Still Remembering Steve

It's been 5 years now. I wish he could be here to give his thoughts on new Howard and Tolkien developments, the Hobbit films, the 1,000th anniversary of the Battle of Clontarf, everything. Even that ridiculous Shadow of Mordor game. But he's surely not forgotten:

Before his death in 2009 Steve Tompkins was probably the most erudite of the Howard scholars on the scene. Now, Leo Grin has received the blessing of Steve’s family and put out a call for material by the late, great critic. Here’s what he’s looking for:
• As complete a bibliography as possible of what Steve published in various fanzines, websites, and comic book letter columns.
• e-texts of these items, either from the original Word docs, or from OCR.
• scans of the actual printed pages, to compare to the e-texts as necessary when editing.
• any email correspondence or paper letters anyone cares to share. Where personal confidences must be retained, strip out the offending passages and replace them with a “***REDACTED***” placeholder.
• Any remembrances of things Steve said to you in person or over the phone, no matter how fleeting or seemingly trivial. Just tell the story and context as best you can. Doesn’t have to be composed for deathless publication, just the facts for now.
If anyone would like to help in this endeavor, shoot us an email at info@rehfoundation.org and we’ll get you in touch with Mr. Grin.

I'm hopeful we'll have a concrete book to supplement the undoubtedly rich legacy left behind.

Bite-Sized Blog: Prometheus, Frost-Giants and Indo-Europeans

"The Frost-Giant's Daughter" may be only 9 pages long, but it's one of Howard's biggest stories, tying in an awful lot of themes and ideas from across multiple stories and mythic inspirations. It's one of the stories that I feel is really important to do justice to, which is why it's taken such a blasted long time to finish: I could've skipped ahead to "The God in the Bowl," but I really want to do everything in the order Howard wrote the stories, since that in itself takes up a big chunk of proceedings. Probably should've split it into multiple parts a while ago. So, in lieu of the next 80 Years of Conan, here's a round-up of links I found of interest.

Back again, Mr Herron?

Hee hee, this is fun.

Meanwhile, over in the World of Robert E. Howard Studies (or at least one encampment where skin-clad knuckle-draggers sit around and devour the latest issue of the Conan comic book in cannabalistic fashion — yum-yum, eat-em-up):

Oh noes, Don Herron is disparaging the faithful Lost Souls!  Good sir, I respect your pre-eminent authority in Howard scholarship, but this slight shall not go unanswered.  They may be skin-clad knuckle-dragging cannibals, but by thunder, they're my skin-clad knuckle-dragging cannibals!

"It's your scholarship, Bobbie! Something's got to be done about your scholarship!"

With The Evolutionary Heroes of Robert E. Howard still on the horizon and more and more academically-minded folks recognizing Howard's scholarly virtues, it's with great enthusiasm that I announce the latest of the Shieldwall's assaults against the ivory towers of Academia who yet deny the Man from Cross Plains' merits as a Real Author of Real Literature - Conan Meets the Academy: Multidisciplinary Essays on the Enduring Barbarian. The press release is excellent, as a somewhat tongue-in-cheek, cheerful explanation of Howard's Conan being more than just a dimwitted brute:

Conan Meets the Academy
Multidisciplinary Essays on the Enduring Barbarian

Edited by Jonas Prida


Print ISBN: 978-0-7864-6152-3
EBook ISBN: 978-0-7864-8989-3
5 maps, 2 photos, tables, notes, bibliography, index
softcover (6 x 9) 2012

Buy Now!

Price: $35.00

Not Yet Published, Available Spring/Summer 2012 About the Book
In 1932, Robert E. Howard penned a series of fantasy stories featuring Conan, a hulking Cimmerian warrior who roamed the mythical Hyborian Age landscape engaging in heroic adventures. More than the quirky manifestation of Depression-era magazines, Conan the Barbarian has endured as a cultural mainstay for over 70 years. This multidisciplinary collection offers the first scholarly investigation of Conan, from Howard’s early stories, through mid-century novels and Arnold Schwarzenegger’s iconic films, to the 2011 cinematic remake of Conan the Barbarian. Drawing on disciplines such as stylometry, archeology, cultural studies, folklore studies, and literary history, the essays examine statistical analyses of Conan texts, the literary genesis of Conan, later-day parodies, Conan video games, and much more. By displaying the wide range of academic interest in Conan, this volume reveals the hidden scholarly depth of this seemingly unsophisticated fictional character.
About the Author
Jonas Prida is an assistant professor of English and head of the English Department at the College of St. Joseph, in Rutland, Vermont.

