Where to begin with Conan the Barbarian? You have movies, comic books, computer games. A number of fantasy writers have taken their hacks and stabs at detailing the Cimmerian’s gore-soaked adventures, either under the Conan name or else a thinly-veiled alternate moniker.
But forget all that. Real Conan begins here with Robert E. Howard’s original stories, set in a mythical long-lost age, which Howard churned out for the pulp-fantasy market. They drench you with a spirit of adventure and appreciation for the splendor and squalor of a unique world:
Torchlight licked luridly from broken windows and wide-thrown doors, and out of those doors, stale smells of wine and rank sweaty bodies, clamor of drinking-jacks and fists hammered on rough tables, snatches of obscene songs, rushed like a blow in the face.
Howard’s rough, frenetic writing style is in evidence in this opening passage from “The Tower Of The Elephant,” but so is that electric hum that propels the reader forward from sentence to sentence, paragraph to paragraph, page to page. Howard overcomes a major challenge of fantasy fiction not by suspending disbelief, but by making it immaterial.
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| One of many fine illustrations by Mark Schultz that illustrate The Coming Of Conan. Schultz reflects the influences of many great Conan artists of the past - Margaret Brundage, Frank Frazetta, and John Buscema, to name three big ones - yet finds his own vivid style. Image from https://www.pinterest.com/pin/313563192797233107/ |
This first Del Ray volume has most of Howard’s Conan stories; those being the earliest ones, published between 1932-1934 before his efforts tended toward novella-sized. As such, The Coming Of Conan gives you the best chance to experience not Conan so much as his mythical world, Hyboria, as various stories set the peripatetic adventurer in different locales at different periods of his life.
“In writing these yarns I’ve always felt less as creating them than as if I were simply chronicling his adventures as he told him to me,” Howard explained. “That’s why they skip around so much, without following a regular order.”
So let’s skip around with Conan, if such an image can be mustered, by taking a capsule look at each of the Howard stories contained here:
“The Phoenix On The Sword” – The first Conan story finds him King of mighty Aquilonia and the focus of intrigue both mortal and supernatural, which he learns when a band of plotters surprise him alone in his palace.
Age and soft living have not weakened him so much, they discover: “He was like a tiger among baboons as he leaped, side-stepped and spun, offering an ever-moving target, while his ax wove a shining wheel of death about him.”
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| Conan as he appeared in his Weird Tales debut in December 1932, fighting a monster summoned from the Unknown: "...the Cimmerian glimpsed the reality of all the abysmal and blasphemous horrors that lurk in the outer darkness of formless voids and nighted gulfs." Image from http://onanunderwood5.blogspot.com/2018/07/ |
“Phoenix” offers very good starting point, as much for discovering Conan’s world as Conan himself. It is an enjoyable adventure story, with just a dash of mystical evil thrown in. Conan reveals a soft spot for the arts by trying to spare one of his attackers, a poet Conan believes offers more to the ages than himself. But the feeling passes; so does the poet.
“The Frost-Giant’s Daughter” – As a young warrior, Conan finds himself the lone survivor after a battle in the snowy steppes of the far north. Suddenly he spies a near-naked woman who challenges him to come get her – leading him into an ambush he suspects but is too crazed by lust or sorcery to avoid.
A short adventure which attracts much notice from Conan buffs both for its fine, enigmatic prose and what many see as a possible rape fantasy, “Daughter” is too thin in the story department for me.
Read after “Phoenix,” though, and a portrait begins to fill out, one which the rest of these stories complement nicely. Howard’s descriptive powers do get a workout, as does young Conan’s swordarm.
“The God In The Bowl” – Conan is caught breaking into a museum and blamed for a dead body found inside. The truth is more horrible, and less human, than anyone can guess.
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| While it begins as a mystery, "God Of The Bowl" eventually incorporates more familiar swordplay elements, including the decapitation of an ungrateful client. This is a scene from the Marvel Comics series. Image from http://www.howardandrewjones.com/conan-re-read/the-coming-of-conan-re-read-the-god-in-the-bowl |
Like “Frost Giant’s Daughter,” this didn’t see publication in Howard’s lifetime. “God In The Bowl” is a thin, oddly-shaped locked-room mystery story with much unrealized potential. As a suspense piece it falters, yet it showcases a major theme of these stories, the culture clash between Conan the barbarian and the civilized world he inhabits:
He was not afraid, but slightly bewildered, as a barbarian always is when confronted by the evidence of civilized networks and systems, the workings of which are so baffling and mysterious to him.
