REH Bookshelf - F

compiled by Rusty Burke

The Fantasy Fan.

REH to Charles D. Hornig, 1 November 1933: "Thanks for the copy of The Fantasy Fan. I found it very interesting, and think it has a good future. Anybody ought to be willing to pay a dollar for the privilege of reading, for a whole year, the works of Lovecraft, Smith, and Derleth. I am glad to see that you announce a poem by Smith in the next issue. He is a poet second to none. I also hope you can persuade Lovecraft to let you use some of his superb verse. Weird poetry possesses an appeal peculiar to itself and the careful use of it raises the quality of any magazine. ¶ I liked very much the department of 'True Ghost Stories' and hope you will continue it. The world is full of unexplained incidents and peculiar circumstances, the logical reasons of which are often so obscure and hidden that they are lent the illusion of the supernatural. ¶ Enclosed find my check for a year's subscription. I shall be glad to submit some things, if you wish."

REH to H.P. Lovecraft , ca. 3 November 1933: "I've read a copy of Fantasy Fan, and subscribed for a year."

REH to Charles D. Hornig, 3 May 1935: "I'm very sorry to learn that 'The Fantasy Fan' has to be discontinued. I enjoyed the magazine very much, and had hoped that it would be able to carry on. It doesn't seem quite fair for the editor of a fan magazine to have to bear all the financial loss of the magazine's failure. In the case of my unfinished subscription, at least, let's split the expense. I'm taking the liberty of returning half the stamps you sent me. I got all my money's worth and more out of the pleasure I derived from the magazine."

[See entries on Robert H. Barlow, August Derleth, H.P. Lovecraft, William Lumley, and Clark Ashton Smith for references to particular stories or poems in this fan magazine.]

Farnol, [John Jeffery]

(1878-1952)

REH to H.P. Lovecraft, ca. December 1932: Farnol is listed among those Howard refers to as "my favorite writers."

Black Bartlemy's Treasure

New York: A.L. Burt Co., 1920. 30752; PQ3; GL; TDB. Still in HPU holdings.

The Broad Highway

Boston: Little, Brown & Co., 1911. 30648; PQ3; GL; TDB.

Guyfford of Weare

Boston: Little, Brown & Co., 1928. 30628; PQ3; GL; TDB.

Martin Conisby's Vengeance

New York: A.L. Burt Co., n.d. [1921]. 30764; PQ1; GL; TDB. Still in HPU holdings.

[Note in PQ1: Penciled on the title-page is this statement. "Read 'Black Bartlemy's Treasure' first. This is a sequel to it."]

Sir John Dering

Boston: Little, Brown & Co., 1923. 30650; PQ3; GL; TDB.

Ferber, Edna

(1887-1968)

Cimarron

1930. 30614; PQ3; TDB. Now missing from HPU holdings.

[Note in PQ3: "...Cimarron, by Edna Ferber, does not have the bookplate, but accession records indicate that it probably is the copy which was originally in Robert E. Howard's library. A section on page 35 of that book has been underlined twice, once in pencil, and once in ink. If we could be sure that this passage had been so emphasized by Howard, we might better understand Howard's unusual dependence on his mother. The passage reads, 'Twenty-one, and the yoke of her mother's dominance was beginning to gall her. Now, at her own inner rage and sickening disappointment, all the iron in her fused and hardened.'"]

Field, Eugene

(1850-1895)

In "The Fastidious Fooey Mancucu" (parody, included in REH to Tevis Clyde Smith, ca. October 1927), Howard has a character say: "He thought it was merely Eugene Field and one of his pranks." According to The Reader's Encyclopedia, Field was "Expelled from three colleges because of his pranks…."

Fielding, William J[ohn]

(1886-1973)

REH to Tevis Clyde Smith, ca. March 1928: "Long live such men as Markun and Fielding, who realize that psychology has its roots deep in biology."

