THIS STORY WILL RUIN YOUR MIND (The King in Yellow)
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- Опубликовано: 3 ноя 2021
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“The King in Yellow” is a name I see thrown around in a lot of different media. Usually it’s treated like some kind of eldritch space monster a’la H.P. Lovecraft, but it… really isn’t very much like that at all.
Really, it’s just a play.
But that doesn’t stop it from being just as dangerous.
#KingInYellow #StoryTime #Lovecraft
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There is a *lot* we had to leave out of this video. Like, a ton. If you want a more in-depth interpretation of the play itself and the symbols Chambers invoked for it, definitely check out the extended version on Nebula! You can get access to it for free with a curiosity stream subscription, which is only $15 per YEAR (like $2 a month or something, it's ridiculously cheap): curiositystream.com/talefoundry
For those of you who watched the longer version, what'd you think of the whole "the death of the land of lost souls" thing? Did it inspire you in any way?
From what i know there are two theories as to why the King in Yellow play disappears from the other half of the book.
One is that Robert hated the first half. He was tired of writing horror and wanted to write romance but they never sold well so he put them together.
The second is that it is a clever way to make you feel what the characters feel. In the book it is specifically the second half of the play that drives you mad. And the second half of the real book does the same as you get wrapped up in this mystery made of crumbs and pieces that just, stops. No more mysteries, no more horror, no more King in Yellow. Your left unfulfilled and confused and you need to know what happened. What is the story about? You will ask and research and maybe make a Nebula video about it. It is true madness for the curious.
First of all, definitely going to get the curiosity stream for you. Love your work.
Second:
There are alot of things to go over for SCP and I believe you went over some already. Are you at all interested in doing one on the hanged king? With its cryptic lore and pieces that can fit multiple puzzles. Of course inspired by this but in a ... weird way. If not, and if you have time, atleast check it out on your own time. There are audible ones on RUclips if you just want some good background aswell
I absolutely plan to carve out some time for this and The Broken God! Thanks so much for the kind words and the support ❤️
-Benji
Uh, they aren't *wrong* about the King being a space monster, the King isn't *really* a play - the play is *named* for the *author* (Which is assumed to be the King, albeit indirectly, similar to how religious people think God wrote the Bible, via direct inspiration.) so no.
You're painting people as wrong, when they aren't. You might wanna do more research.
The King *is* a typical lovecraftian monster, and just reading one book doesn't give you all the data.
You seem to be accepting only Chambers' book, which is illogical - Chambers wrote additions to Lovecraft's mythos, but isn't Lovecraft himself. To accept his but discount the others... would be like demanding people accept *some* of the old Star Wars extended universe, but *only* the parts that *you* like.
You can either accept only what the OG author wrote, or you can accept all the EU stuff, and remain logical in your debate.
Accepting only what you like is fine for personal taste, but it is *not* acceptable for discussion, attempting to teach, or to "prove" a position. *Especially* just to then call everyone else wrong. That isn't logical, that is folly.
Now if instead of saying "The King is *really* X," if you'd said "The King was *originally* X," that's be both logical and lacking the "you're all wrong" context. From watching your videos, I honesty dont think you *intended* to do it this way - you don't seem so arrogant as that, so it seems to havw come off that way accidentally. Just pointing out, that phrasing is key.
Also, trying to "read into" works to find "deeper meanings" is inherently flawed. Yes, *some* works have deeper meanings left by their human authors. But if you "look" into any book long enough you can *assume* that.
That doesn't mean there *is* one. In fact, *very few* tales have such things. Most stories are face value. No hidden meanings for you to find, what you find tends to instead be a reflection of yourself.
Of course... if you *never* look, then those with such meanings, will have them missed, so you have a bit of a complication there.
You will Serve the King in Yellow the world will tremble before the king in yellow
As someone who has read the story, here's a little known fact. The King In Yellow isn't merely a king. He is a jester too, an artist. If you look at the original book cover up close you will see he does not just wear a hood, but a hood that is in fact a jester's cap. When I had this pointed out to me I was shocked!
Oh shit ur right! Even the reprints of the same illustration cut off that minor detail. Im seeing interesting parallels in my writing now. Weird and cool
@@niftyskates85 It's a cliche that the jester holds a powerful position by being able to speak the truth with impunity (usually). A jester who is also a king...? Well, in those very rare games where the Joker is not removed from the deck before play begins, it is empowered to take the place of any card, including a king....
@@arcadiaberger9204 interesting card metaphor. From what I seen though in stories the jester is basically a slave and gets its tongue cut off if he says the wrong thing in summary. Or punished if they can't consistently entertain with quality
A jester us a joker, like a clown or a trixter. Another name for the joker is a Jack.
he's doin a minor amount of tomfoolery
HP Lovecraft didn't intend for all his gods to just look like squidpeople. They're much stranger than that.
One can not fathom nor imagine. Shapes only as pleasant as the mind can comprehend.
The idea of squid/seapeople as his 9wn envision of cosmic horror, from what I read, was merely his own reflection of his greatest fear: the sea.
This said, if you need to write a monstrosity, always use something thatrealy invoke terror to your very eyes and write what emotions it wakes in you: Lovecraft and the creatures from the sea, you and whatever evoke dread in your mind... and I with eyes and insects (especially the smaller ones)
HP Lovecraft couldn't figure out how circles work. He was just so bad at geometry (and other basic mathematic/scientific concepts) that in his attempts to explain something completely mundane, people thought he was talking about unknowable monstrosities.
It cannot be said enough, Lovecraft doesn't deserve the majority of the praise he gets.
@@renatocorvaro6924 example of something mundane he failed to explain?
@@renatocorvaro6924 he was also fanatical at writing like it was 1800 still, yet considering his thematics he did a good job in his supposed ignorance at making the mundane rather extraordinare... plus readers are supposed, to a limit, to just say "ok, this is weird but sounds cool, I'll excuse this thing this time" in a story. I don't say all of Lovecraft's stories were a success, but if we must speak of some ancient, alien, extradimensional horror from beyond the veil of reality, what would fit better as their homes? A simple giant city that makes sense, or something that makes absolutely no sense for humans of this tiny world?