Looks great!  Can't wait for its release, and to find out more about its contents. But there's something bothering me that I can't quite put my finger on... Wait...

This multidisciplinary collection offers the first scholarly investigation of Conan

What the...

"Aly!  You've got to come back with me - back to the future!

Whoa there, Doc, you want 8-year-old Aly, I'll just get him:

...

"Doc, I got my older self's Robert E. Howard Foundation award here, I was just going to try out my new victory pose!"

"Well, bring it along, it concerns it too!"

"What do you mean?  What happens?  Does something happen to Robert E. Howard?  Does he get erased from existence?"

"No, you and Robert E. Howard turn out fine: it's the scholarship, Aly!  Something's gotta be done about the scholarship!"

"According to my theory, someone interfered with Glenn Lord's discovery of Howard's work. If Glenn doesn't read it, he won't read any more Howard, he won't start The Howard Collector and he won't open the gates to Robert E. Howard scholarship - no Dark Barbarian, no Blood & Thunder, no Echos de Cimmerie, no Evolutionary Heroes, not even The Robert E. Howard Reader! That's why your copy of The Barbaric Triumph's disappearing from that photograph. The fanzines will follow, and unless you repair the damage, your Foundation Award'll be next!"

"Sounds pretty heavy, Doc!"

"Weight has nothing to do with it."

"You're right, I don't know why I used a popular idiom to illustrate my feelings to an absent-minded professor. To the Delorean!"

*I should point out that just after I posted this, Agent Theagenes posted this on the REH Forums:

I brought up that problematic sentence with Jonas this morning after I saw it and there is some discussion underway right now about changing it. His intent was not to diss all of the previous REH scholarship, but to point out that this is the first study of Conan as an over-all pop culture figure---not just Howard's Conan. But the sentence is poorly worded---hopefully it won't be much of a problem to get it changed.

So that's cleared up, but dammit, I just watched Back to the Future with my cousin and infant second-cousin for the first time (theirs, not mine) and I'm still buzzing from the fun of it.

** I should also point out that this was also partially inspired by my recognition of Glenn Lord's impending 80th birthday.  I truly hope to meet him someday, though due to his health and age and my wet-behind-the-ears level of experience in Texas, time is running out.  Unfortunately, I don't have a Delorean.

*** Damon Sasser alerted me to another rupture in the space-time continuum, as Doc and 8-year-old Aly inadvertently created a universe where Glenn Lord's journal was called The Howard Reader rather than The Howard Collecter. Luckily the original timeline has been restored, or my name isn't Al Rudiger Cunningham.

The division between the literary story and the action one

I think I understand why Otto Penzler went with "The Devil in Iron" when composing The Big Book of Adventure Stories: because it's just that, an adventure story.  It doesn't have the special something which puts it among the ranks of Howard's greatest works, or even the greatest of Howard's fantasy, or even the greatest of Howard's Conans, or even the greatest of Howard's eastern Conan stories - but it is what is, in the ol' vernacular, a Ripping Yarn.

It's one of my favourites, and to say that it doesn't have the cosmic tragedy of "The Tower of the Elephant" or the dystopian degeneracy of "Red Nails" doesn't necessarily make it a bad story, just not an exceptional one. Howard wrote dozens of these sorts of tales that are great fun to read, but there isn't much else lurking beneath the surface - at least, nothing that we haven't seen better executed in previous Howard tales. With this in mind, Penzler's choice actually seems fairly good for the sort of book he was trying to compile - rough-and-tumble, boy's own adventure tales.

Unfortunately, such an approach can sometimes lead to reviews like this.

The Literary Omnivore is a wonderful, wonderful human being

You know how me and others are always ranting about the arbitrary silliness of "literary fiction" and "genre fiction"?  Well, The Literary Omnivore, aka Clare, is just as sick and fed up of it as Brian Murphy and I am - to the point where she made a video on the subject.