Fielding was the author of books on psychology, including a number of Little Blue Books (q.v.). The Puzzle of Personality (Little Blue Book #217), adapted from Fielding's The Cave Man Within Us (1922), pertains particularly to this topic.

Firkins, Chester

"Canoe Song of the North."

Argosy All-Story Weekly, 6 January 1923.

Howard used lines 6-8 of this poem as a heading for the second issue of his amateur journal, The Right Hook, in 1925.

The opening stanza, "On lakes adream our paddles gleam, | Ashore the grim pines croon; | On waves of light we ride the bright | Gold highways of the moon," seems to have inspired one of the verses in "Men of the Shadows" (untitled but later published as "The Chant of the White Beard"): "O'er lakes agleam the old gods dream; | Ghosts stride the heather dim. | The night winds croon; the eery moon | Slips o'er the ocean's rim."

Fitzgerald, Edward

(1809-1883) (translator)

The Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám

(1861). 30827 (as "Khayyam - The Rubyiat"); PQ3 (author as "Khayam"), PQ4; GL (as "Khayyam, Omar, The Rubyiat"); TDB (listed among books which "were donated to the Robert E. Howard Memorial Collection and never formed part of Howard's own library."). Still in HPU holdings.

REH to Tevis Clyde Smith, 8 June 1923: "In the words of Omar Khayyam: 'East is East and West is West | To a ramblin' gay galoot.'"

REH to Tevis Clyde Smith, 6 August 1925, quotes four stanzas (in the 5th edition, stanzas II, LXXV, XII, XIV).

REH to Tevis Clyde Smith, ca. 20 February 1928 [SL 1 #10]: "I have carefully gone over, in my mind, the most powerful men – that is, in my opinion – in all of the world's literature and here is my list: Jack London, Leonid Andreyev, Omar Khayyam, Eugene O'Neill, William Shakespeare. ¶ "All these men, and especially London and Khayyam, to my mind stand out so far above the rest of the world that comparison is futile, a waste of time. Reading these men and appreciating them makes a man feel life is not altogether useless."

"Skull-Face" (Weird Tales, October, November, December 1929 [3 part serial]): Heading for Chapter 1 is from Stanza LXVIII, ll. 1-2 (5th ed.); for Chapter 2 is from Stanza XXXI, ll. 1-2 (5th ed.); for Chapter 3 is from Stanza LXX, ll. 3-4 (5th ed.); for Chapter 4 is from Stanza XXXII, ll. 1-2 (5th ed.).

REH to H.P. Lovecraft, ca. December 1932: Omar Khayyam is listed among a number of poets Howard likes.

One Who Walked Alone, p. 92: "Bob's attention was centered on a copy of The Rubáiyat. He already had a copy, but he said he might come back next week and pick up that book..."

[Steve Trout is of the opinion that Howard's quotations from Khayyam are taken from Little Blue Book #1, which follows the text of the 5th edition. The copy in the REH Memorial Collection at HPU was donated by Howard's father (see Appendix Three), but as can be seen from the above, Howard obviously had at least one copy of the book.]

Fitzgerald, Francis Scott Key

(1896-1940)

Mentioned in "The Fastidious Fooey Mancucu" (parody, included in REH to Tevis Clyde Smith, ca. October 1927) as "F. Scotch Hitsgerald" and his new book, "The Snootiful But Damned" (The Beautiful and Damned, 1921).

REH to H.P. Lovecraft, ca. December 1932 includes Fitzgerald among a group of writers of whom Howard says, "...three ringing razzberries for the whole mob....they're all wet smacks."

Flannagan, Roy [Catesby]

(1897-1952)

The Whipping

New York: Jonathan Cape & Harrison Smith, 1930. 30774; PQ3; GL; TDB.

Mainstream novel of a woman in a small Southern town who is whipped by a Ku Klux Klan-like gang

Flecker, James Elroy

(1884-1915)

REH to H.P. Lovecraft, ca. December 1932: Flecker is listed among a number of poets Howard likes.

