Show Notes
For their 200th episode, JF and Phil turn their attention to H. P. Lovecraft’s “The Call of Cthulhu,” a story foundational not only to modern horror fiction but to the very idea of the Weird. In revisiting this tale of forbidden knowledge and cosmic ambiguity, the hosts reflect on Weird Studies itself as a “slow piecing together of dissociated knowledge” that mirrors the work of Lovecraft’s own bewildered protagonists.
Image by Antoni Espinosa via Wikimedia Commons.
Upcoming Events:
Peter Bebergal teaches on Weirdosphere starting November 20, 2025
JF Martel speaks at Back to Haunt Us in East London on November 8, 2025
Phil Ford speaks at the Durations Festival in NYC on November 7, 2025
Phil Ford hangs out at Archestratus Books and Food on November 8, 2025
References
H. P. Lovecraft, The Call of Cthulhu
Weird Studies, Episode 2 on Garmonbozia
Rene Descartes, Meditations on First Philosophy
Phil Ford, “The Wanderer”
H. P. Lovecraft, "Nyarlathotep"
Weird Studies, Episode 74 on Jung
Phil Ford, Jacob Foster, and J. F. Martel, “Care of the Dead”
Weird Studies, Episode 110 on The Glass Bead Game
Weird Studies, Episode 101 on Tanizaki
Graham Harman, Weird Realism: Lovecraft and Philosophy
Weird Studies, Episode 156 on Donna Tartt Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
More from Weird Studies
In this episode, long overdue, Phil and JF discuss one of the great American horror films: WIlliam Friedkin's 1973 adaptation of Willam Peter's Blatty's _The Exorcist_.
On September 26, JF and Phil took part in the Dream Mapping Symposium, a three-day event organized by the Dream Mapping Project and the Dream Library Foundation, and held at the Brooklyn Public Library. Their mission was twofold. First, Phil was to read Dostoevsky's short story "The Dream of a Ridiculous Man," and then, he and JF were to have one of their conversations about it. Despite inclement weather, exploding lighting equipment and the labyrinthine NYC subway system, it went off like a dream. In this episode, we offer you the full recording of the event.
In this episode, JF and Phil are joined by their beloved assistant and invaluable collaborator Meredith Rigby (formerly Meredith Michael) to discuss her recently completed doctoral dissertation, Composing the Cosmos: 20th Century Musical Mythologies of Outer Space. Meredith explains how classical music, in the last century, became a privileged zone for exploring the meaning, threat, and promise of the starry void after the collapse of the old cosmologies.
Having taken up the first part of J.R.R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings in episode 207, Phil and JF turn to part two, The Two Towers. Together, they peel back the husk of familiarity to reveal the strange object underneath: a story about stories, about life and destiny in a storied world.
Episode 218 will drop at the end of our summer break on September 9, 2026. Today, enjoy this recent audio extra, originally released for members of the Weird Studies Patreon. In the intro, JF announces two important Weirdosphere events: a talk on language in the age of AI by Emma Stamm, and a new six-week course on the idea of truth in horror cinema and literature. To learn more and enroll, visit Weirdosphere.