Robert Ervin Howard was an
AmericanThe United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
authorAn author is broadly defined as "the person who originates or gives existence to anything" and that authorship determines responsibility for what is created. Narrowly defined, an author is the originator of any written work.-Legal significance:...
who wrote
pulp fictionPulp magazines , also collectively known as pulp fiction, refers to inexpensive fiction magazines published from 1896 through the 1950s. The typical pulp magazine was seven inches wide by ten inches high, half an inch thick, and 128 pages long...
in a diverse range of genres. Best known for his character
Conan the BarbarianConan the Barbarian is a fictional sword and sorcery hero that originated in pulp fiction magazines and has since been adapted to books, comics, several films , television programs, video games, roleplaying games and other media...
, he is regarded as the father of the
sword and sorcerySword and sorcery is a sub-genre of fantasy and historical fantasy, generally characterized by sword-wielding heroes engaged in exciting and violent conflicts. An element of romance is often present, as is an element of magic and the supernatural...
subgenre.
Howard was born and raised in the state of Texas. He spent most of his life in the town of
Cross PlainsCross Plains is a town in Callahan County, Texas, United States. The population was 1,068 at the 2000 census. It is part of the Abilene, Texas Metropolitan Statistical Area.-Geography:Cross Plains is located at ....
with some time spent in nearby
BrownwoodBrownwood is a city in and the county seat of Brown County, Texas, United States. The population was 18,813 at the 2000 census.-History:The original site of the Brown County seat of Brownwood was on the east of Pecan Bayou. A dispute arose over land and water rights, and the settlers were forced...
. A bookish and intellectual child, he was also a fan of
boxingBoxing, also called pugilism, is a combat sport in which two people fight each other using their fists. Boxing is supervised by a referee over a series of between one to three minute intervals called rounds...
and spent some time in his late teens
bodybuildingBodybuilding is a form of body modification involving intensive muscle hypertrophy. An individual who engages in this activity is referred to as a bodybuilder. In competitive and professional bodybuilding, bodybuilders display their physiques to a panel of judges, who assign points based on their...
, eventually taking up amateur boxing himself. From the age of nine he dreamed of becoming a writer of adventure fiction but did not have real success until he was twenty-three. Thereafter, until his death at the age of thirty by suicide, Howard's writings were published in a wide selection of magazines, journals, and newspapers, and he had became successful in several genres. Although a Conan novel was nearly published into a book in 1934, his stories never appeared in book form during his lifetime. The main outlet for his stories was in the
pulp magazinePulp magazines , also collectively known as pulp fiction, refers to inexpensive fiction magazines published from 1896 through the 1950s. The typical pulp magazine was seven inches wide by ten inches high, half an inch thick, and 128 pages long...
Weird TalesWeird Tales is an American fantasy and horror fiction pulp magazine first published in March 1923. It ceased its original run in September 1954, after 279 issues, but has since been revived. The magazine was set up in Chicago by J. C. Henneberger, an ex-journalist with a taste for the macabre....
.
Howard’s suicide and the circumstances surrounding it have led to varied speculation about his mental health; from an
Oedipus complexIn psychoanalytic theory, the term Oedipus complex denotes the emotions and ideas that the mind keeps in the unconscious, via dynamic repression, that concentrate upon a boy’s desire to sexually possess his mother, and kill his father...
, to
clinical depressionMajor depressive disorder is a mental disorder characterized by an all-encompassing low mood accompanied by low self-esteem, and by loss of interest or pleasure in normally enjoyable activities...
, to no mental disorders of any kind. His mother had been ill with
tuberculosisTuberculosis, MTB, or TB is a common, and in many cases lethal, infectious disease caused by various strains of mycobacteria, usually Mycobacterium tuberculosis. Tuberculosis usually attacks the lungs but can also affect other parts of the body...
his entire life; upon learning that she had entered a coma from which she was not expected to wake, he, for reasons that are not clear, walked out to his car and shot himself in the head.
Howard created Conan the Barbarian, in the pages of the
DepressionThe Great Depression was a severe worldwide economic depression in the decade preceding World War II. The timing of the Great Depression varied across nations, but in most countries it started in about 1929 and lasted until the late 1930s or early 1940s...
-era pulp magazine
Weird Tales, a character whose pop-culture imprint has been compared to such icons as
TarzanTarzan is a fictional character, an archetypal feral child raised in the African jungles by the Mangani "great apes"; he later experiences civilization only to largely reject it and return to the wild as a heroic adventurer...
,
Count DraculaCount Dracula is a fictional character, the titular antagonist of Bram Stoker's 1897 Gothic horror novel Dracula and archetypal vampire. Some aspects of his character have been inspired by the 15th century Romanian general and Wallachian Prince Vlad III the Impaler...
,
Sherlock HolmesSherlock Holmes is a fictional detective created by Scottish author and physician Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. The fantastic London-based "consulting detective", Holmes is famous for his astute logical reasoning, his ability to take almost any disguise, and his use of forensic science skills to solve...
, and
James BondJames Bond, code name 007, is a fictional character created in 1953 by writer Ian Fleming, who featured him in twelve novels and two short story collections. There have been a six other authors who wrote authorised Bond novels or novelizations after Fleming's death in 1964: Kingsley Amis,...
. With Conan and his other heroes, Howard created the genre now known as
sword and sorcerySword and sorcery is a sub-genre of fantasy and historical fantasy, generally characterized by sword-wielding heroes engaged in exciting and violent conflicts. An element of romance is often present, as is an element of magic and the supernatural...
, spawning a wide swath of imitators and giving him an influence in the fantasy field rivaled only by
J. R. R. TolkienJohn Ronald Reuel Tolkien, CBE was an English writer, poet, philologist, and university professor, best known as the author of the classic high fantasy works The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings, and The Silmarillion.Tolkien was Rawlinson and Bosworth Professor of Anglo-Saxon at Pembroke College,...
and Tolkien's similarly inspired creation of
high fantasyHigh fantasy or epic fantasy is a subgenre of fantasy that is set in invented or parallel worlds. High fantasy was brought to fruition through the work of authors such as J. R. R. Tolkien and C. S. Lewis, whose major fantasy works were published in the 1950s...
. Howard remains a highly read author, with his best works endlessly reprinted. He has been compared to other American masters of the weird, gloomy and spectral, such as
Nathaniel HawthorneNathaniel Hawthorne was an American novelist and short story writer.Nathaniel Hawthorne was born in 1804 in the city of Salem, Massachusetts to Nathaniel Hathorne and the former Elizabeth Clarke Manning. His ancestors include John Hathorne, a judge during the Salem Witch Trials...
,
Herman MelvilleHerman Melville was an American novelist, short story writer, essayist, and poet. He is best known for his novel Moby-Dick and the posthumous novella Billy Budd....
, and
Jack LondonJohn Griffith "Jack" London was an American author, journalist, and social activist. He was a pioneer in the then-burgeoning world of commercial magazine fiction and was one of the first fiction writers to obtain worldwide celebrity and a large fortune from his fiction alone...
.
Early years
Howard was born January 22, 1906 in
Peaster, TexasPeaster is an unincorporated community in Parker County, Texas, United States, nine miles northwest of Weatherford.-History:Settlement began in the 1870s when Georgia native H.H. Peaster bought of land and built a house. The community that developed near the site of his home was originally called...
, the only son of a traveling country physician, Dr. Isaac Mordecai Howard, and his wife, Hester Jane Ervin Howard.
[: Contains facsimile reproductions of Howard's birth certificate and death record.][ notes that the birth record incorrectly shows Howard's birthdate as January 24, in addition to altering his mother's age.][Burke (3rd paragraph): notes that Howard celebrated his birthday on the 22nd rather than the 24th, as recorded in Parker County records. His father also gave his birthday as January 22.] His early life was spent wandering through a variety of
TexasTexas is the second largest U.S. state by both area and population, and the largest state by area in the contiguous United States.The name, based on the Caddo word "Tejas" meaning "friends" or "allies", was applied by the Spanish to the Caddo themselves and to the region of their settlement in...
cowtowns and boomtowns: Dark Valley (1906),
SeminoleSeminole is a city in and the county seat of Gaines County in west Texas, United States. The population was 6,430 at the 2010 census. It is the birthplace of Country music singers Larry Gatlin and Tanya Tucker...
(1908),
BronteBronte is a town in Coke County, Texas, United States. The population was 1,076 at the 2000 census.Texas State Senator Grady Hazlewood, who served from the Amarillo-based District 31 from 1941-1971, was born in 1902 in Coke County near Bronte.-Geography:...
(1909),
PoteetPoteet is a city in Atascosa County, Texas, United States. The population was 3,305 as of the 2000 census. It is part of the San Antonio Metropolitan Statistical Area. It was named for its first postmaster, Francis Marion Poteet....
(1910),
OranOran is an unincorporated community in Palo Pinto County, Texas, United States.Public education in the community is provided by the Graford Independent School District.-External links:...
(1912),
Wichita FallsWichita Falls is a city in and the county seat of Wichita County, Texas, United States, United States. Wichita Falls is the principal city of the Wichita Falls Metropolitan Statistical Area, which encompasses all of Archer, Clay and Wichita counties. According to the U.S. Census estimate of 2010,...
(1913),
BagwellBagwell is an unincorporated community in Red River County, Texas, United States. Although it is unincorporated, Bagwell has a post office, with the ZIP code of 75412.-External links:...
(1913), Cross Cut (1915), and
BurkettBurkett is an unincorporated community in Coleman County, Texas, United States. Although it is unincorporated, Burkett has a post office, with the ZIP code of 76828.-External links:...
(1917).
During Howard's youth his parents' relationship began to break down. The Howard family had problems with money which may have been exacerbated by Isaac Howard investing in get-rich-quick schemes. Hester Howard, meanwhile, came to believe that she had married below herself. Soon the pair were actively fighting. Hester did not want Isaac to have anything to do with their son. His mother Hester had a particularly strong influence on his intellectual growth. She had spent her early years helping a variety of sick relatives, contracting tuberculosis in the process. She instilled in her son a deep love of poetry and literature, recited verse daily and supported him unceasingly in his efforts to write.
Other themes began to appear at this time which would later seep into his prose. Although he loved reading and learning, he found school to be confining and began to hate having anyone in authority over him. Experiences watching and confronting bullies revealed the omnipresence of evil and enemies in the world, and taught him the value of physical strength and violence. Being the son of the local doctor gave Howard frequent exposure to the effects of injury and violence, due to accidents on farms and oil fields combined with the massive increase in crime that came with the
oil boomAn oil boom is a boom in the oil producing sector of an economy. Generally, this short period initially brings economical benefits, in term of increased GDP growth, but might later lead to a resource curse.-Consequences:...
. Firsthand tales of gunfights, lynchings, feuds, and
IndianNative Americans in the United States are the indigenous peoples in North America within the boundaries of the present-day continental United States, parts of Alaska, and the island state of Hawaii. They are composed of numerous, distinct tribes, states, and ethnic groups, many of which survive as...
raids developed his distinctly Texan,
hardboiledHardboiled crime fiction is a literary style, most commonly associated with detective stories, distinguished by the unsentimental portrayal of violence and sex. The style was pioneered by Carroll John Daly in the mid-1920s, popularized by Dashiell Hammett over the course of the decade, and refined...
outlook on the world. Sports, especially
boxingBoxing, also called pugilism, is a combat sport in which two people fight each other using their fists. Boxing is supervised by a referee over a series of between one to three minute intervals called rounds...
, became a passionate preoccupation. At the time, boxing was the most popular sport in the country, with a cultural influence far in excess of what it is today.
James J. JeffriesJames Jackson Jeffries was a world heavyweight boxing champion.His greatest assets were his enormous strength and stamina. Using a technique taught to him by his trainer, former welterweight and middleweight champion Tommy Ryan, Jeffries fought out of a crouch with his left arm extended forward...
,
Jack JohnsonJohn Arthur Johnson , nicknamed the “Galveston Giant,” was an American boxer. At the height of the Jim Crow era, Johnson became the first African American world heavyweight boxing champion...
,
Bob FitzsimmonsRobert James "Bob" Fitzsimmons , was a British boxer who made boxing history as the sport's first three-division world champion. He also achieved fame for beating Gentleman Jim Corbett, the man who beat John L. Sullivan, and is in The Guinness Book of World Records as the Lightest heavyweight...
, and later
Jack DempseyWilliam Harrison "Jack" Dempsey was an American boxer who held the world heavyweight title from 1919 to 1926. Dempsey's aggressive style and exceptional punching power made him one of the most popular boxers in history. Many of his fights set financial and attendance records, including the first...
were the names that inspired during those years, and he grew up a lover of all contests of violent, masculine struggle.
