Project Pride of Cross Plains, Texas, the community organization directly responsible for the restoration and maintenance of the Robert E. Howard Museum, has announced the publication of A WORD FROM THE OUTER DARK.

This nifty little paperback tome is a generous collection of 100 poems of Robert E. Howard, and pretty well covers the broad scope of Howard’s poetic greatness: heroic, history, horror, love, self-reflection, boxing, humor, Texas and the Old West – all this and more is represented here.

Props go out to Paul Herman for getting this book out, with the assistance of Rob Roehm for the restored texts (taken from The Collected Poems of Robert E. Howard from the REH Foundation Press), Dennis McHaney for his graphics wizardry, and David Burton for a bang-up cover.

This 5×7, 213 page volume is now available exclusively from the Robert E. Howard Museum, for the extraordinary price of $15.00. If you can’t wait for REH Days to buy your copy directly at the House, you can order them via mail from Project Pride, POB 534, Cross Plains, Texas 76443. Like I said, they are 15 bucks each, with a $2.00 S/H fee. (If you’d like more than one, please add $1.00 per book.)

Grab up a copy or two of A WORD FROM THE OUTER DARK, and know that your money contributes directly to the preservation of the Legacy of Robert E. Howard. After all, that’s a big part of why we’re here! Thanks!

Every once in a while you find a book that grabs you and holds you until the end. The Year of the Horsetails by R. F. Tapsell is one of those. I first heard of this book reading a review by L. Sprague de Camp in an old issue of Amra. Readers of this site know that I have some problems with de Camp but I generally agree with his book reviews. De Camp hemmed and hawed about this book but in the end gave it barely passing grade. He thought the military aspects took up too much of the book. I decided to track down a copy and read it.

     The book takes place probably in Russia or Ukraine in an unspecified time. Some online sites say between the time of Attila and Genghis Khan. Actually it can be narrowed down. Bardiya, a refugee Saka tribesman escapes a death sentence from the Mongolian “Tugars.” He comes across a Slavic tribe, the Drevich and decided to throw in his lot with them. Bardiya warns the Drevich that the Tugars are coming their way and nothing will be left after they are done.  Bardiya teaches the Slavic Drevichians on steppe warfare and how to counter the well disciplined steppe raiders. There are several wonderful battles. One battle in the open is the best I have ever read of an infantry army on one side and a mounted light cavalry on the other. As to time– the novel is probably between the time of the Czech revolt against the Avars and rise of the Kieven Rus which would place the novel between the 7th and 9th Centuries A.D. (I don’t use the Common Era designation). My guess is the place is the area where the Carpathian Mountians meet the steppes of Ukraine. De Camp thought the novel took place in the Ural Mountains. The Slavs hadn’t pushed that far east for the time frame I have placed the story.  The writer, R. F. Tapsell, wrote three novels and a book on royal dynasties. He is an Englishman and was in military intelligence with the Royal Air Force specializing in Eastern Europe. It shows in this novel with proper use of terms and familiarity with the cultures. The book never drags and keeps up the adrenaline right up to the last paragraph. I couldn’t put it down. It is in my top five list for books that should be reprinted along with Gordon D. Shirreffs’ Calgaich the Swordsman and Don Tracy’s The Black Amulet. The book is without humor and very grim in tone. That is probably why de Camp was not enthusiastic about the book. Copies do show up on E-bay very sporadically. I upgraded my copy and am circulating my original among friends. If you ever wonder how the Robert E. Howard fragment, “The Shadow of the Hun” turns out, The Year of the Horsetails gives you an idea.

     A few weeks back, I wrote about C. Hall Thompson and his short career of writing H. P. Lovecraft pastiches. Thompson is somewhat famous within Mythos history. There are a couple of Mythos stories from the same period that are completely unknown. The author- Gardner F. Fox. Comic book fans should know the name as he wrote Batman, Green Lantern, Hawkman, The Flash etc.  Fox had a decent little career in the pulps with ten stories in Planet Stories, three of which display varying degrees of Robert E. Howard influence; one story in Amazing Stories; one short novel in Marvel Science Fiction; and three stories in Weird Tales. Fox also sold as many or more stories to the sports pulps and western pulps.

     His first pulp sale was to Weird Tales with a story entitled “The Weirds of the Woodcarver” (September 1944). The story is a short tale of small figurines carved by a queer little man in a shop in Brooklyn. The Cthulhu Mythos elements are grafted on with the references to the Primal Ones, the Mi-Go etc. Still, a totally forgotten story never reprinted by Rober M. Price and not listed at any of the Cthulhu Mythos sites.

Another story, “Heart of Light” (Amazing Stories, July 1946) has an archaeologist finding a statue in the Australian desert that comes to life. Lead down a tunnel to an underground city, home of “The Glitterer,” a superior being of energy.  The Glitterer transforms the living statue into the beautiful Tonal Tu.  There is a battle with a horde of shoggoths that ate all of the original inhabitants of the city except Tonal Tu.  Fox named checked his inspiration in a sentence: “Men like Lovecraft, Derleth–they came very close to guessing.”

