I discovered the following gem several years ago while reading through some old REHupas, and wonder if my fellow blogger Steve Trout remembers it. Steve is currently the longest serving REHupan, having been a member since 1976 with only a short gap of inactivity during all those years.

In his ‘zine Beltric Writes #10 for July 1979, Steve ran a copy of a Howard-related newspaper item he had come across. The funny thing from a modern perspective is the author of the piece. Steve wrote, “This here on the right is from the letters column of the Detroit News,” and then reproduced the following tidbit:

JUNE 11

There must be something special about the 11th of June. It was on June 11, 1936, that Robert E. Howard, the creator of Conan the Barbarian, committed suicide. On June 11, 1979, the Detroit News decided to drop the Conan the Barbarian comic strip. And also on June 11, I decided to drop the News.

– Gary Romeo, Royal Oak

Back then, of course, Gary was unknown to Trout and the rest of REHupa, he was just a name in a newspaper. It would be almost two decades later, in October of 1997, when Gary would sign up with REHupa and formally “meet” Trout and the rest of the a.p.a.’s top-flight Howardists. I’m guessing Gary never knew that his first appearance in the pages of REHupa was actually in 1979! Earlier even than Rusty!

PS — June 11, 1979 has an even greater, non-REH resonance for me: that was the day John Wayne died. The thirtieth anniversary of the Duke’s death is this year.

Steve adds: Yes, I came across that some years ago. Gary actually visited my sf fan club during those years, but we didn’t meet. Obviously, a pastiche-lover even then.

Although I made my official Cimmerian debut last week, this is not the first time the name Al Harron has appeared on this site. A little yarn by the name of El Ingenioso Bàrbaro Rey Konahn de Simaria was unleashed on the unsuspecting website, causing a bit of a ruckus in its shameless parodying of Milius’ film. This story means immeasurably more to me now than it did when it was written, since it was the basis of a connection between myself and the late Steve Tompkins. Even at the time, the playful, tongue-in-cheek praise he espoused for my little tale was an incredible source of confidence, and knowing that this is the last communication between the two of us until the Valkyries come for me, I wish to share my own thoughts on a man whose brilliance has illuminated so much.

As a latecomer to Robert E. Howard studies, I have been fortunate to have a huge catalog of past essays to discover. Going through tomes of scholarly criticism such as The Dark Barbarian, The Barbaric Triumph, The Hyborian Heresies and others, I was enthused by the sheer range of Howard scholars, how their views, backgrounds and personal history could all be so different, yet find a unifying quality in a writer from Texas. Though I found every writer fascinating, Steve Tompkins in particular intrigued me. Though half a world apart and twice my age, I believe that had circumstances been different, I would have met him, we would have talked and laughed and disagreed violently, but always coming away with a new view, discovery or appreciation of the subject discussed. I have no doubt in some multiverse, Tompkins is yet on Midgard, and an alternate version of me would have a chance to talk to him in person, and thank him for what he has done for Howard studies, Howard fans, and myself.

Since reading my first Tompkins essay, “The Chants of Old Heroes, Singing in Our Ears,” I knew he was someone special even in the field of Howard studies. I went out of my way to find anything he wrote, scouring the internet for more. Be it in celebrated, Cimmerian Award-winning pieces like “The Shortest Distance Between Two Towers,” rousing rallies like “Pan versus Peter Pan,” or sly homages such as “Night Falls on Whoheim,” Steve Tompkins never failed to enthrall, and his works remain a testament to his incredible mind.

Perhaps one of my favourite Tompkins pieces is “What A Mummer Wild, What An Insane Child,” a surprising discussion on the similarities The Dark Knight shares with Howard’s fiction. This, I believe, encapsulates Tompkins at his best: he convincingly explores how far-reaching and universal Howard’s themes are, beyond the mere blood-and-thunder boy’s fantasy many a critic accuses him of. The subcutaneous truths of barbarism’s war against civilization in society and the individual, humanity’s defiance against cosmic indifference, and the battle of hate and death are so strong that they can be seen in all manner of films that one would not normally associate with Howard. Above all others, Tompkins showed me that Howard is relevant, his themes are relevant, his words are relevant: they can be felt in mythology, the ancient sagas, in legend, in modern fiction, and even in modern blockbusters. For inspiring that realization to me through his work, I will forever remain in his debt.