Couldn't have said it better myself.  I'm going to be linking to this in future whenever someone brings up the "literary/genre fiction" false dichotomy.

"Jim was most ruined for an automaton..."

Sheer, unmitigated, unadulterated, unpossible brilliance.

The Philip Palmer Challenge

I like to imagine he's contemplating how his company is going to take over the Crown.

In his recent post, Philip Palmer gives the very silly man Edward Docx both barrels for his very silly post.  It's from The Guardian, that home of baby intellectuals, so I can't be surprised at the silliness.  How silly?  Here's an excerpt:

... in my view, we need urgently to remind ourselves of – for want of better terminology – the difference between literary and genre fiction; because, to misquote the literary essayist Isaac D'Israeli, "it seems to me a wretched national compulsion to be gratified by mediocrity when the excellent lies before us".

It appears to be of the typical tired "fantasy, science fiction and horror aren't "real" literature" stripe, and again, he brings up that odious, snivelling, miserable, worthless malapropism "literary fiction."  Few phrases infuriate me more than "literary fiction": "now a major motion picture" is pretty close, though.  Hell, by his definition, isn't literary fiction in itself a genre - and thus, genre fiction?  I'd love to see Docx bend over backwards to make allowances for the many classics which couldn't be anything but "genre fiction".  Palmer does a fantastic job destroying, disintegrating and defenestrating Docx's idiocy.

However, he has something to say about Howard.  Something both challenging, and awesome.

Well, we all knew this would happen.

As for love of Truth, it never occurred to me to doubt that you were motivated by a desire to establish truth. I supposed it was a fact that everybody took for granted, that the aim of every intelligent man was Truth. I knew it was your aim, and it did not occur to me to make the formal statement that my aims were similar. I did not suppose it was necessary.
- Robert E. Howard, letter to H.P. Lovecraft, January 1935

Mark Finn's New Manifesto was bound to rankle some folks, but the net had been unusually quiet.

But fear not, for James Nicoll has come to the rescue with a post called "By Crom, they seem thin-skinned." If you met some of us in person, you'd find that very little about a substantial subset of Howard fans can be called "thin." But I kid.

We get the usual sort of gems, like mistaking what the Manifesto was about (that apparently Mark is rallying against literary criticism when it's quite clear that he's rallying against bad literary criticism), a deCampista leaping to the Spraguester's defense (in the form of James Enge, who wrote a review of Almuric that utterly beggars belief in some respects), and the pop culture reference posing as gag (Leave Brit Robert Alone! please (sob)).

It's a shame most of the criticism of Mark's piece is essentially a misunderstanding of what it was all about.  As is clear in the article, Mark is not against new ideas on Howard's writing and their approach to sex, gender, race, class and whatnot.  What he is against is the silly nonsense based on absolutely no concrete foundations that somehow get touted as fact.  It isn't about being unable to cope with criticism of REH as a man and an author - it's about not putting up with inaccuracy and shoddy or non-existent research.

The New Manifesto is not just about defending REH from those meanies who throw silly insults his way, or come up with crazy ideas about his work: it's about establishing the truth.  Even if you don't know, like or care about Robert E. Howard and his work, surely one can sympathise with the desire to lift the obfuscating veil of rumour and groundless speculation to reveal the light of knowledge and truth?

But then, failing - or even refusing - to understand things is the hallmark of the deCampista.

There seems to be a conviction among modems that anything which seems to fall outside the narrow lines of their personal experience is impossible. They are like colorblind men who deny the existence of colors because they are unable to detect them. Like you, I prefer an open mind. I do not think that I have such a grasp on cosmic truth that a thing is necessarily false because I fail to understand the reason of it; I am willing to believe that things very possibly may exist outside my limited range of comprehension.
- Robert E. Howard, Letter to Clark Ashton Smith, 14th December, 1933

Guy's Lit Wire on Howard

A while back, Will Ludwigsen wrote a very good review of The Coming of Conan the Cimmerian on Guy's Lit Wire.  His fellow blogger Alex Bledsoe has decided to add his own.

