Quoted By:
On Lovecraft as a young man
>"All this may seem to give the impression that Lovecraft, in spite of his precosciousness, his early health problems, his solitude as a very young boy, and his unsettled nervous condition, was evolving into a relatively "normal" youth with vigorous enthusiasms (except sports and girls, in which he never took any interest). [...] But how normal, really, was he? The later testimony of Stuart Coleman is striking [...] "from the age of 8 to 18, I saw quite a bit of him [...] I won't say I knew him 'well' as I doubt if any of his contemporaries at that time did. He was definitely not a normal child and his companions were few."
__________
On young Lovecraft's "tics"
>"Harry Brobst [...] spoke to a woman who had gone to high school with Lovecraft. "She [...] described these terrible tics that he had - he'd be sitting in his seat and he'd suddenly up and jump - I think they referred to them as seizures. [...] oh, yes, she remembered him. I guess he scared the student body half to death."
__________
On young Lovecraft's friendships in highschool
>"Clarence H. Philbrick told me that he and others in high school with Lovecraft made attempts at friendliness but always were rebuffed by a chill disinterest or a shyness that seemed like it; they finally quit their attempts. Lovecraft later did have a few local friends, and loyal ones; the sort who failed to understand him and yet were impressed by his extraordinary range of interests, by his phenomenally exact memory, and by the brilliance of his talk; who found, when they gave him affection, the depth of goodwill and charm to which his later literary friends have testified."
__________
