(urth) Gummed-Up Works or Got Lives?
David Stockhoff
dstockhoff at verizon.net
Fri Dec 16 11:31:12 PST 2011
Yes. Although Howard touched a bit on horror too, it was never the main
point, and Howard, Burroughs, and Fritz Lieber codified the s&s genre
(which was often enough swords VS sorcery) more than anyone.
Too bad Lovecraft never wrote about a lone swordsman---that would really
have been something. He'd have to be a madman who never gets close
enough to the creeping horror to kill it. Kind of like a detective who
is always too drunk to solve murders but somehow has an interesting
career nevertheless.
On 12/16/2011 1:27 PM, Daniel Petersen wrote:
> I tend to think of Robert Howard and Tolkien as two differing and
> interesting streams that find their mutual source in Dunsany (at least
> in so far as each of the former embody modern S&S). Again, it's as if
> these two streams reunite into one at Wolfe. (You can also do this
> sort of 'flow chart' from Dunsany with Lovecraft and Tolkien as the
> two streams reunited in Wolfe - this time in relation to horror.)
>
> -DOJP
>
> On Fri, Dec 16, 2011 at 5:23 PM, David Stockhoff
> <dstockhoff at verizon.net <mailto:dstockhoff at verizon.net>> wrote:
>
> And Dunsany and Wilde.
>
>
> On 12/16/2011 12:21 PM, Dan'l Danehy-Oakes wrote:
>
> Yes, and there is plenty of "high" fantasy that precedes JRRT
> also --
> notably William Morris.
>
> On Fri, Dec 16, 2011 at 9:01 AM, Larry
> Miller<decanus1284 at gmail.com <mailto:decanus1284 at gmail.com>>
> wrote:
>
> Dont forget that sword and sorcery also has roots in the
> planetary
> romances of burroughs who we know Wolfe was aware of.
> There was also
> the Jirel of Joiry and the Zothique stories that are the
> earliest
> sword and sorcery tales. Or the Worm Ouroborous. They
> all predate
> Tolkien. And Conan being a cheap comic book derivative?
> Come on!
>
> On 12/16/11, Lee Berman<severiansola at hotmail.com
> <mailto:severiansola at hotmail.com>> wrote:
>
> Dan'l Danehy-Oakes: You are absolutely correct, I
> meant "religious
> morality" and should
> have said so explicitly.
>
> Ah, well, not really. I understood but I'll confess
> that I just wanted an
> excuse to
> further discuss Tolkien with someone who knows more
> than I do about the
> subject. :- )
>
> Antonio Pedro Marques: The discussion was about
> what it looked like on the
> _surface_. If
> you only find out at the end of the story that a
> character seems to fit a
> fairy tale,
> then the fairytaleness isn't really part of the
> scenery, is it?
>
> Scenery! That's an interesting point. For me, it was
> fairly early in BotNS
> that the S& S/
>
> fairy tale aspects hit me. What came later (much
> later) was the recognition
> of real religious
> content in the story, albeit with an intensely gnostic
> flavor.
>
> For years I had wondered why Wolfe put "gnostic
> symbols" in the Witches
> Tower. The problem
> was my own limited knowledge of gnosticism. The impact
> of Alexander's brief
> but mighty
> empire on all levels of Western culture can't be
> ignored, including
> religion. Our legends of
> witches, vampires, manbeasts shapeshifting gods,
> monsters etc. can be traced
> back to that time
> period, in that part of the world.
>
> But anyway, does the fact that my realization of the
> religious aspect of
> BotNS came later mean
> it is not a religious story? Or even that religious
> trappings are not part
> of the scenery?
>
> Maybe for me s&s is a more restricted thing than
> for others. I think of
> Conan the Barbarian
> rather than LotR as the prototype. I'm not even
> sure I find LotR all that
> s&s, given the serious
> 'historical' feeling I get from it, nor the
> Hobbit, given its (deceivingly)
> children's-tale style.
>
> Great observation and recognition Antonio. Perhaps I
> am not alone in having
> assumed that LotR was
> more of a prototype or archetype of S& S while Conan
> is more of a cheap
>
> comic book derivative.
> A cultural bias? Conan (like Tarzan) is a European
> character created by an
> American, while LotR seems
> somehow more authentic and refined- high brow British
> characters created by
> an Englishman.
>
> But, a check online about Robert Howard, the creator
> of Conan (and who
> pre-dates Tolkien), produces
> this blurb:
>
> With Conan and his other heroes, Howard created
> the genre now known as
> sword and sorcery, spawning
> a wide swath of imitators and giving him an
> influence in the fantasy field
> rivaled only by J. R. R.
> Tolkien and Tolkien's similarly inspired creation
> of high fantasy.
>
>
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