The
Conan Stories Never Seen In Weird Tales
by
James Van Hise
This is a companion piece to the 8,000 word
examination of the Conan stories in WEIRD TALES which appears in
the second edition of PULP HEROES OF THE THIRTIES (1997). The
following Robert E. Howard stories were either submitted to WEIRD
TALES and rejected, or were begun but never completed and exist
only as unfinished manuscripts, fragments or in one case just as a
synopsis of plot ideas. In each case I have read and reviewed only
the unaltered Howard text, not any of the versions which were
edited and revised by hands other than Howard's own. For each
story I'll list the published source for the preferred text, as
well as where the altered versions appeared. The order of the
stories is fairly random, although I'm beginning with those tales
which were apparently the earliest Conan stories Howard wrote.
THE FROST GIANT'S DAUGHTER
"The Frost Giant's Daughter" was
published for the first time in its unedited form in the Donald M.
Grant hard cover ROGUES IN THE HOUSE, and in paperback in ECHOES
OF VALOR II (a 1989 anthology edited by Karl Edward Wagner).
Previously the story had been rewritten by L. Sprague de Camp and
published in FANTASY FICTION (August 1953) as well as in THE
COMING OF CONAN (Gnome Press) and in CONAN OF CIMMERIA
(Lancer/Ace). It didn't need to be rewritten because this is one
of the most polished pieces of prose Howard ever produced.
The story opens on a snow field following a
terrible battle. Only Conan and one of his opponents survive, but
soon the battle is rejoined and Conan stands alone. Then out of
the icy wastes dances a beautiful woman whose red-gold hair
shimmers blindingly in the sun. She lures Conan off the
battlefield until he is attacked by two warriors, whom he slays.
In combined fury and lust he pursues the woman who tried to lure
him to his death and at one point even catches up to her, his
intentions towards her clearly less than honorable. But she
manages to escape in a burst of a supernatural flare, leaving
Conan with her whisper thin garment clutched in his hand.
This is a very simple story, one which almost
reads like the first chapter in a novel. What elevates it into
classic status is the sheer power of Howard's writing and the
eerie effectiveness of it all. It was rejected by Wright who
stated at the time, "I do not much care for it."
Speculation is that the fairly explicit near-rape of the story's
title character was a bit too much for Wright. Conan dismisses his
actions later in the tale by stating, "A strange madness fell
upon me when I looked at her, so I forgot all else in the
world." Howard describes that madness in terms that make it
clear it is in large measure lust for a beautiful, alluring naked
woman who danced in front of Conan with deliberate provocation.
But then Conan is, after all, a barbarian. I recall reading that
back in 1970 when it was announced that Marvel Comics was doing a
Conan comic book, someone wrote a letter complaining that unless
Conan is was portrayed as being a rapist and a violent killer that
the comic book would be untrue to its source material.
"The Frost Giant's Daughter" is
largely acknowledged as being literally the first Conan story
Howard ever wrote. Certainly the next story is not the kind Howard
would have used to introduce a character since it does not explore
the Cimmerian with any real passion or excitement. It's just
another story, and certainly not one as intense or memorable as
"The Frost Giant's Daughter," in spite of what
Farnsworth Wright thought of it. As far as what the earliest Conan
adventure is chronicled by Howard, some vote for "Tower of
the Elephant" and others for "The Frost Giant's
Daughter." There are good arguments to be made for both.
