The Tree (Unabridged)

"The Tree" is a macabre short story by American horror fiction writer H. P. Lovecraft. It was written in 1920, and published in October 1921 in The Tryout. Set in ancient Greece, the story concerns two sculptors who accept a commission with ironic consequences. Lovecraft wrote «The Tree» early in his career. He was dismissive of the story in a 1936 letter. Such stories, he said, «if typed on good stock make excellent shelf-paper, but little else.» The assessment of Lovecraft authority S. T. Joshi was that although the story «may be a trifle obvious… it is an effective display of Lovecraft's skill in handling a historical setting.» On a slope of Mount Maenalus in Arcadia is an olive grove that grows around a marble tomb and the ruin of an old villa. There, one gigantic tree resembles a frighteningly distorted man, and the roots of the tree have shifted the blocks of the tomb.