Talk:The Colour Out of Space

Film adaptations
The article doesn't mention that there is a german independent film from 2010, Die Farbe, based on this novel. --Duckwing (talk) 11:25, 19 June 2012 (UTC)

Wrong Picture
I removed the image in this article because it depicts a creature from Lovecraft's "The Shadow Out of Time" and has nothing to do with "The Color Out of Space." —Preceding unsigned comment added by Vlad the Impaler (talk • contribs) 01:40, 28 November 2007 (UTC)


 * I have to agree with V-the-I; it's a swell illustration, but it does not illustrate the subject of this article. I don't recall "Color" even being adapted in that collection.  Asat (talk) 22:40, 16 December 2007 (UTC)


 * The following discussion is an archived debate of the . Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section. 

move. &mdash; Nightst a  llion  (?) 09:41, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

Requested move
The Colour out of Space → The Colour Out of Space – Speedy move back to correct title. I blundered when I first moved this page (I suppose I had a bad case of Wiki-lowercase-itis). -,-~ R 'lyeh R isin g  ~-,- 19:09, 23 February 2006 (UTC)


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

"Mutagenic"
I removed the term "mutagenic" from the plot synopsis for a rather simple reason - DNA had not even been discovered during Lovecraft's lifetime, let alone when this story was written. Nice analysis from a 21st century viewpoint, but kind of ridiculus when taken in context. --71.201.77.111 01:23, 25 July 2006 (UTC)


 * What's the problem with using the word mutagenic? The glowing plants are mutants.  The mutation is caused by the metorite.  Thus, the meteorite/color from space would be mutagenic.  Merely because Lovecraft himself didn't know about DNA, doesn't mean this article shouldn't use the word.

I think User:71.201.77.111 is confused about the etymology of the word mutagenic. Mutagenic shares the same Latin base as "mutate," derived from the Latin verb mutare. the -Genic part isn't from "gene" but a suffix meaning "to pruduce." Mutagen is "something that produces a change," and doesn't have anything to specifically do with DNA genes. Remember also that Darwin had been around long before DNA was discovered, and scientists were looking for the biological basis for "genes" long before DNA and its double helix structure were discovered. To this day, the word "gene" is for the Evolutionary Biologist an abstract construct, while for other scientists and biologists, gene is the physical DNA. Cuvtixo 18:23, 17 July 2007 (UTC)

Unconvincing quote
"Robert M. Price has pointed to a passage in Edgar Rice Burroughs' The Gods of Mars describing the gems of Barsoom: "[W]here are the words to describe the glorious colours that are unknown to earthly eyes? where the mind or imagination that can grasp the gorgeous scintillations of unheard-of rays as they emanate from the thousand nameless jewels of Barsoom?"

The "scintillations of unheard of rays" could simply be hyberbole in describing the strength of light or perhaps the combinations of colors of light. A lot of multicolored jewels might create an interesting light show of various hues, but this doesn't strike me as describing "a colour out of space." There are already several quotes about ultraviolet light in the article, and, with apologies to Mr. Price, this particular citation sounds like padding or filling for an bad college essay. I don't see any reason to connect Burroughs with Lovecraft, and I don't see the reason for including this quote. Cuvtixo 20:29, 17 July 2007 (UTC)
 * I believe it's been speculated that Lovecraft was inspired by Burroughs' Mars novels, at least in The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath. It makes some sense.
 * I personally don't think, though, that Lovecraft had to get the idea from any earlier story - it's a fairly obvious imaginative leap from the nature of color as wavelength and the fact that there are wavelengths we can't see. I used to imagine what infrared-sight would look like long before I'd read Lovecraft. Vultur (talk) 03:46, 4 October 2008 (UTC)

I agree with the objection to the ERB quote. I read this article before I read the story and I assumed based on this that the "colour" would just be some mumbo-jumbo "it baffles the eye" kind of thing, but instead it's discussed in terms of scientific testing and wavelengths. The silly "ooh the jewels were impossible to describe"-type quote would be a pretty weak "inspiration." Just get rid of it. XKL (talk) 14:40, 17 September 2009 (UTC)

=Colour=

Out of curiosity - and I'm not suggesting that it's wrong - why did he use "colour" instead of "color"? Was it the done thing in his period, or was he very posh, or writing for a British audience? I worry that someone will proofread the article and, given that Lovecraft is an American author, they will retitle it. -Ashley Pomeroy 17:03, 19 September 2007 (UTC)
 * It probably has a lot to do with Lovecraft's anglophilia. I think he used British English spellings in some of his other stories too. --86.135.218.137 (talk) 18:47, 26 December 2007 (UTC)
 * Lovecraft wrote in a very informed, descriptive style. He had an extremely wide vocabulary, and knowledge of such things. Colour must have struck him as a more traditional and refined version of the word, instead of the American "bastardization" of the word. --MwNNrules (talk) 00:58, 21 June 2008 (UTC)