Pre-Tolkien Fantasists

[The Good Hunter]

[This topic is a placeholder for something verbose, intellectual, and perhaps even witty about the course of fantasy before Tolkien]

Recently, I've been delving into the works of Clark Ashton Smith (CAS to his friends), Robert E. Howard, Fritz Leiber, and a few others and they've been rip roaring fun. I don't have anything profound to discuss yet, indeed I might be the only person on the Plaza that enjoys these authors at all, but I'd love to talk about them, how they connect and interact with fantasy today and how their work informs the works of Tolkien.

Sword and Sorcery, what are people's general thoughts?

This is a directionless boat and anyone can grab the oars and steer it for a bit if they'd like, I have no outline of what I'd like to talk about or goals I want to achieve here so let's see where this takes us

[Drífa]

Oi! I am still determining if I will grab an oar as I will likely be too busy holding on to both sides of the boat. We dwarves are particularly shy of water- sailing on, not bathing in. But I will ride along and enjoy the discussion and the authors. Thank you for posting what you, and I quote, 'fine rip roaring fun.' I always look for something new and engaging to read or listen to, and now I have three new authors to explore.

[Chrysophylax Dives]

Had to google the authors you mention and I don't know nothing about any of this, certainly never read anything here. So more than happy to read what comes out of any discussion, which holds the promise of opening up some new vistas.

[Aikári Salmarinian]

Frost: I think of these writers are from before our time at least. Googling they were all born around 1900 and long dead. Nah, I can't say I have never heard of them, nor know of their works. My questions to you are: What kind of works have you read of them? What are the titles of their books?

Swords and sorcery, there are multiple fantasy writers of my era (1975 - 2024/today) that I enjoyed in my youngers years, but are not pre-Tolkienist fantasy writers.

My boat had a leak and sits momentarily with oars and all on the bottom of the sea. When the leak is repaired, it'll come back to surface.

[The Good Hunter]

Drifa: Welcome aboard! I'm gonna use this metaphor as long as the ship floats (and with me as captain we're definitely not going to run aground or straight into the shoals :lol) What I think separates Sword and Sorcery from Fantasy is the sense of adventure. Not to say Fantasy isn't all about the adventure, but the scope involved is different. If we look at the Hobbit we see it's about an adventure, an almost cozy adventure, but we see bits and pieces of the world outside and exactly how this little adventure is going to affect the entire world. Sword and Sorcery, particularly the works of Howard is very focused on the adventures of the protagonist and not much else. Rip-roaring, sword-flinging, and spell-slinging action!

Chrys: Thank you! I'm glad I was able to recommend a few new authors to you. I'm surprised though that you hadn't heard of Howard at the least, I would have put money on you being a Conan the Barbarian fan. Regardless, I look forward to being able to discuss their merits (and demerits) with you.

Aik: These writers are definitely before our time. The lived in the early to mid 20th century during the advent of the "Weird Tales" magazine, a pulp publication dedicated to horror and fantastical fiction before either of those genres really formed into what we know of them today. I found these three in particular because they are part of what is called "The Lovecraft Circle" or writers that corresponded heavily with H.P. Lovecraft.

Clark Ashton Smith wrote in several different "cycles" or settings. His "Hyperborean" cycle was meant to represent Earth's distant past, "Zothique" was meant to represent a far future, while both are replete with fantasy elements, I think his "Averoigne" cycle best fits the definition of fantasy, set in an imaginary medieval France, it has more elements that we might consider fantasy both in setting and mode.
Robert E. Howard if famous for his Conan the Barbarian stories, though he also frequently used the characters Kull of Atlantis and Solomon Kane in his short stories. Of the three authors I mentioned, I think he is my favorite thus far, simply because his writing is so fun and phrenetic, it's very lean and meaty.
Fritz Leiber is new for me, I only recently discovered his more fantastical oriented work after reading a few of his more weird fiction stories and I'm decently impressed, he frequently used the characters Fafhrd and Grey Mouser.


To help you all with your search, I've found a few works that I think are easily readable and digestible, good appetizers into what I'm hoping to discuss.
For Clark Ashton Smith, I think The Colossus of Ylourgne is fantastic. It's not a long read but it's deeply cinematic.
For Robert E. Howard, The Tower of the Elephant is my favorite and I think a good starting point for Conan
Sadly, as I look, I don't think any of Fafhrd and Grey Mouser stories are in the public domain and thus aren't anywhere like Project Gutenberg or anywhere else. I'll keep looking but in the meantime I think two stories are good to start some discussions.

[Chrysophylax Dives]

His gods were simple and understandable; Crom was their chief, and he lived on a great mountain, whence he sent forth dooms and death. It was useless to call on Crom, because he was a gloomy, savage god, and he hated weaklings. But he gave a man courage at birth, and the will and might to kill his enemies, which, in the Cimmerian's mind, was all any god should be expected to do.