In my upper level literature class in college, my professor told me, "No matter what you write and whatever you strive to say, when you release it to the reader, it becomes theirs and means what they think it does."
Terrifyingly enough, this just as much applies to anything you speak or do. So the moral of this knowledge is stfu and don't move, or you inevitably provide people with things they can then throw at you.
@@chickenlover657 then throw it back again
@@Stasemiszu Nah, I discovered the trick is to let it go through you.
La mort de l'auteur
Nah it will never belong to them. Its my Story. I did invent it and came up with everything myself. The only One who can say what its real Purpose is is me. I dont just write for other People but for myself too. And thats why the Story only belongs to me.
The thing that bothers me about the King in Yellow, is that once you know about him, he knows about you and becomes a part of the way you think. It cannot be undone, and you will never truly be alone again.
Ah ha, but I have a genetic defense against the king in yellow! Genetic early onset Alzheimer's 😁
😮💨
@@triarii9257 I have Meniere's, which is severe vertigo. He won't hang around here long. I don't give in to temptation because I can't remember what I was going to do.
great another imaginary friend xD
Do you think he can keep the other voices in my head in check
Sort of like "The Game?"
Which we've all just lost now. Oops! Sorry.
"Love your words enough to choose them well". Probably the best writing advice I have ever received.
@@neo-filthyfrank1347 Are you calling me an SJW loser? I'm just confused with your wording. Also, I know it's kinda cringey, but you have to admit that writers have the power to influence people's thoughts, and that is not a power anyone should take lightly. Few, if any, writing how-tos tell you this. That is what I meant.
What does it mean?
@@neo-filthyfrank1347 I see that you do not love your words, for you did not choose them well.
@@neo-filthyfrank1347 Okay. Just wondering. And you're preaching to the choir, buddy, because I'm a Judeo-Christian conservative. I just thought it was very true that writers should be conscious of what they put in their readers' heads. I'm less concerned about offending people and more concerned about coercing or brainwashing them, which is something SJWs try to do all the time.
@@neo-filthyfrank1347 "choose your words well" = SJW loser
??????????
The King In Yellow, the existential dread that taints even those that are unaware of its existence. Once it was released into our world, it threw a fog over everything.
I read this as it threw a frog. That threw me into a loop.
@@Baximus23 It set a frog card in face-down position in the middle if the board.
Then if you play the frog card, I shall play the fog card in defense position thus ending my turn
once you get a frog caught in your dreadlocks, it's all over
Like satan in revelations.
This story is clearly biblically inspired
I love The King in Yellow, because it feels like the wasn't supposed to originally be part of the character's stories in the book. Most of the stories start off like the events of a relatively normal life, albeit sometimes having a strange undercurrent, but then the play comes in like a rogue star into a solar system and warps it beyond recognition.
When you say it like that, I wish these short stories showed up midway through the anthology, rather than at the beginning.
i.e., After the poem at the beginning, you get (seemingly) unrelated stories until the KiY ones, then it ends with a few more different stories, similar to the current book.
I've heard that the normal stories aren't too great though, so I don't know if reader attention would be engaged enough to reach that twist. You could include references to TKIY and the characters who read it throughout the normal stories, if not just straight up include them in normal settings where possible, so the reader is more unnerved by what's "unsaid" than what is.
My only worry about interweaving these narratives is that it might change or dilute the message and vibes of the KiY stories. What do you think? DDLC did something similar to what I'm suggesting.
The idea that the King in Yellow being the embodiment of the idea that someone’s words can affect other people for better or worse is so interesting! At least that’s how I interpret it. Someone succumbing to false information is basically how the Yellow King “gets you”
*Trump:* "Fake news!"
_The King In Yellow has joined the chat._
It's not simply succumbing to false information, but rather succumbing to something fictitious to the degree that you become unable to seperate it from reality, and allowing such information to worm its way into all your thoughts.
@@DolusVulpes So… are all those reality-shifters all secretly part of the King in Yellow’s schemes?!? (/s, please don’t take this seriously)
Well if you change people to better then the king is “benevolent” if you change them to worse then the king is a “deceiver”
Damn ig the yellow king is just the daily mail
"The very act of writing [fiction] invites an existential threat beyond that of any leviathan." - The Mystagogue of Mundanity (unpublished short story a friend from high school wrote. One of the few lines I remember.)
@@nenmaster5218 sure, go ahead
@@nenmaster5218 fire away bruh
@@nenmaster5218 interesting new bot I like Neil red
@@nenmaster5218 beep boop IM a RoBooabdsldmd.s.
@@nenmaster5218 I'm not gonna lie sir sic is a little funny.
But his content reminds me a little of Thunderf00t and I'm still on the fence about the guy.
The King in Yellow is such a cool concept that can be taken in so many ways, and I'm such a nerd for it
There was some talk Hastur represented Syphilis. The infectious spread and the hazy aspects of Carcosa point towards some sort of disease in many ways.
My current favorite interpretation is the Impossible Landscapes campaign from Delta Green
My favorite representation is from True Detective. And thats all i'll say hihi
Have you seen the yellow sign … have you seen the yellow sign.
A true nerd never brags about nerdness
I think you should reread the Mask. It's also one of my favorite short stories, but it's incredibly sinister when you understand what is actually happening. Boris didn't just learn how to turn things to stone from reading the King in Yellow, he also learned how to make a love potion. Turning things to stone is a metaphor for what Boris is doing to Alec and Genevieve. It's implied that he does it just before Part 1 - that's when he first shows Alec the chemistry and when Genevieve starts acting out of character by kissing Boris instead of Alec. Alec and Genevieve really did love each other. The "mask" is the love potion overpowering their true feelings for each other. Genevieve doesn't fall into the pool, she throws herself in because the effect may be wearing off and she is aware of the truth on some level. Boris says that he was drugging Genny to make her sleep because "she had been quite out of her mind". She is clutching her breast in sculpture form aka her heart, and Boris shoots himself in the heart in the end.
In your opinion.......