THE GOD IN THE BOWL
"The God in the Bowl" was one of the
first Conan adventures Howard ever wrote and is clearly early in
the character's life as he is described in the story as a youth,
and just as he was in "The Tower of the Elephant," Conan
earns his living as a thief. This story, along with "The
Frost Giant's Daughter" and "The Phoenix on the
Sword," were all submitted together to Farnsworth Wright,
editor of WEIRD TALES, in 1932. Wright rejected two of the three
and accepted the strongest story in the trio. "The God in the
Bowl" is an odd story. It begins well enough as Arus, a
guard, comes upon a body inside a museum (described as a temple,
but it's function is clearly more like a museum) and then sees
Conan enter the room. The guard holds Conan at bay while the
police are summoned and for much of its length Conan, sword at the
ready, is grilled by the police who threaten to arrest him. For
page after page of unrelieved dialogue the characters accuse and
debate in what almost comes across as a parody of a murder
mystery. Finally the facts emerge that a huge globe which was
being sent north from Stygia had been opened, and something inside
killed the wealthy owner of the temple. When the mark of Thoth-amon
is found on the bottom of the open globe (the only time this
wizard has been named since "The Phoenix on the Sword,"
making this a prequel to that story), it becomes evident that something
was in the bowl which killed the man who opened it. It seems that
the wealthy owner believed a priceless bauble was contained
therein. Hints of the creature's nature emerge as it is described
as one of the children of Set, the serpent god. Finally everything
bursts when Aztrias, the man who hired Conan to break into the
temple, is himself nabbed and denies knowing who Conan is. He even
suggests that ten years working in the mines would be fitting
punishment for the Cimmerian, whereupon the following occurs.
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Conan's eyes blazed and he started as if
stung; the guards tensed, grasping their bills, then relaxed
as he dropped his head suddenly, as if in sullen resignation,
and not even Demetrio could tell that he was watching them
from under his heavy black brows, with eyes that were slits of
blue bale-fire.
He struck with no more warning than a
striking cobra; his sword flashed in the candlelight. Aztrias
shrieked and his head flew from his shoulders in a shower of
blood, the features frozen in a white mask of horror.
Cat-like, Conan wheeled and thrust murderously for Demetrio's
groin. The Inquisitor's instinctive recoil barely deflected
the point which sank into his thigh, glanced from the bone and
ploughed out through the outer side of the leg. Demetrio went
to his knee with a groan, unnerved and nauseated with agony.
Conan had not paused. The bill which Dionus
flung up saved the prefect's skull from the whistling blade
which turned slightly as it cut through the shaft, and sheared
his ear cleanly from his head. The blinding speed of the
barbarian paralyzed the senses of the police and made their
actions futile gestures. Caught flat-footed and dazed by his
quickness and ferocity, half of them would have been down
before they had a chance to fight back, except that Posthumo,
more by luck than skill, threw his arms about the Cimmerian,
pinioning his sword-arm. Conan's left hand leaped to the
guard's head, and Posthumo fell away and writhed shrieking on
the floor, clutching a gaping red socket where an eye had
been.
Conan bounded back from the waving bills
and his leap carried him outside the ring of his foes, to
where Arus stood fumbling at his crossbow. A savage kick in
the belly dropped him, green-faced and gagging, and Conan's
sandalled heel crunched square in the watchman's mouth. The
wretch screamed through a ruin of splintered teeth, blowing
bloody froth from his mangled lips.
Then all were frozen in their tracks by the
soul-shaking horror of a scream which rose from the chamber
into which Posthumo had hurled Promero, and from the
velvet-hung door the clerk came reeling, and stood there,
shaking with great silent sobs, tears running down his pasty
face and dripping off his loose sagging lips, like an
idiot-babe weeping.
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When Promero drops dead in front of everyone,
that's the last straw. Now they know that something unearthly is
in the temple.
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Then horror swept over them and they ran
screaming for the outer door, jammed there in a clawing
shrieking mob, and burst through like madmen. Arus followed
and the half-blind Posthumo struggled up and blundered blindly
after his fellows, squealing like a wounded pig and begging
them not to leave him behind. He fell among them and they
knocked him down and trampled him, screaming in their fear.
But he crawled after them, and after him came Demetrio. The
Inquisitor had the courage to face the unknown, but he was
unnerved and wounded, and the sword that had struck him down
was still near him. Grasping his blood-spurting thigh, he
limped after his companions. Police, charioteer and watchman,
wounded or whole, they burst screaming into the street, where
the men watching the building took panic and joined in the
flight, not waiting to ask why. Conan stood in the great
corridor alone, save for the corpses on the floor.
