Have you an avatar?

An avatar is:

The physical embodiment of an idea or concept; a personification;
(Computing) A digital representation of a person or being;
(Hinduism) The earthly incarnation of a deity, particularly Vishnu.

Many of the Lovecraft Cosmos gods are embodiments of concepts, particularly Azathoth who is the personification of the nucleus of the cosmos “at the centre of all infinity” yet “beyond time and space”.

Lovecraft was extremely interested in dreams and the nature of reality and many of his stories explore these subjects so, if one considers the role of avatars in role-playing games – many of which feature the Cthulhu Mythos – then there is a fascinating link between his creations and digital representations.

In ‘Beyond the Wall of Sleep’ Lovecraft said,

“…Sometimes I believe that this less material life is our truer life, and that our vain presence on the terraqueous globe is itself the secondary or merely virtual phenomenon.”


In the Lovecraft Cosmos, Nyarlathotep is the avatar and soul of the Outer Gods, serving as an intermediary between the pantheonn.2’s deities and their cults. As such he is very similar to the Greek god Hermes who was messenger for the other gods of the Greek pantheon; the god of crossroads, boundaries and travellers; a psychopomp who led or guided souls to the afterlife; a god of luck, and, of scheming and trickery.

The virtual reality world of the ‘role-playing games’ Second Life (and Second Teen Life for those under eighteen) and World of Warcraft feature avatars in different metaverse environments not unlike, in principle, the virtual reality of the Matrix Trilogy that features a fictional universe where the man-machine interface is integrated. The virtual reality world in the Canadian director David Cronenberg’s eXistenZ may be compared and contrasted with the theories of the Canadian educator, philosopher and scholar Marshall McLuhan who wrote a number of analytical and predictive books, particularly Understanding Media.

In our interaction with fiction, movies, television and, especially, cyberspace we all exist as avatars, not as ourselves but as digital representations of ourselves – as do the creations of our minds. Lovecraft would have loved it!

Yog-Sothiology

Yog-Sothoth – a.k.a. The Lurker at the Threshold, The Key and the Gate, The Beyond One, Opener of the Way, The All-in-One and the One-in-All – like An of the Sumerians, Osiris of the Egyptians, Vishnu of the Indians, Anu of the Babylonians, Zeus of the Greeks and Jupiter of the Romans

Each of these (apart from Yog-Sothoth) are sky- or sun-gods or gods of the heavens, lords of the constellations, and, the kings of all the other gods, spirits and demons. Supreme in their pantheonsn.3, they existed as one of a triadn.1 of gods – An, Enki and Enlil; Osiris, Isis and Horus; Vishnu, Brahma and Shiva; Anu, Bel and Ea; Zeus, Poseidon and Hades; and Jupiter, Neptune and Pluto. Some – like Zeus – directly involved themselves in the affairs of mankind, whilst others – like Anu – were remote and unlikely to respond to personal appeals (in common with many of today’s governmental leaders!). Yog-Sothoth, however, cannot be said to be one of a trinity unless one was to link him with the all-mighty Azathoth and the all-wise Yibb-Tstll (or, of course Nyarlathotep). He is also remote, except that, like Zeus, he has had congressn.5 with human females – in the case of Yog-Sothoth, the issue was Wilbur Whateley, and in the case of Zeus, too many to mention. Unlike An, Osiris, Vishnu, Anu, Zeus and Jupiter, Yog-Sothoth is neither human nor animal in form, being “a congeries of iridescent globes” – a blood-curdling bubble-bath. Also unlike them he is “…coterminous with all time and space yet is supposedly locked outside of the universe we inhabit.” (Wikipedia entry). This description, from “Through the Gates of the Silver Key”, is prescient in that it sounds counterfactual in terms of the Einsteinian spacetime with which Lovecraft would have been familiar but makes perfect sense as far as the ten dimensions of space (and one of time) of string theory are concerned.

However, BEWARE! To learn too much about this deity is to fiddle around with damnation as Yog-Sothoth requires human sacrifice and/or eternal servitude of all his ‘favourites’.