REH Bookshelf - S

compiled by Rusty Burke

Sabatini, Rafael

(1875-1950)

The Snare

New York: Grosset & Dunlap, n.d. [1925]. 30665; PQ4; GL; TDB. Still in HPU holdings.

Inscribed on both sides of front free endpaper: "Merry Xmas | - Bob - | -from Clyde - | [line drawn across page] | Say, Bob, you remember that | little passage about "wrecking | the jail" and the shocking | language which was also | included - shocking to a Puritan - | by the way you and I have | never had any love for Puritans - | well I sent this excerpt to | Klatt, and told him that he | would probably break conventions | in that manner, But I guess | if any of it ever comes true, | it will be flat ly, as Sand- | burg said it: that is, if it | comes true for you and me. | I only hope that we don't | [to verso of front free endpaper]: to break out any time | within the near | future, as I have | other things on my | mind. | And so we will be | suffering while Klatt is | raising h--- on | the out side, by the | way."

The Saga of Burnt Nial

REH to Harry Bates, 1 June 1931: [In submitting "Spears of Clontarf" for Clayton Publications' Torchlights of History]: "In gathering material for this story I have drawn on such sources as... 'The Saga of Burnt Nial'..."

[It is likely that Howard’s true source for material from this saga was P.W. Joyce’s A Short History of Gaelic Ireland, in which chapters on “The Danish Wars” and, in particular, “The Battle of Clontarf,” make extensive use of “The Saga or Story of Burnt Nial, translated by Sir George Webbe Dasent.” This would be The Story of Burnt Njal; from the Icelandic of the Njal’s Saga. Translated by Sir George Webb Dasent (1817-1896), originally published 1861.]

Sampson, Emma Speed

(1868-1947)

Billy and the Major

Chicago: The Reilly & Britton Co., 1918. 30803; PQ4; GL; TDB.

Miss Minerva's Baby

Chicago: Reilly & Lee, 1920. 30659; PQ4; GL; TDB.

Miss Minerva Broadcasts Billy

Chicago: Reilly & Lee, 1925. 30732; PQ4; GL; TDB.

Miss Minerva on the Old Plantation

Chicago: Reilly & Lee, 1923. 30710; PQ4; GL; TDB.

Sandburg, Carl

(1878-1967)

REH to Tevis Clyde Smith, 16 July 1925 [SL 1 #3, portion omitted, follows "I'm writing this on the new typewriter."] "In Carl S.'s style:" [poem "And Dempsey climbed into the ring and the crowd sneered"].

The American Songbag

New York: Harcourt, Brace & Co., 1927.

REH to H.P. Lovecraft, ca. November 1932 [SL 2 #65]: "I used to correspond with one R.W. Gordon who was collecting old songs for an anthology -- though I never got the chance of examining the completed work. The best thing of its kind I ever saw was an anthology compiled by Carl Sandburg, in which I found numbers of old songs I knew by heart but had never seen in print."

"To a Contemporary Bunkshooter."

REH to Tevis Clyde Smith, 6 August 1925: "Say, it's asking a lot, but I wish sometime when you have plenty of time you'd copy off that poem of Sandburg's about 'The Contemporary Bunk-slinger' something or other and send it to me." [He says he is having some arguments with a friend who expresses narrowly conservative religious ideas and he is "slinging all the radical stuff I could find his way."] "But he's a good fellow after all. Merely, like all Christians of that type the idea that there isn't any hell for them to relegate their enemies to with smug satisfaction, is disagreeable. So I want to give him Sandburg's idea. He has never read S. and I want to hear him say Carl is a damn fool. Which he will."

[Sandburg's poem appears in his collection, Chicago Poems (New York: Henry Holt, 1916).]

San Martin

Only this title is given on the accessions list, number 30847. Not included in PQ, GL or TDB listings. I have located only two English-language books on José de San Martin published before 1936: The Emancipation of South America, being a condensed translation by William Pilling of the History of San Martin, by General Don Bartolomé Mitre (London: Chapman & Hall, 1893); and Don José de San Martin, 1778-1850, A Study of His Career, by Anna Schoellkopf (New York: Boni & Liveright, 1924). The story of this South American liberator seems likely to have appealed to Howard, given that among his commanders were the Irishmen Michael Brown and Bernardo O'Higgins, and a Scotsman, Lord Cochrane.

Santayana, George

(1863-1952)

REH to H.P. Lovecraft, ca. May-June 1933 [SL 2 #67]: "My tastes and habits are simple; I am neither erudite nor sophisticated. I prefer jazz to classical music, musical burlesques to Greek tragedy, A. Conan Doyle to Balzac, Bob Service's verse to Santayana's writing, a prize fight to a lecture on art."

[H.P. Lovecraft to Kenneth Sterling, 14 December 1935 (H.P. Lovecraft Selected Letters V.817): "Two-Gun is interesting because he has refused to let his thoughts & feelings be standardized. He remains himself. He couldn't -- today -- solve a quadratic equation, & probably thinks that Santayana is a brand of coffee..."]

Sappho

(ca. 6th c. B.C.)

REH to Harold Preece, ca. December 1928 [SL 1 #20]: "Sappho: doubtless the greatest women poet who ever lived; certainly one of the greatest of all time. The direct incentive of the lyric age of Greece, the age that for pure beauty, surpasses all others. How shall a pen like mine sing of the beauties of Sappho, of the golden streams which flowed from her pen, of her voice which was fairer than the song of a dark star, of the fragrance of her hair and shimmering loveliness of her body? Has it been proved that she was a Lesbian in the generally accepted sense of the word? Who ever accused her but the early Christian -- ignorant monks and monastery swine who were set on breaking all the old golden idols; and Daudet, a libertine, a grovelling ape who could see no good in anything; Mure, a drunkard and a blatant braggart, whose word I hold of less weight than a feather drifting before a south wind. May the saints preserve Comparetti, who was man enough to uphold pure womanhood, and scholar enough to prove what he said. No prude was Sappho, but a full-blooded woman, passionate and open-hearted, with a golden song and a soul large enough to enfold the whole world." [He quotes a number of lines from Sappho.] "The translation is weak and pallid in comparison with the 'winged words' of the original Greek. But even so, we catch the haunting melody, the wistful yet powerful, almost overcoming, beauty of the songs of Sappho. God be with her -- gone to the dust twenty-five hundred years ago -- more than two thousand years ago." [He quotes a verse from Swinburne's "Anactoria."]