@@Felix-SitedI personally like this take. It’s a book so there’s near infinite ways to interpret it unlike a movie for example which gives you that visual and forced perspective.
I didn’t do that
I honestly love that while all of the entities are supposed to be mysterious and unexplainable monstrosities that’d shatter your mind, the king in yellow is the one who best fits the bill. He is a concept you can’t fully grasp. He is, and you know it, yet you can’t put your finger on what exactly he actually is. It feels cosmic, beautiful. Everyone gives him their own shade of yellow and that’s exactly how it should be.
"All the whos down in whoville, the tall and the small were singing to him to which they were inthralled. Their songs they did sing, their voices did bellow and their sanity melted away before the king in yellow."
I love this
The premise of the whovilles' habitat like "inside a snowflake, or inside a dandelion"( horton hears a who) were they can be obliterated at any instance by much a bigger external forces gives me this sense of lovecraftian existensial dread.. but i still love "how the grinch stole christmas though
Enthralled* (Sorry, great little rhyme!)
Never gonna be able to read the grinch who stole Christmas to my kids again without a shiver of dread.
ayo... 666 likes?
Also, the Hanged King and Scarlet King from the SCP universe are both influenced by The King in Yellow. Very interesting reads as well. They're very intertwined with other SCPs and it's a great way to lose yourself in a rabbit hole
Oh greta thats not very good for me then. Lul.
The hanged king is similar to the king in yellow, *really similar*
He is the words, a empty vessel, after all he is "a hole in the shape of a God".
But I don't understand the similarity to the scarlet king
@@cherylbarclay2679 Its in the Understanding of the Scarlet King. the Less you know of him the Safer you are from his Reach.
Aah yes the SCP universe!
I was about to comment this after seeing the title of the video
"This story will ruin your mind"
*me, who physically couldn't get out of bed for an hour this morning thanks to a combo of exhaustion and depression:* You can't break what's already broken.
Hope you're feeling better today, homie.
I hope you are feeling better friend.
Here hoping you're feeling better, choom
Congratulations, want a cookie?
@@dentkort Probably, they weren't exactly asking for applause.
9:22-9:44 I’m impressed by how much expression is shown with that gaze! Not to mention the inversion of colors make the eyes look like your staring into a void. Such a small segment, yet that stare gave me chills!
My favorite thing about the King in Yellow is how interpretable it is. It has these beautiful elements and imagery, we get these hints of names and figures, and you are allowed to puzzle piece these bits together as you feel. August Dereleth, professional "missing the pointer", added it to his version of the mythos by reskinning Cthulhu as Hastur (This is where you get KiY as a big scary tentacle monster.) Others have reinterpreted the play as films or paintings, others like Bliss's "More Light" try to recreate the play and explain why it has this mental effect. You can really ascribe any effects or themes you want, because the book just gives you these bits of pieces to chew on however you feel like, which makes it endlessly fascinating.
lol professional missing the pointer is a very good name for him. tho i do think it would be very possible to turn the king in yellow into a cosmic horror, just a more abstract conceptual being instead of a tentacle monster.
Whats "More Light" by Bliss? I can't find it. Thank you
@@niftyskates85 Oh sorry, must've autocorrected. More Light by James BLISH, not Bliss, is a short story in "The Hastur Cycle" which is a collection of thirteen stories involving the Carcosa mythos. It includes large original passages of the play with a framing device around them, and is a pretty interesting read, both for the content of the play and the ideas given about the play's effects. Hope this helps!
As long as the main theme is kept, whatever or whoever the KiY is, it is a meme and an infohazard.
I'm fairly positive August didn't write anything related to Hastur, he mostly just tried to inject christian archtypes of good and evil into lovecraft's universe and coined the Cthulhu Mythos term, much to the chagrin of other collaborators. I could be wrong though.
You forgot to mention that in the Repairer of Reputations the story is told from an unreliable narrator who has suffered a traumatic brain injury after a fall from a horse. You realize halfway through the story that he’s insane when he goes into detail about wearing a crown he took out of a safe and another character walks into his room and asks him why he is balancing a tin of biscuits on his head. I believe he also talks about “lethal chambers” or suicide booths that are probably just phone booths.
I'm incredibly late on this one, but I couldn't tell personally if the narrator was unreliable because of him falling off a horse or because he read the play. He reads the king in yellow towards the start of the story but not instantly and talks about death booths before he read the play, the doctors also said that he was psychologically analyzed and deemed him mentally stable enough to leave so the line between unreliable because of his injury or unreliable because of the play is a difficult one to draw
Honestly, he was probably a delusional bigot before the horse or the play.
good theory
That's a common, MODERN hypothesis about the story. But as it was written to take place a generation in the future from the book, and contains many predictions that proved to be flat-out wrong, that "unreliable narrator" hypothesis was created to explain the discrepancies.
@Nick Hentschel how does that explain the safe being a bread box and the the crown? I feel like he has to be unreliable for the conflicting dialogue to make sense.
I think it all just represents the horrifying power of art. Stories and art were with us since the dawn of cave drawings. It's in our very DNA to be influenced through the arts I think. It's a force.
Art is magic as it can be left behind by one person and effect or change the consciousness of another, even thousands of years later. Then pen truly is mightier than the sword.
Oh my gosh. That “into the hands of a living god” line is genius.
It’s a direct reference to a bible verse about falling under judgement after death - not into a place like hell, but the person of God.
This reference would have been clear to the people of this day (it was deeply overused, culturally), making it VERY CLEAR that the king in yellow has replaced whatever came before.
Or maybe always was what came before.
It’s a brilliant reference, and in cultural context, deeply scary. I love it.
One thing no one ever talks about when gushing about the book (but this video actually mentions it!) is that only a few stories in the book could be classified as horrror and mention the King in Yellow. Most of the stories bafflingly veer from cosmic horror into run-of-the-mill melodramatic turn-of-the-century retellings of the bohemian love lives of artists and students, complete with lots of fainting and flowers and such, without any hint of horror. I was baffled by this sudden turn and quietly erased it from my memory since.
Until the "King" cycle, Chambers was primarily known for writing mediocre romances so perhaps old habits die hard.