First writings
Voracious reading, along with a natural talent for prose writing and the encouragement of teachers, created in Howard an interest in becoming a professional
writerA writer is a person who produces literature, such as novels, short stories, plays, screenplays, poetry, or other literary art. Skilled writers are able to use language to portray ideas and images....
. From the age of nine he began writing stories, mostly tales of historical fiction centering on Vikings, Arabs,
battleGenerally, a battle is a conceptual component in the hierarchy of combat in warfare between two or more armed forces, or combatants. In a battle, each combatant will seek to defeat the others, with defeat determined by the conditions of a military campaign...
s, and bloodshed. One by one he discovered the authors that would influence his later work:
Jack LondonJohn Griffith "Jack" London was an American author, journalist, and social activist. He was a pioneer in the then-burgeoning world of commercial magazine fiction and was one of the first fiction writers to obtain worldwide celebrity and a large fortune from his fiction alone...
and his stories of
reincarnationReincarnation best describes the concept where the soul or spirit, after the death of the body, is believed to return to live in a new human body, or, in some traditions, either as a human being, animal or plant...
and past lives, most notably
The Star RoverThe Star Rover is a novel by American writer Jack London published in 1915 . It is a story of reincarnation....
(1915);
Rudyard KiplingJoseph Rudyard Kipling was an English poet, short-story writer, and novelist chiefly remembered for his celebration of British imperialism, tales and poems of British soldiers in India, and his tales for children. Kipling received the 1907 Nobel Prize for Literature...
's tales of subcontinent adventure and his chanting, shamanic verse; the classic mythological tales collected by
Thomas BulfinchThomas Bulfinch was an American writer, born in Newton, Massachusetts. Bulfinch belonged to a well educated Bostonian merchant family of modest means. His father was Charles Bulfinch, the architect of the Massachusetts State House in Boston and parts of the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C....
. Howard was considered by friends to be eidetic, and astounded them with his ability to memorize lengthy reams of poetry with ease after one or two readings.
In 1919, when Howard was thirteen, Dr. Howard moved his family to the Central Texas hamlet of
Cross PlainsCross Plains is a town in Callahan County, Texas, United States. The population was 1,068 at the 2000 census. It is part of the Abilene, Texas Metropolitan Statistical Area.-Geography:Cross Plains is located at ....
, and there the family would stay for the rest of Howard's life. Howard's father bought a house in the town with a cash down payment and made extensive renovations. That same year, sitting in a library in New Orleans while his father took medical courses at a nearby college, Howard discovered a book concerned with the scant fact and abundant legends surrounding an indigenous culture in ancient
ScotlandScotland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Occupying the northern third of the island of Great Britain, it shares a border with England to the south and is bounded by the North Sea to the east, the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, and the North Channel and Irish Sea to the...
called the
PictsThe Picts were a group of Late Iron Age and Early Mediaeval people living in what is now eastern and northern Scotland. There is an association with the distribution of brochs, place names beginning 'Pit-', for instance Pitlochry, and Pictish stones. They are recorded from before the Roman conquest...
.
In 1920, on February 17, the Vestal Well within the limits of Cross Plains struck oil and Cross Plains became an oil boomtown. Thousands of people arrived in the town looking for oil wealth. New businesses sprang up from scratch and the crime rate increased to match. Cross Plains' population quickly grew from 1,500 to 10,000, it suffered overcrowding, the traffic ruined its unpaved roads and vice crime exploded but it also used its new wealth on civic improvements, including a new school, an ice manufacturing plant, and new hotels. Howard hated the boom and despised the people who came with it. He was already poorly disposed towards oil booms as they were the cause of the constant traveling in his early years but this was aggravated by what he perceived to be the effect oil booms had on towns.
At fifteen Howard first sampled pulp magazines, especially
AdventureAdventure magazine was first published in November 1910 as a monthly pulp magazine. Adventure went on become one of the most profitable and critically acclaimed of all the American pulp magazines...
and its star authors
Talbot MundyTalbot Mundy was an English writer. He also wrote under the pseudonym Walter Galt.-Life and work:...
and
Harold LambHarold Albert Lamb was an American historian, screenwriter, short story writer, and novelist.Lamb was born in Alpine, New Jersey. He attended Columbia University, where his interest in the peoples and history of Asia began. Lamb's tutors at Columbia included Carl Van Doren andJohn Erskine. ...
. The next few years saw him creating a variety of series characters. Soon he was submitting stories to magazines such as
Adventure and
ArgosyArgosy was an American pulp magazine, published by Frank Munsey. It is generally considered to be the first American pulp magazine. The magazine began as a general information periodical entitled The Golden Argosy, targeted at the boys adventure market.-Launch of Argosy:In late September 1882,...
. Rejections piled up, and with no mentors or instructions of any kind to aid him, Howard became a writing autodidact, methodically studying the markets and tailoring his stories and style to each.
In the fall of 1922, when Howard was sixteen, he temporarily moved to a boarding house in the nearby city of
BrownwoodBrownwood is a city in and the county seat of Brown County, Texas, United States. The population was 18,813 at the 2000 census.-History:The original site of the Brown County seat of Brownwood was on the east of Pecan Bayou. A dispute arose over land and water rights, and the settlers were forced...
to complete his senior year of high school, accompanied by his mother. It was in Brownwood that he first met friends his own age who shared his interest not only for sports and history but also writing and poetry. The two most important of these,
Tevis Clyde SmithTevis Clyde Smith, Jr. was an American historian, fantasy writer, poet and amateur publisher, best known for his association with Robert E. Howard. Most of his writing appeared as by Tevis Clyde Smith; he also wrote as T. C. Smith, Jr., and under his full name, Tevis Clyde Smith, Jr...
and Truett Vinson, shared his
BohemianBohemianism is the practice of an unconventional lifestyle, often in the company of like-minded people, with few permanent ties, involving musical, artistic or literary pursuits...
and literary outlook on life, and together they wrote amateur papers and magazines, exchanged long letters filled with
poetryPoetry is a form of literary art in which language is used for its aesthetic and evocative qualities in addition to, or in lieu of, its apparent meaning...
and
existentialExistentialism is a term applied to a school of 19th- and 20th-century philosophers who, despite profound doctrinal differences, shared the belief that philosophical thinking begins with the human subject—not merely the thinking subject, but the acting, feeling, living human individual...
thoughts on life and
philosophyPhilosophy is the study of general and fundamental problems, such as those connected with existence, knowledge, values, reason, mind, and language. Philosophy is distinguished from other ways of addressing such problems by its critical, generally systematic approach and its reliance on rational...
, and encouraged each other's writing endeavors. Through Vinson, Howard was introduced to
The Tattler, the newspaper of the Brownwood High School. It was in this publication that Howard's stories were first printed. The December 1922 issue featured two stories, "'Golden Hope' Christmas" and "West is West," which won gold and silver prizes respectively.
Howard graduated from high school in May 1923 and moved back to Cross Plains. On his return to his home town, he engaged in a self-created regimen of exercise, including cutting down oak trees and chopping them into firewood every day, lifting weights, punching a bag and springing exercises; eventually building himself from a skinny teenager into a more muscled, burly form.
Professional writer
Howard spent his late teens working odd jobs around Cross Plains; all of which he hated. In 1924, Howard returned to Brownwood to take a stenography course at Howard Payne College, this time boarding with his friend Lindsey Tyson instead of his mother. Howard would have preferred a literary course but was not allowed to take one for some reason. Biographer Mark Finn suggests that his father refused to pay for such a non-vocational education. In the week of Thanksgiving that year, and after years of rejection slips and near acceptances, he finally sold a short
cavemanA caveman or troglodyte is a stock character based upon widespread concepts of the way in which early prehistoric humans may have looked and behaved...
tale titled "Spear and Fang", which netted him the sum of $16 and introduced him to the readers of a struggling pulp called
Weird TalesWeird Tales is an American fantasy and horror fiction pulp magazine first published in March 1923. It ceased its original run in September 1954, after 279 issues, but has since been revived. The magazine was set up in Chicago by J. C. Henneberger, an ex-journalist with a taste for the macabre....
.
Now that his career in fiction had begun, Howard dropped out of Howard Payne College at the end of the semester and returned to Cross Plains. Shortly afterwards, he received notice that another story, "The Hyena," had been accepted by
Weird Tales. During the same period, Howard made his first attempt to write a novel, a loosely autobiographical book modeled on
Jack LondonJohn Griffith "Jack" London was an American author, journalist, and social activist. He was a pioneer in the then-burgeoning world of commercial magazine fiction and was one of the first fiction writers to obtain worldwide celebrity and a large fortune from his fiction alone...
's
Martin EdenMartin Eden is a novel by American author Jack London, about a proletarian young autodidact struggling to become a writer. It was first serialized in the Pacific Monthly magazine from September 1908 to September 1909, and subsequently published in book form by Macmillan in September 1909.This book...
and titled
Post Oaks & Sand RoughsPost Oaks & Sand Roughs is a semi-autobiographical adventure novel by Robert E. Howard. It was first published in 1990 by Donald M. Grant, Publisher, Inc. in an edition of 850 copies. The book contains an introduction and appendix by Glenn Lord where Lord identifies the real people who appear as...
. The book was otherwise of middling quality and was never published in the author's lifetime but it is of interest to Howard scholars for the personal information it contains. Howard's alter ego in this novel is Steve Costigan, a name he would use more than once in the future. The novel was finished in 1928 but not published until long after his death.
Weird Tales paid on publication, meaning that Howard had no money of his own at this time. To remedy this, he took a job writing oil news for the local newspaper
Cross Plains Review at $5 per column. It was not until July 1925 that Howard received payment for his first printed story. Howard lost his job at the newspaper in the same year and spent one month working in a post office before quitting over the low wages. His next job, at the Cross Plains Natural Gas Company, did not last long due to his refusal to be subservient to his boss. He did manual labor for a surveyor for a time before beginning a job as a stenographer for an oil company.
In conjunction with his friend
Tevis Clyde SmithTevis Clyde Smith, Jr. was an American historian, fantasy writer, poet and amateur publisher, best known for his association with Robert E. Howard. Most of his writing appeared as by Tevis Clyde Smith; he also wrote as T. C. Smith, Jr., and under his full name, Tevis Clyde Smith, Jr...
he dabbled heavily in verse, writing hundreds of poems and getting dozens published in
Weird Tales and assorted poetry journals. With poor sales, and many publishers recoiling from his subject matter, Howard ultimately judged poetry writing a luxury he could not afford, and after 1930 he wrote little verse, instead dedicating his time to short stories and higher-paying markets. Nevertheless, as a result of this apprenticeship, his stories increasingly took on the aura of "prose-poems" filled with hypnotic, dreamy imagery and a power lacking in most other pulp efforts of the time.
Further story sales to
Weird Tales were sporadic but encouraging, and soon Howard was a regular in the magazine. His first cover story was for "Wolfshead", a
werewolfA werewolf, also known as a lycanthrope , is a mythological or folkloric human with the ability to shapeshift into a wolf or an anthropomorphic wolf-like creature, either purposely or after being placed under a curse...
story published when he was only twenty. On reading "Wolfshead" in
Weird Tales Howard became dismayed with his writing. He quit his stenographer's job to work at Robertson's Drug Store, where he rose to become Head Soda Jerk on $80 per week. However, he resented the job itself and worked such long hours every day of the week that he became ill. He relaxed by visiting the Neeb Ice House, to which he was introduced by an oil-field worker befriended at the drug store, to drink and began to take part in boxing matches. These matches became an important part of his life; the combination of boxing and writing provided an outlet for his frustrations and anger.
The birth of Sword and Sorcery
In August 1926, Howard quit his exhausting job at the drug store and, in September, returned to Brownwood to complete his bookkeeping course. It was during this August that he began working on the story that would become "
The Shadow Kingdom"The Shadow Kingdom" by Robert E. Howard is the first of Howard's Kull stories, set in his fictional Thurian Age. It was first published in the pulp magazine Weird Tales in August 1929....
", one of the most important works of his career. While at college, Howard wrote for their newspaper,
The Yellow Jacket. One of the short stories printed in this newspaper was a comedy called "Cupid vs. Pollux." This story is Howard's earliest surviving boxing story known to exist; it is told in the first person, uses elements of a traditional tall-tale and is a fictionalized account of Howard (as "Steve") and his friend Lindsey Tyson (as "Spike") training for a fight. This story and the elements it uses would also be important in Howard's literary future.
In May 1927, after having to return home due to contracting measles and then being forced to retake the course, Howard passed his exams. While waiting for the official graduation in August, he returned to writing, including a re-write of "The Shadow Kingdom." He rewrote it again in August and submitted it to
Weird Tales in September. This story was an experiment with the entire concept of the "weird tale"
horror fictionHorror fiction also Horror fantasy is a philosophy of literature, which is intended to, or has the capacity to frighten its readers, inducing feelings of horror and terror. It creates an eerie atmosphere. Horror can be either supernatural or non-supernatural...
as defined by practitioners such as
Edgar Allan PoeEdgar Allan Poe was an American author, poet, editor and literary critic, considered part of the American Romantic Movement. Best known for his tales of mystery and the macabre, Poe was one of the earliest American practitioners of the short story and is considered the inventor of the detective...