[I am of the opinion that Howard took most of this from the chapter on Sappho in Mitchell Carroll, Greek Women, Volume I of Woman; in all ages and in all countries (q.v. under series title). All the quotations REH uses are to be found in precisely the same form on pp. 123-125 of that book, the only exception being that Howard's second quotation ("Lo, Love once more, the limb-dissolving king") omits the second line ("The bitter-sweet, impracticable thing"). Even the quotation from Swinburne's "Anactoria" is identical to that on p. 127 of the book. Daudet, Mure, and Comparetti are discussed on pp. 114-115, though the judgments Howard pronounces are his own.]

Sassoon, Siegfried

(1886-1967)

REH to Tevis Clyde Smith, n.d. (prps. late 1928): "If what you write merits a lot of supercilious question marks after it, the the good Lord knows Shelley and Sassoon are sitting on paper thrones." Mentioned in Howard's untitled parody (" 'Hatrack!' a voice came to me dimly…"), included in REH to Tevis Clyde Smith, ca. March 1929, as "Siegfried Jazzoon."

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

[Howard's copy of Robert W. Service's The Pretender (q.v.) bore the inscription, on the front free endpaper: "My dear Sassoon: | See the cuckoo in | the tree | And when you | see him think of me | Rupert Brooke." In my opinion, the handwriting is that of Clyde Smith.]

Saturday Evening Post

See Armour, J. Ogden; Byrne, Donn; Corbett, James J.; Lorimer, George Horace.

Saxon, Lyle

(1891-1946)

Howard's poem, "To Lyle Saxon," is dedicated to this Louisiana author (Fabulous New Orleans [1928], Old Louisiana [1929], Lafitte the Pirate [1930], etc.)

Sayers, Dorothy

(1893-1957) (ed.).

The Omnibus of Crime

Garden City, New York: Garden City Publishing Co., 1929. 30637 (as "Sawyers"); PQ1; GL; TDB. Still in HPU holdings.

[Contents: "The History of Bel" / "The History of Susanna" / "The Story of Hercules and Cacus" / "The Story of Rhampsinitus" / Mrs. Henry Wood, "The Ebony Box" / Hedley Barker, "The Ace of Trouble" / Edgar Allan Poe, "The Mystery of Marie Rogêt" / Conan Doyle, "The Adventure of the Priory School" / Ernst Brahmah, "The Ghost at Massingham Mansions" / F.A.M. Webster, "The Secret of the Singular Cipher" / Bechhofer Roberts, "The English Filter" / E.C. Bentley, "The Clever Cockatoo" / Eden Philpotts, "Prince Charlie's Dirk" / Robert Barr, "The Absent-minded Coterie" / L.T. Meade and Robert Eustace, "The Face in the Dark" / Edgar Jepson and Robert Eustace, "Mr. Belton's Immunity" / Anthony Wynne, "The Cyprian Bees" / F. Britten Austin, "Diamond Cut Diamond" / Raymund Allen, "A Happy Solution" / Percival Wilde, "The Adventure of the Fallen Angels" / Victor Whitechurch, "Sir Gilbert Murrell's Picture" / G.K. Chesterton, "The Hammer of God" / H.C. Bailey, "The Long Barrow" / Sir Basil Thomson, "The Hanover Court Murder" / Aldous Huxley, "The Gioconda Smile" / Mrs. Belloc Lowndes, "Her Last Adventure" / E.W. Hornung, "The Wrong House" / Mrs. Oliphant, "The Open Door" / Charles Dickens, "Story of the Bagman's Uncle" / Charles Collins and Charles Dickens, "The Trial for Murder" / M.R. James, "Martin's Close" / Robert Hichens, "How Love Came to Professor Guildea" / Saki, "The Open Window" / Arthur Machen, "The Novel of the Black Seal" / Sax Rohmer, "Tchériapin" / W.W. Jacobs, "The Monkey's Paw" / A.J. Alan, "The Hair" / E.F. Benson, "Mrs. Amworth" / Ambrose Bierce, "Moxon's Master" / Jerome K. Jerome, "The Dancing Partner" / R.L. Stevenson, "Thrawn Janet" / Marjorie Bowen, "The Avenging of Ann Leete" / W.F. Harvey, "August Heat" / Morley Roberts, "The Anticipator" / Joseph Conrad, "The Brute" / May Sinclair, "Where their Fire is Not Quenched" / J.S. LeFanu, "Green Tea" / J.D. Beresford, "The Misanthrope" / John Metcalfe, "The Bad Lands" / A.M. Burrage, "Nobody's House" / A.C. Quiller-Couch, "The Seventh Man" / N. Royde-Smith, "Proof" / Walter de la Mare, "Seaton's Aunt" / Edward Lucas White, "Lukundoo" / Michael Arlen, "The Gentleman from America" / R. Ellis Roberts, "The Narrow Way" / Traditional Tales of the Lowlands, "Sawney Bean" / Bram Stoker, "The Squaw" / Violet Hunt, "The Corsican Sisters" / Barry Pain, "The End of a Show" / H.G. Wells, "The Cone" / Ethel Colburn Mayne, "The Separate Room"]

Sayler, Harry Lincoln

(1863- )

See "Whitney, Elliott."

Scandinavian literature

REH to H.P. Lovecraft, ca. 2 November 1932 [SL 2 #65]: "I find the old Scandinavian sagas fascinating, but I can't work up any interest in modern Scandinavian writers. They seem further removed from the pristine Viking type than the English writers.