I think it's considered "weird fiction" not horror
Not entirely unrelated but a fun story nonetheless; but a friend of mine once convinced my group to play a “Romeo & Juliet Tabletop”, where we would play original characters who could influence the story.
Needless to say, we were actually playing a session of Cthulhu Dark, with Romeo & Juliet skinned over it to fool us. And we only figured it out when Romeo’s play “Ode to Juliet” had the lead donning a pallid mask and yellow robe. Biggest swerve I never saw coming by far.
Edit: almost three years later and this comment is still insanely active compared to the usual stuff I drop. Just wanted to make an addendum here to continue to appreciate those that give kind words to one of my best friends, it’s a huge confidence boost to him.
Shit that sounds amazing, I'd pay good money to see the table's reaction to that lol
Holy f**k, that sounds like an amazing friend group to hang out with. I'm jealous.
Aaaannnnnnnd im gonna steal this idea lol
please tell your friend they're a genius
@@Konpekikaminari Done, I keep him regularly updated on this post because nearly half a year later it still gets props from people.
its kinda weird how accurate the representation the king in yellow has in the dating sim game "sucker for love:first date" highly recommend it if you are into HP lovecraft stuff pretty funny with a lot of refrences with both comedy/horror elements as you would think a love sim for comisc horror would be.
Came here cuz Estir is best girl and had no idea she had a real lovecraftian basis
Figured she had to have some, but this was great!
The king in yellow is pretty abstract but its impressive how the game personified in a physical character while still being super accurate to the source
KISS THE MOON
I am so. freaking. GLAD that I'm not the first one to mention that game here. I mean...yeah...that's what I know "The King in Yellow" from. No seriously, never heard of it even the teensiest bit before, ever, until I saw Markiplier meet Estir in his playthrough. But that game is...REALLY weirdly well-written, with funny beats, almost-normalish dating sim elements, and the creepy stuff can get LEGIT creepy. Also all the voice actors rule. I think my fave takeaway from it is that "Worcestershire" is an Eldritch loanword, "why else would it be spelled like that?" XD
When you open the gateway to the abyss, you don’t control who comes back through it with you. Be careful the gates you open. Both mentally and spiritually. The abyss always stares back.
It's seems to me that the "King in Yellow" is the metaphorical/physical representation of Idealism. An ideal is something that is fabricated in the mind seperate from reality, it manifests unto your deepest fears and desires, it gives you hope in your own metaphysical hell. It is until you no longer have a grasp on the material world, the ideals you've placed upon yourself overwhelm you and destroy your identity. A death unseen in a place impossible to conceive.
That's a good point, and keep in mind that the play is described as striking 'The supreme note of art;' it was acknowledged to be an absolute masterpiece despite it being evil and poisonous
I love this idea so much, it makes perfect sense to me, ideals are underrated threats that can either be poisonous or positively enlightening
That is beautiful. Creepy too, but beautifully clear.
Somebody below mentioned that the figure on the cover is the writer himself, and another that the king on the artwork actually wears a jesters hood, being both king and fool/artist at the same time.
That was good.
The last of the four stories suggests to me it can go both ways: idealism, or utter meaninglessness.
I've always interpreted the King in Yellow as living embodiment of The Artist's obsession. It works somewhat, and probably because it always gave me Hellraiser vibes.
It’s the greatest theme of Lovecraftian stories it effects Artists no matter what it may be and in those who are yet artists the experience molds them into one. Their is an animation called White Wall I recommend because it metaphorically describes the horror in Lovcraftian stories. The beauty and horror of something not seen before and just after you get a good look at it, it’s gone. Desperate to see it again and to show others the thing unknown to the world but you they go into a frenzied madness trying to capture its image. They want to be seen, they want to be known but to know them is to be fueled with horrific inspiration.
@@Broomer52 The original one is hardly Lovecraftian, it predates Lovecraft. In fact, Lovecraft was inspired by Chambers' narrative method of only vaguely referring to supernatural events, entities, and places.
@@Vandalgialgtb
Horror babble has an amazing audiobook version here on RUclips, sometimes it’s easier listening than reading. They also have a 22 hour long audiobook of the Cthulhu mythos. One of the best channels ever.
This was my first time watching one of your videos and I loved every moment of it. Thank you and I look forward to listening to your old and new videos!
Even in the original book it is never depicted clearly how The King in Yellow looks, only some reactions from people around him when he takes off his mask. One of the best horror books out there.
It's curious to think that Chambers had a long and lucrative career as a writer of romantic literature, yet almost all of his literary reputation today derives from those four stories.
Because romance books are the equivalent of a twitter post with a bit more value
@@anotherinternetperson8495 Romantic literature ≠ Romance novels.
Reading the King in Yellow made me feel like I was going insane. Truly amazing
I haven’t even watched a second of the video yet and I’m leaving a like. Just seeing the King in Yellow pop up on my feed flooded me with a wave of nostalgia to the best Delta Green campaign my old tabletop group played 15 years ago.
"this story will ruin your mind."
*Me with an already ruined mind.* "Challenge accepted."
Best comment 🏆
I first encountered The Yellow Sign more than 40 years ago in an anthology and then read the rest. The Yellow Sign is still my favorite. One of the interesting facts is about Chambers himself. Apparently he was at one time one of the most popular authors in America with dozens of romances in print. Someone dubbed him, not necessarily as a compliment, The Shopgirls’ Scheherazade. Now all those other books are gone but The King in Yellow is still there. Maybe that is the message.
100% false. He couldn't tell the future.
@@gareththorn4356 He expressed an opinon. You dumbshit dick "Gareth"
I have one of his romance novels. King in Yellow was very much a one-off for the author. I can only wonder what inspired it.
@@geraldmartin7703 Cocaine? Absinthe?
The game "Signalis" has this book in it and I just realized it is a real book. Hopefully this video helps me understand WTH happened in that game.
Just came across this channel. Probably the first time I've subscribed midway through the first video, as far as I can recall. Keep up the good work :)
What if the 'yellow king' was just a metaphor for the power that lies in the words written in yellowed pages of books of literature, 'the king of arts'.
