I first met John D. Haefele at The Walden West Festival in 2008; John had a project he was working on and I agreed to publish it.
John and I discussed many things that day in Sauk City: 1) August Derleth’s Comic Book collection and the unpublished manuscript on comics. 2) The many collections of Mythos stories by Lovecraft and other writers, and the fact that nobody has yet produced a collection of historical merit, nor tried to understand or frame properly August Derleth’s contributions. 3) A updated version of Derleth’s Bibliography as first published by Alisom M. Wilson in 1982 by The Scarecrow Press. and finally 4) the lack of information on the multiple magazine appearances of Derleth’s poetry opus. We agreed that these are all issues that we can work on in the years to come.
Here is John’s commentary about the contents of this monograph which has obviously been compiled in much detail over many years:
Lest We Forget is a reminder to everyone about the important role August Derleth had in fostering the literary reputation of H.P. Lovecraft until Lovecraft was well on the way to becoming the canonical American author he is in 2008. Specifically, it is directed to the generation of Lovecraft aficionados and critics who upon the heels of Derleth benefitted from his nearly half-century of devotion to a friend. Where what Derleth wrote might now seem commonplace, it is nevertheless interesting to note just when he wrote. — John D. Haefele