Tevis Clyde Smith, "Adventurer in Pulp": "James Elroy Flecker...[was] among his favorite poets..."

"The Gates of Damascus."

REH to H.P. Lovecraft, ca. October 1930 [SL 1 #47]: "By the way, I recently sold Weird Tales a short story, 'The Children of the Night' ... quoting lines from Flecker's 'Gates of Damascus' and lending them a cryptic meaning which I'm sure would have astounded the poet remarkably!"

From "The Children of the Night" (Weird Tales, April/May 1931): "Do you remember Von Junzt's hints of 'a city in the waste'? What do you think of Flecker's line: ¶ 'Pass not beneath! Men say there blows in stony-deserts still a rose | 'But with no scarlet to her leaf – and from whose heart no perfume flows.'"

Fleischer, Nat[haniel S.]

(1887-1972)

Jack Dempsey

The Idol of Fistiana; An Intimate Narrative with Numerous Illustrations. New York: Ring Library, 1929. 30696; PQ3; GL; TDB.

[Note in TDB: Lord notes that Fleischer edited Ring Magazine.]

Flinders, W.M.

[See The Book of History and "Petrie, Sir W.M. Flinders"]

Folk Songs and Ballads

Howard was a student of folk songs and ballads. He corresponded with the early collector of folk songs, Robert W. Gordon (1888-1961), during the period Gordon edited the "Old Songs That Men Have Sung" department for Adventure magazine.

REH to R.W. Gordon, 4 February 1925, included lyrics to "Young Johnny" [appeared in Adventure, 23 August 1926], "Rain No Mo'," and "The Mermaid" (as "Title Unknown");

REH to R.W. Gordon, 15 February 1926 included "On the Lakes of the Pontchartrain," "Sanford Burns" [appeared in Adventure, 1 March 1927], and "My Old Beaver Cap";

REH to R.W. Gordon, 9 April 1926 included "omitted" stanza of "Barbara Allen," "The Belle of Edinburgh Town," "Pretty Polly," "A Fragment" ("Oh, Caroline won't you be mine"), "Nancy Till" (as "Nelly Till"), "Brady," and "Tavern Song";

REH to R.W. Gordon, 2 January 1927 included "Botany Bay," "The Highwayman," and "Blow Boys Blow";

REH to R.W. Gordon, 17 March 1927 included "The Scout's Lament," "Mississippi Gals," "The Amsterdam Maid," "Tommy's Gone to Hilo," "Blow the Man Down," and "The Jubilee";

REH to R.W. Gordon, 14 May 1928 included an untitled song ("Now the stars are all gleaming").

Howard mentioned or quoted from many folk songs in his letters to H.P. Lovecraft.

REH to H.P. Lovecraft, ca. December 1930 [SL 1 #49]: "...very seldom do you even hear any of the old range songs any more - 'Sam Bass,' 'The Killing of Jesse James,' 'The Old Chisholm Trail,' 'Utah Charlie,' 'San Antonio,' 'The Ranger.' ¶ But Texas was never as prolific in the matter of songs as Arkansas, for instance. In the Scotch-Irish settlement of Holly Springs where William Benjamin Howard settled in 1858, they still sang songs that carried the tang of the heather, though the singers were generations removed from the old country. Forty years ago such songs were popular there, as 'Barbara Allen,' 'William Hall, a Young Highlander,' 'The Wearin' of the Green,' 'Little Susie, the Pride of Kildare,' 'Shamus O'Brien,' one the name of which I forget but it had to do with the elopement of 'pretty Polly' with one 'Lord Thomas' who had drowned 'six king's daughters,' 'Caroline, the Belle of Edinburgh-town,' and one which began ¶ 'Young Johnny's been on sea, | Young Johnny's been on shore, | Young Johnny's been in New Orleans | Where he has been before.' ¶ Narrating the triumph of a prosperous young sailor over an avaricious landlady. Then there was another, the name of which I do not know, but it contained the lines ¶ 'Oh, come to me arms, Nora darlint, | Bid your frinds and ould companions good-boi, | For it's happy we will be in thot dear land av the free, | Livin' happily wid Barney McCoy.' ¶ Then there was one which must be very old, dealing with 'Fair Elinor,' 'Lord Thomas' and 'the brown girl.' Lord Thomas married the brown girl because of her wealth, but invited Fair Elinor to the banquet, where the jealous brown girl killed her with 'a wee penknife.' Thus the horrific climax: | 'Lord Thomas having a Hielan' sword, | It being sharp and small, | He cut off the brown girl's head | And threw it against the wall!'"