Yup. I do like Howard (Tower of the Elephant). Reminds me a little of H. Rider Haggard in England - must be about the same time. Actually, all these works seems contemporary with composition of The Hobbit (1930-1933).

I found this and this for Fritz Leibter on archive.org. If you sign up you can also borrow the non-public domain work (you get an hour access, but can then borrow again). I see several Fafhrd and Grey Mouser volumes.

[Aikári Salmarinian]

Frost: Thanks for those two links! Lovecraft I have heard off, but cannot remember if I read any of his works?

I am reading through Ylourgne and I get a feeling it is a bit about Sauron and his Nazgul. It well written on visualisation and I get the pictoresk feeling how it is to spent your days in the town. The monks and their crosses. Even the adventures of Gaspard, creepy as they are. It is really a work at length. Quite one of the better horror tales ever written with an kind of good ending to it. It is smacking devilish. Besides on one point, everything in the tale is fictional and doesn't exist. It is written in an era when there was no access to motion pictures or television yet, and cinematic writing was the way, in the same way the Jane Austen tales are. You get the taste, the sounds, the views, the touch and the smell all at once from the pages.

The Conan tale is not so my favourite. I find it a bit overblown, too barbaric. More a tale for men, I think. I know of the tales and seen the Arnold Schwarzenegger movie from 1982 partly. But Howard's barbarian is too brawly for me.

[Lail]

Of these, I've only read Leiber. It was not for me. I don't think Sword & Sorcery tends to be my cup of tea - too much action, too little character insight or emotion, though that doesn't mean I won't try it on occasion. I find I tend to struggle to read some of the older stuff because I find it tends to enforce gender norms and are typically written from a very masculine lens that doesn't interest me. However, I imagine aspects of their work likely laid some foundations for Tolkien (and other authors as well)!

[Chrysophylax Dives]

Of these, I've only read Leiber. It was not for me. I don't think Sword & Sorcery tends to be my cup of tea - too much action, too little character insight or emotion, though that doesn't mean I won't try it on occasion. I find I tend to struggle to read some of the older stuff because I find it tends to enforce gender norms and are typically written from a very masculine lens that doesn't interest me. However, I imagine aspects of their work likely laid some foundations for Tolkien (and other authors as well)!

I quite sympathize with the complaints on character and emotion. What I like is the fantastic world - the 'secondary world' as the Lorists here used to say. I don't know about foundations, but these authors seem to have been doing a similar kind of imagination - the imagination of a whole world. Maybe these guys laid the foundation for D&D.

It is not only gender norms. Big-nosed money-hoarding characters with Semitic names are not exactly rare in these stories. One can discern some very nasty fantasies lurking just below the ground. So I quite understand anyone turning away for this kind of reason.

Two thoughts. (i) Responsible: For myself, these stories have the virtue of drawing these fantasies into the light in a way in which we can still touch them and recognize how they still speak to us. I think we do better facing up to all the stuff still swirling in our culture and ourselves than a simple denial and refusal to look, because in turning away we forget what are the roots of evil. But that is too take the heavy perspective.

(ii) Human: On the other side of the coin, lurid fantasies of barbarian quests to steal jewels from an enchanted tower speak to me, enchant my imagination, and stir my soul. The stories are a century old, and they give us the fantasies of a century ago - and those fantasies are fantastic fun, if a tad disturbing.

[The Good Hunter]

@Chrysophylax Dives - fantastic finds! Ironically those are both Lieber stories I am not familiar with so I will dig into them with relish (internet archives for the win!). H. Rider Haggard has been on my to read list for so long, it's probably time I just push him to the top of the list and find something to read. He's always on the periphery of my preferred writers but he's still a looming figure in their works and inspirations.

Aik - I'm glad you're enjoying Colossus. I agree whole-heartedly that the entire story feels cinematic. This is probably CAS's best work in that regard, the most accessible and the most visual. His output tends very much toward the weird end of fantasy and his vocabulary can often act as a hinderance because it can feel verbose purely for verboseness' sake.

@Lail - You are not wrong in any of your assessments of Sword and Sorcery. Robert E Howard was, well he was problematic at best. Writings of the fin-de-siècle period in general had some pretty poor interpretations of gender and racial roles. Despite it being my literary period of choice, I find it hard to push through sometimes.

@Chrysophylax Dives - again, you are correct (I selected Howard's Tower of the Elephant over Queen of the Black Coast for that exact reason). Reading these stories, with nearly a hundreds years between now and their publication, we can examine how people thought in those days, and ask, pointedly, why, to what end, and have we changed at all through the intervening century.

[The Good Hunter]

This could fit in either "What are you listening to" or this thread but I wanted to post a new dungeon synth artist and album I found today devoted to this very topic: Arcanist - Averoigne. Enjoy!

[Lail]

props to you for reading them @The Good Hunter ! You're doing what I just could not. I hope you find some interesting insights in your exploration of these older works.