Bro
@@gohanward4923 I mean, I think he's right.
You're Awesome.
The idea that the author might not have had a choice to write about the play!!!!! Omg I loved that.
I always hought that 1980s movie The Mouth of Madness with Sam Neill was based off of this part of H.P. Lovecraft's work. The whole notorious story that grabs hold of people like a virus thing sounds like the King in Yellow. However, there's other things Lovecraftian about it, too. Like the fact that the story drives its "fans" to madness and some even start looking different. the more you read, the more you transform into something...other. I also love the part where the missing author that Sam Neill's character is looking for is actually the one causing all the trouble, and not in a "oh, let's pull a publicity stunt about going missing, but it's all fake to sell more copies of my latest book," way.
I heard about The King in Yellow in the game called Sucker for Love, didn't think much about it, on if It was based on anything actually or not, and gotta say I'm glad this showed up in my recommended.
I just read The King in Yellow myself not too long ago. The first four stories are phenomenal, though you need to think deeply about them to truly understand them. At least I now feel comfortable using the King in Yellow and Hastur in my stories in the future (like Stephen King did with his story Gramma).
I really love the idea of "The King in Yellow" as some kind of infectious and possibly sentient(?) idea. It still feels eldritch, but in a more unique way
You know what this reminds me of? It's a freakin' SCP! An SCP in literature form, that spreads into new peoples' minds by retelling. I'm very sure there're already SCPs like that, so this would fit right in. (Maybe it already IS one, specifically--I'm not an SCP expert.)
Maybe the MAGA movement and Q-anon are manifestations of The King in Yellow
@@robinchesterfield42CP 3125, you can search for a declassified post or video explaining it, one of the most dangerous cognito hazard entities
The King in Yellow is my favorite Eldritch God. I recently evoked him in my D&D campaign as an encounter for my players to face. It was creepy, and elegant, and deadly. A lot of fun.
Didn't notice this until I went back to your old videos, but your voice has gotten a lot smoother/softer in newer videos
The concept reminds me of a rather dangerous pitfall of fiction. Too often, I find myself enraptured by it, so fascinated by these dreamt worlds and their countless wonders that I begin to resent the reality in which I myself reside. I spend too many hours wishing to escape into these realms of endless novelty and curiosity, often to my own personal detriment.
In a way, just like the titular play, fiction can take hold of you and encroach upon your own reality.
We've filled shelves upon shelves upon shelves with all the things we can never have, of all the places we'll never visit, of all the people we'll never meet.
Of all the happiness we'll never feel.
Especially now in the era of "aesthetics". Though escapism through images and paintings, or even just poems and the way they can evoke the beauty of a space was already in vogue in the past.
You think unhappiness is partly the result of fiction being compared to real life. I think fiction is the result of peoples unhappiness with real life. You think fiction makes people sadder, I think fiction makes people happier.
@@atomialep every story has context, so does it here. Heroin feels great if you ask an addict, thats what keeps them going back; every hour without their fix is worse, and exponentially so after each high.
Emotions are cyclical and each peak defines the next trough. Some write to enhance beauty, others to escape horror. Nothing taken away from its context is ever properly defined; the context of life is that things are never bound to a single side.
Fuck my boy that kicked me right in my dicks heart
Read Jung’s „Man and his symbols” and the boundaries might dissolve.
I based a dark god in my D&D campaigns on The King in Yellow. Proper non-Hastur King in Yellow.
My DM had a bunch of zombies, not quite fully dead or mindless, afflicted with a yellow mold of sorts which made them the way they were. Then, near the end, one of the zombies looked at our party and said "have you seen the yellow sign?" I nearly died
@@hannahross9256 That's super interesting. My campaign with him in it also had my homebrew variant of mindflayers, who are kind of non-braindead zombies.
(or like the Yerks from Animorphs? They replace your brain like RAW mindflayers, but not your exterior, tentacles come out the mouth when they feed)
@@thegreatandterrible4508 that reminds me of the Ood from doctor who
@@paleoleft I've thought that too, but it definitely gets the right reaction when you describe to your players how an NPC's eyes roll back in their heads and tendrils extend from their mouths, trying to wriggle their way into your eyes and ears to tear your skull apart and feast on what's within.
"Non-Hastur" and "Hastur" King in Yellow are perfectly compatible, though.
Within a shared universe, The King in Yellow could be Hastur's attempt to spread himself through our plane by using a thought virus inscribed or encoded within a play.
I love the usage of the color yellow in writing, especially looking to Dorian Grey. He always wore yellow gloves after his painting was made. I see it as a color that makes one present as golden to others, but underneath that gold is a sickening yellowed soul that brings nothing but destruction in their wake, with no one able to see it.
Came here from Signalis. Thank you for making this video. ♡
based
An interesting thought is that information and ideas are almost viral things, Lovecraft himself had themes of mankind's instinctual curiosity being the end of them. We call this memes or memetics in full, and inevitably in any mention of the King in Yellow you'll have someone ask "have you seen the Yellow Sign?" As a meme.
Sounds like you know some literature, but can you get behind a drumset and rock the crowd on a Friday night???
@Flintlock Musket down the rabbit hole of seeing for the first time in the same day the All Tomorrows, man after Man, and the King in Yellow, I see a Metal Gear Rising reference. Do u have any more recommendations my dude?
@uhh fuсkin dead Wash away the anger
What if The Yellow King is actually just "the friends we met along the way"?
Great heavens!
@@Seen420 LMAO
then introverts are safe. Extroverts, however, are most likely dead.
My god, its full of stars
So he is the source of it? Friendship power? He is the power up every anime protagonist draw upon! Genius! Talk-no-jutsu was the yellow king all along!
yooo that quil pen / paint brush + gear cob animation for the intro looks great ! cool vid btw, subbed!
Ive always hated reading and english class. So when i was recommended your content i was planning on skipping it. Im very glad i didnt! Your content is truly awesome. You make learning about literature very fun. Love your style of conmentary. Keep it up🥰
Hastur is definitely a Alien like, multidimensional demon.
He/she/it preys on artist types.
