My Ignored Blog

Work has been hellishly busy for me the past few months, hence my silence on this blog. On a sadder note, I've finally admitted to myself that my work schedule just does not jive with being able to participate in a face-to-face group. I really dig the people in my group and hope to do the occasional board game with them; however, running or even taking part in a regular game just is not in the cards for me. I'm hoping for a career change in three years, but that is a ways away.

I am currently trying to put together an online game. I play in a Tunnels and Trolls play-by-post and enjoy it, but it is slow and I don't mean that as a criticism of the game, it is just the nature of play-by-post.

I'm not sure if I will run a play-by-post or not. I can't guarantee any regular posting. I would much rather try running something using Skype and/or Fantasy Grounds II. Until I get something going, my gaming is done for now. I will continue posting. I actually have some changes for this blog that I am anxious to get under way. More to come on that, hopefully soon.

Conan, Illustrated through the Ages

In anticipation of the new Conan movie being released in August of this year, my mind and free reading time has been occupied with the writings of Robert E. Howard. I have not been reading his Conan stories, per se; however, I did recently read his Kull stories and his Bran Mak Morn tales. Currently, I'm reading El Borak.

The character of Conan has always intrigued me, but (and here REH enthusiasts are free to hate me) my favorite media to enjoy Conan tales has always been in the medium of comics, be those stories directly REH inspired or not.

Don't get me wrong, I enjoy a good Conan yarn written by the man himself, "Red Nails" and "The Tower of the Elephant" being two of

my favorites, but I'm quickly finding that REH's writing was more powerful with his other, lesser known characters versus with Conan. I believe this is because in Conan he found a marketable character that become more "bread and butter" for him rather then exploratory.

I did a quick search of Conan illustrations, and found it interesting to show case how the Barbarian has been depicted in illustrative interpretations throughout the years.

Pictured above is, as far as I know, the first professional attempt at illustrating the character of Conan. It is an interior illustration from the December 1932 issue of Weird Tales. Consequently, "The Phoenix on the Sword" was Howard's first Conan tale successfully sold (and was of course a re-write of the Kull tale "By This Ax I Rule"). The illustration above is by Jayem Wilcox. I don't know much about Jayem Wilcox. A quick Google search didn't turn up a whole lot, but (as far as I know) he goes down in history as the first artist to render a drawing of Howard's Conan character.

Howard's Conan tales were granted "issue cover status" nine times in Weird Tales. All nine covers were by fan favorite Margaret Brundage. Brundage was known (and favored) for her images depicting bondage and flagellation of women, her women being soft, with a doe like innocence, their faces contorted with fear from the situations Brundage depicts them in. I find her illustrations charged with an undercurrent of repressed sexuality.

Of the nine Conan covers she painted, only three prominently featured the Cimmerian. Those were the May 1934 issue ("Queen of the Black Coast"), August 1934 ("The Devil in Iron") and December 1935 ("The Hour of the Dragon).

So from 1932 to 1935, these were the depictions of the Cimmerian.

The next time Conan would grace the cover of a magazine was in August 1948, issue 8 of Avon Fantasy Reader ("Queen of the Black Coast") then again in October 1949, issue 10 of the same ("A Witch Shall be Born").

Avon Fantasy Reader (hereby referred to as AFR) was published from 1946 to 1952 and ran for 18 issues in total.

AFR published (reprinted actually) works by REH, HPL, C.L. Moore and A. Merritt just to name a few.

I could find no information regarding who illustrated the covers for these two issues. While I find that I prefer the depictions of the damsels in Brundage's illustrations, I find the depiction of Conan on much the same mark as first Wilcox and later Brundage depicted him.

I find the cover of issue 10 interesting as it features a Conan without a "shaggy mane". Conan as depicted here has a decidedly Romanesque look to him, which I also noticed in Jayme Wilcox's interior illustration for "The Phoenix on the Sword". On another side note, I do dig the "target" bra worn by the damsel on the cover of issue 10. It is a bit, mesmerizing.

In 1950, Conan would move from magazine covers to his first collected book editions, the

hardback editions published by Gnome Press from 1950 to 1957.

GP would published seven volumes, collecting together not only those stories which first saw light in Weird Tales but also included previously unpublished tales. It was with Gnome Press that L. Sprague de Camp would begin his habit of rewriting Howard tales to "improve" upon them.

It was also in the final volume of these editions, The Return of Conan (1957) that the first Conan pastiche was born, written by Bjorn Nyberg.

Five of the seven volumes had Conan depicted upon their covers. 1950's Conan the Conquerer (AKA, The Hour of the Dragon) featured a simple drawing of another Romanesque Cimmerian by John Forte. Forte was primarily a comics artist best known for his work on Legion of Super Heroes.

The Coming of Conan, 1953, was for me the most interesting interpretation of Conan to date. The art is by Frank Kelley Freas. Freas was a Hugo award winning artist. He did illustrations for books, magazines, album covers and even NASA (more of his art can be found here).

It wasn't until Lancer Books published Conan the Adventurer in 1966, that Frank Frazetta would paint his character defining images that would influence every artist that depicted Conan after him.

Appendix N: Leigh Brackett's "The Halfling and Other Stories"

While I have immensely enjoyed Leigh Brackett, and will undoubtedly read more from her, this will be the last of my Leigh Brackett Appendix N entries for a while. I am feeling the need to move further down my reading list of Anderson to Zelazny.