There is no literary work, to me, half as zestful as rewriting history in the guise of fiction. Every page of history teems with dramas that should be put on paper . . . — Robert E. Howard

Apparently Paul Kearney has a similar outlook when it comes to rewriting history, since his latest book, The Ten Thousand (Solaris, 2008), is a retelling of historical events. More specifically it is the Anabasis of Xenophon, the story of a large mercenary army recruited to fight in Persia around 450 BC, and then left to fight their way home, transplanted to a fantasy world.

On Kearney’s fictional world of Kuf, mankind shares the planet with two other humanoid species, the tall, yellow-eyed and gold-skinned Kufr and the yeti-like Qaf. The Kufr have the world-spanning Empire, and stand in for the Persians. The humans have a smaller continent to the West, and are called Macht. They are clearly Greco-Roman in culture, war-like, with city-states fighting amongst the ruins of a fabled empire of their own.

As you might expect from a story based on history, there is little magic or fantasy aside from the setting. The Macht have some magical armor, supposedly derived from their gods, but that is about it.

Some critics have compared Kearney to David Gemmell, but I think they are worlds apart. In a Gemmell book, virtue will always triumph, if at a cost. In Kearney’s work it is far less easy to tell where the virtue lies, let alone if it will win. The Macht mercenaries in this book, for example, are our protagonists, but they have come to a peaceful land for the express purpose of waging war on behalf of a usurper. When he dies in battle, the mercenaries try to broker a truce so that they can return home, but the emperor wants nothing but their destruction and treacherously assassinates the generals sent as ambassadors. It’s almost like Howard remarked about one of his Crusader stories, “all the characters complete scoundrels, and everybody double-crossing everybody else.” Well, not quite. Some of the characters have a sense of honor, insofar as their lives make it possible.

I did not like this book as much as I enjoyed The Monarchies of God series, but it was well worth the time. Recommended for readers who enjoy the military fantasies of Glen Cook or David Drake.

Interestingly, I learned the 1979 cult favorite movie The Warriors was also loosely based on the Anabasis, and director Walter Hill wanted to have the audience be aware of its Greek roots, but the executives said no. A remake is in the works, as if we needed one.

Like a wizard and his staff, or a dragon and its gleaming horde, heavy metal/hard rock music and fantasy literature are an inseparable pair. I haven’t seen any statistics published on the subject, but fans of J.R.R. Tolkien and Robert E. Howard just seem more inclined to listen to heavy metal than any other genre of music.

For a small sample of this trend, you need look no further than The Cimmerian’s About the Bloggers page: While I can’t speak for Leo, Steve, or Al, Deuce and I wear our metal credentials on our sleeves like Sauron’s orcs bear the Lidless Eye (for the record, Deuce is more metal than me). I don’t think it’s an aberration that at least 40% of this site’s bloggers are metal fans; there’s something to this phenomenon, even if I don’t quite understand the connection.

You don’t have to look far or dig deep to see the connections between metal and fantasy. Led Zeppelin might be the most popular fantasy-influenced hard rock band, with songs based on the works of J.R.R. Tolkien (Ramble On, Misty Mountain Hop) and Viking invaders (Immigrant Song). Progressive rock band Rush also shows Tolkien influences on its early albums, including Rivendell and The Necromancer. Molly Hatchet’s album covers featured work by the immortal Frank Frazetta, he of Conan the Cimmerian Lancer fame.

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“Before Conan, there was Kane, a Puritan swordsman on a restless search for justice.”

That’s the lead-in from Nick Owchar’s, “Man in black: Robert E. Howard’s Solomon Kane,” published this May 24th in his monthly column for the Los Angeles Times. Owchar, deputy book editor for the LA Times, turns in a quite respectable piece on the Man From Devonshire (and his creator). His column, “The Siren’s Call” (a title I truly dig), was a joy and revelation once I (very recently) discovered it. Dear readers, brethren, kindred and fellow travellers, Ol’ Nick is one of us. Peruse his previous columns (future blog-fodder, for me) and tell me it ain’t so. (Continue reading this post)

This is the last chapter of the story. To recap, Charles Saunders wrote last month:

I’m going to try something new at CharlesSaundersWriter.com. My next four blogs are going to be a serialized story entitled “Luendi.”