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Conan's confrontation with the thing from the
bowl is quite eerie and is classic Howard, although the
"surprise" he encounters comes as no surprise to us as
it had been telegraphed to the reader long before. Interestingly,
when de Camp edited the story for publication, he changed a line
which made the denouement less obvious than Howard did. In de
Camp's version, when Promero staggers out his last words are
"The god has a long reach; Ha-ha-ha! Oh, a cursed long
reach!" Howard had written "long neck" instead of
"long reach." Frankly de Camp's change is an improvement
and helps preserve some mystery, because having previously
established that whatever was in the bowl was a son of Set
remained a strong hint in an of itself without the crack about the
"long neck." Howard drained the effectiveness out of the
climax by making what was coming a bit too obvious.
Had Howard revised the first half of "The
God in the Bowl" he might well have been able to sell it to
Wright later on, particularly after Conan became a popular fixture
in WEIRD TALES, as the only problem with the story is that the
first half is virtually all dialogue as characters argue about
what really happened and whether Conan is guilty. Rather than
being engaging and passionate it comes across as very dry as they
keep talking about the mysterious murder but don't do anything to
investigate it until the last half of the story. The reader can't
help but become impatient while everyone stands around talking and
talking and talking. It's a very odd story structure and I can't
think of another one Howard wrote like this.
While the climactic confrontation is typical
Conan, the ending is something different. After Conan has ably
defended himself by hacking and chopping his way out of this fix,
he flees in terror when the truth is revealed, although he had
already acquitted himself with far more valor than the police who
fled in the face of the unknown. But Conan knows what he was
running away from.
"The God in the Bowl" was published
for the first and only time in its unedited form in the Donald M.
Grant book THE TOWER OF THE ELEPHANT (1975). A version edited by
L. Sprague de Camp was previously published in SPACE SCIENCE
FICTION (Sept. 1952), THE COMING OF CONAN (Gnome Press, 1953) and
in the Lancer/Ace edition of CONAN.
THE VALE OF LOST WOMEN
"The Vale of Lost Women" was first
published in THE MAGAZINE OF HORROR (Spring 1967) and according to
THE LAST CELT was not edited therein by de Camp. It was also
published intact in the Donald M. Grant edition of QUEEN OF THE
BLACK COAST (1978). This is a minor story and I can see why Howard
was never able to sell it to Farnsworth Wright. Not only is it
relatively short, but it also uncomplicated, unlike the better
Conan stories which are crafted to be a bit more intricate than
this. This is one of those Conan stories, like "A Witch Shall
Be Born," wherein Conan serves as largely a supporting
character, although at least in "A Witch Shall Be Born"
he had some major scenes when he was on stage. Not so here. The
main character is Livia, a young woman who, along with her
brother, was captured by Kushites after leaving Stygia to travel
to the city of magicians. Her brother was tortured and slain, but
the corpulent chief of the natives keeps Livia alive for his own
use later. When she sees Conan enter the village at the head of a
group of warriors, she steals into his hut and offers herself in
exchange for helping her escape and killing the chief who ordered
the murder of her brother. Conan agrees, but largely because he
doesn't like the idea of a white woman in the hands of these black
savages.
In the end, when Conan keeps his part of the
bargain, Livia panics and flees during the slaughter, riding her
stolen horse to the brink of a strange valley. There she
encounters strange, ethereal creatures led by a devil of the Outer
Dark whom Conan arrives just in time to drive off. What this
valley is and who the beings are she encountered there are briefly
explained with references to a legend, but the nature of how the
beings came to be there ruled by this winged demon remains
unexplored. It's a rather perfunctory story, and in spite of some
polished writing it has more of the air of a Conan pastiche than
it does of Howard's more polished and well thought out tales.
