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| "The People of the Pit" | |
|---|---|
| Short story by A. Merritt | |
 Cover to Amazing Stories, March 1927 | |
 Text available at Wikisource | |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Genre(s) | Fantastic horror |
| Publication | |
| Published in | All-Story Weekly |
| Publisher | Frank Munsey |
| Media type | |
| Published in English | January 5, 1918 |
The People of the Pit (1918) is a short story by American writer A. Merritt.
Plot Summary
Two gold prospectors are in Alaska to investigate a mountain range known as The Hand, which is supposed to have gold running down the middle. One night, when it is in sight, a beam of light shoots into the sky, and an injured man crawls into their camp. He was also a prospector, and tells them a fantastic tale of his experience with the People of the Pit.
Setting
The story is set "three hundred miles above the first great bend of the Kuskokwim toward the Yukon", in the Kuskokwim Mountains.
A travel book titled In the Alaskan wilderness had been published the previous year by George Byron Gordon, with maps and photographs of the region.
Influence
The story has been cited as a possible inspiration of Lovecraft's novella At the Mountains of Madness.
Publishing history
- All-Story Weekly, January 5, 1918
- Amazing Stories, March 1927, illustrated by Martin Gambee.
- The Third Omnibus of Crime, 1935
- The Fox Woman and Other Stories, 1949
- Masterpieces of Science Fiction, 1966
- The Fantastic Pulps, 1975
- Masterpieces of Terror and the Unknown, 1993
References
- In the Alaskan Wilderness. (George B. Gordon). 1917. John C. Winston Company, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
- Joshi and Schultz, p. 11.
External links
- The People of the Pit title listing at the Internet Speculative Fiction Database
The People of the Pit public domain audiobook at LibriVox- The People of the Pit at Project Gutenberg Australia