Reading Recommendations

xyanthon · Post by **xyanthon** » Sun Mar 04, 2007 6:10 pm

I was wondering if anyone could recommend some good collections of H.P. Lovecraft and R.E. Howard stories? In the past, I've read them but aside from some small collected works which I misplaced over the years, I don't have anything by these two authors.

Is there anything that you guys would consider essential reading? Are there any collections of their work that you would highly recommend? Any other authors in a similar vien that you can highly recommend? Thanks in advance!

TRP · Post by **TRP** » Sun Mar 04, 2007 7:06 pm

Del Rey's The Coming of Conan The Cimmerian would be a good choice. It's all Howard, and nothing but Howard, and it's also still at your local booksellers. The stories are also in chronological order of their penning, not publication.

Right now, I'm reading The Annotated Lovecraft, and it contains The Colour Out of Space, The Dunwich Horror and At the Mountains of Madness. All three of these being, IMO, must reads. I've read these before, but not annotated versions.

JRMapes · Post by **JRMapes** » Sun Mar 04, 2007 7:22 pm

As for Lovecraft I recommend all of his stories. Considering there are so few of them, it is not a lot of material to cover.

they have recently released a group of complete compilations of Howards Soloman Kane and Conan works. The Savage Tales of Solomon Kane, then the three (Del Rey)The Coming of Conan the Cimmerian, The Bloody Crown of Conan, The Conquering Sword of Conan.

I would also look at

Arthur Machen
Robert W. Chambers
Ramsey Cambell
Lord Dunsany
Clark Ashton Smith
Robert Bloch
Lin Carter
Frank Belknap Long
Henry Kuttner
E. Hoffmann Price

Of course a few of these would also fit into R.E. Howard related as well.

Many people really dislike these next two when it comes to the Lovecraft based Mythos tales but I think both has produced some brilliant work despite and nay saying and the questionable business and ethical dealings of the first listed.

August Derleth
Brian Lumley

I suppose when it comes to Howard related authors, the first I can think of and do like despite again how many people negatively feel is,

L. Sprague de Camp

of course there is also Robert Jordan which has been putting out new Conan material. Of which I am less than impressed.

Jerry

TRP · Post by **TRP** » Sun Mar 04, 2007 7:46 pm

The Road to Madness is also a good Lovecraft compilation, and it features his earlier, pre-Mythos books.

stranger · Post by **stranger** » Sun Mar 04, 2007 8:00 pm

To Jerry's Howard list from Del Rey I would also add Kull: Exile of Atlantis and Bran Mak Morn: The Last King. I just finished reading them both and they are quite in line with the Conan works.

Post by **Falconer** » Sun Mar 04, 2007 8:40 pm

H.P. LOVECRAFT
Arkham House Publishers

CLARK ASHTON SMITH
Ballantine Books

ROBERT E. HOWARD
Del Rey

This is the stuff! Enjoy!

xyanthon · Post by **xyanthon** » Sun Mar 04, 2007 9:28 pm

Thanks fro the recommendations all. I've read bits and pieces over the years but haven't had any collected works or anything. I figure it's time for me to dive in and rediscover these guys.

JamesEightBitStar · Post by **JamesEightBitStar** » Sun Mar 04, 2007 11:10 pm

Falconer wrote:H.P. LOVECRAFT
Arkham House Publishers

Isn't there a fourth book? I could swear there was a fourth.

Also if you're a member of the Science Fiction Book Club you can get five books for five bucks and they currently have hardcover versions of all the Robert E. Howard Del Rey collections.

EDIT:

JRMapes wrote:I suppose when it comes to Howard related authors, the first I can think of and do like despite again how many people negatively feel is,

L. Sprague de Camp

Why isn't Lin Carter on this list? Wasn't she involved with an editted Kull volume and one of de Camp's co-conspirators in the mission to screw up Conan back in the 1960s?

Post by **Falconer** » Mon Mar 05, 2007 4:01 am

JamesEightBitStar wrote:Why isn't Lin Carter on this list? Wasn't she involved with an editted Kull volume and one of de Camp's co-conspirators in the mission to screw up Conan back in the 1960s?

Incidentally, Lin Carter was a "he". I read his "King Kull" collection when I was a kid. If not for that collection, probably nobody would have ever heard of Kull, nor would there still be Kull collections available in print today. More or less the same deal with de Camp and Carter and their Conan collections. You know, they were writing/publishing for a different audience, and you can't judge history by contemporary morés. Conan was only known through comic books; Howard was a seldom-heard name. De Camp and Carter brought Conan back as a literary character. The audience wanted good Conan yarns, not fragments from a pulp writer they had never heard of and who was not yet considered venerable.

Only after there had been fifty Conan books by dozens of authors did the audience become interested in the essential Conan, and therefore Howard. And that has only happened in the past decade or so. So you may or may not like de Camp's writing, but you have got to hand it to him for ultimately safeguarding Howard's immortality.

Falconer wrote:H.P. LOVECRAFT
Arkham House Publishers

Isn't there a fourth book? I could swear there was a fourth.

Kind of. Maybe you're thinking of one of these:

But I tend to think that the first three collections more-or-less cover the important stuff. Regards.

JamesEightBitStar · Post by **JamesEightBitStar** » Mon Mar 05, 2007 9:18 am

Falconer wrote:
JamesEightBitStar wrote:Why isn't Lin Carter on this list? Wasn't she involved with an editted Kull volume and one of de Camp's co-conspirators in the mission to screw up Conan back in the 1960s?
Incidentally, Lin Carter was a "he".

