j d worthington
Well-Known Member
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- May 9, 2006
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You asked for Conan so you could try Wandering Star's ongoing publication of Conan if you are an absolute aficionado of Howard and have a wheelbarrow full of cash. Otherwise the VG edn. of his stories is actually quite good.
For Other material by Howard I think the easiest solution would be to go for the IMO excellent Del Rey edns of his work including Kull, Solomon Kane, Bran Mak Morn and collections of Horror stories and Best Of. They also have a Conan release but I've not got those due to other publications, so I can't give a definitive answer either way in terms of quality or inlcusiveness. The only issue with these is that some members ( not mentioning names...) are not great fans of the "intrusive: art work that does manage to find itself in many of the pages of the book. I happen to like what they've done but not all do. They are also beautiful looking productions but at the same time not that expensive.
Anent the Del Rey Conan: Those are American reprints of the British Wandering Star books (save that I believe some of the artwork may be missing in one or two). And yes, they are quite thorough, including some variant versions of manuscripts, a return to Howard's original manuscripts on those previously published, etc.
The problem is that the poster is reluctant about acquiring trade paperbacks (correct me if I'm wrong about that, Larry), and that's all Del Rey puts out in this line. That being the case, the Berkley Howard line (or its subsequent reprints from -- Ace, was it? are probably the best bet, but hardly complete, only reprinting a total of about 7 or so of the original Howard Conan tales. Or there is the massive VG edition mentioned, but that is massive, and I'm not at all sure about the textual integrity there, either....
To aid you should you choose the Berkley set, these would include:
Conan:
The Hour of the Dragon
The People of the Black Circle (including the title piece, "The Devil in Iron", "A Witch Shall Be Born" -- a personal favorite, in many ways, and "The Jewels of Gwahlur")
Red Nails (includes the title piece, "Shadows in Zamboula" and "Beyond the Black River" -- another particularly great piece; as well as the complete essay "The Hyborian Age")
El Borak:
Son of the White Wolf (includes the title piece, "Blood of the Gods", and "The Country of the Knife") These are tales set in contemporary Afghanistan and the surrounding region.
Kirby O'Donnell:
Swords of Shahrazar (containing the title piece, "The Treasures of Tartary", "The Curse of the Crimson God" -- which de Camp rewrote as a Conan tale, "Trail of the Bloodstained God", "The Brazen Peacock", and "The Black Bear Bites"). Again, contemporary Oriental adventure tales, sometimes with a dash of the supernatural fantasy to them. (Not all the tales are of O'Donnell, but the bulk of the book is.)
Skull-Face (not to be confused with the Arkham House Skull-Face and Others -- later reprinted in paperback by Panther Books as The Skull-Face Omnibus, in three volumes). Contains the title piece -- Howard's tribute to Sax Rohmer, as it were -- as well as "Lord of the Dead", "Names in the Black Book", and "Taverel Manor" (the last completed by Richard A. Lupoff)
Almuric (Howard's only interplanetary adventure novel, very much in the school of Edgar Rice Burroughs)
Marchers of Valhalla (a collection of lesser-known fantasy and horror pieces, including the title piece, "The Grey God Passes" -- another particular favorite, "The Thunder of Trumpets", "Sea Curse", "Ouf of the Deep", "The Thunder-Rider", "For the Love of Barbara Allen", and "The Valley of the Lost")
Black Canaan (another collection of Howard's lesser-known tales -- generally speaking, though the title piece is anything but -- and including "Delenda Est", "The Haunter of the Ring", "The House in the Oaks" -- later proven to be a tale by August Derleth from some ideas by Howard, "The Cobra in the Dream", "Dermod's Bane", "People of the Black Coast", "The Dwellers Under the Tombs", "The Noseless Horror", and "Moon Over Zimbabwei")
and The Last Ride (a collection of Westerns by Howard, including the title piece, "The Extermination of Yellow Donory", "Knife, Bullet and Noose", "The Devil's Joker", "Vulture's Sanctuary", "Law-Shooters of Cowtown", and "Gunman's Debt")
With the exceptions noted above, if I remember correctly, these all follow the text of the original publications of the stories....
As for Skull-Face and Others, here is the table of contents of that rather massive tome, via the services of Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skull-Face_and_Others
(And yes, I know this is correct, as I used to have the Arkham edition and the Neville Spearman edition, and still have the Panther three-volume set....)