“Luendi” is one of my vintage short stories, written at the same time I was working on the first Imaro stories. That would be the early 1970s. It was one of the few stories I’d written that was not set in Nyumbani, or some other, unnamed fantasy version of Africa. But it wasn’t exactly modern mainstream, either. Its setting is the Southern Africa of the late 1800s, around the time the Zimbabwe ruins were first discovered by Europeans. I did have something of an agenda when I wrote this, as I was a strong opponent of apartheid. So, I thought I would get one back — symbolically speaking — against the colonists and settlers of that time.

The story was published in the September 1977 issue of The Diversifier, a popular small-press magazine of the time. Times have changed a lot since then, bit I hope “Luendi” still has some resonance after all these years.

It will debut on Friday, May 1 and the next three installments will appear on May 8, May 15, & May 22.

If you haven’t yet, head on over to Charles’ website and read the whole story. And remember that Charles’ revised edition of Imaro III: The Trail of Bohu is now available here.

I think an introduction is in order: my full name is Alexander James Harron. Though a relative newcomer in the vast field of Howard studies at 25 years of age, few authors have galvanized my imagination quite as much as the Man from Cross Plains.

As a young boy, I devoured adventure fiction: Burroughs, Haggard, Conan Doyle, Stevenson, Dumas, Verne and Wells were my inspiration, the lost worlds and grand struggles of history my tonic. I also read Almuric during this time, then unaware that the author of one of my favourite books wrote anything else. Soon I would discover Tolkien, Moorcock and Le Guin, but finding other such fantasy fiction lacking I almost gave up on the genre entirely, until I picked up a copy of Gollancz’ Fantasy Masterworks collection of the original Howard Conan tales. Through Conan I discovered the vast field of Howard’s writings, and it is by way of REH that I found the other great writers of the Weird Tales era: Smith, Merritt, Moore, Brackett and others.

So what can this upstart from Scotland offer to the study of a dust bowl period Texan author? Well, my exposure to Howard has been relatively bereft of pastiche material: I neither watched the films, nor read the Lancers and comics until after I had the fortune to read the Del Reys. Arguably my first experience of Conan was the recent animated series Conan the Adventurer, though considering Robert E. Howard did not receive so much as a credit (nor did he deserve the shame) I would confidently call The Conan Chronicles my first “true” Conan experience. Whether this shaping results in new insights or just the reanimation of dead horses to flog anew remains to be seen. So let’s jump right in.

Considering the enormous output Robert E. Howard created in his career, it is inevitable that some stories were abandoned, rewritten or otherwise unfinished. Some are fragments ending abruptly, others with a rough outline, and others still remaining only as synopses. When synopses and drafts for published stories are discounted, there are dozens of such documents remaining. Using the clinical “untitled draft/fragment/synopsis” is technically correct, but not descriptive of the content therein. In the case of posthumous collaborations, sometimes a name supplied by the “co-writer” is used, but that is unsatisfying for a number of reasons.

Inspired by archaeological precedent of naming artifacts after a defining characteristic such as place, discoverer or distinctive element, I have designated new titles for nameless tales that are more easily recognizable and more representative of the original text. I originally started this project as a system to name the unnamed Conan stories, so they shall form the first part. (Continue reading this post)

Muchas gracias to our amigo, Bill Thom, for informing all of us over on the Official Robert E. Howard Forum that Wandering Star has signed a deal to publish the final deluxe, hardcover volume in the Conan series.

Through an agreement with Wandering Star, Book Palace Books will bring out a deluxe hardcover of The Conquering Sword of Conan that will (presumably) match the earlier, Wandering Star editions of The Coming of Conan of Cimmeria and The Bloody Crown of Conan.

The book features 13 colour paintings and 52 tonal paintings in a
signed and numbered edition of 1000 copies.

Limited Clothbound edition of 1000 – $195
Limited leatherbound edition of 100 – $500

Publication – November 2009

Not much else is known at this time.