Schidloff, Berthold, M.D.

Sexual Life of South Sea Natives

In Venus Oceanica; The Sexual Life of South Sea Natives, by Prof. B. Schidloff; Erotic Rituals of Australian Aboriginals by Doctor H. Basedow; Ethnopornographia by Doctor W.E. Roth. Edited by R[onald] Burton. Privately Printed for Subscribers. New York: Oceanica Research Press, 1935.

REH to H.P. Lovecraft, ca. January-February 1935: "For instance Professor B. Schidloff, the noted anthropologist, says in the introduction to one of his most profound books: '-- No thinking person who forms his own opinion on the modern times doubts any longer that civilization is equivalent to moral degeneracy.' If I'd said that I bet you'd have instantly accused me of enmity to progress and enlightenment. But are you going to say that Schidloff is 'an enemy to humanity'?"

[The quoted passage is from p. 37, Schidloff's "Introduction" to his section of the book. This is a translation of his Das Sexualleben der Australier und Ozeanier (1908).]

Schopenhauer, Arthur

(1788-1860)

REH to Tevis Clyde Smith, ca. 20 February 1928 [SL 1 #10]: "Nietzsche never untwined the human from the cosmic nor did Schopenhauer."

Schorer, Mark

(1908-1977)

See "Derleth, August and Mark Schorer."

Schreiner, Olive

(1855-1920)

The Story of an African Farm

London: Chapman & Hall, 1883.

Harold Preece, "The Last Celt," in The Last Celt, p. 95: "I remember that Bob had bought several books during the trip, and they were in sight.... I had heard of Miss [Nathalia] Crane, but not of Olive Schreiner, whose STORY OF AN AFRICAN FARM was also among Bob's purchases."

[The trip mentioned was to Austin, Texas, ca. 22 August 1927, during which he and Preece first met.]

"Visions of the Hunter."

Post Oaks and Sand Roughs, p. 36: "He ["Lars Jansen" = R. Fowler Gafford] had almost memorized by heart Schreiner's Visions, and in repeating them to Steve ["Steve Costigan" = REH] instilled a mystic fire in the telling which caused Steve to thrill more than when he read them."

[Ibid., p. 49]: "He [Jansen] again narrated Olive Schreiner's "Visions of the Hunter," seeming to find in it a great deal of solace."

[A section appended to The Story of an African Farm, titled "Dreams," contains a vignette entitled "The Hunter."]

Schurtz, Heinrich

(1863-1903)

"Spain and Its Conquerors,"

in The Book of History (q.v.), volume 7, pp. 3508ff.

REH to H.P. Lovecraft, ca. September 1933: "I have it on the authority of Professor Heinrich Shurtz, that after the invasion of Spain by the mixed bands of Vandals, Alani and Suevi who overthrew the Roman bureaucracy, the coming of the Visigoths as allies of the Roman governors was not looked upon by the natives as the return of rescuers."

Schurtz wrote (p. 3510): "The German races already settled in Spain were driven into the wild North-west, and Roman governors were reinstated in the provinces.... And it is a strange and significant fact that when the hated barbarians were driven into the Galician mountains, numbers of the natives joined their ranks, preferring to share danger and freedom with the wild sons of the North rather than bow their necks again under the yoke of the Roman military bureaucracy."

Scott, Sir Walter

(1771-1832)

REH to H.P. Lovecraft, ca. November 1932 [SL 2 #65]: "Dumas has a virility lacking in other French writers – I attribute it to his negroid strain – but his historical fiction lacks, at least to me, the gripping vividness of Sir Walter Scott, for instance..."

[Ibid.]: "I wouldn't take anything, though, for my early readings of Scott, Dickens and other English writers."

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

Tevis Clyde Smith, "Adventurer in Pulp": Scott was "among his favorite writers...."

Seabrook, William [Buehler]

(1887-1945)

REH to H.P. Lovecraft, 13 May 1936: "You ought to read ... some of Seabrook's travel books if you want to get a realistic view of French colonial policy."

[Adventures in Arabia; Among the Bedouins, Druses, Whirling Dervishes & Yezidee Devil Worshippers (1927); The Magic Island (1929; concerns Haiti); Jungle Ways (1931; concerns French West Africa, Mali, Ivory Coast, Upper Volta); Air Adventure; From Paris to the Sahara Desert and Timbuctoo (1933); The White Monk of Timbuctoo (1934); all New York: Harcourt, Brace & Co.]

Seeger, Alan

(1888-1916)

REH to Tevis Clyde Smith, 6 August 1926: "Did you ever read anything by Alan Seeger? I've been thinking about getting some of his poetry."

Service, Robert W[illiam]

(1874-1958)

Post Oaks and Sand Roughs, p. 74: "Steve [Costigan = REH] tried rhymes. He wrote a great deal of jingling, jangling verse on the order of Robert W. Service, for whom he entertained a regard second only to Rudyard Kipling. Clive [Hilton = Tevis Clyde Smith] considered Service the greatest poet of all time, but Steve leaned toward Kipling, because, as he said, Service wrote a few rotten poems, but Kipling never did. The rhymes of Service made Steve freeze and burn inside, and he sought to imitate him."

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

REH to H.P. Lovecraft, ca. May-June 1933 [SL 2 #67]: "My tastes and habits are simple; I am neither erudite nor sophisticated. I prefer jazz to classical music, musical burlesques to Greek tragedy, A. Conan Doyle to Balzac, Bob Service's verse to Santayana's writing, a prize fight to a lecture on art."

REH to H.P. Lovecraft, ca. September 1933: "If I can enjoy (for instance) both Service and Baudelaire, I see no reason why I should feel inferior to the man who can only enjoy Baudelaire, any more than to the man who can only enjoy Service."

Ballads of a Bohemian

New York: Barse and Hopkins, 1921. 30693; PQ1; GL; TDB. Still in HPU holdings.

