seventeenth issue - RPG Review

The racism in Lovecraft presents a problem.
All horror literature has fear of the Other as a part of how it works, and many of the moves which play on that carry
racist symbolism. But Lovecraft's world presents bigger problems than this fundamental note in horror, and many
people have remarked [11] on how racism animates much of his work. It contains ooga­booga cults of “savages” and
fear of miscegenation and more. Lovecraft was an exceptionally racially bigoted man [12], even for his time. So
contemporary writers and game designers try to avoid surfacing that aspect of his work.
A group of designers recently announced a Kickstarter for tremulus: a storytelling game of lovecraftian horror [13],
and I threw in a few shekels. The fundraiser has been going well, so as the pledges have piled up the authors have been
offering expansions to the game as stretch goals if the game reaches a higher funding target. So a couple of weeks ago,
they circulated this announcement [14] to project backers:
We shall now turn our attention away from the creepy litle town of Ebon Eaves and cast our eyes to strange, foreign
soils with The Congo Playset. That's right. You'll be able to quickly create a framework to let your characters explore
the heart of darkness. And it comes with three playbooks: The Captain, The Guide, and The Wild Man.
Whoa.
Seeing that, I tried to gather my thoughts and comment on the Kickstarter page about the problems with it. Before I got
to it, other backers were also on the case.
Just ... be careful with this one. Reading the phrases “Congo”, “Heart of darkness” and “Wild Man” makes me worry
that you're coming dangerously near some cultural third rails like racism and colonialism. Obviously the original
material of the Mythos is full of that stuff, but Lovecraft had the excuse of writing in the 1930s (and Conrad in 1899).
Revisiting those tropes nowadays will require some tricky balance between faithfulness to the original works, respect
for different cultures, and healthy fear of creating a shit­ton of bad feeling.
Anyway. Sorry to go all Edward Said on you, and maybe you've already thought through all this, but I thought it was
worth bringing up.
....
Put me down as another person whose red flags went up upon hearing “The Congo”
....
Ah, so “the Congo” is all about exoticism, going to the Other Place, and experience the primal alienness there. And
the home you return triumphantly to is presumably an industrialized nation. With Tarzan.
....
I have to say, I'm really, really, REALLY not cool with this playset, and the update/comment intended to be reassuring
really isn't. Taking someone's home, and then saying “well pretend the PEOPLE aren't there, and just the cool exotic
place is, and it's all okay”...no. That's not okay. I'm going to have to reconsider this.
44 RPG REVIEW ISSUE SEVENTEEN September 2012