REH to H.P. Lovecraft, ca. January 1931: "And Sam Bass, of whom the old song narrates: ¶ 'Sam Bass was born in Indiana, that was his native home, | And at the age of seventeen, young Sam began to roam. | He first came out to Texas, a drover for to be, | And a kinder hearted fellow, you seldom ever see. | Sam used to deal in race stock, one called the Denton Mare; | He matched her in scrub races and took her to the Fair. | Sam used to coin the money, and he spent it just as free, | He always drank good whiskey, where-ever he might be.'

REH to H.P. Lovecraft, ca. August 1931: "We of the Southwest - of the old stock, at least - are inclined to be a gloomy race. Our folk-songs reflect our natures. The greater majority of the songs and ballads which grew up in, or were favorites in the early Southwest, dealt almost exclusively with battle, murder and sudden death. Listen to some of the lines of a few: ¶ 'As I rode by Tom Sherman's barroom, Tom Sherman's barroom, so | early one day, | 'I saw a young cowboy, so young and so handsome, all wrapped in | linen, as though for the grave!' | And: | 'Twas in the merry month of May, when all sweet buds were swelling, | 'Sweet William on his death-bed lay, for the love of Barbara Allen!' | And: | 'One morning, one morning, one morning in May, | 'I heard an old soldier, lamentingly say - ' | And: | 'Come all you punchers and listen to my tale, | 'While I tell you of my troubles on the Old Chisholm Trail - ' | And: | 'Oh, beat the drum slowly and play the fife slowly, | 'And play the death-march as you bear me along! | 'Take me to some green valley and lay the sod o'er me, | 'For I'm a young cowboy and I know I've done wrong!' | And: | 'He had wasted in pain, till o'er his brow, | 'The shades of death were gathering now. | 'And he thought of his home and his loved ones nigh | 'And the cowboys gathered to see him die!' | And: | 'Early in the morning, in the month of May, | 'Brady came down on the morning train, | 'Brady came down on the Shining Star, | 'And he shot Mr. Duncan in behind the bar!' | And: | 'Oh, once in the saddle I used to go dashing, | 'Oh, once in the saddle I used to look brave, | 'I then got to drinking, and then took to gambling, | 'Got into a fight, and now for the grave.' | And: | 'Oh, put me in that dungeon, oh, put me in that cell - | 'Put me where the north wind blows from the southeast | corner of Hell!' | And: | 'The dogs they did howl, the dogs they did bark, | 'When Stackerlee the murderer went creeping through the dark - | 'Everybody talk about Stackerlee!' | And: | 'Come all of you my brother scouts, | 'And listen to my song; | 'Come let us sing together | 'Though the shadows fall so long.'"

REH to H.P. Lovecraft, ca. October 1931: "It's strange how old some of those songs are, and how long the old ballads lingered. For instance, 'Barbara Allen' at one time sung all over the South and Southwest. It's age can be calculated when it is known that the last stanza of the original version - which stanza I have never heard sung - is as follows: ¶ But by and rade the Black Douglas, | And wow, but he was rough! | For he tore up the bonny briar | And threw it in St. ____'s Loch. ¶ I've forgotten the name of the Loch and so leave it blank. [REH to R.W. Gordon, 9 April 1926, gives this last line as "And thraw it in St. Levins (?) loch."] And then there was an old drinking song very popular in taverns a generation ago: ¶ Old Compass lies dead and is under the ground, | Ho, ho! under the ground! | A green apple tree grew over his head, | Ho, ho! over his head! ¶ The revellers had long forgotten who or what 'Old Compass' was, but in correspondence with Gordon, the ardent collector and student of folk-songs, I learned that this was a distortion of an old English song of the days of the Commonwealth, and that 'Old Compass' was none less than the bloody hypocrite himself, Cromwell. But this song was never popular in Texas; it flourished in the Irish communities of Arkansas."