,
A. MerrittAbraham Grace Merritt — known by his byline, A. Merritt — was an American editor and author of works of fantastic fiction.-Life:...
, and
H. P. LovecraftHoward Phillips Lovecraft --often credited as H.P. Lovecraft — was an American author of horror, fantasy and science fiction, especially the subgenre known as weird fiction....
; mixing elements of fantasy, horror and
mythologyThe term mythology can refer either to the study of myths, or to a body or collection of myths. As examples, comparative mythology is the study of connections between myths from different cultures, whereas Greek mythology is the body of myths from ancient Greece...
with
historical romanceHistorical romance is a subgenre of two literary genres, the romance novel and the historical novel.-Definition:Historical romance is set before World War II...
, action and
swordplayFencing, which is also known as modern fencing to distinguish it from historical fencing, is a family of combat sports using bladed weapons.Fencing is one of four sports which have been featured at every one of the modern Olympic Games...
into thematic vehicles never before seen, a new style of tale which ultimately became known as "
sword and sorcerySword and sorcery is a sub-genre of fantasy and historical fantasy, generally characterized by sword-wielding heroes engaged in exciting and violent conflicts. An element of romance is often present, as is an element of magic and the supernatural...
".
[: "Critical consensus, however, unfailingly places the birth of sword-and-sorcery with the publication of 'The Shadow Kingdom' (August 1929), in which Howard introduced the brooding figure of King Kull, ruling over the fading land of Valusia in a Pre-Cataclysmic Age when Atlantis is but newly risen from the waves."][: "The term 'sword and sorcery' was coined by Fritz Leiber]Fritz Reuter Leiber, Jr. was an American writer of fantasy, horror and science fiction. He was also a poet, actor in theatre and films, playwright, expert chess player and a champion fencer. Possibly his greatest chess accomplishment was winning clear first in the 1958 Santa Monica Open.. With...
but the genre was pioneered by Robert E. Howard, a Texas pulp writer who combined fantasy, history, horror, and the Gothic to create the Hyborian Age and such characters as Conan the Conqueror and Kull." Featuring Kull, a barbarian precursor to later Howard heroes such as
ConanConan the Barbarian is a fictional sword and sorcery hero that originated in pulp fiction magazines and has since been adapted to books, comics, several films , television programs, video games, roleplaying games and other media...
, the tale hit
Weird Tales in August 1929 and received fanfare from readers.
Weird Tales editor
Farnsworth WrightFarnsworth Wright was the editor of the pulp magazine Weird Tales during the magazine's heyday.He was born in California, and educated in the University of Nevada and the University of Washington....
bought the story for $100, the most Howard had earned for a story at this time, and several more Kull stories followed. However, all but two were rejected, convincing Howard not to continue the series.
In March 1928, Howard salvaged and re-submitted to
Weird Tales a story rejected by the more popular pulp
Argosy, and the result was "Red Shadows", the first of many stories featuring the vengeful Puritan swashbuckler
Solomon KaneSolomon Kane is a fictional character created by the pulp-era writer Robert E. Howard. A late 16th / early 17th century Puritan, Solomon Kane is a sombre-looking man who wanders the world with no apparent goal other than to vanquish evil in all its forms...
. Appearing in the August 1928 issue of
Weird Tales, the character was a big hit with readers and this was the first of Howard's characters to sustain a series in print beyond just two stories (seven Kane stories were printed in the 1928-32 period). As the magazine published the Solomon Kane tale before Kull, this can be considered the first published example of Sword and Sorcery.
1929 was the year Howard broke out into other pulp markets, rather than just
Weird Tales. The first story he sold to another magazine was "The Apparition in the Prize Ring," a boxing-related ghost story published in the magazine
Ghost Stories. In July of the same year,
Argosy finally published one of Howard's stories, "Crowd-Horror", which was also a boxing story. Neither developed into ongoing series, however.
After several minor successes and false starts, he struck gold again with a new series based on one of his favorite passions: boxing. July 1929 saw the debut of
Sailor Steve CostiganSailor Steve Costigan is a fictional character created by Robert E. Howard. He is a merchant sailor on the Sea Girl and is also its champion boxer...
in the pages of
Fight StoriesFight Stories was a pulp magazine devoted to stories of Boxing published between June 1928 and spring 1952...
. A tough-as-nails, two-fisted mariner with a head of rocks and occasionally a heart of gold, Costigan began boxing his way through a variety of exotic seaports and adventure locales, becoming so popular in
Fight Stories that the same editors began using additional Costigan episodes in their sister magazine
Action StoriesAction Stories was a multi-genre pulp magazine published between September 1921 and Fall 1950, with a brief hiatus at the end of 1932.As an adventure pulp it did not feature the horror and science fiction of other pulp magazines. Instead it focused on real-world adventure stories...
. The series saw a return to Howard's use of humor and (
unreliableAn unreliable narrator is a narrator, whether in literature, film, or theatre, whose credibility has been seriously compromised. The term was coined in 1961 by Wayne C. Booth in The Rhetoric of Fiction. This narrative mode is one that can be developed by an author for a number of reasons, usually...
) first-person narration, with the combination of a traditional tall tale and slapstick comedy. Stories sold to
Fight Stories provided Howard with a market just as stable as
Weird Tales.
Due to his success in
Fight Stories, Howard was contacted by the publisher
Street & SmithStreet & Smith or Street & Smith Publications, Inc. was a New York City publisher specializing in inexpensive paperbacks and magazines referred to as pulp fiction and dime novels. They also published comic books and sporting yearbooks...
in February 1931 with a request to move the Steve Costigan stories to their own pulp
Sport Story Magazine. Howard refused but created a new, similar series just for them based on a boxer called Kid Allison. Howard wrote ten stories for this series but
Sport Story only published three of them.
With solid markets now all buying up his stories regularly, Howard quit taking college classes, and indeed would never again work a regular job. At twenty-three years of age, from the middle of nowhere in Texas, he had become a full-time writer; he was making good money and his father began bragging about his success, not to mention buying multiple copies of his work in the pulps.
Howard's "Celtic phase" began in 1930, during which he became fascinated by Celtic themes and his own Irish ancestry. He shared this enthusiasm with Harold Preece, a friend made in Austin in the summer of 1927; Howard's letters to both Preece and Clyde Smith contain much Irish-related material and discussion. Howard taught himself a little Gaelic, examined the Irish parts of his family history and began writing about Irish characters.
Turlogh Dubh O'BrienTurlogh Dubh O'Brien or Black Turlogh, is a fictional 11th Century Irishman created by Robert E. Howard.-Stories:* The Gods of Bal-Sagoth - Also known as The Blond Goddess of Bal-Sagoth, this is a sequel to The Dark Man despite seeing print before that story...
and Cormac Mac Art were created at this time, although he was not able to sell the latter's stories.
When
Farnsworth WrightFarnsworth Wright was the editor of the pulp magazine Weird Tales during the magazine's heyday.He was born in California, and educated in the University of Nevada and the University of Washington....
started a new pulp in 1930 called
Oriental Stories, Howard was overjoyed—here was a venue where he could run riot through favorite themes of history and battle and exotic mysticism. During the four years of the magazine's existence, he crafted some of his very best tales, gloomy vignettes of war and rapine in the
MiddleThe Middle East is a region that encompasses Western Asia and Northern Africa. It is often used as a synonym for Near East, in opposition to Far East...
and
Far EastThe Far East is an English term mostly describing East Asia and Southeast Asia, with South Asia sometimes also included for economic and cultural reasons.The term came into use in European geopolitical discourse in the 19th century,...
during the
Middle AgesThe Middle Ages is a periodization of European history from the 5th century to the 15th century. The Middle Ages follows the fall of the Western Roman Empire in 476 and precedes the Early Modern Era. It is the middle period of a three-period division of Western history: Classic, Medieval and Modern...
and the early
RenaissanceThe Renaissance was a cultural movement that spanned roughly the 14th to the 17th century, beginning in Italy in the Late Middle Ages and later spreading to the rest of Europe. The term is also used more loosely to refer to the historical era, but since the changes of the Renaissance were not...
, tales that rival even his best
ConanConan the Barbarian is a fictional sword and sorcery hero that originated in pulp fiction magazines and has since been adapted to books, comics, several films , television programs, video games, roleplaying games and other media...
stories for their historical sweep and splendor. In addition to series characters such as
Turlogh Dubh O'BrienTurlogh Dubh O'Brien or Black Turlogh, is a fictional 11th Century Irishman created by Robert E. Howard.-Stories:* The Gods of Bal-Sagoth - Also known as The Blond Goddess of Bal-Sagoth, this is a sequel to The Dark Man despite seeing print before that story...
and
Cormac FitzgeoffreyCormac Fitzgeoffrey is a fictional character created by Robert E. Howard. He is a half-Norman, half-Gael taking part in the Third Crusade. Howard wrote two short stories featuring the character and synopsis that was later completed by another author...
, Howard sold a variety of tales depicting various times and periods from the fall of Rome to the fifteenth century. The magazine eventually ceased publication in 1934 due to the Depression, leaving several of Howard's stories aimed at this market unsold.
The Lovecraft Circle
In August 1930 Howard wrote a letter to
Weird Tales praising a recent reprint of
H. P. LovecraftHoward Phillips Lovecraft --often credited as H.P. Lovecraft — was an American author of horror, fantasy and science fiction, especially the subgenre known as weird fiction....
's "
The Rats in the Walls"The Rats in the Walls" is a short story by American author H. P. Lovecraft. Written in August–September 1923, it was first published in Weird Tales, March 1924.-Plot summary:...
" and discussing some of the obscure
GaelicScottish Gaelic is a Celtic language native to Scotland. A member of the Goidelic branch of the Celtic languages, Scottish Gaelic, like Modern Irish and Manx, developed out of Middle Irish, and thus descends ultimately from Primitive Irish....
references used within. Editor Farnsworth Wright forwarded the letter to Lovecraft, who responded warmly to Howard, and soon the two
Weird Tales veterans were engaged in a vigorous correspondence that would last for the rest of Howard's life. By virtue of this, Howard quickly became a member of "
The Lovecraft CircleHoward Phillips Lovecraft --often credited as H.P. Lovecraft — was an American author of horror, fantasy and science fiction, especially the subgenre known as weird fiction....
", a group of writers and friends all linked via the immense correspondence of H.P. Lovecraft, who made it a point to introduce his many like-minded friends to each other and encourage them to share stories, utilize each other's invented fictional trappings, and help each other succeed in the pulp field. In time this circle of correspondents has developed a legendary patina about it rivaling similar literary conclaves such as The Inklings, the
Bloomsbury GroupThe Bloomsbury Group or Bloomsbury Set was a group of writers, intellectuals, philosophers and artists who held informal discussions in Bloomsbury throughout the 20th century. This English collective of friends and relatives lived, worked or studied near Bloomsbury in London during the first half...
, and the Beats.
[: "Suddenly one Golden Age in literature had drawn to a close...For just over a decade these three [REH, CAS, and HPL] had created a phenomenal array of new imaginative fiction and poetry...In these same years another Golden Age played out in the detective pulp The Black Mask...In England, C. S. Lewis, J.R.R. Tolkien and others called their group centered in Oxford University The Inklings...the Bloomsbury Group, which flourished from 1904 until World War II, form yet another. So do the American poets and novelists who became known as The Beats..."]
Howard was given the affectionate nickname "Two-Gun Bob" by virtue of his long explications to Lovecraft about the history of his beloved Southwest, and during the ensuing years he contributed several notable elements to Lovecraft's
Cthulhu MythosThe Cthulhu Mythos is a shared fictional universe, based on the work of American horror writer H. P. Lovecraft.The term was first coined by August Derleth, a contemporary correspondent of Lovecraft, who used the name of the creature Cthulhu - a central figure in Lovecraft literature and the focus...
of horror stories (beginning with "
The Black Stone"The Black Stone" is a classic short story by Robert E. Howard, first published in the November 1931 issue of Weird Tales. The story introduces the mad poet Justin Geoffrey and the fictitious Unaussprechlichen Kulten by Friedrich von Junzt....
", his Mythos stories also included "The Cairn on the Headland", "
The Children of the Night"The Children of the Night" is a 1931 short story by Robert E. Howard, belonging to the Cthulhu Mythos. It was first published in the pulp magazine Weird Tales in the April/May 1931 issue...
" and "The Fire of Asshurbanipal"). He also corresponded with other "Weird Tale" writers such as
Clark Ashton SmithClark Ashton Smith was a self-educated American poet, sculptor, painter and author of fantasy, horror and science fiction short stories. He achieved early local recognition, largely through the enthusiasm of George Sterling, for traditional verse in the vein of Swinburne...