It's... problematic. Between the factual inaccuracies (like how Howard apparently never traveled out of his "own back yard") and the not very complimentary statements like this:

So what's my point? Simply this--he did the best he could, and with nothing but drive and imagination he created a whole new genre. And those are tools anyone reading this blog has to some degree. We often talk about what the books reviewed here mean to boys, and whether or not boys would like them; in this case, I want to use The Coming of Conan the Cimmerian as a challenge to cultivate your own drive and imagination, and apply it to creating something new. If an isolated young man in the middle of the Texas oil fields can create sword and sorcery, then what might you create?

It basically comes across like he's saying anyone reading this blog might do something better than REH.  It's the old "REH's work was immature, imagine what he could've done when he was older" thing.

I think Mr Bledsoe needs to give the books another read, myself.  With lines like these:

Yet it's also clearly the work of a young man. Most characters other than Conan are defined by a single quality, and are either good or evil, with little middle ground. In The Phoenix on the Sword and The Scarlet Citadel, Conan is the middle-aged king of Aquilonia, but none of the wounds and injuries he suffers as a younger man tell on him. There's no mention of any aches or pains, and the scars are simply marks of past adventures. Only an inexperienced young man in his twenties would imagine this as middle age. And his women, while not exactly shrinking violets (the pirate queen Belit trysts with Conan on deck, in full view of her crew), are also nothing like actual human beings, being once again defined by two simplistic qualities: how beautiful they are, and how quickly Conan gets them. Had Howard lived, I imagine his Conan stories would have grown in sophistication and depth to reflect his own life experience.

I have to wonder if he's reading the same stories I am.   Did he somehow miss how the villains of "The Phoenix on the Sword" all had independent, understandable motivations beyond "they're evil because they're evil"? If Conan was feeling aches and pains, he would be distracted and vulnerable - and dead.  Luckily, Conan's made of sterner stuff than the average soft-bellied middle-aged civilized man.  Gotta love Howard's women being "nothing like human beings": in fairness, he has clearly not read "Red Nails," "The People of the Black Circle," "The Black Stranger," The Hour of the Dragon or the other Conan stories with the best women, but at the same time, even in TCoCtC, women do not exist for Conan to "get them."

It all seems to smack of back-handed compliments.  Yet early in the article, Bledsoe says "Much as Tolkein did for epic fantasy, Howard set the initial bar so high that few have equalled, let alone surpassed what he accomplished."  Yet if few have equalled Howard, how could you possibly expect the readers of the blog to approach it?  Confusing.

I appreciate the good things Bledsoe says about Howard, but the inaccurate information and facile readings (seriously, not all middle-aged men who've been in the wars have nagging injuries, and it's quite clear Conan's a barbarian with pretty impressive healing qualities of his own) undermine it.  Hopefully he'll go back and pore over the stories with a more discerning eye, and read the other two Del Reys.  Maybe then he'll see just how much Howard has to offer beyond musing on "what could have been."

Feminism and the Women in Robert E. Howard's Fictional Worlds

A while back, I talked about Howard's feminism - or more specifically, a particular letter Howard wrote to Harold Preece.  This was inspired by Barbara Barrett & Amy Kerr's work on an ACA/PCA conference paper.  Now, the two Howardian Shield-Maidens have returned to those waters on REH: Two-Gun Raconteur, with an expanded version of their fantastic and well-received ACA/PCA conference paper, to be posted in multiple parts.

While the women in Howard’s real world had the vote and could own property, the attitude that women were inferior to men still prevailed throughout most of the world during his lifetime. Robert E. Howard’s fictional world was an exception.  In it he created women who fought bravely, skillfully and fearlessly beside men as well as against them.  In fact, each of Howard’s strong women lived the life she chose for herself and when necessary, she fought to maintain that way of living.  Long before the feminist definition of empowerment, Howard’s heroines, took control over the decisions and issues that shaped their lives.

One of the unavoidable conundrums of feminism in a male author is, while the idea is to offer forward ideals of equality and equal opportunities, an argument sounds much more compelling when made by a woman.  I guess it's due to perspective: after all, it'd be like an Englishman writing a history of Scotland, or a white man talking of modern urban black society.  They can be as learned as any person can be on the subject, but unless they actually are part of the demographic in question, there's always that niggling concern in the back of the mind: how can you really know what it's like?