The Pretender

a Story of the Latin Quarter. New York: A.L. Burt Co., [n.d.] (1914). 30783; PQ1; GL; TDB. Still in HPU holdings.

Note in PQ1: This book is inscribed on the front free endpaper. "My dear Sassoon: | See the cuckoo in | the tree | And when you | see him think of me | Rupert Brooke." [I am of the opinion that the handwriting of the inscription is Tevis Clyde Smith's.]

Rhymes of a Red-Cross Man

Illustrated by Charles L. Wrenn. New York: Barse and Hopkins, 1916. 30806; PQ1; GL; TDB. Still in HPU holdings.

The book has a two-color (red and black) title page and eight full-color plates.

Rhymes of a Rolling Stone

New York: Dodd, Mead and Co., 1923. 30739 (as "Rolling Stone Rhymes"); PQ1; GL; TDB. Still in HPU holdings.

"A Rolling Stone."

(1912).

[Included in Rhymes of a Rolling Stone.]

REH to Farnsworth Wright, ca. Summer 1931 [SL 2 #54] quotes lines 53-56 ("In belly-pinch I will pay the price, | But God! let me be free; | For once I know in the long ago | They made a slave of me.").

The Spell of the Yukon and Other Verses

New York: Barse and Hopkins, 1907. 30762; PQ1; GL; TDB. Still in HPU holdings.

Shakespeare, William

(1564-1616)

"The Dook of Stork" (parody, included in REH to Tevis Clyde Smith, 7 July 1923), is subtitled "A Dramma by Willie Shakesbeer."

"The Thessalians" (The Yellow Jacket [Howard Payne College], 13 January 1927): "…we played Shakespeare, Marlow, Goethe and some of the moderns."

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." In the same letter, in an untitled scenario, the character "Mike" (apparently the REH viewpoint character) says, "What do people know of the men who struggle to amuse them or to educate them? What is Shakespeare but a name, a mass of words, a dusty volume?"

REH to Tevis Clyde Smith, ca. March 1929: [Following Howard's parodic playlet, "Bastards All"] "I have a feeling that I've unconsciously plagiarized a good deal on this drammer but what the hell. It's very disconnected because my desires wavered between a wish to write straight jovial obscenity and a desire to simply parody Shakespeare and exaggerate and emphasize what I consider show the bastardness of the scut's nature -- the brutal inconsistencies of his characters. I admit that he portrayed human nature that way, but his damnable preachings show his swinishness to my mind. I admit Shakespeare nauseates me quickly. If I might wish for any real power in anything I might write, it would be to write a book proving he wrote all his dramas but making him out such a bastard that it would influence future literature. I can stand all but the ruling class moral tone he puts in from time to time. That isn't an echo of Upty [Upton Sinclair]. I never even read what Upty said about him. He narrates the doings of a bastard, makes you see he is a bastard, then leaves you with the impression that after all, the bastard was morally in the right. Oh, hell, I can't say what I'm trying to... I consider a swing with a mallet an unanswerable argument. At this time, instead of trying to make my friends understand what I can't understand myself, I'd simply seek out a teacher of Shakespeare and slam him with a mallet, thereby exhibiting my contempt for the subject and my stand on the matter as a whole."

REH to H.P. Lovecraft, ca. 13 July 1932: "Once I tried to write polished verse and prose with the classic touch, and my efforts were merely ridiculous, like Falstaff trying to don the mantle of Pindar."

REH to H.P. Lovecraft , ca. 22 September 1932 [SL 2 #64]: "I notice where a mug named Oliver Herford has decided Shakespeare was Lord Oxford. It must have been a momentus decision, affecting the destiny of the world for Olivero to get his map in the magazines. Personally, I never cared whether the Shakespearian plays were written by Shakespeare of Stratford-on-Avon, or Lord Oxford-on-Thames or Lord Bitchbelly of Hogwallow-on-the-Tripe. It's a cinch somebody wrote 'em, because I've read 'em myself, unless I was suffering from an optical delusion, and if so, I enjoyed the delusion. Although there's only one character of Shakespeare that I have any real attachment to, and that's Sir John Falstaff. I have a sincere affection for that old bastard."

[H.P. Lovecraft to REH, 7 October 1932: "As for the authorship of the Shakespearian plays and poems -- I can't take very seriously the various attempts to attribute them to persons other than W.S. of Stratford and London. All the evidence given in such claims seems to me very thin and forced, while a great deal of evidence on the other side exists. Many seem to think that no one with Shakespeare's limited education and commonplace background could have written the existing works -- yet on the other hand I don't believe that they could have been written by anyone without a limited education and commonplace background. The historical and other errors in the plays are numerous and often absurd -- and cannot be explained away as common attributes of the Elizabethan age. Not one of the men -- Bacon, Oxford, etc. -- to whom people have tried to credit the plays could have made such mistakes. Ben Jonson's 'Sejanus' and 'Catiline' shew the exactness of the scholarship prevailing among the really educated men of Shakespeare's time. There is also in Shakespeare a sort of fawning affection for royalty and nobility which eloquently bespeaks the emulous plebian rather than the actual nobleman. To me, the plays and poems seem just about what would naturally be written by a man of prodigious natural genius in the position of William Shakespeare of Stratford. Some are obviously collaborated, but a certain thread of unity runs through them all. I don't for a moment believe that anyone but W.S. is primarily responsible for them."]

REH to H.P. Lovecraft, ca. November 1932 [SL 2 #65]: "I don't doubt that you're right about Shakespeare. I never paid much attention to the anti-Shakespeare theory myself."

REH to H.P. Lovecraft, ca. September 1933: "I quite agree with your estimate of the average newspaper, and do not differ radically with your opinion of radio programs. And yet it would be erroneous to say that all radio programs are entirely without cultural value... I have heard, among other things, such plays as... a number of Shakespearean plays. Of course I had rather see these things on the stage, but as my chances of doing that are so slim they are practically non-existant, I was grateful for the opportunity of hearing them over the air."