,
August DerlethAugust William Derleth was an American writer and anthologist. Though best remembered as the first publisher of the writings of H. P...
, and E. Hoffmann Price.
The correspondence between Howard and Lovecraft contained a lengthy discussion on a frequent element in Howard's fiction, barbarism versus civilization. Howard, probably based on his experience of the oil boom in Texas, held that civilization was inherently corrupt and fragile. This attitude is summed up in his famous line from "
Beyond the Black River"Beyond the Black River" is one of the original short stories about Conan the Cimmerian, written by American author Robert E. Howard and first published in Weird Tales magazine circa 1935. The story was republished in the collections King Conan and Conan the Warrior...
": "Barbarism is the natural state of mankind. Civilization is unnatural. It is a whim of circumstance. And barbarism must always ultimately triumph." Lovecraft held the opposite viewpoint, that civilization was the peak of human achievement and the only way forward. Howard initially deferred to Lovecraft but gradually asserted his own views, even coming to deride Lovecraft's opinions (such as his support for
fascismFascism is a radical authoritarian nationalist political ideology. Fascists seek to rejuvenate their nation based on commitment to the national community as an organic entity, in which individuals are bound together in national identity by suprapersonal connections of ancestry, culture, and blood...
).
In 1930, with his interest in Solomon Kane dwindling and his Kull stories not catching on, Howard applied his new Sword-and-Sorcery and Horror experience to one of his first loves: the
PictsThe Picts were a group of Late Iron Age and Early Mediaeval people living in what is now eastern and northern Scotland. There is an association with the distribution of brochs, place names beginning 'Pit-', for instance Pitlochry, and Pictish stones. They are recorded from before the Roman conquest...
. His story "Kings of the Night" depicted King Kull conjured into pre-Christian Britain to aid the Picts in their struggle against the invading
RomansAncient Rome was a thriving civilization that grew on the Italian Peninsula as early as the 8th century BC. Located along the Mediterranean Sea and centered on the city of Rome, it expanded to one of the largest empires in the ancient world....
, and introduced readers to Howard's king of the Picts,
Bran Mak MornBran Mak Morn is a hero of several pulp fiction short stories by Robert E. Howard. In the stories, most of which were first published in Weird Tales, Bran is the last king of Howard's romanticized version of the tribal race of Picts....
. Howard followed up this tale with the now-classic revenge nightmare "
Worms of the Earth"Worms of the Earth" is a short story by American fantasy fiction writer Robert E. Howard. It was originally published in the magazine Weird Tales in November 1932, then again in 1975 in a collection of Howard's short stories, Worms of the Earth...
" and several other tales, creating horrific adventures tinged with a
CthulhuCthulhu is a fictional character that first appeared in the short story "The Call of Cthulhu", published in the pulp magazine Weird Tales in 1928. The character was created by writer H. P...
-esque gloss and notable for their memorable use of metaphor and symbolism.
With the onset of the
Great DepressionThe Great Depression was a severe worldwide economic depression in the decade preceding World War II. The timing of the Great Depression varied across nations, but in most countries it started in about 1929 and lasted until the late 1930s or early 1940s...
, many pulp markets reduced their schedules or went out of business entirely. Howard saw market after market falter and vanish.
Weird Tales became a bimonthly publication and pulps such as
Fight Stories,
Action Stories and
Strange Tales all folded. Howard was further hit when his savings were wiped out in 1931 when the Farmer's National Bank
failedA bank run occurs when a large number of bank customers withdraw their deposits because they believe the bank is, or might become, insolvent...
, and again, after transferring to another bank, when that one failed as well.
Conan
Early 1932 saw Howard taking one of his frequent trips around
TexasTexas is the second largest U.S. state by both area and population, and the largest state by area in the contiguous United States.The name, based on the Caddo word "Tejas" meaning "friends" or "allies", was applied by the Spanish to the Caddo themselves and to the region of their settlement in...
. He traveled through the southern part of the state with his main occupation being, in his own words, "the wholesale consumption of tortillas, enchiladas and cheap Spanish wine." In
FredericksburgFredericksburg is the seat of Gillespie County, in the U.S. state of Texas. As of the 2010 Census estimate, the city had a population of 10, 530...
, while overlooking sullen hills through a misty rain, he conceived of the fantasy land of
CimmeriaCimmeria is a fictional land of barbarians in antediluvian earth and the homeland of Conan the Barbarian in the works of Robert E. Howard.-Fictional history:...
, a bitter hard northern region home to fearsome barbarians. In February, while in
MissionMission is a city in Hidalgo County, Texas, United States. The population was 77,058 at the 2010 census Mission is part of the McAllen–Edinburg–Mission and Reynosa–McAllen metropolitan areas.-Geography:Mission is located at ....
, he wrote the poem
Cimmeria"Cimmeria" is a poem by Robert E. Howard about the fictional country Cimmeria, created by Howard as part of his Hyborian world which is the setting for his character Conan the Barbarian...
.
It was also during this trip that Howard first conceived of the character of
ConanConan the Barbarian is a fictional sword and sorcery hero that originated in pulp fiction magazines and has since been adapted to books, comics, several films , television programs, video games, roleplaying games and other media...
. Later, in 1935, Howard claimed in a letter to
Clark Ashton SmithClark Ashton Smith was a self-educated American poet, sculptor, painter and author of fantasy, horror and science fiction short stories. He achieved early local recognition, largely through the enthusiasm of George Sterling, for traditional verse in the vein of Swinburne...
that Conan "simply grew up in my mind a few years ago when I was stopping in a little border town on the lower Rio Grande." However, the character actually took nine months to develop.
Howard had originally used the name "Conan" for a Gael reaver in a past-life-themed story he completed in October 1931, which was published in the magazine
Strange TalesStrange Tales is the name of several comic book anthology series published by Marvel Comics. It introduced the features "Doctor Strange" and "Nick Fury, Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D.", and was a showcase for the science fiction/suspense stories of artists Jack Kirby and Steve Ditko, and for the...
in June 1932. Although the character swears by the god "Crom" that is his only link to the more famous successor character.
Going back home he developed the idea, fleshing out a new invented world—his
Hyborian AgeThe Hyborian Age is a fictional period within the artificial mythology created by Robert E. Howard, in which the sword and sorcery tales of Conan the Barbarian are set....
—and populating it with all manner of countries, peoples, monsters, and
magicMagic is the claimed art of manipulating aspects of reality either by supernatural means or through knowledge of occult laws unknown to science. It is in contrast to science, in that science does not accept anything not subject to either direct or indirect observation, and subject to logical...
. Howard loved history and enjoyed writing historical stories. However, the research necessary for a purely historical setting was too time consuming for him to engage in on a regular basis and still earn a living. The Hyborian Age, with its varied settings similar to real places and eras of history, allowed him to write pseudo-historical fiction without such problems. He may have been inspired in the creation of his setting by
Thomas BulfinchThomas Bulfinch was an American writer, born in Newton, Massachusetts. Bulfinch belonged to a well educated Bostonian merchant family of modest means. His father was Charles Bulfinch, the architect of the Massachusetts State House in Boston and parts of the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C....
's 1913 edition of his
Bulfinch's MythologyBulfinch's Mythology is a collection of the works of Thomas Bulfinch, named after him and published after his death. Bulfinch originally published his work as three volumes: The Age of Fable, or Stories of Gods and Heroes, published in 1855; The Age of Chivalry, or Legends of King Arthur, published...
called
The Outline of Mythology, which contained stories from history and legend, including many which were direct influences on Howard's work. Another potential inspiration is
G. K. ChestertonGilbert Keith Chesterton, KC*SG was an English writer. His prolific and diverse output included philosophy, ontology, poetry, plays, journalism, public lectures and debates, literary and art criticism, biography, Christian apologetics, and fiction, including fantasy and detective fiction....
's
The Ballad of the White HorseThe Ballad of the White Horse is a poem by G. K. Chesterton about the idealized exploits of the Saxon King Alfred the Great, published in 1911. Written in ballad form, the work is usually considered the last great traditional epic poems ever written in the English language...
and Chesterton's concept that "it is the chief value of legend to mix up the centuries while preserving the sentiment."
By March, Howard had recycled an unpublished Kull story called "By This Axe I Rule!" into his first Conan story. The central plot remains that of a barbarian having become king of a civilized country and a conspiracy to assassinate him. However, he removed an entire subplot concerning a couple's romance and created a new one with a supernatural element; the story was re-titled "
The Phoenix on the Sword"The Phoenix on the Sword" is one of the original short stories about Conan the Cimmerian, written by American author Robert E. Howard and first published in Weird Tales magazine December 1932. The tale was a rewrite of the unpublished Kull story, "By This Axe I Rule!" with long passages being...
", an element from this new subplot. Howard immediately went on to write two more Conan stories. The first of these was "The Frost-Giant's Daughter", an inversion of the Greek myth surrounding Apollo and Daphne, set much earlier in Conan's life. The last of the initial trio was "
The God in the Bowl"The God in the Bowl" is one of the original short stories featuring the sword and sorcery hero Conan the Cimmerian, written by American author Robert E. Howard but not published during his lifetime. It is set in the pseudo-historical Hyborian Age and concerns Conan robbing a temple museum only to...
", which went through three drafts and has a slower pace than most Conan stories. This one is a murder mystery filled with corrupt officials and serves as Conan's introduction into civilization, while showing that he is a more decent person than the civilized characters. Before the end of the month, he sent the first two stories to
Weird Tales in the same package, with the third following a few days later.
With these three completed he created an essay called "
The Hyborian AgeThe Hyborian Age is an essay by Robert E. Howard pertaining to the Hyborian Age, the fictional setting of his stories about Conan the Cimmerian. It was written in the 1930s but not published during Howard's lifetime...
" in order to flesh out his setting in more detail. There were four drafts of this essay, starting with a two-page outline and finishing as an 8,000-word essay. Howard supplemented this with two sketched maps and an additional short piece entitled "Notes on Various Peoples of the Hyborian Age."
In a letter dated March 10, 1932, Farnsworth Wright rejected "The Frost-Giant's Daughter" but noted that "The Phoenix on the Sword" had "points of real excellence" and suggested changes. "The God in the Bowl" would also be rejected and so a potential fourth Conan story concerning Conan as a thief was abandoned at the synopsis stage. Instead of abandoning the entire Conan concept, as had happened with previous failed characters, Howard rewrote "The Phoenix on the Sword" based on Wright's feedback and including material from his essay. Both this revision and the next Conan story, "
The Tower of the Elephant"The Tower of the Elephant" is one of the original short stories starring the fictional sword and sorcery hero Conan the Cimmerian, written by American author Robert E. Howard. It is set in the pseudo-historical Hyborian Age and concerns Conan infiltrating a perilous tower in order to steal a...
", sold with no problems. Howard had written nine Conan stories before the first saw print.
Conan first appeared to the public in
Weird Tales in December 1932 and was such a hit that Howard was eventually able to place seventeen Conan stories in the magazine between 1933 and 1936. Howard then took a short break from Conan after his initial burst of stories, returning to the character in mid-1933. These stories, his "middle period," are routine and considered the weakest of the series. These stories, such as "
Iron Shadows in the Moon"Shadows in the Moonlight" is one of the original short stories starring the fictional sword and sorcery hero Conan the Cimmerian, written by American author Robert E. Howard and first published in Weird Tales magazine in April 1934. Howard originally named his story "Iron Shadows in the Moon"...
", were often simply Conan rescuing a damsel in distress from a monster in some ruins. While earlier Conan stories had three or four drafts, some in this period had only two including the final version. "
Rogues in the House"Rogues in the House" is one of the original short stories starring the fictional sword and sorcery hero Conan the Cimmerian, written by American author Robert E. Howard and first published in Weird Tales magazine circa January 1934...
" is the only Conan story to be completed in a single draft. These stories sold easily and they include the first and second Conan stories to feature on the cover of
Weird Tales, "
Black Colossus"Black Colossus" is one of the original short stories starring the fictional sword and sorcery hero Conan the Cimmerian, written by American author Robert E. Howard and first published in Weird Tales magazine, June 1933...
" and "
Xuthal of the Dusk"The Slithering Shadow" is one of the original short stories starring the fictional sword and sorcery hero Conan the Cimmerian, written by American author Robert E. Howard and first published in the September 1933 issue of Weird Tales magazine. The story's original title was "Xuthal of the Dusk"...
". Howard's motivation for quick and easy sales at this time was partly motivated by the collapse of some other markets, such as
Fight Stories, in the Depression.