THE BLACK STRANGER
"The Black Stranger" was published
for the first and only time in its original, unedited form in
ECHOES OF VALOR #1 (an anthology edited by Karl Edward Wagner).
Previously the story had been rewritten by L. Sprague de Camp and
published as "The Treasure of Tranicos" in FANTASY
MAGAZINE (March 1953) and in the Lancer/Ace collection CONAN THE
USURPER.
This story is a direct sequel to "Beyond
the Black River," and that fact is clearly established in
chapter five when Conan states, "I crossed Thunder River to
follow a raiding party that had been harrying the frontier. I
followed them deep into the wilderness, and killed their chief,
but was knocked senseless by a stone from a sling during the
melee, and the dogs captured me alive. They were Wolfmen, but they
traded me to the Eagle clan in return for a chief of theirs the
Eagles had captured. The Eagles carried me nearly a hundred miles
westward to burn me in their chief village, but I killed their
war-chief and three or four others one night, and broke
away."
I can't think of any other Conan stories which
dovetail as closely as these. The closest would be the stories of
King Conan, but while those are clearly in the same period of
Conan's life, you can't really say that one story seems to occur
shortly after another.
Out of the four complete Howard Conan stories
not published in WEIRD TALES, "The Black Stranger" is
the most ambitious. While the prose in this and "The Frost
Giant's Daughter" are quite polished, that story is much
shorter and not as complicated in its inner workings. But
"The Black Stranger" takes more chances in establishing
strong supporting characters who carry much of the story until
Conan takes over some halfway through. But Conan's absence does
not harm the tale because the writing is so good that it draws you
into the situations of the supporting characters with surprising
ease, and lines like The sun set in a welter of blood are
just too good to resist.
"The Black Stranger" introduces Conan
at the beginning of the story, and then leaves him off stage for
about half the story until Conan re-emerges with dynamic
suddenness to occupy center stage and direct the action. Initially
I felt that this story had structural problems because of the fact
that Conan is only prominently featured in the last half, but the
characters, the setting and the intrigue are interesting
throughout, and when Conan does make his grand re-entry it's
dynamic and exciting. The climax involving the battle with the
picts as they attack the fort while the various personal intrigues
inside work themselves out is also powerful. Farnsworth Wright may
have rejected the story because it is the same length as
"People of the Black Circle" and would have needed to be
serialized over three issues, and the supernatural element in the
story would not be manifested until the last third.
But this is a major Conan story which is rich
and powerful in those elements which mark the best of the tales.
While "The God in the Bowl" is uneven and "Vale of
Lost Women" is a minor effort, this story is supercharged
with Howard's creative strengths as he tosses in marvelous offhand
moments like the following which occurs in the middle of a battle
against Pictish raiders:
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"If we can hold the fort until dawn
they'll lose heart," grunted Conan, splitting a feathered
skull with professional precision.
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But the battle inside the fort does not go
well, particularly when two pirate bands, who mistrust each other
under the best of circumstances, snap and start fighting with each
other, and thereby abandoning their guard posts and hastening
their own doom.
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More and more savages streamed from behind
the huts, having scaled the undefended south wall. Strom and
his pirates were beaten back from the other sides of the
palisade and in an instant the compound was swarming with
naked warriors. They dragged down the defenders like wolves;
the battle revolved into swirling whirlpools of painted
figures surging about small groups of desperate white men.
Picts, sailors and henchmen littered the earth, stamped
underfoot by the heedless feet. Blood-smeared braves dived
howling into huts and the shrieks that rose from the interiors
where women and children died beneath the red axes rose above
the din of battle. The men-at-arms abandoned the gate when
they heard those pitiful cries, in an instant the Picts had
burst it and were pouring into the palisade at that point
also. Huts began to go up in flames.
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This story holds up as well under repeated
readings as the best of Howard's WEIRD TALES Conan adventures.
