Here's the Story Behind City of Ardham in 'Lovecraft Country'
Lovecraft Country's allure lies in the fact that it weaves fictional, supernatural storylines in a real-life historical setting, and its superstar cast includes Jurnee Smollett, Jonathan Majors, Aunjanue Ellis, Courtney B. Vance, Jamie Chung, and Michael K. Williams.
The 1950s setting also adds another layer to the show. The Jim Crow laws in place at the time force the characters to deal with both real-life racist monsters, along with terrifying monster monsters that plague the region. As you can expect, fans are interested in where the show filmed, but viewers also want to know if Ardham, the town housing the giant manor featured in the series, is real. Here's what we know.
Is Ardham a real place?
While Ardham is a fictional location, it does have a connection to another place that fans of Matt Ruff's Lovecraft Country novel may recognize. It's meant to be a stand-in, of sorts, for Arkham, the fictional Massachusetts city featured in many of H.P. Lovecraft's most famous stories. The show implies that Lovecraft's 'Arkham' is based on the 'real town' of Ardham (though, again, neither of them are actually real).
"Lovecraft based [Arkham] on Salem, but it’s not a real place," George tells Tic in the 2016 novel. He also points out that what Tic read as "Arkham" in Montrose's letter to him is actually "Ardham," a small town of 250 people that's near the New Hampshire border as the book explains.
Interestingly, Lovecraft's Arkham is said to be based on Salem, Massachusetts, and Lovecraft reportedly picked the infamous town as his inspiration due to its reputation for the witch trials and its history with the occult.
August Derleth was the first book publisher of Lovecraft's novels, and he later founded the publishing company Arkham House. On the publishing house's website, he's quoted as saying, "There was never any question about the name of our publishing house. Arkham House suggested itself at once, since it was Lovecraft’s own well-known, widely-used place-name for legend-haunted Salem, Massachusetts, in his remarkable fiction; it seemed to us that this was fitting and that Lovecraft himself would have approved it enthusiastically.'
And of course, Arkham is known as the name of Gotham's asylum in the DC Universe, where supervillains are often sent after losing in battle with Batman. Writers Jack C. Harris and Dennis O'Neil named the asylum in homage to Lovecraft.
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