Thus, because Barbara and Amy are women, the impression is that they are simply more qualified to speak on the feminist elements of Howard's fiction than a man could.  It would seem to contradict the essential point of feminism - that of equal opportunities, not female superiority - to value someone's opinion more simply because of their gender, but at least in this case, it makes sense.  It's the old astronomer/astronaut question: when you want to know about the moon, do you ask the one who's studied it from afar from 50 years, or the one who's actually been there?

Turn off your Mind, folks: Gary Lachman's Way Ahead of You

This was a bombshell from Mikey C (of Necronomania):

You are going to love this one, comrades-in-arms. All the standard DeCampisms, plus a gratuitous link between REH and Charlie Manson of all people!

Maybe you can't really expect much from a book which solemnly recounts on page 3 the old urban myth that Manson was auditioned for the Monkees (which would have been extremely difficult as he was in prison at the time!) and then goes on to repeat just about every shaggy dog story from the period that your acid casualty friends have ever told you. But Dedalus is a highly respected publisher in receipt, I believe, of Arts Council funding.

It really puzzles me why Lachman thinks that Robert E. Howard is of such significance to the "Age of Aquarius". The Manson connection is entirely spurious - I have recently read three books about the Manson Family, and watched several documentaries, and I can assure you there is absolutely no similarity or link between any his rantings and Howard's ideas!

Anyway - here are the scans of the offending article.

More knowledgeable readers might be able to spot a source for this piece. I have just read a section of the book about Aldous Huxley and Christopher Isherwood's exploits in California. Feeling a sense of deja vu, I picked up another book I recently read called Madame Blavatsky's Baboon by Peter Washington. Well, I'm no lawyer, but the "p" word immediately sprang to mind.

It gives me no pleasure to attack, Mr Lachman's work, btw. For a time in the 70s he went by the name of "Gary Valentine" and was an original member of Blondie. He actually wrote one of my favourite ever songs: "I'm always touched by your presence, dear".

I have no knowledge of Lachman's work, though I do have a little soft spot for Blondie: that won't save him from my searing gaze.

Just in case you think I'm being overly negative...

I came across a really cool blog, by one J.P. Walter.  He's an English teacher who thinks Howard is a worthwhile subject for literary study.

Hell yes.

The Internet Movie Database, Where Intelligent Discussion Dare Not Tread

I've seen some hilarious battles over at the IMDB. Idiots presuming to know about something because they saw a film, read a few reviews, or whatever. Here's the latest.

McQualude fails on so many levels. First of all, he adamantly refuses to acknowledge how I shot down his ludicrous statement that the Conan stories were variations of a theme, specifically "Conan rescues the damsel and kills the bad guy." Second of all, he shockingly mentions that he has not read "Beyond the Black River" and, no doubt, several others on the list.

How on earth can you make a statement about an author's series being "variations on a theme" when you admit that you have not read everything? Absolutely astonishing, and very entertaining for me. For a guy who loves his Hemingway, I'm amazed he proclaims ignorance of Penguin Classics, one of the biggest publishers of classic literature.

Besides, I'm sure I could play the same game with his favourite authors. Hemingway's stories are just variations on "Americans talk about death." Melville is just "Men going on self-destructive paths." Steinbeck is merely "families go through struggles." Of course, I'd never say those things, because those statements are wrong. Just like how categorizing the Conan stories as variations on a theme is wrong.

And, of course, I mention all the scholarly websites, publications, books, journals, critics, authors and the like who speak in praise of REH. He didn't act like he even noticed. How predictable.

EDIT: What bullshot. Apparently, someone complained about the discussion, and the administrators deleted the whole topic. How infuriating: now McQualude thinks we're a bunch of spineless wimps who go to the authorities, and my smackdown of his stupid statements is lost forever.

Truly, the IMDB is not a good place for discussion in general.

A Scholar for the Ages

(Originally published on The Cimmerian, 30th May 2009)

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.

Nameless Tales: Labeling Howard’s Untitled Fiction

(Originally published on The Cimmerian website, 23rd May 2009)

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.