I would suppose that everyone who is interested in the new “Star Trek” movie has seen it by now, so I won’t worry about spoilers. A long time ago, Fritz Leiber wrote a story — “Try and Change the Past” (Amazing Science Fiction, March 1958) — postulating that the space-time continuum resists change. If a time traveler alters the past, the future may be slightly changed, but soon the future finds its way to the former norm. “Star Trek” reminds me very much of this story; while the intrusion of a Romulan from the future changes the history of the galaxy in some major ways, by the end of the movie most of the crew of the Enterprise have found their way to the positions and characters that we know from ST:TOS.

First of these history alterations is the destruction of a starship commanded by James Kirk’s father. We see the fatherless Kirk grow up as a juvenile delinquent; him stealing and wrecking his step-father’s classic car is our introduction to the character. Next he is seen hanging out in a bar, hitting on the lovely cadet Uhura and getting in a fight. There is a James Dean rebel quality in Kirk 2.0, or to quote from Ted Anthony’s perceptive AP review:

[Chris] Pine’s Kirk is Shatner’s on Red Bull and vodka — rebellious and sarcastic, vaguely felonious, tragically hip, soaked in irony and maybe a bit ADD. He leaps, then — maybe — looks.

I found the scene where Kirk overcomes the Kobayashi Maru no-win scenario particularly highlights this aspect, as Kirk doesn’t even pretend not to be cheating. And somehow I suspect, egalitarian future and all, that if this Kirk had been raised by his father he would, like the 60′s Kirk, prefer blondes.

Ted Anthony paints Kirk as an iconic American character, born of the New Frontier but true heir of the old one, having a dual nature, exuberant and impetuous, yet serious and intelligent; “hawk and dove, humble and arrogant, futurist and traditionalist — and in the most American duality of all, childlike and completely adult.”

That last duality brings Breckinridge Elkins to mind, somehow.

Frontier scholar Richard Slotkin weighs in comparing Kirk with the persona George Bush tried to mould for himself, the “compassionate conservative” — but notes Kirk’s “right-wing style” is actually controlled by his “ingrained progressivism.”

Chris Pine and Zachary Quinto (Spock) are well-cast as the young leads, which really helps. Add in a strong story which, from the get-go, allows the writers freedom to stray from the massive weight of Star Trek lore, a powerful villian played with dire scowls by Eric Bana, great effects and plenty of action and you have a film that should captivate old fans and new alike.

Listen, and understand! That Terminator is out there. It can’t be bargained with. It can’t be reasoned with. It doesn’t feel pity, or remorse, or fear. And it absolutely will not stop, ever, until you are dead.

Kyle Reese, The Terminator

From the previews I’ve seen, Terminator Salvation (which opened today in a theatre near you) looks pretty damned good, at least visually. But it will take one hell of an effort to wrest the title of best Terminator film from the vice-like, cyborg death grip of the original.

I don’t necessarily consider Rotten Tomatoes a bellwether for my own critical appreciation of a film, but it says something that The Terminator (1984) has a perfect, 100% “fresh” rating out of 38 total reviews. I won’t argue with the critics; the first Terminator is still the best in my book. Others argue convincingly for Terminator 2, a fine sequel whose special effects were revolutionary for its time and remain spectacular now. However, in my opinion the first film is better plotted, and more compelling due to its uncompromising ruthlessness and non-stop narrative thrust. T2 is excellent but has a tad too much humor and playfulness injected into the script for my own tastes.

Part of my unabashed love for The Terminator may be nostalgia: I was a kid when I first saw the film and was simultaneously enthralled by the great action and visuals, and haunted by its apocalyptic vision of the future, one which seemed all too plausible — not Skynet or robots, mind you, but nuclear destruction. When The Terminator came out the cold war was still going on and a full-scale nuclear exchange between the United States and the Soviet Union was an all too real possibility. The grim television miniseries The Day After was frightening audiences at the time with the likely impact of a nuclear war, which promised instant annihilation for some, and a prolonged, painful death by radiation poisoning for the less fortunate. The Terminator seized on the fears of the age and a generation growing up with an omnipresent fear of atomic annihilation. I’ll never forget the ominous, mechanical opening theme, and the visceral image of the futuristic tank crushing a mound of skulls under its merciless track.

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