Lovecraft's disgust for New York stemmed in large part from his racist attitudes, which are also reflected in 'He''s narrator: My coming to New York had been a mistake for whereas I had looked for poignant wonder and inspiration in the teeming labyrinths of ancient streets that twist endlessly from forgotten courts and squares and waterfronts to courts and squares and waterfronts equally forgotten, and in the Cyclopean modern towers and pinnacles that rise blackly Babylonian under waning moons, I had found instead only a sense of horror and oppression which threatened to master, paralyze, and annihilate me.

The opening paragraphs of 'He' are believed to be largely autobiographical, expressing Lovecraft's own feelings about the city:

He moved back to Providence, Rhode Island in April 1926, having developed a thorough aversion to New York. Lovecraft had moved to New York City in March 1924 for his short-lived marriage to Sonia Greene. the next morning, Lovecraft had reached Elizabeth, New Jersey, by ferry, where he bought a dime composition book and wrote the story in Elizabeth's Scott Park. The story 'He' was written after an all-night tour of the remnants of Old New York by 7 a.m. The screams rouse the spirits of the Native Americans to take vengeance on the man, who is the same squire from 1768.

The man shows the narrator visions of the city's past and future so terrifying that he begins to scream wildly. Within a week all of them were dead, and he alone had their secret knowledge. After learning these secrets, the squire killed the Native Americans by giving them 'monstrous bad rum'. There, he tells him the story of a squire who bargained with Native Americans for the secrets of their rituals concerning time and space, which were practiced on the land where the squire had recently taken up residence. The man brings the narrator into his home. The man offers to show the narrator the secrets of the town. One night, while wandering through a historic part of Greenwich Village, he happens upon a man dressed in garments from the 18th century. The story's anonymous narrator has moved from New England to New York City, and greatly regrets it. Written August 1925, it was first published in Weird Tales, September 1926. ' He' is a short story by American horror writer H. Title page of 'He' as it appeared in Weird Tales, September 1926.

Hp lovecraft tales of horror