Fritz Leiber's Lankhmar (Sword)- Discussion

[Brys]

I thought Clark Ashton Smith was New Weird?
I've seen a copy of Moore's stories in the fantasy masterworks series:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/0575074175/qid=1124441049/sr=1-2/ref=sr_1_11_2/026-1692360-1478831

I had heard that Moorcock's latest work wasn't as strong as his earlier Elric stuff. If it is, that's good news, because Elric is already one of my favourite series. I prefer Moorcock to Gemmell generally because Elric's a more interesting character than Druss, Waylander etc, and Moorcock has a much better command of language - but the question here - is Leiber or Moorcock or Howard the true master of Sword and Sorcery? I'd say that at his best in Elric, Moorcock is easily the best, but Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser is more consistently entertaining.

 

[GOLLUM]

Brys I've seen those Masterworks in the local bookshop but not sure if they contain the full collected works of Jierel of Jorey which was published as a sperate book many moons ago. The Masterworks cover a number of Jierel tales and Northwest Smith stories I note so may not be the full complement but YES good pointer to Moore's writing.

 

[GOLLUM]

Brys I haven't read that much on Moorcok so I assume if you're talking the earlier Eternal Champion series they weren't bad and I'm a Howard fan as most members here probably already know but I think actually Lieber's Lankmehr series is the best of that S&S bunch IMO.

 

[Jayaprakash Satyamurthy]

Clark Ashton Smith was a contemporary of HP Lovecraft and Robert Howard - definitely Old Weird!


Ah, Moorcock Leiber or Howard? That's a tough call. There's the pioneering value of Howard's work, but Moorcock and Lieber are clearly better writers all-round. Moorcock's work is more varied than Leiber's so I'd favour him too, but I don't think anyone did humour in the S&S genre better than Leiber.

 

[GOLLUM]

Since we're quite freely wandering now, I find it interesting that while Howard and to a lesser extent Smith have been reprinted over the years, Weird Tales' most prolific contributor, and a fan favourite at the time, Seabury Quin, is almost unheard of now.

Yes I'm not sure why Quin is so little known these days exactly. I can only point to the obvious example of Howard rising to promninence in part by people like L Sprague De Camp and the executor of his estate (forget the name) in the 60s and 70s and the obvious commercial followup by Hollywood with the Conan the Barbarian movies (as bad as they were) and with Ashton Smith perhaps in part with this author's association with Lovecraft and the latter Cthulhu Mythos (I'm guessing a little here).

Doesn't really answer the query on Quin except to say this author perhaps just didn't get the same "breaks" if that's the appropriate word here or maybe Smith and Howard were generally the better writers??

Anyone read the occult detectvie Jules de Grandin stories by Quin?

 

[Jayaprakash Satyamurthy]

I have one possible theory abt Quin, actually - he was a professional writer who wrote a lot of non-adventure pulp stuff as well (including the supposed memoirs of a coroner, etc) and I think he was the sort of competent writer who understands his markets and tailors his works to them. As such, his works are maybe too much a product of their times, and have not survived as well as those of people like Smith or Howard who were following their own vision to an extent. Then again, maybe Howard just struck it lucky, since it's largely on the strength of Conan that he is remembered.

The only reason this explanation occured to me is because I recently found out that, back in the day, both Charles Dickens and Jane Austen were outsold by Queen Victoria's favourite novelist, Marie Corelli - whose melodramatic occult tales are now amost unread.

 

[GOLLUM]

I have one possible theory abt Quin, actually - he was a professional writer who wrote a lot of non-adventure pulp stuff as well (including the supposed memoirs of a coroner, etc) and I think he was the sort of competent writer who understands his markets and tailors his works to them. As such, his works are maybe too much a product of their times, and have not survived as well as those of people like Smith or Howard who were following their own vision to an extent. Then again, maybe Howard just struck it lucky, since it's largely on the strength of Conan that he is remembered.

The only reason this explanation occured to me is because I recently found out that, back in the day, both Charles Dickens and Jane Austen were outsold by Queen Victoria's favourite novelist, Marie Corelli - whose melodramatic occult tales are now amost unread.