Tevis Clyde Smith, "Adventurer in Pulp": "...Shakespeare was his favorite playwright..."

Tevis Clyde Smith, "Report on a Writing Man": "'Shakespeare,' he would say, 'had perspective. That is why he is so great, why he continues to live. It is something so few have. He probably had it more than any man.'"

Hamlet, Prince of Denmark

(ca. 1601).

One Who Walked Alone, p. 204: [During a discussion of whether or not Francis Bacon wrote the Shakespearean plays (in which Howard seems to be suggesting he did)] "'The thinking in those essays [Bacon's] could very well have been in Shakespeare's plays. Read Hamlet. In it, you get something that was bothering the Elizabethans. Bacon especially. They still held to the old belief in blood revenge. You kill my father, and I'll kill your father.... Another idea was growing too, the idea of the responsibility of the State.... Can't you just see those old Elizabethans sitting around talking, trying to decide whether revenge should be done by the next of kin or by the State? Bacon was especially interested in things like that. That's why he wrote his essay on revenge.... You read that essay and then read Hamlet.... See if you don't think that was one of Hamlet's problems."

King Henry the Fifth

(ca. 1599).

REH to Tevis Clyde Smith, ca. March 1932: [Howard was apparently extremely drunk] "You know, Cladye, I have been reading Shajepshere lately and thinjk Prince Henry which was Henry the ¢Fifghth was a dirty swine to turn off Good old Sir John Falstifaff, the on.y human chatacte Shakeperezes ever creaged. If I mete King Henry in hell I will swinge his hides."

Macbeth

(ca. 1606).

Tevis Clyde Smith, "Report on a Writing Man": "He was equally at home in discussing Macbeth and Jack Harkaway."

In One Who Walked Alone, Howard is quoted several times using the phrase "sere and yellow leaf," generally to refer to his own feeling of being old. On page 301, Ellis relates her discovery that the line is from Macbeth. It is from Act V, scene 3, Macbeth's fourth speech.

The Merchant of Venice

(ca. 1595).

REH to H.P. Lovecraft, ca. 6 March 1933: "I was much interested in what you said about the cat-phobia. A most peculiar phenomenon, and one that seems absolutely inexplicable to me... I reckon it's a phobia of long standing. Seems like I remember Shakespeare making some sort of a crack about."

[The Merchant of Venice, Act IV, scene 1, Shylock's first speech: "Some men there are love not a gaping pig; | Some, that are mad if they behold a cat; | and others, when the bag-pipe sings i' th' nose, | cannot contain their urine..."]

Titus Andronicus

(ca. 1594).

"Graveyard Rats": "I’ve seen you poring over Aaron’s lines in ‘Titus Andronicus’: "‘Oft have I digg’d up dead men / from their graves, / And set them upright at their / dear friends’ doors!’"

[These lines are from Act V, Scene I.]

Shaw, George Bernard

(1856-1950)

Mentioned in "King Hootus" (parody, included in REH to Tevis Clyde Smith, ca. January 1928).

Mentioned in "A Fable for Critics." REH to Tevis Clyde Smith, ca. October 1928 [SL 1 #15]: "No one judges George Bernard Shaw, Upton Sinclair, or Jack London by what they wrote in their early youth when they were struggling up the long ladder..."

Mentioned in "Lives and Crimes of Notable Artists" (parody, included in REH to Tevis Clyde Smith, ca. July 1930).

REH to H.P. Lovecraft, ca. December 1932: "I've never read any of G.B. Shaw's muck, either; he's probably a genius. He's also a poser, an egomaniac, and a jackass. I see he's coming to America at last. Very condescending on his part. If I had my way, he'd be met on the wharf by a committee of welcome in top-hats and ivory-headed canes who would tender him the keys of the city, and pull all his whiskers out, hair by hair."

REH to H.P. Lovecraft, 6 March 1933: "...even the superior Mr. Shaw was once a clever boxer."

One Who Walked Alone, p. 119: "Then I very innocently said that I thought the play 'Candida' by George Bernard Shaw was great. He exploded. Apparently, Bob doesn't think the man has a brain in his head."

Shelley, Percy Bysshe

(1792-1822)

REH to Tevis Clyde Smith, n.d. (prps. late 1928): "If what you write merits a lot of supercilious question marks after it, the the good Lord knows Shelley and Sassoon are sitting on paper thrones."

"Ozymandias."

REH to Tevis Clyde Smith, 6 August 1926: "Say, Weird Tales is publishing some fine poetry, reprints, you know. This last issue they published 'Ozymandias' by Shelley..."

Sinclair, Upton [Beall]

(1878-1968)

Mentioned in "King Hootus" (parody, included in REH to Tevis Clyde Smith, ca. January 1928) as "Upanddown Sinclarified."

Mentioned in "The Rump of Swift" (parody, included in REH to Tevis Clyde Smith, ca. June 1928).

Post Oaks and Sand Roughs, p. 36, named as a writer Lars [Jansen = Fowler Gafford] "had never heard of..."

REH to Tevis Clyde Smith, ca. October 1928 [SL 1 #15]: "No one judges George Bernard Shaw, Upton Sinclair, or Jack London by what they wrote in their early youth when they were struggling up the long ladder..."

Mentioned in untitled parody ("'Hatrack!' a voice came to me dimly…") (included in REH to Tevis Clyde Smith, ca. March 1929).

REH to Tevis Clyde Smith, ca. March 1929: (re: William Shakespeare's "ruling class moral tone") "That isn't an echo of Upty. I never even read what Upty said about him."

Mentioned in "A Fable for Critics" (also his books: "The Goose Step," "King Coal," "The Money Changers"): "Tremble ye tyrants, flee with leaps and bounds! | For every book he writes weighs forty pounds! | Ye who but laugh at poets' rhymes and rages | 'Ware the statistics in these deadly pages!"