Also in this period, Howard wrote the first of the James Allison stories, "Marchers of Valhalla." Allison is a disabled Texan who begins to recall his past lives, the first of which is in the later part of Howard's new Hyborian age. In a letter to Clark Ashton Smith in October 1933, he wrote that its sequel "The Garden of Fear" was "dealing with one of my various conceptions of the Hyborian and post-Hyborian world."
In May 1933, a British publisher, Denis Archer, contacted Howard about publishing a potential book in the United Kingdom. Howard submitted a batch of his best available stories, including "The Tower of the Elephant" and "
The Scarlet Citadel"The Scarlet Citadel" is one of the original short stories starring the fictional sword and sorcery hero Conan the Cimmerian, written by American author Robert E. Howard and first published in Weird Tales magazine circa January 1933...
", on June 15. In January 1934 the publisher rejected the collection but suggested a novel instead. Though the publisher was "exceedingly interested" in the stories, the rejection letter explained that there was a "prejudice that is very strong over here just now against collections of short stories." The suggested novel, however, could be published by Pawling and Ness Ltd in a first edition of 5,000 copies for lending libraries.
In late 1933 Howard returned to Conan, starting again slightly awkwardly with "
The Devil in Iron"The Devil in Iron" is one of the original stories by Robert E. Howard about Conan the Cimmerian, first published in Weird Tales in August of 1934. Howard earned £115 for the publication of this story....
". However, this was followed with the beginning of the latter group of Conan stories which "carry the most intellectual punch," starting with "
The People of the Black Circle"The People of the Black Circle" is one of the original novellas about Conan the Cimmerian, written by American author Robert E. Howard and first published in Weird Tales magazine in three parts over the September, October and November 1934 issues...
".
Howard probably began to work on the novel in February 1934, starting to write
Almuric (a non-Conan,
sword and planetSword and Planet is a subgenre of science fantasy that features rousing adventure stories set on other planets, and usually featuring Earthmen as protagonists. The name derives from the heroes of the genre engaging their adversaries in hand to hand combat primarily with simple melee weapons such as...
science fiction novel) but abandoned it half way. This was followed by another abortive attempt at a novel, this time a Conan novel which later became
Drums of Tombalku"Drums of Tombalku" is an American fantasy short story, one of the original ones by Robert E. Howard featuring Conan the Cimmerian, a fragment begun in the 1930s but not finished or published in Howard's lifetime. It was completed by L. Sprague de Camp and in this form first published in the...
. The third attempt at writing the novel was more successful, resulting in Howard's only Conan novel
The Hour of the DragonThe Hour of the Dragon, also known as Conan the Conqueror, is a fantasy novel written by Robert E. Howard featuring his seminal sword and sorcery hero Conan the Cimmerian. It was first published in serial form in the pulp magazine Weird Tales in 1935 through 1936; and in book form in 1950 by Gnome...
, which was probably started on or around March 17, 1934. This novel combines elements of two previous Conan stories, "Black Colossus" and "The Scarlet Citadel," with Arthurian myth and provides an overview of Conan and the Hyborian age for the new British audience. Howard sent his final draft to Denis Archer on May 20, 1934. He had worked exclusively on the novel for two months, writing approximately 5,000 words per day, seven days a week. Although he told acquaintances that he had little hope for this novel, he had put a lot of effort into it.
However, the publisher went into receivership in late 1934, before it could print the novel. The story was briefly held as part of the company's assets before being returned to Howard. It was later printed in
Weird Tales as a serial over five months, beginning with the December 1935 issue.
Howard may have begun losing interest in Conan in late 1934, with a growing desire to write westerns. He began to write, although never finished, a Conan story called "
Wolves Beyond the Border"Wolves Beyond the Border" is one of the original stories by Robert E. Howard about Conan the Cimmerian, a fragment begun in the 1930s but not finished or published in Howard's lifetime. It is a peripheral story in the canon in that while it takes place in Conan's "Hyborian Age" and during Conan's...
". This was the first Conan tale to have an explicit (
Robert W. ChambersRobert William Chambers was an American artist and writer.-Biography:He was born in Brooklyn, New York, to William P. Chambers , a famous lawyer, and Caroline Chambers , a direct descendant of Roger Williams, the founder of Providence, Rhode Island...
-influenced) American setting, although American themes had appeared earlier, and the only one in which Conan himself does not appear. His next story was based on his unfinished material and became "
Beyond the Black River"Beyond the Black River" is one of the original short stories about Conan the Cimmerian, written by American author Robert E. Howard and first published in Weird Tales magazine circa 1935. The story was republished in the collections King Conan and Conan the Warrior...
" which not only used the different American-frontier setting but was also, in Howard's own words, a "Conan yarn without sex interest." In another novel twist, Conan and the other protagonists have, at best, a
pyrrhic victoryA Pyrrhic victory is a victory with such a devastating cost to the victor that it carries the implication that another such victory will ultimately cause defeat.-Origin:...
; this was rare for pulp magazines. This was followed by another experimental Conan story, "
The Black Stranger"The Black Stranger" is one of the stories by Robert E. Howard about Conan the Cimmerian, it was produced in the 1930s but not published in his lifetime. When the original Conan version of the story failed to find a publisher, Howard re-wrote "The Black Stranger" into a piratical Terence Vulmea...
", with a similar setting. The story was, however, rejected by
Weird Tales, which was rare for later Conan stories. Howard's next piece, "The Man-Eaters of Zamboula", was more formulaic and was accepted by the magazine with no problems. Howard only wrote one more Conan story, "Red Nails," which was influenced both by his personal experiences at the time and an extrapolation of his views on civilization.
The character of Conan had a wide and enduring influence among other
Weird Tales writers, including
C. L. MooreCatherine Lucille Moore was an American science fiction and fantasy writer, as C. L. Moore. She was one of the first women to write in the genre, and paved the way for many other female writers in speculative fiction....
and
Fritz LeiberFritz Reuter Leiber, Jr. was an American writer of fantasy, horror and science fiction. He was also a poet, actor in theatre and films, playwright, expert chess player and a champion fencer. Possibly his greatest chess accomplishment was winning clear first in the 1958 Santa Monica Open.. With...
, and over the ensuing decades the genre of Sword and Sorcery grew up around Howard's masterwork, with dozens of practitioners evoking Howard's creation to one degree or another.
New markets
In spring 1933, Howard started to place work with
Otis Adelbert KlineOtis Adelbert Kline born in Chicago, Illinois, USA, was an adventure novelist and literary agent during the pulp era. Much of his work first appeared in the magazine Weird Tales. Kline was an amateur orientalist and a student of Arabic, like his friend and sometime collaborator, E...
, a former pulp writer, as his agent. Kline encouraged him to try writing in other genres in order to expand into different markets. Kline's agency was successful in finding outlets for more of Howard's stories and even placed works that had been rejected when Howard was marketing himself alone. Howard continued to sell directly to
Weird Tales, however.
Howard wrote one of the first "Weird Western" stories ever created, "The Horror from the Mound," published in the May 1932 issue of
Weird Tales. This genre acted as a bridge between his early "weird" stories (a contemporary term for horror and fantasy) and his later straight western tales.
He tried writing detective fiction but hated reading mystery stories and disliked writing them; he was not successful in this genre. More successfully, in late 1933 Howard took a character conceived in his youth,
El BorakEl Borak, otherwise known as Francis Xavier Gordon, is a fictional character created by Robert E. Howard. Gordon was a Texan gunfighter from El Paso who had travelled the world and settled in Afghanistan...
, and began using him in mature, professional tales of WWI-era Middle Eastern adventure that landed in
Top Notch,
Complete Stories, and
Thrilling AdventuresThrilling Adventures was a monthly American pulp magazine from 1931 to 1943.Thrilling Adventures was created by editor Leo Margulies and was patterned after the pulp Adventure. It was one of 16 pulps that Margulies founded that incorporated the adjective "Thrilling" in the title...
. The 1920s version was a treasure-hunting adventurer but the 1930s version, first seen in "
The Daughter of Erlik KhanThe Daughter of Erlik Khan is an El Borak short story by Robert E. Howard. It was originally published in December 1934 issue of the pulp magazine Top-Notch.-External links:*...
" in December 1934 issue of
Top-Notch, was a grim gun-fighter keeping the peace after having gone native in Afghanistan. The stories have a lot in common with those of
Talbot MundyTalbot Mundy was an English writer. He also wrote under the pseudonym Walter Galt.-Life and work:...
, Harry Lamb and
T. E. LawrenceLieutenant Colonel Thomas Edward Lawrence, CB, DSO , known professionally as T. E. Lawrence, was a British Army officer renowned especially for his liaison role during the Arab Revolt against Ottoman Turkish rule of 1916–18...
, with Western themes and Howard's hardboiled style of writing. As with his other series, he created another character in the same vein,
Kirby O'DonnellKirby O'Donnell is a fictional character created by Robert E. Howard. He is an American treasure hunter in early-twentieth century Afghanistan disguised as a Kurdish merchant, "Ali el Ghazi"...
, but this character lacked the grim, western elements and was not as successful.
In the years since Conan had been created, Howard found himself increasingly fascinated with the
historyHistory is the discovery, collection, organization, and presentation of information about past events. History can also mean the period of time after writing was invented. Scholars who write about history are called historians...
and
loreFolklore consists of legends, music, oral history, proverbs, jokes, popular beliefs, fairy tales and customs that are the traditions of a culture, subculture, or group. It is also the set of practices through which those expressive genres are shared. The study of folklore is sometimes called...
of
TexasTexas is the second largest U.S. state by both area and population, and the largest state by area in the contiguous United States.The name, based on the Caddo word "Tejas" meaning "friends" or "allies", was applied by the Spanish to the Caddo themselves and to the region of their settlement in...
and the American Southwest. Many of his letters to
H. P. LovecraftHoward Phillips Lovecraft --often credited as H.P. Lovecraft — was an American author of horror, fantasy and science fiction, especially the subgenre known as weird fiction....
ran for a dozen pages or more, filled with stories he had picked up from elderly
Civil WarThe American Civil War was a civil war fought in the United States of America. In response to the election of Abraham Lincoln as President of the United States, 11 southern slave states declared their secession from the United States and formed the Confederate States of America ; the other 25...
veterans,
Texas RangersThe Texas Ranger Division, commonly called the Texas Rangers, is a law enforcement agency with statewide jurisdiction in Texas, and is based in Austin, Texas...
, and
pioneersA settler is a person who has migrated to an area and established permanent residence there, often to colonize the area. Settlers are generally people who take up residence on land and cultivate it, as opposed to nomads...
. His
ConanConan the Barbarian is a fictional sword and sorcery hero that originated in pulp fiction magazines and has since been adapted to books, comics, several films , television programs, video games, roleplaying games and other media...
stories began featuring western elements, most notably in "
Beyond the Black River"Beyond the Black River" is one of the original short stories about Conan the Cimmerian, written by American author Robert E. Howard and first published in Weird Tales magazine circa 1935. The story was republished in the collections King Conan and Conan the Warrior...
", "
The Black Stranger"The Black Stranger" is one of the stories by Robert E. Howard about Conan the Cimmerian, it was produced in the 1930s but not published in his lifetime. When the original Conan version of the story failed to find a publisher, Howard re-wrote "The Black Stranger" into a piratical Terence Vulmea...
", and the unfinished "
Wolves Beyond the Border"Wolves Beyond the Border" is one of the original stories by Robert E. Howard about Conan the Cimmerian, a fragment begun in the 1930s but not finished or published in Howard's lifetime. It is a peripheral story in the canon in that while it takes place in Conan's "Hyborian Age" and during Conan's...
". By 1934 some of the markets killed off by the
DepressionThe Great Depression was a severe worldwide economic depression in the decade preceding World War II. The timing of the Great Depression varied across nations, but in most countries it started in about 1929 and lasted until the late 1930s or early 1940s...
had come back, and
Weird Tales was over $1500 behind on payments to Howard. The author therefore stopped writing weird fiction and turned his attentions to this steadily growing passion.
The first of Howard's most commercially successful series (within his own lifetime) was started in July 1933. "Mountain Man" was the first of the Breckenridge Elkins stories, humorous westerns in a similar style to his earlier Sailor Steve Costigan stories and again featuring an exaggerated, cartoonish version of Howard himself as the main character. Written as tall tales in the vein of Texas "Tall Lying" stories, the story first appeared in the March–April 1934 issue of
Action Stories and was so successful that other magazines asked Howard for similar characters. Howard created Pike Bearfield for
Argosy and Buckner J. Grimes for
Cowboy Stories.
Action Stories published a new Elkins story every month without fail until well after Howard's death. At Kline's suggestion, he also created
A Gent from Bear CreekA Gent from Bear Creek is a collection of Western short stories by Robert E. Howard. It was first published in the UK in 1937 by Herbert Jenkins. The first US edition was published by Donald M. Grant, Publisher, Inc...
, a Breckenridge Elkins novel comprised from existing short stories and new material.