While "The Frost Giant's Daughter" is an interesting and
memorable little encounter, "The Black Stranger"
achieves the powerful epic scope of the best of the Howard Conan
epics.
WOLVES BEYOND THE BORDER
"Wolves Beyond the Border" (an
unfinished story) has never been published in its original form.
It was completed by L. Sprague de Camp and published in CONAN THE
USURPER, but I had access to a copy of the original unfinished
manuscript. This story, set in the Pictish wilderness, takes place
some years after events described in "Beyond the Black
River" and in fact is concurrent with Conan's rise to king of
Aquilonia. The main character in the story states that he was ten
years old when "the Picts broke over Black River and stormed
Fort Tuscelan," but in his determination to hammer this into
his series continuity, de Camp alters that line and states the
story takes place two years after events in "Beyond the Black
River."
But then this isn't a traditional Conan story.
The main character is known as Gault Hagar's son and the story is
told in the first person. It begins in moody desperation as the
man hides in the forest and witnesses a rare Pictish ceremony in
which the soul of a man and a serpent are exchanged, before both
are beheaded. But what most unnerves him is that he sees a
Hyborian among the Picts, a white man welcomed like a blood
brother. Later he sees this same man in town and accuses him,
proving that what he says is the truth. The man is a Lord of the
town, and is quietly arrested, only to escape that night with the
aid of his Pictish mistress. The main character barely escapes an
assassination attempt made by an ape creature, and he and others
track down the Lord and attempt to slay him and his allies before
a treacherous plan can be carried out, but the Lord escapes. . .
This story was supposedly completed by de Camp
with the assistance of a synopsis Howard left (to date the
synopsis has not been published anywhere). In CONAN THE USURPER,
de Camp's version uses Howard's text largely intact as the first
three chapters (although he pads out the fight in the cabin in
chapter three) and then begins completely new with chapter four.
The rough draft of this story is not the polished Howard prose
we're used to reading, and in fact the clipped writing style reads
more akin to de Camp's Conan pastiche writing to such a degree
that his continuation of the story reads seamlessly. Plus the
uncharacteristic use by Howard of the first person distances it
even more from Howard's usual writing style. Considering Howard's
odd approach to the story, particularly in his placing it
concurrent with Conan's rise to the throne of Aquilonia while not
having the Cimmerian as more than an offstage presence in the
story, made it easier for it to be completed and fit into the
scheme of things as viewed by de Camp. The only problem is, while
reading "Wolves Beyond the Border" in CONAN THE USURPER,
the reader keeps expecting Conan to suddenly step forward, but
this never happens, and apparently Howard never intended it to
happen in this particular tale. Some have suggested that Howard
might have written this prior to writing "Beyond the Black
River," but that doesn't seem logical in light of the fact
that this abandoned first draft refers to Conan and events which
transpired in "Beyond the Black River." Why would Howard
refer to a story he hadn't even written yet, and to a character
who otherwise does not appear in this tale, if he wasn't still
very much influenced by the experience of writing that other story
at the time he began this one? Howard may have abandoned this
because even though the story starts out strong, it soon runs out
of steam and Howard may have put the manuscript aside to rethink
and return to at a later date.
THE DRUMS OF TOMBALKU
"The Drums of Tombalku" (unfinished)
was published in its original form only in POOL OF THE BLACK ONE
(Donald M. Grant) with the original Howard synopsis appearing in
CROMLECH #3 (1988). The story was completed by de Camp and
published in THE FANTASTIC SWORDSMEN (anthology) and in CONAN THE
ADVENTURER.