REH to H.P. Lovecraft, ca. December 1932: "As for American writers, I think yourself and Jim Tully are the only ones whose work will endure; among the writers now living, I mean. Upton Sinclair may get by because of the pictures of economic and social life he draws."

The Jungle

New York: Doubleday, Page & Company, 1906.

The Right Hook, vol. 1, no. 1: "Read Upton Sinclair's 'The Jungle'."

Letters To Judd

An American Workingman. Pasadena, CA: Author, 1925.

Truett Vinson to REH, ca. fall 1925: "Upton has a new book now -- 'Letters to Judd' is the title of it. I'll send you a paper bound copy this week. Be sure to read it."

Howard's copy of this paperbound book was found among his papers.

Mammonart

An Essay in Economic Interpretation. Pasadena: Published by the Author, 1925.

The Right Hook, vol. 1, no. 1: (Under heading "Bookmen and Books") "Upton Sinclair has written a new book, 'Mammonart'. It is just as good as his previous works, though in a different style. It is a complete anyalysis of the world of literature. Upton Sinclair is a great man. The only foremost writer of today who dares lay bare the smut and slime and sin that, hidden by a smooth mask of sham, thrives all over the world. So. The great American commonwealth approaches Upton circumspectly. Perhaps he is a new brand of oats! Then, 'He is a SOCIALIST!' someone brays. That is enough to send the great American commonwealth away a full gallop, flapping their ears in holy horror. We are not a Socialist, personally. We think Socialism has its faults; but we do seek to uphold common sense."

Oil!

A Novel. Long Beach, California: Published by the Author, 1927. 30760; PQ1; GL; TDB. Still in HPU holdings.

Note in PQ2: "There are many pencil underlinings in this book. On p. 346, is the penciled statement: 'We Jews have learned not to go where we're new.'"

The Profits of Religion

A Study of Supernaturalism as a Source of Income and a Shield to Privilege. Pasadena: Upton Sinclair, 1918; New York: Vanguard Press, 1918.

            REH to Tevis Clyde Smith, ca. 20 February 1928 [SL 1 #10]: I've just been reading 'The Profits of Religion'. Upton bids all 'real thinkers' shun the 'morasses' of cosmic thinking. He, in his omnipotence, relegates to the limbo of intellectual oblivion such men as Haeckel, Spencer and the Yogis. Not being quite ready to set Upton on the throne of the Almighty and kow-tow I beg to differ with him... I am disappointed; I thought Upton Sinclair a stronger man than that."

REH to Tevis Clyde Smith, ca. March 1928 [SL 1 #11]: "The only reason for writing this letter is to retract some statements I made in my previous letter, relative to Upton Sinclair and his 'Profits of Religion.' I find on careful perusal that, far from being an idealist propoganda, that the book is undoubtedly the most powerful upholder and exponent of material science I have yet encountered... Glancing over the book for the first time, I came upon an isolated remark dealing with Haeckel and I believe failed to interpret it in its true light... Upton did not fling reflections upon Haeckel as a man nor upon his followers, but simply warned against his material monism... his warning was against all metaphysics in general."

[Ibid.]: "For all human ideas are finite and relative, while the All or One or Unknowable is infinite and absolute. Upton appears to agree perfectly and gives the Yogis great respect. In fact, Upton is more of an occultist than I thought -- he leans more strongly toward the existence of the occult than I... Upton says, in effect, that a man is foolish to deny that which he cannot conceive simply because he cannot conceive it."

Siringo, Charles A.

(1855-1928)

Riata and Spurs

the Story of a Lifetime Spent in the Saddle as Cowboy and Ranger. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co., 1931. 30690; PQ1; GL; TDB. Still in HPU holdings.

REH to Tevis Clyde Smith, ca. April 1932 [SL 2 #62]: "Where did you get the Siringo book, and how much did it cost? If not too much, I think I'll get a copy. I'm interested in the bold buccaleeros of early days."

REH to August W. Derleth, ca. March 1933: "Yet such an absolutely authentic work as Charles Siringo's autobiography contain repeated references to murders and homicides."

[Stamped on bottom of title page, 'A.F. Von Blon | Rare Book Dealer | Waco, Texas.'] This would be the revised edition. The first edition of the book was published in 1927 by the same company. According to J. Frank Dobie, Guide to Life and Literature of the Southwest (Dallas: Southern Methodist University Press, 1952), "Because of a threatened lawsuit, half of it had to be cut and additional material provided for a 'Revised Edition.'"

Skeyhill, Tom [Thomas John]

(1896-1932)

Sergeant York

Last of the Long Hunters. Philadelphia: John C. Winston Co., 1930. 30652 (as "Sergeant York," no subtitle given); PQ4; GL; TDB.

Skeyhill also edited Sergeant York; His own life story and war diary (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, Doran & Co., 1928).

Slavonic literature

REH to H.P. Lovecraft, ca. 2 November 1932 [SL 2 #65]: "Some Slavonic tales are gripping by their sheer somberness, but taken as a whole their literature fails to arouse my enthusiasm. That phrase -- taken as a whole -- is misleading, seeming to indicate that I was deeply familiar with that literature. I'm not, of course. What I meant was that part of the literature which I have read."

Smith, Clark Ashton

(1893-1961)

"The Charnel God." | "The Colossus of Ylourgne." | "The Dark Eidolon." | "The Death of Malygris." | "Demon of the Flower." | "Dominion." | The Double Shadow and Other Stories | "A Dream of the Abyss." | Ebony and Crystal | "Ennui." | "The Flower Women." | "The Hashish-Eater." | "The Holiness of Azedarac." | "The Ice-Demon." | "The Isle of the Torturers." | "The Kingdom of the Worm." | "The Last Heiroglyph." | "The Monster of the Prophecy." | "The Return of the Sorcerer." | "Revenant." | "The Seed From the Sepulchre." | "Ubbo-Sathla." | "The Weaver in the Vault." | "Winter Moonlight."