Conan remained the only character that Howard ever spoke of with his friends in Texas and the only one in whom they seemed interested. It is possible that Breckenridge Elkins and the other characters in his stories were too close to home for Howard to be entirely comfortable discussing them.
In the spring of 1936, Howard sold a series of "spicy" stories to
Spicy-Adventure Stories. The "spicy" series of pulp magazines dealt in stories that were considered borderline softcore pornography at the time but are now similar to romance novels. These stories, which Howard referred to as "bubby-twisters", featured the character Wild Bill Clanton and were published under the pseudonym Sam Walser.
Novalyne Price
Howard had only one known girlfriend in his life,
Novalyne PriceNovalyne Price Ellis was a Texas-born schoolteacher and writer who became close friends with and occasionally dated famed pulp fiction writer Robert E. Howard....
. Novalyne was an ex-girlfriend of Tevis Clyde Smith, one of Howard's best friends, whom she had known since high school and they had remained friends after their relationship ended. She first met Howard in spring 1933 when Howard was visiting Smith after driving his mother to a Brownwood clinic. Howard and Smith drove to the Price farm and Smith introduced his friends to each other. Novalyne was an aspiring writer, had heard of Howard from Smith in the past and was enthusiastic to meet him in person. However, he was not what she expected. She wrote in her diary about this first meeting: "This man was a writer! Him? It was unbelievable. He was not dressed as I thought a writer should dress." They parted after a drive and would not see each other again for over a year.
In late 1934 Novalyne got a job as a schoolteacher in Cross Plains High School through her cousin, the Head of the English department. When Howard came up in conversation with her new colleagues she defended him from accusations of being a "freak" and "crazy," then phoned his house and left a message. This call was not returned so she tried a few more times. Novalyne visited the Howard house in person after having her telephone calls blocked by a passive aggressive Hester Howard. After a drive through town they arranged their first date.
Through much of the next two years they dated on and off, spending much time discussing writing, philosophy, history, religion, reincarnation and much else. Both considered marriage but never at the same time. Novalyne became ill from overwork in mid-1935. Her doctor, a friend of Howard's father, advised her to end the relationship and get a job in a different state. Despite agreeing to this, she met with Howard soon after being discharged. Howard, however, was too preoccupied with the state of his mother's health to give her the attention she wanted. Their relationship did not last much longer.
Not considering herself to be in an exclusive relationship, Novalyne began dating one of Howard's best friends, Truett Vinson. Ironically, Howard also began to pay more attention to her at this time. Howard discovered his friends' relationship while he and Truett were on a week's trip together to New Mexico (the same trip which inspired a lot of the final Conan story "
Red Nails"Red Nails" is the last of the stories about Conan the Cimmerian written by American author Robert E. Howard. A novella, it was originally serialized in Weird Tales magazine from July to October 1936. It is set in the pseudo-historical Hyborian Age and concerns Conan encountering a lost city in...
"). The relationship between the couple was irrevocably scarred, but they continued visiting with each other as friends until May 1936, when Novalyne left Cross Plains for
Louisiana State UniversityLouisiana State University and Agricultural and Mechanical College, most often referred to as Louisiana State University, or LSU, is a public coeducational university located in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. The University was founded in 1853 in what is now known as Pineville, Louisiana, under the name...
to get a graduate degree. The two never spoke or wrote to each other again.
In an effort to improve her memory and writing, Novalyne began recording all her daily conversations into a journal, in the process preserving an intimate record of her time with Howard. This was useful years later when she wrote of their relationship in a book called "One Who Walked Alone", which was the basis for the 1996 film
The Whole Wide WorldThe Whole Wide World is a 1996 American film depicting the relationship between pulp fiction writer Robert E. Howard and schoolteacher Novalyne Price Ellis ....
starring
Vincent D'OnofrioVincent Phillip D'Onofrio is an American actor, director, film producer, writer, and singer. Often referred to as an actor's actor, his work as a character actor has earned him the nickname of "Human Chameleon"...
as Howard.
Death
By 1936, almost all of his fiction writing was being devoted to westerns, the novel
A Gent from Bear Creek was due to be published by
Herbert JenkinsBarrie & Jenkins was a small British publishing house that was formed in 1964 from the merger of "Herbert Jenkins" and "Barrie & Rockcliffe". One of their most notable authors was P. G...
in England, and, by all accounts, it looked as if Howard was finally breaking out of the pulps and into the more prestigious book market. However, life was becoming especially difficult for Howard. All of his close friends had married and were immersed in their careers, Novalyne Price had left Cross Plains for graduate school, and his most reliable market,
Weird Tales, had grown far behind on payments. Most importantly, his home life was falling apart — after decades of struggle, his mother was finally nearing death, and the constant interruptions of care workers at home, combined with frequent trips to various sanatoriums for her care, made it nearly impossible for him to write.
In hindsight, there were hints about Howard's plans; several times in 1935–36, whenever his mother's health precipitously threatened to give out, he made veiled allusions to his father about planning suicide, which his father did not understand at the time. He had made references when speaking to Novalyne Price to being in his "sere and yellow leaf." The words sounded familiar to her but it was only in early June 1936 that she found the source in
MacbethThe Tragedy of Macbeth is a play by William Shakespeare about a regicide and its aftermath. It is Shakespeare's shortest tragedy and is believed to have been written sometime between 1603 and 1607...
:
In the weeks before his suicide, Howard wrote to Kline giving his agent instructions of what to do in case of his death; he wrote his last will and testament; and he borrowed a
.380 Colt AutomaticThe .380 ACP pistol cartridge is a rimless, straight-walled pistol cartridge developed by firearms designer John Browning. The cartridge headspaces on the mouth of the case. It was introduced in 1908 by Colt, and has been a popular self-defense cartridge ever since...
from his friend Lindsey Tyson. On June 10, he drove to Brownwood and bought a burial plot for the whole family. On the night before his suicide, when his father confirmed that his mother was finally dying, he asked where his father would go afterwards; Isaac Howard replied that he would go wherever his son went, thinking he meant to travel away from Cross Plains. It is possible that Howard thought his father would join him in ending their lives together as a family.
In June 1936, as Hester Howard slipped into her final coma, her son maintained a death vigil with his father and friends of the family, getting little sleep, drinking huge amounts of coffee, and growing more despondent. On the morning of June 11, 1936, Howard asked one of his mother's nurses, a Mrs. Green, if she would ever regain consciousness. When she told him no, he walked out to his car in the driveway, took the pistol from the glove box, and shot himself in the head. His father and another doctor rushed out, but the wound was too grievous for anything to be done. Howard lived for another eight hours, dying at 4 pm; his mother died the following day. The story occupied the entirety of that week's edition of the
Cross Plains Review along with the publication of Howard's "A Man-Eating Jeopard". On June 14, 1936 a double funeral service was held at Cross Plains First Baptist Church and they were both buried in Greenleaf Cemetery in
Brownwood, TexasBrownwood is a city in and the county seat of Brown County, Texas, United States. The population was 18,813 at the 2000 census.-History:The original site of the Brown County seat of Brownwood was on the east of Pecan Bayou. A dispute arose over land and water rights, and the settlers were forced...
.
Health
Robert E. Howard's health, especially his mental health, has been the focus of the biographical and critical analysis of his life. In terms of physical health, Howard had a weak heart which he treated by taking digitalis. The precise nature of Howard's mental health has been much debated, both during his life and following his suicide. Three main points of view exist: Some have declared that Howard suffered from an Oedipal complex or similar mental disorder; another viewpoint is that Howard suffered from major depressive disorder; the third view is that Howard had no disorders and his suicide was a common reaction to stress.
Attitudes
Robert E. Howard's character, his personality and points of view, are important in gaining an understanding of Howard as a person and his body of work. Information about his attitudes come from memories of those who knew him, his surviving correspondence and analyses of his works.
In his attitude towards race and racism, Howard was certainly racist by modern standards. However, the extent of his racist beliefs is debated. Howard used race as shorthand for physical characteristics and motivation. He would also make up some racial traits, possibly for the sake of brevity. Howard wrote mostly about the clash of cultures rather than racial groups. He was also of the belief that, no matter who won the subsequent conflicts, it would only ever be a temporary victory. Howard became less racist as he grew older, due to several influences. Later works include more sympathetic black characters, as well as other minority groups such as Jews. Significant works in terms of Howard's views on race are "
Black CanaanBlack Canaan is a short story written by Robert E. Howard that was originally published in the June 1936 issue of Weird Tales. It is a regional horror story in the Southern Gothic mode, one of several such tales by Howard set in the piney woods of the ArkLaTex region of the American South...
" and "The Last White Man." Howard was proud of his Irish ancestry at a time when the Irish were considered an undesirable minority group themselves. He was consciously defining himself as part of a minority group and most of his characters are also of Irish origin in some way (including the prehistoric Kull and Conan, who both belong to racial groups that later become the Celts).
Howard had feminist views despite his era and location which he espoused in both personal and professional life. Howard wrote to his friends and associates defending the achievements and capabilities of women. Strong female characters in Howard's works of fiction include the protofeminist
Dark Agnes de ChastillonDark Agnes de Chastillon is a fictional character created by Robert E...
(first appearing in "Sword Woman", circa 1932-34); the early modern pirate Helen Tavrel ("The Isle of Pirates' Doom", 1928), two pirates and Conan supporting characters, Bêlit ("
Queen of the Black Coast"Queen of the Black Coast" is one of the original short stories about Conan the Cimmerian, written by American author Robert E. Howard and first published in Weird Tales magazine circa May 1934...
", 1934) and Valeria of the Red Brotherhood ("
Red Nails"Red Nails" is the last of the stories about Conan the Cimmerian written by American author Robert E. Howard. A novella, it was originally serialized in Weird Tales magazine from July to October 1936. It is set in the pseudo-historical Hyborian Age and concerns Conan encountering a lost city in...
", 1936); as well as the Ukrainian mercenary Red Sonya of Rogatino ("
The Shadow of the Vulture"The Shadow of the Vulture" is a short story by Robert E. Howard, first published in The Magic Carpet Magazine, January 1934. The story introduces the character of Red Sonya of Rogatino, who later became the inspiration for the popular character Red Sonja, archetype of the chainmail-bikini clad...
", 1934).
Howard was afraid of aging and made many references to the subject, including a stated preference to die young.
Physical
Physically, Howard was tall and heavily built. He had a gentle, round face with a soft, deep voice. E. Hoffmann Price wrote that when he first met Howard in 1934 he "was busy trying to combine two images, that of the actual man, and that of the man who loomed up in those stirring yarns. The synthesis was never effected. He was packed with the whimsy and poetry which rang out in his letters, and blazed up in much of his published fiction, but, as is usually the case with writers, his appearance belied him. His face was boyish, not yet having squared off into angles; his blue eyes slightly prominent, had a wide-openness which did not suggest anything of the man's keen wit and agile fancy. That first picture persists—a powerful, solid, round-faced fellow, kindly and somewhat stolid seeming."
Leisure activities
Howard enjoyed listening to other people's stories. He listened to tales told by family members growing up and, as an adult, collected stories from any older people willing to tell them. Howard's parents were both natural storytellers of different kinds and he grew up in early twentieth century Texas, an environment in which the telling of tall tales was a standard form of entertainment. Howard himself was a natural storyteller and later a professional storyteller. Combined, this often led to Howard embellishing facts in his communication, not with an intention to deceive but just to make a better story. This can be a problem for biographers reading his works and letters with an aim to understand Howard himself.
Howard had an almost photographic memory and could memorize long poems after only a few readings. Howard also enjoyed listening to music and drama on the radio. However his main interests were sports and politics; listening to match reports and election results as they came in.
After Howard bought a car in 1932, he and his friends took regular excursions across Texas and nearby states. His letters to Lovecraft also contain information about the history and geography he encountered on his journeys.
Writing
Howard's first published poem was
The Sea, in an early 1923 issue of local newspaper
The Baylor United Statement. His first published story was "Spear and Fang", sold in late November 1924 and published in the July 1925 issue of the pulp magazine
Weird Tales. However, Howard's first real success was the
Sailor Steve CostiganSailor Steve Costigan is a fictional character created by Robert E. Howard. He is a merchant sailor on the Sea Girl and is also its champion boxer...
series of humorous boxing stories, beginning with "
The Pit of the SerpentThe Pit of the Serpent is a Sailor Steve Costigan short story by Robert E. Howard. It was originally published in July 1929 issue of Fight Stories.The story is now in the public domain.-External links:*...
" published in the July 1929 issue of the pulp magazine
Fight StoriesFight Stories was a pulp magazine devoted to stories of Boxing published between June 1928 and spring 1952...
.