Initially this is the story of Amalric the
mercenary. The story opens in an oasis where he sees one of his
present comrades ride in with an exhausted young women he'd found
wandering in the desert. Aware that the desert men plan to rape
her as soon as they make sure she's still alive, Amalric attacks
them and barely manages to kill the other three. He and the girl,
named Lissa, return to her desert home, a strange crumbling city
named Gazal, built on an oasis. But in the center of the city is a
crimson tower inhabited by a monstrosity which emerges at night to
kill and devour at will. This story is weird and wild and moves at
an enormously fast pace. Although the fragment (and it's a long
fragment, just as "Wolves Beyond the Border" is) is
supposedly a first draft, the prose is more crisp and polished
than that in "Wolves Beyond the Border" (and even more
polished than some parts of the novel ALMURIC, which was awaiting
a final rewrite when Howard died). There's conflict, confrontation
with a monster and then escape into the desert only to be pursued
by demonic horsemen—and then Conan arrives on stage. He and
Amalric had become separated earlier and Amalric had believed his
comrade to be dead. But Conan had survived and been spared when he
found that one of the dual kings in Tombalku turned out to be a
former friend of Conan's from his buccaneering days when he was
known as Amra.
It is interesting that Howard maintained the
continuity that he did in his stories for even though he never
specifically wrote a story from the time when Conan was known as
Amra the Lion, there are references to that period this story as
well as in "The Scarlet Citadel" and in "Hour of
the Dragon." From this point forward in the tale Conan
emerges as the center of the story, only to have the fragment end.
But the ending of the story is known. Howard's
original synopsis (something writers sometimes do to work out
story points in advance of beginning a full manuscript—I know,
I've done it myself) was published in the fanzine CROMLECH. The
synopsis reveals that Conan joins his old comrade and becomes one
of the kings of Tombalku, but political intrigue (and the
revelation that Amalric killed one of their gods in Gazal) brings
everything crashing down and Conan, Amalric and Lissa barely
escape with their lives.
It's odd how this story falls neatly into two
distinct halves as the first part of the story featuring Amalric
can stand almost entirely on its own, until he has to be rescued
by Conan. The synopsis essentially deals only with Conan's stake
in all this and doesn't examine anything else accomplished by
Amalric and Lissa in the last part of the story, other than
staying alive.
There is a strange reference to the fact that
the people in Gazal (Lissa's city) have been there for 900 years,
but this seems to mean that they and their descendants have
occupied the city for that long, not that they are literally 900
years old as the only history they know is what their ancestors
knew. It has an eerie effect, though. But the city of Gazal
itself, what with the way it's described as being a crumbling ruin
occupied by strange denizens, calls to mind the Mars of Edgar Rice
Burroughs which is dotted with ancient crumbling cities built by a
race long gone, and one can sense at least a subconscious
influence on Howard in the portrayal of this decaying cityscape.
The story, what there is of it (and
surprisingly there is a lot) is quite good. I think had Howard
finished it he would have placed it with WEIRD TALES quite easily,
particularly since the supernatural element occurs early in the
story. This is a gem worth seeking out.
THE SNOUT IN THE DARK
"The Snout in the Dark" (unfinished)
was published only in THE JEWELS OF GWAHLUR (Donald M. Grant) with
the synopsis appearing in CROMLECH #3. It was completed by de Camp
and Lin Carter in CONAN OF CIMMERIA.
The setting of the story is Kush and it opens
when a Kush lord, imprisoned temporarily in a lavish tower room
for offending the queen, finds himself confronted by an inhuman
monstrosity which has bent the iron bars of his cell window and
entered the room. He's actually able to see the thing before it
kills him. The queen, Tananda, is framed for the murder by another
noble, and when she's attacked in the streets she's rescued by
Conan, who just happens to be riding by and thunders in on his
horse to rescue her, after the rioters have already stripped her
naked.
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Men went down screaming to be crushed under
the flailing hoofs; Tananda got a dizzy glimpse of a figure
towering above the press, of a dark scarred face under a steel
helmet, of a scarlet cloak unfurled from mighty mailed
shoulders, and a great sword lashing up and down, spattering
crimson splashes. But from somewhere in the press a spear
licked upward, disemboweling the steed. It screamed, plunged
and went down, but the rider landed on his feet, smiting right
and left. Wildly driven spears and knives glanced from his
helmet or the shield on his left arm, while his broadsword
cleft flesh and bone, split skulls, scattered brains and
spilled entrails into the bloody dust.