REH to H.P. Lovecraft, ca. October 1932 [SL 2 #64]: quotes three verses of 'The Lakes of the Pontchartrain'

REH to H.P. Lovecraft, ca. November 1932 [SL 2 #65]: quotes 'Oh, Susanna,' 'John Brown's Body,' 'We'll hang Abe Lincoln to a sour-apple tree,' 'The Bonny Blue Flag,' 'The Battle-Cry of Freedom,' 'Get Along, Little Dogies,' 'Tom Quick,' 'The Pride of the Mohawk Vale,' and "the old New England ballad relating the fate of 'Deacon Jones's oldest son' who 'just had turned his twenty-one.' Who was nipped in the heel by a 'venomous rep-tile', and the ballad of which concluded with the warning, ¶ 'Come all, young men, | And warning take, | And never get bit | By a big black snake.'"

REH to H.P. Lovecraft, ca. July 1934: "On the way back to Brownwood [St. Patrick's Day] I enlivened our progress by bellowing 'Wearin' of the Green', 'The Shan Van Vocht', 'The Risin' of the Moon' and other belligerent Gaelic chants...

"The Last Ride" (Western Aces, October 1935, with Robert Enders Allen), incorporates verses from "Brady." "

Knife, Bullet and Noose" incorporates a verse from (apparently) "Jesse James."

"Drums of the Sunset" (Cross Plains Review, 2 November 1928 through 4 January 1929 [9 part serial]) incorporates verses from "The Old Chisholm Trail," "The Dying Cowboy," and "Sam Bass." [The quoted lines from "Sam Bass" ("He first come in the money and he spent it just as free! | He always drank good liquor wherever he might be.") differ from the same lines quoted to H.P. Lovecraft, ca. January 1931: "Sam used to coin the money, and he spent it just as free, | He always drank good whiskey, where-ever he might be." ]

"Lord of Samarkand" (Oriental Stories, Spring 1932) uses verses from an old Scottish ballad, "The Ballad of Otterbourne" (probably the version in Parrot and Long, English Poems from Chaucer to Kipling [q.v.]) as headings for Chapters 2 (ll. 33-36), 3 (ll. 21-24, 4 (ll. 45-48), and 8 (ll. 73-76).

"'For the Love of Barbara Allen'" (originally untitled) is based upon the folk song of that title, and incorporates verses from it.

One Who Walked Alone, p. 226, refers to Howard's interest in old folk ballads, "wanting me to write them down exactly as Mammy sang them."

Ford, Corey

(1902-1969)

Three Rousing Cheers for the Rollo Boys

New York: George H. Doran, 1925.

Tevis Clyde Smith, "Report on a Writing Man": "...the pleasure a number of us received during the Christmas Holiday in 1925 from reading Three Rousing Cheers for the Rollo Boys, a clever book by Corey Ford." [See also Riddell, John]

Fort, Charles [Hoy]

(1874-1932)

Lo!

New York: Claude Kendall, 1931. 30870; PQ3; GL.

Foxcroft, Frank

(1850-1921) (ed.)

War Verse

Eighth printing. New York: Thomas Y. Crowell Co., 1918. 30820; PQ1; GL; TDB. Still in HPU holdings.

France, Hector

(1840-1908)

Musk, Hashish and Blood

London and Paris: "Printed for Subscribers Only," 1900. [A later edition, privately printed by the Panurge Press, New York, in an edition of 2010 copies, also exists, as may other editions.] 30629; PQ3; GL; TDB.