That's an interesting theory Knivesout but it's difficult to say as I've read almost nothing by Quin. Don't forget with Howard as we're saying here, he was little known from what I understand in the 60s and without De Camp and Co. stepping in with the Commerical success of Conan he may well have ended up the same way as Quin as we're obviuosly suggesting is a possibility.

Basically it's speculation at this stage so I'm going to do some more study into Quin and see if I can find a more defnitive answer.

Never heard of Corelli so thanks for the education.

 

[GOLLUM]

I've been doing some more digging into Seabury Quin and some of the other popular authors of Weird Tales magazine. It seems that basically following the demise of this magazine that a number of the authors who significantly contributed towards the publication could well have fallen into obscurity if not for the support of secific key people. In the case of Lovecraft obviously August Derleth had a fairly strong hand in the codifying of HP's work into the well known Mythos. In Howard's case it was people like L. Sprague de Camp and Lin Carter. For Quinn there simply wasn't anyone interested enough to champion his stories. Perhaps Knivesout's comments on Quinn's stories simply not having the same appeal to a future generation therefore meant no-one within the literary community was interested in taking up his cause. Other than an occasional appearance in an e.g. anthology he was basically unheard of so really a combination of fate and lack of appeal most likely contributed towards his liteary demise. It really could be as simple as that. It's only recently in 2001 that his 91 supernatural tales revolving around his most famous of characters detective Jules de Grandin have been republished in a new 3 volume set that has begun to garner some interest.

The other point to make here I think is that eventhough Quinn's writings certainly had a mass appeal at the time, more than one literary observer has pointed out that the quality of his writing wasn't at the same level as Howard and Lovecraft. I've read some of Quin's detective stories (by far his most popular) and obviuosly Howards' works and a number of Lovecraft's stories and I feel he was a pretty competent writer although not as compelling as the other two. Certainly no-one following his death in the decade of the '70s, '80s and beyond thought enough of him to be moved to republishing his work.

I don't know how further these observations contribute towards a definitive answer but I do think they're quite plausible and certainly supportable.

 

[Jayaprakash Satyamurthy]

a number of the authors who significantly contributed towards the publication could well have fallen into obscurity if not for the support of secific key people.

That's quite probably a key point. While I suspect that Howard's fame would have endured anyway - Conan is right up there with Tarzan in the list of archetypal pulp-fiction characters that a reasonable number of people will never tire of - Lovecraft could so easily have fallen into utter disregard if not for Derleth's efforts, which exposed HPL's work to a new generation of fans some of whom who would grow up to be well-known writers like King, Campbell, Barker and Gaiman who serve as important proselytisers because of their level of fame in the genre, and outside. Quinn hasn't found his Lin Carter, his August Derleth. I can't comment further on the question of actual literary or entertainment value - I've only read a couple of stories in anthologies and they did not strike me especially as excellent or bad, but are too small a sample, I think.

 

[GOLLUM]

Yes JP I think I've come to the conclusion that that is probably THE Key point although the question of WHY there was an absence of any key supporter still remains open and I'm not convinced it can be so easily answered. Bottom line is he just doesn't seem to have 'cut the mustard' in a lot of people's eyes post Weird Tales or even now.

 

[Jayaprakash Satyamurthy]

Makes you wonder about shifting literary regard, though, doesn't it? I imagine a classical scholar meeting an actual ancient Greek, who says 'Homer? Sophocles? Euripides? Good lord, what are you still reading those hacks for?'!

 

[GOLLUM]

Yes that's a tantalizing point you make.

What intrigues me and I think it's part of what you're pointing out is why an author who by all accounts was THE most popular contributor of his day with Weird Tales as far as the fans went would suddenly become persona non grata with the public?? I wonder if he'd had the marketing team and benefit of commerical globalization that someone like J K Rowling presumably has today that he would not have become more of a household name to the masses. Part of the reason why I think the WHY part of my previous comment is not such an easy thing to asses.

 

[rune]

This discussion is running on for September

 

[BAYLOR]

Ive read the first 4 books , very offbeat stuff but fun to read. It surprising that hollowed has never tired to to Fafhard and the Grey mouse film.