Flesh and blood could not stand before it.
Clearing a space he stooped, caught up the terrified girl and
covering her with his shield, fell back, cutting a ruthless
way. He backed into the angle of a wall and dropping her
behind him, stood before her, beating back the frothing,
screaming onslaught.
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Not bad.
There's less of this story completed than there
is of "Drums of Tombalku," and the structure of it,
starting off immediately by introducing the supernatural element,
makes it a natural for what WEIRD TALES would have wanted.
When Conan introduces himself, his name is
recognized as being Amra the Lion, as apparently his then recent
corsair activity made him well known in Kush. Again the name Amra
pops up, but only in referring to that period in Conan's life
after the fact.
Conan is named the new captain of the guard and
the synopsis of the story reveals that he becomes embroiled in the
intrigue which follows until the true master of the demon is
exposed, but not after Conan has had his own battle with the
monster. This could have been a great story, if it had been
completed. Whether the story was unfinished or whether the
remaining pages were lost is unknown, but again the prose is more
polished than that found in the fragment "Wolves Beyond the
Border."
THE HAND OF NERGAL
"The Hand of Nergal" is just a story
fragment (published in THE LAST CELT, page 355). The story opens
on a battlefield where Conan (seemingly one of the lone survivors
of the battle) returns to find bodies everywhere, all robbed by
battlefield scavengers. But in the reeds he finds a naked girl,
wounded and suffering, and whom he decides to try to save. In
chapter two (which ends abruptly) it describes how people bolt
their doors at night in the city of Yaralet because of something
inhuman that stalks the streets from dusk to dawn, but what it is
we don't know. It's an interesting beginning, particularly the
very polished opening paragraph:
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The battlefield stretched silent, crimson
pools among the still sprawling figures seeming to reflect the
lurid red-streamered sunset sky. Furtive figures slunk from
the tall grass; birds of prey dropped down on mangled heaps
with a rustle of dusky wings. Like harbingers of Fate a
wavering line of herons flapped slowly away toward the
reed-grown banks of the river. No rumble of chariot wheel or
peal of trumpet disturbed the unseeing stillness. The silence
of death followed the thundering of battle.
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It really makes you want to read the rest of
the story. . .
THE HALL OF THE DEAD
"The Hall of the Dead" exists only as
a synopsis (published in THE LAST CELT, page 367). In this case we
know what happens in the storyline and it's pretty routine stuff.
Conan finds a lost city and in the process of looting its treasure
he trips a magic booby trap and finds himself fighting dead
warriors returned to life. When Conan flees the haunted palace the
warriors crumple to dust in the sunlight. Back in civilization
he's set upon by soldiers, but when the captain of the guard
reaches into a sack to get a jade serpent Conan put in there, the
man screams because the serpent has come to life. Conan escapes in
the confusion. This story exists in no other form, but since
Howard wrote this synopsis, that made it ripe for plunder by the
pastichists.
In conclusion I'll quote from the letter Robert
E. Howard wrote to P. Schuyler Miller on March 10, 1936, and which
was published in 1953 as the foreword to THE COMING OF CONAN
(Gnome Press). Miller had sent Howard a probable outline of
Conan's career based on the stories published up to that time, and
Howard replied with corrections. The following passages have
periodically been cited piecemeal over the years in various places
since they provide nearly all of the biographical information on
Conan not found in the actual stories and therefore is part of the
official canon.
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As for Conan's eventual fate—frankly I
can't predict it. In writing these yarns I've always felt less
as creating them than as if I were simply chronicling his
adventures as he told them to me. That's why they skip about
so much, without following a regular order. The average
adventurer, telling tales of a wild life at random, seldom
follows any ordered plan, but narrates episodes widely
separated by space and years, as they occur to him.