It exists on the edges of reality.
It enjoys driving the artist types mad.
Somewhat like a more prejudice Nyarlethotep.
Potentially even Nyarlethotep,
A theory states that Nyar is actually a vast majority of minor gods due to his shapeshifting ability. Maybe, maybe not.
We will never know.
Well what we know as the king in yellow is more accurately described as the culmination of 3 things
1. The story the king in yellow
2. The feaster from afar
3. Hastor a minor and overall benevolent shepherd god
Hastur, or The King in Yellow was a very large influence on the formation of Lovecraft's Nyarlethotep. Indeed anyone who has read the relevant short stories in The King in Yellow, can very easily see the influence the works had on H.P. Lovecraft not only for Nyarlethotep, but as a whole.
Hastur, brings a level of terror for similar reasons to Nyarlethotep. Both take an interest in humanity, but for Nyarlethotep, torturing the poor little creatures is the end goal in of itself, it's fun for him. But Hastur, his machinations and reasons just outside of our current knowledge, uses humanity, wields them for his own ends. He understands human societies and the structures therein, he understands the nature of humanity, he understands he doesn't need to control ALL the humans, just the important ones. The rest will simply follow.
@@kennethleo4471He also hates Cthulhu. Like, a lot
@@kennethleo4471 nyarlethotep wants the throne at the center of chaos for himself can't be bothered
They is a word
I love this.
I took away that this is someone taking the idea of “ideas being dangerous” very seriously and it tickles my brain! In a very good way!
if you like those themes , i recomend the adventures of marion wheeler in the scp fandom . 10/10 tale
L Ron Hubbard, Dianetics, and the Church of Scientology come to mind.
All art is propaganda
@@lordsolrak1713 sgwhhh2
@@lordsolrak1713 5t
Great video. I was able to understand a lot of the references and lore in Fear and Hunger 1 thanks to you. The Court of the Dragon story has a lot of parallels with the game
i cant believe how good this guys videos are
I swear to GOD your videos are the singular thing getting me through English this year. I love the way you pick apart narratives and stories and explain them. your in-depth analysis and mentality towards stories has taught me to look at stories, and the themes/symbols/characters within them in whole new ways
also, my take on the King in Yellow, is that he represents hatred, with Carcosa representing the place we go when we dwell in our Hatred. it makes sense, since the dark trance-like atmosphere of the planet represents the dark trance-like state of rage. of thinking of your hatred and letting it fester and grow. the King himself being the voice in your head that is hate. the voice that tells you to hurt others because of your dislike of them. with this in mind, I think the play represents physical hatred, and the action on internal feelings of hate. the infectous properties of the plat mirror how hatred can spread just as quickly as any virus. the victims of the play's power serving as both poignant allegories of victims of the hate; or on the other side of the coin, those radicalized by it.
Idk tho thatz just my two cents
This is very obviously the main inspiration for The Hanged King's Tragedy. I love it when I learn stuff that ties into other stuff I like
Just found this channel through this video. INSTANT Sub. S+ Tier content. I’m huge into really interesting and unique stories, and never thought there were any channels that would fit my exact tastes but this one seems to be it!
Cognito hazards are the most fascinating of all thought-provoking anomalies.
pontypool
I felt the need to read it after the first season of True Detective... totally broke my brain. Even more than The Yellow Wallpaper, a story about madness as well.
I knew there had to be a True Detective comment in here somewhere.
You explain the magick of words very well towards the end. Thank you for this video, as it serves us well.
Video title :"This story will ruin your mind"
1.6M people : Sounds good to me
It was a dangerous meme before the term was coined, and before SCP made the idea of a deadly, infectious idea cool.
This is an older idea than the King In Yellow too.
Much of the point of the fear of magic, the occult, witchcraft, and the educated/literate, etc. stems from people being afraid of writing itself. Thinking the act of "making words stay" was inherently magical and possibly evil. It's an ancient idea, really. Might even be older than civilization. Might even be older than writing. It could have started with an irrational fear of drawing.
Uhm. I work as an Assyriologist, and from the inception of writing onwards there are no sources whatsoever in the entire text corpus of the Ancient Near East that indicate that people were afraid of writing, or didn't trust it. I think what you said might be the case for the European Dark Age(s), but it certainly isn't a universal or early thing.
@@nyarparablepsis872 There's also not much evidence for it in the Dark Ages. Though to be fair, the Dark Ages are called that because there isn't much evidence in general.
@@nyarparablepsis872 Maybe it was an unwritten rule? Hahahaha
@@nyarparablepsis872 hey, I think I remember a passage from James C Scott "against the grain" refering to the quite common aversion to writing in stateless societies, beacause writing was percived as a mean to control/tax the population. We don't see anyone in State litterature being afraid of writing, but maybe this is just because it's writen by people who have an interest in presenting writing as good/necessary ?
@@soencoda754 That might of course be possible, since the scribes producing the texts probably were pretty biased pro-writing. Then again, Mesopotamia was not a stateless society, but a pretty complex state. I'll check out the book
Oh nice, the King in Yellow! One of my favorite concepts/entities in horror. I'm still looking for a creepypasta I've read a long time ago based on the collection where a screenwriting student finds an ancient tome with a play in it in their library but doesn't use it. They find out later their own teacher, in a rush to get a proper play together made hers based on one of the tome's stories. On the performance night, all the actors are wearing masks and performing normally, an unknown figure roaming around the stage. Eventually the actors start to detract from their lines and eventually see the mysterious figure, praising them as King before slicing their own necks. Seeing the play causes the audience to go berserk, leading the teacher and student having to get away so they won't get hurt. Had a phase years ago where i was obsessed with the entity after that. Good times.
are you may be referring to the hanged king?
sounds like the hanged king from the scp foundation
So by virtue of you posting this video the plague and name of the book in yellow has successfully done it’s job in spreading and grabbing the attention of all its readers to delve deeper in understanding it’s story . Thus dragging us into a reality in which we truly don’t comprehend
I have read The King in Yellow three times. It is an absolute masterpiece. No other collection of stories made such a powerful impression on my emotions, taking me from the heights of joy to the depths of despair and back. Many times I have wished that I could find The Repairer of Reputations or meet the Demoiselle D'Ys, and I pray that I never walk into The Court of the Dragon or find The Yellow Sign. Robert W. Chambers was able to get The King in Yellow published in both America and England in 1895, yet the language is so clear that all the stories feel as though they could have been written yesterday and are just as meaningful to life in today's world as they were in their own time.