I found my copy of this book in a used book store, and while I have seen it for sale on-line, I encourage you to haunt your local used book stores first, as I firmly believe in supporting local owned businesses.

As far as I know, this book and many of the stories contained within it are out of print.

My copy is dog eared, beaten up, stained with loose pages. Luckily, it is intact and I only paid $1. It is a paperback first Ace Books printing from 1973. I was unable to confirm who the cover art was by, any information on this would be appreciated. There was a second Ace printing done in 1983 which has cover art cited to Mel Odom.

It contains the following stories: "The Halfling", "The Dancing Girl of Ganymede", "The Citadel of Lost Ages", "All the Colors of the Rainbow", "The Shadows", "Enchantress of Venus", "The Lake of the Gone Forever" and "The Truants". Strangely, "The Truants" is not included in the table of contents, nor is any first printing information provided for it in the Acknowledgements section. I was able to find said information with minimal research.

"The Halfling" being the title story, was the first in the collection. It first appeared in Astonishing Stories, 1943. While it was not my favourite story in the collection, it showcased Brackett's ability to write across genres as it was a science fiction story, but had a definite hard boiled noire feel to it. Halflings in Brackett's universe are not the happy hobbits found in Tolkien's world. In Brackett's stories, a halfling is a creature that is half human and half something else. It is a concept seen in her novel The Sword of Rhiannon, and to a lesser extent, her Skaith novels as well. It is a concept that I find intriguing, and I am considering adopting it into my own D&D universe; perhaps retiring the happy hobbits of "Tolkienville".

"The Dancing Girl of Ganymede" first appeared in Thrilling Wonder Stories, 1950. This story was a striking cross between C.L. Moore's "Shambleau" and Philip K. Dick's novel, Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? Interestingly enough, C.L. Moore's Northwest Smith story was published in Weird Tales in 1933, while Androids was not published until 1968. I wonder if Moore's story influenced Brackett, and consequently, Brackett influenced Dick? Honestly, I am not enough of a scholar on any of the three to say with any certainty. I draw connections between these three as a casual reader. I point out a connection to Catherine Moore as "Dancing Girl" shares a plot structure used to a large extent (perhaps too large of an extent) by Moore in her Northwest Smith stories; that being "Boy meets Girl, Girl turns out to be far more then Boy anticipated". I only use "Shambleau" as an example as it was the first to pop into my head by Moore; actually, any number of her Smith stories would work nicely. As to the connection to Philip K. Dick, there is a theme shared in both "Dancing Girl" and "Androids", "Man vs. Machine, and the rights of said machines".

"The Citadel of Lost Ages" first appeared in Thrilling Wonder Stories, 1950. This story reminded me of a novel by Henry Kuttner, The Dark World, published 1946. Thematically both are similar, but my connection may be born of the fact that I read The Dark World not too long ago.

"All the Colors of the Rainbow", Venture Science Fiction, 1957. This story stood out for me the most in the entire collection. Here Brackett tackles racism as only a science fiction writer can. I found it, interesting, sad and still (sadly) relevant.

"The Shadows", Startling Stories, 1952. This was a straight up "bug-hunt"; although in this case the "bugs" were shadows. It contained the most interesting quote in the collection: "We aren't welcome in the universe. I don't know why. Maybe it's because we're not content to be the animals we are, but must always be pretending that we're something else, prying about and upsetting things, grasping after stars, making trouble and screaming because it hurts. I don't know. I only know that we are hated. Everywhere I've been, everywhere there was a man, they've been gotten rid of somehow". Substitute "world" for "universe" and "American" for "man" and it is still a phrase that rings true.

"The Enchantress of Venus", Planet Stories, 1949 (also published as "City of the Lost Ones"). This is an Eric John Stark tale; actually, it is the second Stark story written by Brackett, the first being "Queen of the Martian Catacombs". It is a solid Stark story, and a solid story regardless of the protagonist, and I wonder why it has not been re-printed by Paizo in their Planet Stories line?

"The Lake of the Gone Forever", Thrilling Wonder Stories, 1949. I found the reading of this as almost a warning story of those that try to take the magic of the world and keep it for themselves.

"The Truants", Startling Stories, 1950. Again, this story did not appear in the table of contents, so I was surprised and pleased upon reaching the end of "Lake" to find I had one more tale. It is a creepy tale, almost Stephen King like in style, with a rather, in my opinion, silly ending that still satisfied.

Overall, this is a great collection, and read along with the Stark/Skaith stories available from Paizo and The Sword of Rhiannon, serves as a great introduction to the writings of Leigh Brackett.

In Memory of Catherine Jeffrey Jones

An icon of fantasy art died yesterday. She was more commonly known as Jeffrey Jones. She had sexual reassignment surgery in the 90's.

Her art was inspiring and always intriguing. Plus, her art was always sexy.

Here are two covers by her that I have in my collection.

RIP. You were one of the greats.

More Frank Frazetta Art Inspired by Edgar Rice Burroughs

I found a few books that I had forgotten that I bought in San Diego on a recent family vacation. Among them was this gorgeous Frank Frazetta cover for Savage Pellucidar. My copy is a fourth priting by Ace Books circa 1973.

Again, I am struck by how sexy the women in Frazetta's art were. Heavy breasted, round butts, savage, yet innocent.

Enjoy.