Your outline follows his career as I have
visualized it pretty closely. The differences are minor. As
you deduct, Conan was about seventeen when he was introduced
to the public in "The Tower of the Elephant." While
not fully matured, he was riper than the average civilized
youth at that age. He was born on a battlefield, during a
fight between his tribe and a horde of raiding vanir. The
country claimed by and roved over by his clan lay in the
northwest of Cimmeria, but Conan was of mixed blood, although
a purebred Cimmerian. His grandfather was a member of a
southern tribe who had fled from his own people because of a
blood-feud and after long wanderings, eventually taken refuge
with the people of the north. He had taken part in many raids
into the Hyborian nations in his youth, before his flight, and
perhaps it was the tales he told of those softer countries
which roused in Conan, as a child, a desire to see them. There
are many things concerning Conan's life of which I am not
certain myself. I do not know, for instance, when he got his
first sight of civilized people. It might have been at
Vanarium, or he might have made a peaceable visit to some
frontier town before that. At Vanarium he was already a
formidable antagonist, though only fifteen. He stood six feet
and weighed 180 pounds, though he lacked much of having his
full growth.
There was a space of about a year between
Vanarium and his entrance into the thief-city of Zamora.
During this time he returned to the northern territories of
his tribe., and made his first journey beyond the boundaries
of Cimmeria. This, strange to say, was north instead of south.
Why or how, I am not certain, but he spent some months among a
tribe of the AEsir, fighting with the Vanir and the
Hyperboreans, and developing a hate for the latter which
lasted all his life and later affected his policies as king of
Aquilonia. Captured by them, he escaped southward and came
into Zamora in time to make his debut in print.
I am not sure that the adventures
chronicled in "Rogues in the House" occurred in
Zamora. The presence of opposing factions of politics would
seem to indicate otherwise, since Zamora was an absolute
despotism where differing political opinions were not
tolerated. I am of the opinion that the city was one of the
small city-states lying just west of Zamora, and into which
Conan had wandered after leaving Zamora. Shortly after this he
returned for a brief period to Cimmeria, and there were other
returns to his native land from time to time. The
chronological order of his adventures is about as you have
worked it out, except that they covered a little more time.
Conan was about forty when he seized the crown of Aquilonia,
and was about forty-four or forty-five at the time of
"The Hour of the Dragon." He had no male heir at
that time, because he had never bothered to formally make some
woman his queen, and the sons of concubines, of which he had a
goodly number, were not recognized as heirs to the throne.
He was, I think, king of Aquilonia for many
years, in a turbulent and unquiet reign, when the Hyborian
civilization had reached its most magnificent high-tide, and
every king had imperial ambitions. At first he fought on the
defensive, but I am of the opinion that at last he was forced
into wars of aggression as a matter of self-preservation.
Whether he succeeded in conquering a world-wide empire, or
perished in the attempt, I do not know.
He traveled widely, not only before his
kingship, but after he was king. He traveled to Khitai and
Hyrkania, and to the even less known regions north of the
latter and south of the former. He even visited a nameless
continent in the western hemisphere, and roamed among the
islands adjacent to it. How much of this roaming will get into
print, I can not foretell with any accuracy. I was much
interested in your remarks concerning findings on the Yamal
Peninsula, the first time I had heard anything about that.
Doubtless Conan had first-hand acquaintance with the people
who evolved the culture described, or their ancestors, at
least.
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And thus ends the saga of Conan by Robert E.
Howard. Other hands have told new tales, but they are just about a
character named Conan. The only genuine Conan tales are those
written by Robert E. Howard just as the only genuine Sherlock
Holmes stories were those chronicled by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.
["Conan in Weird Tales: A 1930s
Treasure," the companion piece to this article, can be found
in the just published PULP HEROES OF THE THIRTIES edited by James
Van Hise. Order for $22.00 postpaid from James Van Hise, 57754
Onaga Trail, Yucca Valley, CA 92284]
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