This is probably the most important and significant video I’ve seen in months! I kept feeling like The King in Yellow was a harbinger of online doom only to be beautifully followed by addressing “The Algorithm” and how it controls what we can see and hear, what we can show and say. Absolutely brilliant, even if not intended, but especially because it’s not pointed out.
THE MASK sounds like YOUNG WERTHER fanfiction, but the excerpt at the beginning sounds like something Edgar Allan Poe would have written instead of Goethe.
y'know, 'Werther by way of Poe' seems like a very apt way of characterizing the story.
I've been running a DnD campaign for af ew years now, several campaigns technically. A reoccurring plot point is there is always a man in yellow who periodically shows up, waxes sweetly about future long lost nostalgia at some point and fades into obscurity only to reappear again in another campaign. In his most recent iteration he even name drops Carcosa and how he enables false kings to rule his once opulent Kingdom just to see what a man would do with his godhood. The players have no idea who this guy is still and it makes me just so happy. The best part however is a one point I had him introduced playing a pipe organ in a church dedicated to Carcosa and I had forgotten that was even a part of the story until rewatching this video a full 2 years later. It really clings to you.
I didn't think that there would be something out there that could ruin my mind anymore than what it has been through already.
"Love your words enough to choose then well." wow, what a beautiful lesson!
Your interpretation of the creature makes me want a movie with the king in yellow. Would make an excellent psychological thriller
I find The Yellow Sign fascinating. Almost like Roko's Basilisk where if you take the idea too seriously it can really mess with your perspective. The concept behind The Yellow Sign is that it's basically a curse posing as a meme. In today's internet world that's an extra-scary thought.
Hastur, The King in Yellow, gains control of people through his influence and his influence is spread by the play. Hastur doesn’t like being ignored. The whole book is written like it wasn’t made by a person. Like Foundry said how their was this weird fog reading the stories and the feeling something was wrong. The stories are like a fever dream even the more “normal” ones and the play is called King in Yellow but the book is also called it. It could be a meta narrative that this book too was made through the influence of the King in Yellow. You have seen the Yellow Sign, and you have seen the King in Yellow and now he has seen you and it’s image is stuck in your head.
Have you seen the yellow sign ?
It's not funny tho?
@Syd McCreath my thoughts exactly
It always made me think of House Of Leaves; the King is the Minotaur, & the book is just his way jnto your mind.
I had a thought, so it is often said in the stories that the second act of the king in yellow drives one mad and that the first act being so plain only serves to deepen the madness. As it happens the book is the reverse, the first part maddeningly hints at a symbol, or place or being called the king in yellow but we never fully comprehend it, and then the rest of the book is so plain and full of trivialities that it only serves to frustrate the curious and comprehensive reader. Just a thought but perhaps he did this intentionally, much like the world of the book, avid scholars know at least of the king in yellow from pop culture, but deeper dives into the lore only result in frustration and if obsessed over, madness. and so, much like the fictional play which has infested the minds of people in the story so to does the concept of the king in yellow linger with us though not as harmful as the story imagines. even just taking this little dip into the story as I have, has made me think about this more
you're brilliant.
Compounding what the other guy said. You're brilliant
If you are thinking of reading The King in Yellow, you would do well to first read Ambrose Bierce's "An Inhabitant of Carcosa", given that Carcosa is referenced a fair bit throughout. I've actually done this book as an audiobook on my channel, you can find it as a playlist there. The first story is really the best of the lot, and the last couple of stories are just pedestrian romances that are jarringly out of place with the rest. They're fine if you like that kind of thing, they just don't fit in with the theme of the earlier stories. But at the very least, the first story is worth a read (or listen).
I love how, for the first story, you made both crowns of the mad man reflect the crowns in the book.
Having read the story myself, I instantly saw the connection to John Carpenter's In the Mouth of Madness. Another parallel I would like to point out for those interested is Roko's Basilisk
In the mouth of madness is Lovecraft.
@@markw.loughton6786 In the Mouth of Madness has both drawn from Lovecraft and The King in Yellow. Notice the parallell between Sutter Cane's work and the play in Chambers' book. They both drive everyone who read them mad and convinced that they're part of the story. They're both composed in a way that makes us see this descent into madness through the main character's eyes; we as readers (and watchers) experience the same seamless transition from sane to mad as the story progresses. In Chambers' book this is reflected through the words chosen and in the movie through the surreal climax.
Roko's basilisk seems riddled with fallacies to me. Its so hard to accept that this idea frightens logical people. Same with matrix/simulation theory, though the issue with that one is it seems irrelevant.
Do you read Sutter Cane?
@@rickwrites2612 The King in Yellow functions as a working Rokkos Basilisk. It’s power comes from those who observe the play and it doesn’t like being ignored. While it has power over the world to any degree it sustains itself by spreading. Making sure it’s observed so Hasturs power remains. It exists as an idea and as an observed concept it uses it’s power to sustain itself.
I thought Genevieve ending up in the bath was a freak accident; y'know, since it's a clear watery liquid that got left in a bathtub in her own house. Which, ignoring suspension of disbelief, why did Boris think it was a good idea to put gallons of that stuff in the house at all really, but especially in a bathtub?
Marketing
Perhaps on purpose
Came for King of Yellow (he is in my current Call of Cthulhu campaign), but I am pleasantly surprised by the Nebula ad.
Nice.
"Remember our promise"
"It's hard to know why these stories are in here" They were published in the 30s, they got the authors some extra cash!