General Mentions

REH to H.P. Lovecraft, ca. August 1930 [SL 1 #41]: "And I am highly honored to know that Mr. Long and Mr. Clark Ashton Smith have noticed my efforts. Both are writers and poets whose work I very much admire, having carefully preserved all of their poems (as well as all of your's) that have appeared in Weird Tales since I first made my acquaintance with the magazine."

[Smith's poems in Weird Tales prior to this date were: "The Red Moon," July/August 1923; "The Garden of Evil," July/August 1923; "Solution," January 1924; "The Melancholy Pool," March 1924; "A Fable," July 1927; "Interrogation," September 1927; "The Saturnienne," December 1927; "Warning," October 1928; "Sonnet," April 1929; "Nyctalops," October 1929; "The Nightmare Tarn," November 1929; "Fantaisie d'Antan," December 1929; "Ougabalys," January 1930; "Shadows," February 1930.]

REH to Charles D. Hornig, 1 November 1933: "Thanks for the copy of The Fantasy Fan... I am glad to see that you announce a poem by Smith in the next issue. He is a poet second to none."

REH to Clark Ashton Smith, ca. January 1934 [SL 2 #72]: "I hope Wright will let you do a lot of illustrating for Weird Tales, for other stories as well as your own. I'll certainly be glad to see your Zothique stories collected in book form."

"The Charnel God."

Weird Tales, March 1934.

REH to Clark Ashton Smith, ca. March 1934 [SL 2 #73]: "I was glad to see your illustration of your really magnificent 'Charnel God.' That story is really a tremendously powerful thing, sinister figures moving mysteriously against a black background of subtle horror. I don't know when I've read anything I admired more."

REH to Clark Aston Smith, ca. 21 May 1934 [SL 2 #74]: "Yes, I certainly did like the 'The Charnel God' and its fine illustration..."

"The Colossus of Ylourgne."

Weird Tales, June 1934.

REH to Clark Ashton Smith, ca. March 1934 [SL 2 #73]: "I look forward to... 'The Colossus of Ylourgne.'."

REH to Clark Ashton Smith, ca. 21 May 1934 [SL 2 #74]: "I haven't yet obtained the June Weird Tales, but I look forward to reading your 'Colossus of Ylourgne.' That advance notice sure caught my fancy."

"The Dark Eidolon."

Weird Tales, January 1935.

REH to Clark Ashton Smith, ca. 15 March 1933: "I shall look forward with eager anticipation for 'The Dark Eidolon' and the other stories you mentioned to be published in Weird Tales."

REH to Clark Ashton Smith, 23 July 1935: "I very much enjoyed 'The Dark Eidolon'..."

"The Death of Malygris."

Weird Tales, April 1934.

REH to Clark Ashton Smith, ca. March 1934 [SL 2 #73]: "I look forward to 'Malygris,' not only the story itself, but your illustration also..."

REH to Clark Ashton Smith, ca. 21 May 1934 [SL 2 #74]: "...the Malygris story came up to expectations splendidly. In some ways I liked the illustration even better than that of 'The Charnel God,' though both were fine."

"Demon of the Flower."

Astounding, December 1933.

REH to Clark Ashton Smith, ca. October 1933 [SL 2 #68]: "Glad you made the Astounding Story market."

REH to Clark Ashton Smith, ca. 14 December 1933 [SL 2 #70]: "I enjoyed your 'Demon in the Flower' very much and am sorry that Astounding is closed to stories of the weird nature."

"Dominion."

Weird Tales, June 1935.

REH to Clark Ashton Smith, 23 July 1935: "I very much enjoyed... the splendid poem: 'Dominion'. I am not exaggerating when I say that I do not consider that I ever read a finer poem than that. I'd give my trigger-finger for the ability to make words flame and burn as you do."

The Double Shadow and Other Stories

Privately printed collection, 1933.

[According to Donald Sidney Fryer, Emperor of Dreams: A Clark Ashton Smith Bibliography (West Kingston, RI: Donald M. Grant, 1978), this was a 30-page, 8-5/8" by 11-1/2" paperbound booklet, printed by The Auburn [CA] Journal Press, February through June 1933. Contents: "The Voyage of King Eurovan"; "The Maze of the Enchanter"; "The Double Shadow"; "The Night in Malneant"; "The Devotee of Evil"; "The Willow Landscape"]

REH to Clark Ashton Smith, ca. 15 March 1933: "I hardly know how to thank you for the copy of The Double Shadow. I have read the stories with the most intense interest and appreciation, and hardly know which I like the best. All are magnificent, splendid examples of that poetic prose which is so characteristic of your work. I envy you your rich and vivid style.... Thanking you again for the magnificent Double Shadow..."

REH to H.P. Lovecraft , ca. September 1933: "Yes, I got both Smith's brochure [The Double Shadow] and his book of poems [Ebony and Crystal]. Both were splendid, as I told him."

"A Dream of the Abyss."

The Fantasy Fan, November 1933.

REH to Clark Ashton Smith, ca. 14 December 1933 [SL 2 #70]: "I also enjoyed your poem in the Fantasy Fan and have urged the editor to publish more of your poetry."

Ebony and Crystal

Auburn, California: Privately printed, 1922. 30624; PQ4; GL; TDB. Inscribed to REH from Clark Ashton Smith.

[PQ4 notes that this book was given to Glenn Lord by a former Howard Payne librarian.]

REH to Clark Ashton Smith, ca. 15 March 1933: "I am enclosing a check for Ebony and Crystal and would feel most honored if you would write your autograph on the fly page."