Oh, okay. The name "Lin" throws me off.

I read his "King Kull" collection when I was a kid. If not for that collection, probably nobody would have ever heard of Kull, nor would there still be Kull collections available in print today.

I very much doubt that, considering that evidently Bran Mak Morn and Solomon Kane were even less well-known and they got reprinted long before Kull did.

More or less the same deal with de Camp and Carter and their Conan collections. You know, they were writing/publishing for a different audience, and you can't judge history by contemporary morés. Conan was only known through comic books; Howard was a seldom-heard name.

Unless there was another Conan comic book, Marvel's Conan didn't start until the 1970s, which would be a full decade after the de Camp/Carter collections.

And I fail to see how "publishing for a different audience" excuses the de Camp/Carter treatment of Conan. If the only thing they did was include their own pastiches in the collections it would be one thing, but they actually rewrote Howard's original stories--in at least one instance going so far as to change half the plot!

You can argue that their collections kept Conan popular, and that's probably true; However its difficult to say that their collections wouldn't have been popular if they hadn't totally messed up Howard's own stories.

Only after there had been fifty Conan books by dozens of authors did the audience become interested in the essential Conan, and therefore Howard. And that has only happened in the past decade or so.

Again I do think you've got your history backwards. The way I've always heard it, Fantasy in general was on some sort of rise in the 1960s (possibly due, perhaps, to Lord of the Rings) and Robert E. Howard was a beneficiary of that--indeed I've seen many books from around that time that proudly announce his name on the cover and point out that he's the creator of Conan. It was through this resurgence that we had Conan comics, then Conan movies, then all those pastiches (which invariably seemed to take more cues from the movies than from Howard).

Those pastiches, by the way, barely had anything to do with Howard's popularity... at least according to this guy.

Kind of. Maybe you're thinking of one of these:

Yeah, Horror in the Museum was the one I was thinking of.

Post by **Falconer** » Mon Mar 05, 2007 5:42 pm

JamesEightBitStar wrote:You can argue that their collections kept Conan popular, and that's probably true; However its difficult to say that their collections wouldn't have been popular if they hadn't totally messed up Howard's own stories.

True. De Camp definitely overstepped the boundary of "editor". However, I don't think hubris was the main motivating factor in his overzealous rewriting. And I think his efforts and apparent success in keeping the ball rolling really overshadow all the criticism.

Those pastiches, by the way, barely had anything to do with Howard's popularity... at least according to this guy.

The essay you link to here is very outdated and is now completely incorrect. Right now, between the Del Rey collections, the Bison Books (University of Nebraska) collections, and the Wildside Press collections, there is by far more Howard in print than there has ever been, and it's all pure Howard. Regards.

JamesEightBitStar · Post by **JamesEightBitStar** » Mon Mar 05, 2007 11:37 pm

Falconer wrote:
JamesEightBitStar wrote:Those pastiches, by the way, barely had anything to do with Howard's popularity... at least according to this guy.
The essay you link to here is very outdated and is now completely incorrect. Right now, between the Del Rey collections, the Bison Books (University of Nebraska) collections, and the Wildside Press collections, there is by far more Howard in print than there has ever been, and it's all pure Howard. Regards.

The point of the article was that the Conan pastiches published by Tor had little effect on Conan's popularity, a point that still stands, even moreso now today that Howard's Conan is back in print and the pastiches have all been forgotten.

(I'd argue that if anything, it was probably the movies that helped maintain interest in Conan through the years)

Thoth Amon · Post by **Thoth Amon** » Tue Mar 06, 2007 5:26 am

JamesEightBitStar wrote:
(I'd argue that if anything, it was probably the movies that helped maintain interest in Conan through the years)

I would agree with this. I know the movie got me interested in Conan.

rogatny · Post by **rogatny** » Tue Mar 06, 2007 10:07 am

and the comic books. Don't forget the comic books. Prior to the movies, Marvel's Conan and Kull comics of the 70's were probably the main gateway to Howard's writing.

TRP · Post by **TRP** » Tue Mar 06, 2007 10:33 am

JamesEightBitStar wrote:
Only after there had been fifty Conan books by dozens of authors did the audience become interested in the essential Conan, and therefore Howard. And that has only happened in the past decade or so.
Again I do think you've got your history backwards. The way I've always heard it, Fantasy in general was on some sort of rise in the 1960s (possibly due, perhaps, to Lord of the Rings) and Robert E. Howard was a beneficiary of that--indeed I've seen many books from around that time that proudly announce his name on the cover and point out that he's the creator of Conan. It was through this resurgence that we had Conan comics, then Conan movies, then all those pastiches (which invariably seemed to take more cues from the movies than from Howard).

Those pastiches, by the way, barely had anything to do with Howard's popularity... at least according to this guy.

It was the de Camp and Carter pastiches of the sixties that kept, or revived, the interest in Conan. That is, the pastiches first, then the increased popularity because of them, not vice versa.

Those pastiches are what brought Howard to the wider audience. Prior to them, Howard stories were read by a much smaller audience. True, there was an increased interest in fantasy beginning in the 60's, but prior to that, Howard's stuff was not nearly as famous before the pastiches as they were after them.

Compiling the Conan stories into easy to read, and readily available, paperbacks was the key.