Yo I literally just did a review of this book like a lil while ago, lol! XD I think The King in Yellow really marked the dawn of cosmic horror. (The play may only be mentioned in the first 4 stories, but I do think they're all meant to be taken together. The time travel story mentions a lake named Hali, I think, which corresponds with a location from Carcosa, and the protagonist in the war story briefly passes through the Cour de Dragon, which kinda hints that it takes place in the same world as the Court of the Dragon story. So I do think it's all a more or less singular work. Kinda.)
Do you take review requests?
@@tudoraragornofgreyscot8482 Uhh, sure! If you'd like me to review a specific book, and if I own that book, I'll try to do so! :D
@@TH3F4LC0Nx when you’re done with Homestuck, I recommend you check out the Six of Crows duologu!
I think RUclips ate my second comment, let’s try Discord or something.
Sick! I'm check out ur channel. You seem invested and enthusiastic about reading.
I recently bought the book! It was a really good read. It wasn't really as horrorish as the summary had promised but there was still a certain... uncanniness to it that compelled me to keep reading lol
Love the video I was wondering if you have considered doing a video reading each story and discussing the afterthoughts.
“Literature isn’t something that’s supposed to help people! Literature should be a poison!”
“It could be just one line. I want to pour in a deadly poison. Just one person is enough. I want to influence that person’s heart with poison.”
This dialogue is between two writers from my favorite story ever. A true masterpiece in my eyes.
The story is “Koi wa ameagari no you ni” or “Love like after the rain.” They have a fantastic manga and anime adaptation.
It might seem like a love story between a high school student and a 40 year old guy. But it becomes so much more later in the story. It truly gives me inspiration in life.
RUclipsr named Grex also made a good analysis of it.
Yes. I loved that manga.
Wait how can that be a love story
@@sommerblume9671 by being a love story.
@@joaonitro5149 Idk man usually highschool students and a 40 year old wouldn't interact. I'm hoping that this highschooler is like what 18 or smth ?
@@sommerblume9671 If manga and anime needed to be realistic then it would be boring af.
I like the vibe of the King in Yellow. They give me the same feeling I got from stories like Mononoke (the medicine seller one, not the Ghibli one) and Darkmans.
It’s so dissonant like Foundry explained almost by design like it’s not a person who wrote it. If you hadn’t noticed the Play is called “The King in Yellow” but the book is also called that. The King in Yellow is sustained by its observation and you read it with confusion and curiosity. Stories with some odd connection you can’t quite make out and this off putting feeling that something is wrong but nothing about it seems wrong. The Stories are odd and almost dream like.
He's popped up in many books I've listened to while at work. Welder not a big reader but a good story can get me through the boring hours of laying beads
I've read this book many times. It's pleasingly creepy, nothing more than that. I've never dreamt about it, or thought about it much after reading it. Unlike H.P. Lovecraft's 'The Tomb', which I read when I was about 12, and it stuck in my imagination for ages.
There is a dating sim where you court eldrich beings and the king in yellow is one of them, I had no idea what or who the king in yellow was until now. The dating sim is love sucks btw
I was familiar with the work, but I didn't realize how influential it was. The beginning poem is reminiscent of Poe's work, too.
I love this book. Finally got it last Christmas, definitely recommend the read.
Your voice as the Stranger/The King in Yellow reminded me of Jhin from League of Legends it was spine chilling and made the video so immersive.
As a writer I need to read this book. I usually write short stories but this is short stories that is basically a novel. It sounds fantastic,. Thanks for the information but I need to read this.
I’m not going to lie. I’ve been spending a few years trying to figure out the meaning of the King in Yellow. I’ve even read up to prophet’s paradise, hoping to find something. I do got to say, I think this interpretation of the play is honestly the best one!
Very cool explanation and exploration of The King in Yellow. Just read it myself. One thing to mention, only cause I feel it's worth taking into account, in the first play, Hildred suffers a horseback accident where he spends time recovering. I felt like this added a lot to his reliability (or lack of) as a stable character. I also didn't get the impression that Alec and Genevieve lived happily after she was restored. My impression left a more ominous feeling. Regardless, loved the video!
12:30 i was pulled in and your question of the author themself possibly being compelled to tell the story was the very question that freed my mind from the grip of the story plot 😅
This book reminds me of Tenacious D.
In their travels, the duo run into the devil. To save their souls, they offer Satan "the greatest song ever written" but instead they sing a song ABOUT how great the greatest song ever written is, which works on the devil.
This book is a song about a life changing song. (And a huuuuge copout given the lack of a true "song")
I hadn't drawn that parallel yet, but god damn, you're too right.
Why does it work
Its not a cop-out.
The idea of a thing is often worse than the thing itself.
Like fear itself.
@@TheSkyGuy77 this basalisk is like wondering if its gonna rain or snow at the bus stop. The only threat determining factor is whether or not you cared enough to dress for the worst.
I thought they DID play the greatest song, but for the devil, then played the tribute for us
Heh! I just this morning listened to a fantastic short story about the king in yellow. IMO, Hastur is definitely a monster... he’s the only elder god (or emissary thereof, depending on who wrote the source material) who has the capability (or perhaps just the motivation) to interact directly with the human race in a way we can understand, albeit marginally. But he only does so because of the quality he shares with the rest of the outer gods; a total, complete, uncaring disregard for life and it’s needs or preferences. He just _seems_ like less of a monster because he’s the only one of the bunch that we can even comprehend the very edges of, I think. Although he was originally portrayed as a benign god of shepherds, the vast majority of material suggests that when he does such things he does them as a ploy to advance his own inscrutable aims..edit: wait a sec. nyarlathotep is the emissary. Disregard pretty much all of that, my mistake. 🧐 I guess my mind was ruined even before I clicked.
Oh, The black stars of dim carcosa,
Have you seen the yellow sign?
Oh great king, in his tattered robes...
All we have to offer him are blood and bones...
Lol. As I was reading this, I was thinking "Nyarlathotep tho?"
@@leakypeach6250 Oh God, he was infected! Now we will be too after interacting with him!
Donald Trump is the KiY
@@mjzacchea2888 more like the king in fake , unnatural, and off-putting orange, but still fairly close. Just a hop skip and a jump down the ol spectrum, all things considered.
@@kadoj it's not his color; it's what he uses as a backdrop.