REH to Clark Ashton Smith, ca. 22 July 1933: "I can hardly find words to express the pleasure -- I might even say ecstasy -- with which I have read, and re-read, your magnificent 'Ebony and Crystal.' Every line in it is a gem. I could dip into the pages and pick at random, anywhere in the book, images of clarity and depth unsurpassed. I haven't the words to express what I feel, my vocabulary being disgustingly small. But so many of your images stir feeling of such unusual depth and intensity, and bring back half forgotten instincts and emotions with such crystal clearness. ¶ For instance, the stanza containing the line: ¶ 'The pines are ebony' ¶ A memory springs up with startling clearness of a starlit glade wherein I stood, years ago and hundreds of miles distant, a glade bordered with pine trees that rose like a solid wall of blackness. 'Ebony.' I have never encountered a darkness like that of a pine-forest at midnight. ¶ And again, 'Winter Moonlight' and the line: ¶ 'Carven of steel or fretted stone' ¶ It limns a picture of last winter when I was struck with the weird and somber imagery of a tall mesquite tree etched against a snowy land and the dimly gleaming steel of a cloudy winter sky. ¶ But I could go on indefinitely. I will not seek to express my appreciation of 'The Hashish-Eater.' I lack the words. I have read it many times already; I hope to read it many more times."

REH to H.P. Lovecraft , ca. September 1933: "Yes, I got both Smith's brochure [The Double Shadow] and his book of poems [Ebony and Crystal]. Both were splendid, as I told him."

"Ennui."

Weird Tales, May 1936.

REH to August W. Derleth, 9 May 1936: "I did like Smith's poem..."

[in May Weird Tales].

"The Flower Women."

Weird Tales, May 1935.

REH to Clark Ashton Smith, 23 July 1935: "I very much enjoyed... 'The Flower Women'..."

"The Hashish-Eater."

[See Ebony and Crystal].

"The Holiness of Azedarac."

Weird Tales, November 1933.

REH to Clark Ashton Smith, ca. 1 November 1933: "...haven't gotten the November copy yet, but look forward to reading your 'Holiness of Azedarac.'."

"The Ice-Demon."

Weird Tales, April 1933.

REH to Clark Ashton Smith, ca. 15 March 1933: "Incidentally, your story in the current Weird Tales is splendid."

[This could be in reference to "The Isle of the Torturers," March 1933, but seems more likely to be this story.]

"The Isle of the Torturers."

Weird Tales, March 1933.

REH to Clark Ashton Smith, ca. 15 March 1933: "Incidentally, your story in the current Weird Tales is splendid."

[This could be in reference to "The Isle of the Torturers," but seems more likely to be "The Ice-Demon," April 1933.]

"The Kingdom of the Worm."

The Fantasy Fan, October 1933.

REH to Clark Ashton Smith, ca. October 1933 [SL 2 #68]: "I enjoyed very much your 'Kingdom of the Worm.' It is an awesome and magnificent and somber word picture you have drawn of the haunted land of Antchar."

REH to H.P. Lovecraft , ca. November 1933 [SL 2 #69]: "I've read a copy of Fantasy Fan... I enjoyed Smith's tale..."

"The Last Heiroglyph."

Weird Tales, April 1935.

REH to Clark Ashton Smith, 23 July 1935: "I very much enjoyed... 'The Last Hieroglyph'..."

"The Monster of the Prophecy."

Weird Tales, January 1932.

REH to The Eyrie, March 1932: "...the stories [in the January issue] by Smith, Long, Hurst and Jacobi could scarcely be excelled... Smith's sweep of imagination and fantasy is enthralling, but what captivates me most is the subtle, satiric humour that threads its delicate way through so much of his work -- a sly humour that equals the more subtle touches of Rabelais and Petronius."

"The Return of the Sorcerer."

Strange Tales, September 1931.

REH to Clark Ashton Smith, ca. October 1933 [SL 2 #68]: "I envy you your knack of making the fantastic seem real. I particularly remember your remarkable 'Return of the Sorcerer' in Strange Tales. That was no story for one with weak nerves. The horror you evoked was almost unbearable. I have read and written weird stuff for more years than I like to remember, and it takes a regular literary earthquake to touch my callous soul. But it is the honest truth that my hair stood up when I read that story. Poe never wrote anything that congealed my blood like that did. I wrote the editor to that effect."

"Revenant."

The Fantasy Fan, March 1934.

REH to Clark Ashton Smith, ca July 1933: "First let me thank you very much indeed for the magnificent poem 'Revenant' which is as splendid as anything of its kind that I ever read, and which I have placed among my most treasured possessions. It is indeed an honor to receive an addressed and signed copy of such a poem. How I envy your superb gift of conjuring up images of wizardry and wonder, like clouds rising from the ocean."

REH to The Fantasy Fan, May 1934: "Smith's poem in the March issue was splendid, as always. By all means, publish as many of his poems as possible; I would like to see more by Lumley and it would be a fine thing if you could get some of Lovecraft's poetry."

"The Seed From the Sepulchre."

Weird Tales, October 1933.

REH to Clark Ashton Smith, ca. October 1933 [SL 2 #68]: "I enjoyed your story in the October Weird Tales, as always..."

REH to August W. Derleth, ca. October 1933: "I got a big kick out of Lovecraft's story, as well as those of Smith, Long etc."

"Ubbo-Sathla."

Weird Tales, July 1933.

REH to Clark Ashton Smith, ca. 22 July 1933: "That is a fine story you have in the current Weird Tales. I mean 'Ubbo Sathla'; short as it is, it has a really epochal sweep that is almost dizzying in the vistas it opens of awful and incredible antiquity."

REH to August W. Derleth, ca. July 1933: "Smith's yarn [in Weird Tales, July 1933] was first class, too."

"The Weaver in the Vault."

Weird Tales, January 1934.

REH to Clark Ashton Smith, ca. January 1934 [SL 2 #72]: "I liked your story in the current Weird Tales very much indeed; it had that smooth beauty of narration and sense of remote antiquity that characterizes all your work; poetic prose in the finest sense. And the illustration was splendid."

"Winter Moonlight."

[See

REH Bookshelf - S

Miss Minerva's Baby

Miss Minerva Broadcasts Billy

Riata and Spurs

General Mentions

"The Monster of the Prophecy."