Styles and themes
Howard's distinctive literary style relies on a combination of existentialism, poetic lyricism, violence, grimness, humour, burlesque, and a degree of hardboiled realism. Howard's background in Texan tall tales is the source of the rhythm, drive and authenticity of his work. Howard used an economy of words to sketch out scenes in his stories; his ability to do so has been attributed to his skill with, and experience of, both tall tales and poetry. The tone of Howard's works, especially in the Conan stories, is hardboiled, dark and realistic. This is contrasted with the fantastic elements contained within the stories. Direct experience of the oil booms in early twentieth century Texas tainted Howard's view of civilization. The benefits of progress came with lawlessness and corruption. One of the most common themes in Howard's writing is based on his view of history, a repeating patter of civilizations reaching their peak, becoming decadent, decaying and then being conquered by another people. Many of his works are set in the period of decay or among the ruins the dead civilization leaves behind.
Influence and influences
The oil boom in Texas was "one of the most powerful influences on [Howard's] life and art", albeit one that he hated. Howard grew to despise the oil industry along with everyone and everything associated with it. The oil boom heavily influenced Howard's view of civilization as a constant cycle of
boom and bustA credit boom-bust cycle is an episode characterized by a sustained increase in several economics indicators followed by a sharp and rapid contraction. Commonly the boom is driven by a rapid expansion of credit to the private sector accompanied with rising prices of commodities and stock market index...
in the same manner as the oil industry in contemporary Texas. A town such as Cross Plains was built by pioneers. The boom brought civilization in the form of people and investment but also social breakdown. The oil people contributed little or nothing to the town in the long term and eventually left for the next oil field. This led Howard to see civilization as corrupting and society as a whole in decay.
Howard first bought a pulp magazine, a copy of
AdventureAdventure magazine was first published in November 1910 as a monthly pulp magazine. Adventure went on become one of the most profitable and critically acclaimed of all the American pulp magazines...
, when he was fifteen. The stories and writers featured in this magazine were a strong influence on Howard. In the same year, he sent his first story, "Bill Smalley and the Power of the Human Eye", to the magazine, although it was rejected. Despite repeated attempts during his life, Howard never sold a story to
Adventure.
Howard was both influenced by and an influence on his friend H. P Lovecraft. Many ideas that he discussed in his letters to Lovecraft were repeated in his fiction and the discussion with a fellow professional writer was useful to him. For his part, Lovecraft began to include Howardian action sequences in his own work, for example in "
The Shadow Over InnsmouthThe Shadow Over Innsmouth is a novella by H. P. Lovecraft. Written in November-December 1931, the story was first published in April 1936; this was the only fiction of Lovecraft's published during his lifetime that did not appear in a periodical....
". Much of 1931 was spent by Howard attempting to mimic Lovecraft's style. After that year, he had absorbed the parts of it that worked best for him and made them his own.
Howard influenced and inspired later writers including
David GemmellDavid Andrew Gemmell was a bestselling British author of heroic fantasy. A former journalist and newspaper editor, Gemmell had his first work of fiction published in 1984. He went on to write over thirty novels. Best known for his debut, Legend, Gemmell's works display violence, yet also explore...
,
Matthew Woodring StoverMatthew Woodring Stover is an American fantasy and science fiction novelist. He is perhaps best known for his four Star Wars novels, including the novelization of Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith. He has also written several fantasy novels, including Iron Dawn and Jericho Moon...
,
Charles R. SaundersCharles R. Saunders also credited as Charles Saunders is an African American author and journalist currently living in Canada. During his long career, he has written everything from novels both fiction and non-fiction, to screenplays and radio plays.- Background :Saunders was born in Elizabeth,...
,
Karl Edward WagnerKarl Edward Wagner was an American writer, editor and publisher of horror, science fiction, and heroic fantasy, who was born in Knoxville, Tennessee and originally trained as a psychiatrist. His disillusionment with the medical profession can be seen in the stories "The Fourth Seal" and "Into...
,
Paul KearneyPaul Kearney is a Northern Irish fantasy author. He is noted for his work in the epic fantasy subgenre and his work has been compared to that of David Gemmell.-Life:...
,
Steven EriksonSteven Erikson is the pseudonym of Steve Rune Lundin, a Canadian novelist, who was educated and trained as both an archaeologist and anthropologist....
,
Joe R. LansdaleJoe R. Lansdale is an American author and martial-arts expert. He has written novels and stories in many genres, including Western, horror, science fiction, mystery, and suspense...
, and
William KingWilliam King also known as "Bill King" is the writer of a number of successful science-fiction and fantasy books, most notably in Games Workshop's Warhammer and Warhammer 40,000 series, all published by GW's fiction arm, The Black Library...
.
[: "True, the era during which drugstore racks were a Muscle Beach of Kandars, Kothars, Thongors, Wandors, Odans, and Orons is long gone, but is S&S in trouble?" Tompkins then presents a series of quotes from modern fantasy writers who claim a strong Howardian influence.] He also has an influence on the field of fantasy fiction rivaled only by
J. R. R. TolkienJohn Ronald Reuel Tolkien, CBE was an English writer, poet, philologist, and university professor, best known as the author of the classic high fantasy works The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings, and The Silmarillion.Tolkien was Rawlinson and Bosworth Professor of Anglo-Saxon at Pembroke College,...
and Tolkien's similarly inspired creation of the modern genre of
High FantasyHigh fantasy or epic fantasy is a subgenre of fantasy that is set in invented or parallel worlds. High fantasy was brought to fruition through the work of authors such as J. R. R. Tolkien and C. S. Lewis, whose major fantasy works were published in the 1950s...
.
[: "The combined success of Howard's Conan books and J.R.R. Tolkien's LotR]The Lord of the Rings is a high fantasy epic written by English philologist and University of Oxford professor J. R. R. Tolkien. The story began as a sequel to Tolkien's earlier, less complex children's fantasy novel The Hobbit , but eventually developed into a much larger work. It was written in...
in paperback had resulted in unprecedented interest in heroic and high fantasy."; "[Howard] remains of central interest in the field of fantasy for his sword and sorcery; the templates he established for that mode have remained influential for most of the 20th century."
Criticism
Criticism of Robert E. Howard and his work often turns towards biographical details and "backhanded compliment[s]." Many imply that Howard was an uneducated
idiot savantSavant syndrome , sometimes referred to as savantism, is a rare condition in which people with developmental disorders have one or more areas of expertise, ability, or brilliance that are in contrast with the individual's overall limitations...
and that his success was due more to luck than skill.
The first professional critic to comment of Howard's work was Hoffman Reynolds Hays, reviewing the
Arkham HouseArkham House is a publishing house specializing in weird fiction founded in Sauk City, Wisconsin in 1939 by August Derleth and Donald Wandrei to preserve in hardcover the best fiction of H.P. Lovecraft. The company's name is derived from Lovecraft's fictional New England city, Arkham. Arkham House...
collection
Skull-Face and OthersSkull-Face and Others is a collection of fantasy and horror short stories by author Robert E. Howard. It was the author's third book and was published by Arkham House in 1946 in an edition of 3,004 copies....
in in
The New York Times Book ReviewThe New York Times Book Review is a weekly paper-magazine supplement to The New York Times in which current non-fiction and fiction books are reviewed. It is one of the most influential and widely read book review publications in the industry. The offices are located near Times Square in New York...
. Under the title "Superman on a Psychotic Bender", Hays wrote, "Howard used a good deal of the Lovecraft cosmogony and demonology, but his own contribution was a sadistic conqueror who, when cracking heads did not solve his difficulties, had recourse to magic and the aid of Lovecraft's Elder Gods. The stories are written on a competent pulp level (a higher level, by the way, than that of some best sellers) and are allied to the Superman genre which pours forth in countless comic books and radio serials." Hays then moved on to Howard himself and the genre in which he wrote: "A sensitive boy, he was apparently bullied by his schoolmates. ... Howard's heroes were consequently wish-projections of himself. All of the frustrations of his own life were conquered in a dream world of magic and heroic carnage. In exactly the same way
SupermanSuperman is a fictional comic book superhero appearing in publications by DC Comics, widely considered to be an American cultural icon. Created by American writer Jerry Siegel and Canadian-born American artist Joe Shuster in 1932 while both were living in Cleveland, Ohio, and sold to Detective...
compensates for all the bewilderment and frustration in which the semi-literate product of the Industrial age finds himself enmeshed. The problem of evil is solved by an impossibly omnipotent hero. ... Thus the hero-literature of the pulps and the comics is symptomatic of a profound contradiction. On the one hand it is testimony to insecurity and apprehension, and on the other it is a degraded echo of the epic. But the ancient hero story was a glorification of significant elements in the culture that produced it. Mr. Howard's heroes project the immature fantasy of a split mind and logically pave the way to schizophrenia."
In a review of
Michel HouellebecqMichel Houellebecq , born Michel Thomas, 26 February 1958—or 1956 —on the French island of Réunion, is a controversial and award-winning French author, filmmaker and poet. To admirers he is a writer in the tradition of literary provocation that reaches back to the Marquis de Sade and Baudelaire;...
's essay "H. P. Lovecraft: Against the World, Against Life" published in the
Los Angeles TimesThe Los Angeles Times is a daily newspaper published in Los Angeles, California, since 1881. It was the second-largest metropolitan newspaper in circulation in the United States in 2008 and the fourth most widely distributed newspaper in the country....
, April 17, 2005,
Stephen KingStephen Edwin King is an American author of contemporary horror, suspense, science fiction and fantasy fiction. His books have sold more than 350 million copies and have been adapted into a number of feature films, television movies and comic books...
implies that Howard did not work at his craft and was merely pastiching
LovecraftHoward Phillips Lovecraft --often credited as H.P. Lovecraft — was an American author of horror, fantasy and science fiction, especially the subgenre known as weird fiction....
. King described his disapproval of the
sword and sorcerySword and sorcery is a sub-genre of fantasy and historical fantasy, generally characterized by sword-wielding heroes engaged in exciting and violent conflicts. An element of romance is often present, as is an element of magic and the supernatural...
genre, and superheroes, in his book on writing
Danse MacabreDanse Macabre is a non-fiction book by Stephen King, about horror fiction in print, radio, film and comics, and the genre's influence on United States popular culture...
: "[It] is not fantasy at its lowest, but it still has a pretty tacky feel. ... Sword and sorcery novels and stories are tales of power for the powerless. The fellow who is afraid of being rousted by those young punks who hang around his bus stop can go home at night and imagine himself wielding a sword, his potbelly miraculously gone, his slack muscles magically transmuted into those "iron thews" which have been sung and storied in the pulps for the last fifty years." On Howard in particular, he wrote, "Howard overcame the limitations of his puerile material by the force and fury of his writing and by his imagination, which was powerful beyond his hero Conan's wildest dreams of power. In his best work, Howard's writing seems so highly charged with energy that it nearly gives off sparks. Stories such as '
The People of the Black Circle"The People of the Black Circle" is one of the original novellas about Conan the Cimmerian, written by American author Robert E. Howard and first published in Weird Tales magazine in three parts over the September, October and November 1934 issues...
' glow with the fierce and eldritch light of his frenzied intensity. At his best, Howard was the Thomas Wolfe of fantasy, and most of his Conan tales seem to almost fall over themselves in their need to get out. Yet his other work was either unremarkable or just abysmal."
In the foreword to
Two-Gun Bob, a collection of essays on the subject of Howard, fellow fantasy fiction writer,
Michael MoorcockMichael John Moorcock is an English writer, primarily of science fiction and fantasy, who has also published a number of literary novels....
, wrote: "The ability to paint a complex scene with a few expert brushstrokes remains Howard's greatest talent, and such talent can't, of course, ever be taught." Howard scholar Rob Roehm considers the use of the phrase "can't ever be taught" to a variation on the recurrent theme of Howard's lack of skill or training.. Moorcock's foreword goes on
"[Howard's] greatest hero, Conan the Barbarian, is his best, created from whole cloth, with a nod to
Natty BumppoNathaniel "Natty" Bumppo is the protagonist of James Fenimore Cooper's pentalogy of novels known as the Leatherstocking Tales.- Fictional biography :...
and
Tarzan of the ApesTarzan is a fictional character, an archetypal feral child raised in the African jungles by the Mangani "great apes"; he later experiences civilization only to largely reject it and return to the wild as a heroic adventurer...
, and most closely representing the kind of person Howard, home-bound, mother-worshipping, suspicious of big cities, would in his dreams most like to be." Roehm counters that none of the assertions made about Howard in that comment are true, although none of them are unique to Moorcock either. In
Wizardry & Wild Romance, Moorcock has also written both that Howard "brought a brash, tough element to the epic fantasy that did as much to change the cource of the American school away from previous writing and static imagery as
HammettSamuel Dashiell Hammett was an American author of hard-boiled detective novels and short stories, and political activist. Among the enduring characters he created are Sam Spade , Nick and Nora Charles , and the Continental Op .In addition to the significant influence his novels and stories had on...