Neither story added anything to the Cthulhu Mythos. “Heart of Light” is one of those silly spectacular quasi-science fiction stories from the pulp years. The Lovecraft element actually works better for background in it than “Weirds of the Woodcarver.” Fox may also have innoculated himself from the wrath of Derleth by mentioning the man from Sauk City next to Lovecraft. Derleth probably knew of this story as “Scar Tissue” by Henry S. Whitehead was in the same issue of Amazing Stories. That story may be some sort of mix of Whitehead, Lovecraft, and Derleth–I don’t think anyone has quite figured that one out. Gardner Fox later used Lovecraftian words and ideas in some of his comic book work. The guy liked his Robert E. Howard and H. P. Lovecraft.

While March is coming in like Amra the Lion here in NW Indiana, I’m finding that thinking about REH Days in June is making me warm all over!

The 2009 version of Robert E. Howard Days will take place on June 12th and 13th in Cross Plains, Texas, and I’m here to say, “Y’all come!”

As in years past, Howard Days is a joint venture sponsored by Project Pride, the Robert E. Howard United Press Association, and the Robert E. Howard Foundation. This year we’re trying something just a little different by theming Howard Days to The Poetry of Robert E. Howard.

By way of celebrating the 2009 publication of  The Collected Poetry of Robert E. Howard from the REHF Press, we thought focusing on the wonderful poems of REH was a theme certainly worth doing, and long overdue at that. We’ve invited Larry D. Thomas, the 2008 Poet Laureate of  Texas, to be our Guest of Honor, and Donald Sidney-Fryer, an outstanding poet and authority on the Weird Tales poets, to be our Special Guest. Four of the five panels we have planned will focus on Ol’ Two-Gun’s poetry, and in addition to Mr. Thomas and Mr. Sidney-Fryer, we’ll have on hand a number of REH Poetry experts (like Frank Coffman and Barbara Barrett) to enlighten and entertain us. Plus we’ll all be able to participate in reading Howard’s poetry at the 2nd Annual Robert E. Howard Poetry Throwdown!

Fear not, the usual Howard Days activities are still in place: the Robert E. Howard House is open for all, there’ll be walking tours of the town of Cross Plains, bus tours of the surrounding areas, panels, swap meet, Postal Cancellation, Celebration Banquet & Silent Auction, the REH Foundation (formerly the Cimmerian) Awards, Poetry Throwdown, Barbarian Festival uptown, and the Saturday Sunset Barbeque at Caddo Peak Ranch. The best part of the weekend, as always, is the fine REH fellowship that happens, where fans meet and talk the days and night away, all right next to the very room where Robert E. Howard wrote over three million words!

Details of the schedule that follows are forthcoming, but I wanted to give you a good idea of what we have planned. Of course this will be subject to some change, but it will only be for the better!

We hope to see a passle of y’all in Texas this June. The fine folks at Project Pride, who are the real reason Howard Days exists, do request a nominal $10.00 per person registration fee for the Friday night banquet. This also helps give them a basic head count and a head start in planning the weekend’s activities. You could give them a real head start by sending your registration fee early to: Project Pride, POB 534, Cross Plains, Texas 76443.

I’ll be re-doing the detailed REH Days page here on the REHupa site within a week or so, but I hope this is enough to get all of you started on your planning a great Robert E. Howard weekend. See you in June!

9 am – 4 pm: Robert E. Howard House Museum open. Closed for Lunch 12-1

9 am – 4 pm: REH Postal Cancellation at Cross Plains Post Office

9 am – 11 am: Walking Tour of Cross Plains

9:30 am – 12 Noon: Bus Tour of Cross Plains area

10 am – 5 pm: Cross Plains Public Library open

Noon: Lunch hosted by Project Pride. Donations Welcome.

Noon to 4 pm: Pavilion available for REH items Swap Meet

1 pm: PANEL: Poetry Theme. Panelists and Location to be announced.

3 pm: PANEL: Poetry Theme. Panelists and Location to be announced.

 5:30 – 6:30: Silent Auction items available for viewing & bidding at Banquet site

6:30: Robert E. Howard Celebration Banquet and Silent Auction at the Cross Plains Community Center featuring Guest of Honor Larry D. Thomas, 2008 Texas Poet Laureate

9:00: The Robert E. Howard Foundation Awards at the Howard House Pavilion, followed by The 2^nd Annual ROBERT E. HOWARD POETRY THROWDOWN (open to all)

9 am – 4 pm: Robert E. Howard House Museum open. Closed for Lunch 12-1

9 am – 4 pm: BARBARIAN FESTIVAL in the large lot North of the Dollar Store on Main St.

9 am – 11 am: Walking Tour of Cross Plains

9:30 am – 12 Noon: Bus Tour of Cross Plains area

10 am – 3 pm: Cross Plains Public Library open

10 am: PANEL: Poetry Theme. Panelists and Location to be announced.

Noon to 4 pm: Pavilion available for REH items Swap Meet

Lunch & Festival Activities at your leisure during the day

1 pm PANEL: Readings & Book Signings: Larry D. Thomas & Donald Sidney-Fryer at the Cross Plains Library

3 pm PANEL: What’s Happening with REH: Leslie Buhler from Paradox Entertainment, Rusty Burke, Paul Herman, Bill Cavalier

5 pm: Sunset BBQ at the Caddo Peak Ranch

NOTES: A visit to the Howard gravesite at the Greenleaf Cemetery in Brownwood is not a planned activity, but directions are available at the Howard House.

The REH Days Documentary done by Goodspeed Productions in 2008 may be ready for showing at the 2009 Howard Days. Information will be forthcoming.