumba, demonios del mismísimo infierno, lo que podría comprobar al leer este párrafo: "En aquellos frenéticos acordes creía ver sombríos faunos y bacantes que bailaban y giraban...".
Pero al leer la descripción de lo que se ve o mas bien de lo que no se ve por la ventana me pregunto si es un lugar fuera de nuestro espacio...
En fin, lo recomiendo! Esta historia es parte de una compilación de historias de Lovecraft de la editorial EMU, por lo que puedo decir de la traducción me parece correcta y sin errores hasta ahora.
He empezado a leer a Lovecraft pues me lo recomendaron al ver en mi librero a Stephen King.
Le doy 3.5 me causo intriga y emoción el estarlo leyendo, no soy una experta lectora en Lovecraft, no puedo decir si sus historias son siempre así, pero el final me dejó algo confusa, aunque te lleva a plantear diferentes conclusiones y expandir tus horizontes de lo que se encuentra más allá de nuestra comprensión.
Una historia corta y enigmática, ¿para quien tocaba Zann? ¿es acaso su mutismo el que lo lleva a comunicarse con otros seres por medio de la música?
Al principio pensé que a seres de ultratumba, demonios del mismísimo infierno, lo que podría comprobar al leer este párrafo: "En aquellos frenéticos acordes creía ver sombríos faunos y bacantes que bailaban y giraban...".
Pero al leer la descripción de lo que se ve o mas bien de lo que no se ve por la ventana me pregunto si es un lugar fuera de nuestro espacio...
En fin, lo recomiendo! Esta historia es parte de una compilación de historias de Lovecraft de la editorial EMU, por lo que puedo decir de la traducción me parece correcta y sin errores hasta ahora.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
August 26, 2023
Goth goth goth gothic yummy yum yum
June 1, 2019
There's something I love about Lovecraft. I can't quite put my finger on it. Even though he isn't by any means a great writer, he's the one who made me start loving literature. It could be his prose style, but I first read him in translation, and even in Spanish his stories hold up.
The Music of Erich Zann is a story where many things are suggested and yet almost nothing really happens. Ol' Howard describes the setting of the story, an eerie street where the house the protagonist stays in is located. Then Mr. Zann is introduced. A mute foreigner who plays strange music on his viol. Like most pieces by this author, this one is a first person narrative whose protagonist is probably a thinly disguised version of Lovecraft. A one-dimensional cardboard character whose speech consists of one adjective piled upon another. In the end, as I say, many things are implied, but we end up in the dark as to what was really going on with monsieur Zann.
Anyway, H.P. considered this one of his best stories. Don't know if I agree, but it was a delightful read nonetheless.
The Music of Erich Zann is a story where many things are suggested and yet almost nothing really happens. Ol' Howard describes the setting of the story, an eerie street where the house the protagonist stays in is located. Then Mr. Zann is introduced. A mute foreigner who plays strange music on his viol. Like most pieces by this author, this one is a first person narrative whose protagonist is probably a thinly disguised version of Lovecraft. A one-dimensional cardboard character whose speech consists of one adjective piled upon another. In the end, as I say, many things are implied, but we end up in the dark as to what was really going on with monsieur Zann.
Anyway, H.P. considered this one of his best stories. Don't know if I agree, but it was a delightful read nonetheless.
October 30, 2019
Why isn't this one of the more recognized works of Lovecraft?
A very short story, but it's amazing how beautifully crafted and haunting this is! I'm waiting for the oncoming winter to come, be over and a storm to come before the onset of summer, because it's that type of story to read when the outside is a void suddenly filled with the chaos and fluctuation of mad winds and rain, with an eerie sound of that chaos brushing past buildings...
Just a remarkable story, and sadly overshadowed by his "Mythos" and other more known works...
A very short story, but it's amazing how beautifully crafted and haunting this is! I'm waiting for the oncoming winter to come, be over and a storm to come before the onset of summer, because it's that type of story to read when the outside is a void suddenly filled with the chaos and fluctuation of mad winds and rain, with an eerie sound of that chaos brushing past buildings...
Just a remarkable story, and sadly overshadowed by his "Mythos" and other more known works...
March 16, 2021
Supongo que haberlo escuchado de un ivoox con música incluída le hace ganar muchísimos puntos. Inquietante.
Me quedo con la manera en que nada se explica, todo se sugiere. Consigue que seas prácticamente tú solo quien te asustes a ti mismo.
Me quedo con la manera en que nada se explica, todo se sugiere. Consigue que seas prácticamente tú solo quien te asustes a ti mismo.
July 14, 2021
This is a wonderful Lovecraft story, the earliest I have read from him that gets my 5-star rating. I can see why Lovecraft liked the story so much for its inexplicitness. We never really know exactly what the menace or the threat is, and that works really well.
What I appreciate most about the story was the description of its setting on Rue d’Auseil. I picture something in early nineteenth century Paris, this Zann being a German political refugee trying to live out the remainder of his life on a small pension in complete obscurity. The most remarkable things for me about Lovecraft's descriptions of Rue d’Auseil is the extent I am reminded of New Crebuzon. It's as if China Miéville lifted his fictional city-state depicted in Perdido Street Station directly from this Lovecraft story.
What I appreciate most about the story was the description of its setting on Rue d’Auseil. I picture something in early nineteenth century Paris, this Zann being a German political refugee trying to live out the remainder of his life on a small pension in complete obscurity. The most remarkable things for me about Lovecraft's descriptions of Rue d’Auseil is the extent I am reminded of New Crebuzon. It's as if China Miéville lifted his fictional city-state depicted in Perdido Street Station directly from this Lovecraft story.
January 22, 2021
Me encantó, me impactó y me hizo temblar...
Un verdadero Paganini poseído...
¡Excelente narración!, ¡intensa!...
Un verdadero Paganini poseído...
¡Excelente narración!, ¡intensa!...
August 27, 2023
What makes the music of Erich Zann so special? An intriguing question, you should read & find out.
April 14, 2024
Joder, qué buen relato... Me ha tenido tenso e impactado con las últimas líneas, muy bien ahí.
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