,
ChandlerRaymond Thornton Chandler was an American novelist and screenwriter.In 1932, at age forty-five, Raymond Chandler decided to become a detective fiction writer after losing his job as an oil company executive during the Depression. His first short story, "Blackmailers Don't Shoot", was published in...
and the
Black Mask pulp writers were to change the course of the American detective fiction" and that he "was never a commercially successful writer in his lifetime. His brash, hasty, careless style did not lend itself to the classier pulps. Most of his work appeared in the cheapest of them."
Lovecraft scholar
S. T. JoshiSunand Tryambak Joshi — known as S. T. Joshi — is an award-winning Indian American literary critic, novelist, and a leading figure in the study of Howard Phillips Lovecraft and other authors of weird and fantastic fiction...
wrote, in his biography
H. P. Lovecraft: A LifeH. P. Lovecraft: A Life is a biography of H. P. Lovecraft by S. T. Joshi, first published by Necronomicon Press in 1996. The original one-volume edition was reissued in 2004, with a new afterword by Joshi....
, that "The bulk of Howard's fiction is subliterary hackwork that does not even begin to approach genuine literature" and "The simple fact is, however, that his views are not of any great substance or profundity and that Howard's style is crude, slip-shod, and unwieldy. It is all just pulp—although, perhaps, a somewhat superior grade of pulp than the average."
Earnings
The following table shows Howard's earnings from writing throughout his career, with appropriate milestones and events noted by each year. During the Depression, Howard earned more than anyone else in Cross Plains. When Howard died,
Weird Tales still owed him between $800 and $1,300. (Adjusted for inflation, this amount would be equivalent to between $ and $.)
Robert E. Howard's Earnings from Writing
| Year |
Earnings |
Adjusted for Inflation |
Notes |
| 1926 |
$50.00 |
$ |
|
| 1927 |
$37.50 |
$ |
|
| 1928 |
$186.00 |
$ |
1st Solomon Kane published |
| 1929 |
$772.50 |
$ |
1st Kull, 1st Steve Costigan |
| 1930 |
$1,303.50 |
$ |
Oriental Stories launched, 1st Bran Mak Morn |
| 1931 |
$1,500.26 |
$ |
|
| 1932 |
$1,067.50 |
$ |
Fight Stories suspended, Kline engaged as agent, 1st Conan |
| 1933 |
$962.25 |
$ |
Oriental Stories becomes Magic Carpet |
| 1934 |
$1,853.05 |
$ |
Magic Carpet cancelled, Action Stories re-launched, 1st professional El Borak, 1st Kirby O'Donnell, 1st Breckenridge Elkins |
| 1935 |
$2,000+ |
$+ |
Records incomplete |
| 1936 |
"By the spring of 1936, he was enjoying an all-time high in sales." |
| : |
Legacy
Robert E. Howard's legacy extended after his death in 1936. Howard's most famous character, Conan the Cimmerian, has a pop-culture imprint that has been compared to such icons as
Tarzan of the ApesTarzan of the Apes is a novel written by Edgar Rice Burroughs, the first in a series of books about the title character Tarzan. It was first published in the pulp magazine All-Story Magazine in October, 1912; the first book edition was published in 1914. The character was so popular that Burroughs...
,
Count DraculaCount Dracula is a fictional character, the titular antagonist of Bram Stoker's 1897 Gothic horror novel Dracula and archetypal vampire. Some aspects of his character have been inspired by the 15th century Romanian general and Wallachian Prince Vlad III the Impaler...
,
Sherlock HolmesSherlock Holmes is a fictional detective created by Scottish author and physician Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. The fantastic London-based "consulting detective", Holmes is famous for his astute logical reasoning, his ability to take almost any disguise, and his use of forensic science skills to solve...
, and
James BondJames Bond, code name 007, is a fictional character created in 1953 by writer Ian Fleming, who featured him in twelve novels and two short story collections. There have been a six other authors who wrote authorised Bond novels or novelizations after Fleming's death in 1964: Kingsley Amis,...
. Howard's critical reputation suffered at first but over the decades works of Howard scholarship have been published. The first professionally published example of this was
L. Sprague de CampLyon Sprague de Camp was an American author of science fiction and fantasy books, non-fiction and biography. In a writing career spanning 60 years, he wrote over 100 books, including novels and notable works of non-fiction, including biographies of other important fantasy authors...
's
Dark Valley Destiny (1983) which was followed by other works, including Don Herron's
The Dark Barbarian (1984) and
Mark FinnMark Finn is the pseudonym of Mark Farr-Nash, a science fiction and fantasy writer, essayist, and playwright...
's
Blood & ThunderBlood & Thunder: The Life & Art of Robert E. Howard is a biography of the writer Robert E. Howard by Mark Finn, first published in November 2006 by MonkeyBrain Books. It includes an introduction by suspense writer Joe R...
(2006). Also in 2006, a charity, Robert E. Howard Foundation, was created to promote further scholarship.
Following Robert E. Howard's death, the courts granted his estate to his father, who continued to work with Howard's literary agent
Otis Adelbert KlineOtis Adelbert Kline born in Chicago, Illinois, USA, was an adventure novelist and literary agent during the pulp era. Much of his work first appeared in the magazine Weird Tales. Kline was an amateur orientalist and a student of Arabic, like his friend and sometime collaborator, E...
. Dr. Isaac Howard passed the rights on to his friend Dr. Pere Kuykendall, who passed them to his wife, Alla Ray Kuykendall, and daughter, Alla Ray Morris. Morris left the rights to the widow of her cousin, Zora Mae Bryant, who gave control to her children, Jack Baum and Terry Baum Rogers. The Baums eventually sold their rights to the Swedish company
Paradox Entertainment, IncParadox Entertainment owns rights to many intellectual properties, the most famous of which is Conan the Barbarian as created by pulp author Robert E. Howard and expanded upon by many other authors over the years. Other properties include Bran Mak Morn, Kull, Solomon Kane, Mutant, Mutant...
.
Howard's first published novel,
A Gent from Bear Creek, was printed in Britain one year after his death. This was followed in the United States by a collection of Howard's stories,
Skull-Face and OthersSkull-Face and Others is a collection of fantasy and horror short stories by author Robert E. Howard. It was the author's third book and was published by Arkham House in 1946 in an edition of 3,004 copies....
(1946) and then the novel
Conan the ConquerorThe Hour of the Dragon, also known as Conan the Conqueror, is a fantasy novel written by Robert E. Howard featuring his seminal sword and sorcery hero Conan the Cimmerian. It was first published in serial form in the pulp magazine Weird Tales in 1935 through 1936; and in book form in 1950 by Gnome...
(1950). The success of
Conan the Conqueror led to a series of Conan books from publisher Gnome Press, the later editor of which was L. Sprague de Camp. The series led to the first Conan pastiche, the novel
The Return of ConanThe Return of Conan is a 1957 fantasy novel written by Björn Nyberg and L. Sprague de Camp featuring Robert E. Howard's seminal sword and sorcery hero Conan the Barbarian...
by de Camp and Swedish Howard fan
Björn NybergBjörn Emil Oscar Nyberg, born September 11, 1929, is a Swedish fantasy author best known for his additions to the series of Conan stories begun by Robert E. Howard. His primary contribution to the series was The Return of Conan , which was revised for publication by L. Sprague de Camp. He lives in...
. De Camp eventually achieved control over the Conan stories and Conan brand in general. Oscar Friend took over from Kline as literary agent and he was followed by his daughter Kittie West. When she closed the agency in 1965, a new agent was required. De Camp was offered the role but he recommended
Glenn LordGlenn Lord has been an agent, editor, and publisher of the prose and poetry of fellow Texan Robert E. Howard , and the first and most important researcher and scholar of Howard’s life and writings.- Biography :...
instead. Lord began as a fan of Howard and had re-discovered many unpublished pieces that would otherwise have been lost, printing them in books such as
Always Comes EveningAlways Comes Evening is a collection of poems by Robert E. Howard. It was released in 1957 and was the author's second book to be published by Arkham House. It was released in an edition of 636 copies...
(1957) and his own magazine
The Howard Collector (1961–1973). He became responsible for the non-Conan works and later restored, textually-pure versions of the Conan stories themselves.
In 1966, de Camp made a deal with
Lancer BooksLancer Books was a series of paperback books published from 1961 through 1973 by Irwin Stein and Walter Zacharius. While it published stories of a number of genres, it was noted most for its science fiction and fantasy, particularly its series of Robert E. Howard's Conan the Barbarian tales, the...
to republish the Conan series, which led to the "First Howard Boom" of the 1970s; their popularity was enhanced by the cover artwork of Frank Frazetta on most of the volumes. Many of his works were reprinted (some printed for the first time) and they expanded into other media such as comic books and films. The Conan stories were increasingly edited by de Camp and the series was extended by pastiches until they replaced the original stories. In response, a "purist" movement grew up demanding Howard's original, un-edited stories. The first boom ended in the mid-1980s. In the late 1990s and early 21st century, the "Second Howard Boom" occurred. This saw the printing of new collections of Howard's work, with the restored texts desired by Purists. As before, the boom led to new comic books, films and computer games. Howard's house in Cross Plains has been converted into the Robert E. Howard Museum which has been added to the
National Register of Historic PlacesThe National Register of Historic Places is the United States government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures, and objects deemed worthy of preservation...
.
Adaptations
The works of Robert E. Howard have been adaptated into multiple media, the most famous being the Conan films starring
Arnold SchwarzeneggerArnold Alois Schwarzenegger is an Austrian-American former professional bodybuilder, actor, businessman, investor, and politician. Schwarzenegger served as the 38th Governor of California from 2003 until 2011....
. In addition to the Conan films, other adaptations have included
Kull the ConquerorKull the Conqueror is a 1997 fantasy film about the Robert E. Howard character Kull starring Kevin Sorbo. It is a movie adaptation of Howard's Conan novel The Hour of the Dragon, with the protagonist changed to the author's other barbarian hero Kull...
(1997) and
Solomon KaneSolomon Kane is a 2009 epic action film directed by Michael J. Bassett based on the pulp magazine character Solomon Kane created in 1928 by Robert E. Howard. James Purefoy stars in the title role. Despite optioning the rights in 1997, filming did not begin until January 2008. The film is an origin...
(2009). In television, the anthology series
Thriller (1961) led the adaptations with an episode based on the short story "Pigeons from Hell." The bulk of the adaptations have, however, been based on Conan with two animated and one live action series. Multiple audio dramas have been adapted, from professional audio books and plays to
LibriVoxLibriVox is an online digital library of free public domain audiobooks, read by volunteers and is probably, since 2007, the world's most prolific audiobook publisher...
recordings of works in the public domain. Computer games have focussed on Conan, beginning with
Conan: Hall of VoltaConan: Hall of Volta is a 1984 action/platform computer game, designed by Eric Robinson and Eric Parker, and published by Datasoft. It is based on the character Conan created by Robert E. Howard....
(1984) and continuing on to the MMO
Age of Conan: Hyborian AdventuresAge of Conan: Hyborian Adventures is a fantasy-themed massively multiplayer online role-playing game developed by a Norwegian computer video game developer company, Funcom, and is published by Eidos Interactive for the PC platform...
(2008). The first table-top roleplaying game based on Howard's works was TSR's "
Conan Unchained!Conan Unchained! is a 1984 adventure module for the Dungeons & Dragons roleplaying game. Its associated code is CB1 and its TSR product code is TSR 9123.-Plot summary:...
" (1984) for their game Advanced Dungeons & Dragons. The first comic book adaptation was in the Mexican
Cuentos de Abuelito - La Reina de la Costa Negra #17 (1952). Howard related comic books continued to be published to the present day. Howard is an ongoing inspiration for and influence on
heavy metal musicHeavy metal is a genre of rock music that developed in the late 1960s and early 1970s, largely in the Midlands of the United Kingdom and the United States...
. Several bands have adapted Howard's works to tracks or entire albums. The British metal band
Bal-SagothBal-Sagoth is a symphonic black metal band from Yorkshire, England, formed in 1993.Originally formed as an epic/symphonic black metal band with strong death metal elements, vocalist/lyricist Byron Roberts took the name 'Bal-Sagoth' from the Robert E. Howard short story "The Gods of Bal-Sagoth"...
is named after Howard's story "The Gods of Bal-Sagoth."
See also
Further reading
. Chapbook. Later expanded into
Dark Valley Destiny. (Basis for the movie
The Whole Wide World)
External links
Biography
- a film relating to his relationship with Novalyne Price
Works
- "The Barbarian From Rural Texas", essay and commentary by Tom Shippey
Thomas Alan Shippey is a scholar of medieval literature, including that of Anglo-Saxon England, and of modern fantasy and science fiction, in particular the works of J. R. R. Tolkien, about whom he has written several scholarly studies. He is widely considered one of the leading academic scholars...
Scholarly sources