At the Mountains of Madness

When descending into the tunnel, Dyer experiences his only real encounter with a non-human life form. He passes through the Old Ones’ dead city, examines their art and history, and then follows them down into the area below the city. However, the only actual Old Ones he encounters are either in the distance or dead. Instead, he meets something that frightens him even more: Dyer and Danforth are chased out of the tunnel by a Shoggoth, a formless creature made of slime that fills Dyer with terror. The Old Ones are alien and strange, but they have a physical presence that Dyer appreciates. He can understand the presence of an Old One, even if he does not fully understand their molecular makeup. By contrast, the Shoggoth is formless and beyond explanation.

The Shoggoths’ status in the Old Ones’ society also contributes to its horror, at least in Dyer’s eyes. The Old Ones created the Shoggoths as slaves. These slaves then rebelled against the Old Ones, were defeated, and possibly eventually destroyed the Old Ones’ civilization. The threat the Shoggoths pose thus has racist and perhaps classist overtones; Dyer presents the Shoggoths as more terrifying than the Old Ones because they lack the culture and refinement that he has observed in the city. He cannot relate to the formless slime in the way that he can relate to the Old Ones. When he flees, he leaves behind an Old One that is killed by the Shoggoth. In this moment, he feels an unexpected pang of sympathy for the creature. He never feels any sort of positive emotion for the Shoggoth. The Shoggoths emerge as the true villain of At the Mountains of Madness, as they are utterly inhuman, completely unsympathetic, and particularly aggressive.

As they ride in a plane from the city, Danforth experiences a vision. The terror of what he has seen causes him to have a nervous breakdown later in life, alienating him from the world. He also refuses to share the vision with anyone else, though Dyer hints that the vision involves the distant mountain range that scared the Old Ones. Danforth’s vision reveals the weakness of humanity. Danforth and Dyer have struggled to deal with the Old Ones and the Shoggoths, and the suggestion that there is an even greater evil terrifies them. This mysterious evil force can frighten a species as advanced as the Old Ones, and even the hint of it is enough to break a human mind beyond repair. As palpable as the fear of the unknown is throughout the novel, the reality of knowing even a small amount about the strange, distant mountains is utterly overwhelming. Danforth’s vision reiterates the weakness of the humans and shows the reader how ill-prepared humanity is to deal with the horrors that lurk in the unexplored corners of the Earth.

The ending underscores this sense of helplessness. Dyer concludes with a plea to other scientists not to make an expedition to Antarctica. However, he seems resigned to the reality of the situation. He knows that an expedition is already being planned, regardless of whether he publishes his work in time. Dyer writes to try to save people, but his work conveys a sense of helplessness that reflects his experiences in Antarctica. His trip taught him that humans are essentially irrelevant and foolish in comparison to the other species that came before them. Should the Old Ones awaken, or any of the other alien species that visited Earth return, humans will be powerless to stop them. The final lines express this sense of helplessness. Dyer’s writing and his work have taught him about his own inadequacy, crushing the arrogance and confidence that he once possessed. The ending, much like the story itself, suggests that humanity must reckon with its position of weakness. Until then, people will continue to make the same mistakes as Dyer and the rest of his team.