REH to H.P. Lovecraft, 13 May 1936: "You ought to read Hector France's 'Musk, Hashish and Blood'...if you want to get a realistic view of French colonial policy."

Franklin, Benjamin

(1706-1790)

Mentioned in Howard's parody, "The Rump of Swift" (written ca. June 1928).

Frazer, Sir James George

(1854-1941)

The Golden Bough

A Study in Comparative Religion. 2 volumes. London and New York: Macmillan and Co., 1890.

"Spectres in the Dark": "I had settled myself comfortably with a volume of Fraser's Golden Bough..."

[Originally published in two volumes, by 1915 this work had expanded to twelve. Frazer himself then produced a one-volume abridgement, The Golden Bough: A Study in Magic and Religion (New York: The Macmillan Co., 1922) which went through many printings.]

French literature

REH to H.P. Lovecraft , ca. 2 November 1932 [SL 2 #65]: "I admire many points of the French character, but I can not include their literature. This is no criticism, only my own personal viewpoint. I certainly don't consider myself a critic, but I know what I like and what I don't like. And I don't like French literature. If I were able to read it in the untranslated original, I might like it better, but I doubt it. There's a polished hardness about the literature of the Latins that I don't relish. Even when it lack this polish, I don't care for it."

REH to H.P. Lovecraft , ca. December 1932: "No doubt the French excel us in many phases of literature. The point is that personally I can't endure much of the stuff. After wading through a few chapters, my teeth get on edge and I am aware of an almost overpowering desire to spring from my chair and kick somebody violently in the pants.... Maybe the French excel the British in some ways, but where is the Frenchman who writes, or wrote, with the fire of Jack London, the mysticism of Ambrose Bierce, or the terrific power your own weird masterpieces possess?"

[See entries for "Balzac," "Baudelaire," "De Maupassant," "Dumas," "Gautier," "Rabelais," "Villon," "Verlaine," et "Voltaire."]

Friel, Arthur O[lney]

(1885-1959)

REH to Carl Jacobi, ca. June 1934: "I was much interested to note that you are acquainted with Arthur O. Friel. He has been one of my favorite authors for years. I have not read the book you mention, but it sounds good."

"The Barrigudo."

Adventure, 1 June 1921.

[See Appendix Two]

"Black Hawk."

Adventure, 10 March 1922.

[See Appendix Two]

"The Jararaca."

Adventure, 30 December 1921.

[See Appendix Two]

"The Pathless Trail."

Adventure, 10 October - 10 November 1921 (4 parts).

[See Appendix Two]

"The Tailed Men."

Adventure, 14 February 1921.

[See Appendix Two]

"Tupahn—The Thunderstorm."

Adventure, 10 May 1922.

[See Appendix Two]

Frontier Times

See entry for John C. Duval, Adventures of Bigfoot Wallace.

This magazine also reprinted Howard's "The Ghost of Camp Colorado" in the June 1931 issue.

Frost, Robert

(1874-1963)

Mentioned in Howard's parody, "The People of the Winged Skulls" (probably written ca. 1928) and in the poem, "A Fable for Critics"

Frothingham, Robert

(ed.)

Songs of Adventure

An anthology selected and arranged by Robert Frothingham. Cambridge, MA: Houghton Mifflin Co., The Riverside Press, 1926.

This collection is listed here because it contains "The Closed Door," by Benjamin De Casseres (q.v.) and "The House of Cæsar" by Viola Garvin (q.v.). The latter appears to be the source of Howard's suicide couplet, and this is the only appearance of the poem that I have been able to locate. The anthology also includes Bill Adams' "Flower of the Morning" (q.v.), although under the title "Light of Morning." Also included are verses by J. Allan Dunn, George Allan England, James Elroy Flecker, Rudyard Kipling, Henry Herbert Knibbs, and Talbot Mundy, all of whom appear in this listing.

Frothingham originated the "Old Songs That Men Have Sung" department in Adventure.

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