“The Tower Of The Elephant” – Conan is a young thief in a city known for thieves, who breaks into a priest’s foreboding tower to steal something called “the Elephant’s Heart.” Getting in is easier with the help of an unexpected ally, but once inside, he is confronted by a horror beyond his ken, not to mention evidence of human depravity which sickens him.
This is the story many fans see as Howard’s best, and it captures nearly everything you want in a Conan tale: A brilliantly detailed locale, a constant state of adventurous exploration, a dubious companion, and a supernatural element that adds a philosophical dimension…
A civilized man in his position would have sought doubtful refuge in the conclusion that he was insane; it did not occur to the Cimmerian to doubt his senses. He knew he was face to face with a demon of the Elder World, and the realization robbed him of all his facilities except sight.
Howard takes this elemental horror and flips it in a way that gives “Elephant” emotional depth. It’s a real heart-tugger of a tale. Literally.
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| Conan learns of the Tower of the Elephant, as drawn by Barry Windsor-Smith for Marvel Comics in 1971. "Civilized men are more discourteous than savages because they know they
can be impolite without having their skulls split, as a general thing," Howard writes. Image from https://comicbookhistorians.com/visualizing-robert-e-howards-the-tower-of-the-elephant-in-conan-the-barbarian-4-by-anthony-caro/ |
“The Scarlet Citadel” – Again Conan is King of Aquilonia, betrayed and imprisoned in a dungeon by the cruel wizard Tsotha-lanti. But being Conan, he finds his way to freedom and, with the assistance of a rival wizard for whom Conan renders service, goes on the warpath to liberate his people from their enemies.
This is a thrill ride that never lets up, even when logic might dictate otherwise. Howard’s sense of play and wit are on strong display, as he builds on the otherworld weirdness of “Tower” but incorporates it even more directly into a captivating-if-bonkers plot:
“Oh, Set!” he lifted his hands and invoked the serpent-god to even Strabonus’ horror, “grant us victory and I swear I will offer up to thee five hundred virgins of Shamar, writhing in their blood!”
I prefer “Citadel” to “Elephant,” though it’s not as solidly constructed and carries nothing like the same punch. It is just a lot of fun, with a final image of Tsotha-lanti right out of Monty Python. Howard could be zany as well as bleak, sometimes even both at once.
“Queen Of The Black Coast” – A fugitive from justice aboard a merchant ship, Conan is captured by a band of pirates known as the Black Corsairs. Their leader, Bêlit, “the wildest she-devil unhanged,” takes a liking to Conan after battle and decides to make him her mate. Journeying inland with her Black Corsairs, they come upon the jungle ruins of an ancient civilization, and danger beyond their imagining.
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| Conan and Bêlit, as depicted by Margaret Brundage for the May 1934 cover of Weird Tales. "Her white ivory limbs and the ivory globes of her breasts drove a beat of fierce passion through the Cimmerian's pulse," Howard writes of Bêlit. Image from https://www.wikiwand.com/en/B%C3%AAlit |
As a 13-year-old, I first encountered Conan in Bêlit’s company in the Marvel Comic series “Conan The Barbarian.” A swashbuckling romance that was there stretched out for over 40 issues – where dream-fever plots competed with Bêlit’s bearskin bikini for prime place on splashy color covers – is handled by Howard in a few pages of limned-over adventure culminating in the jungle episode.
Truth be told, I prefer the Marvel version to Howard’s, which is rather brief and thin on incident. Howard’s Bêlit is a strong character, but pairing her up with Conan is a case of subtraction by addition. On the plus side, the barbarian does provide his most lengthy exegesis on what makes him tick:
“Let me live deep while I live; let me know the rich juices of red meat and stinging wine on my palate, the hot embrace of white arms, the mad exultation of battle when the blue blades flame and crimson, and I am content.”
“Black Colossus” – Conan is a mercenary captain who finds himself suddenly in charge of a queen’s army just before they march out into what appears to be certain doom.
The set-up is what makes “Black Colossus” work so well; our hero is selected, apparently by chance, after Queen Yasmela is told by a disembodied voice to make the first man she finds her general.
Conan’s talk on leadership reveals a sharp sense of strategy:
“But can you lead men and arrange battle-lines?”
“Well, I can try,” he returned imperturbably. “It’s not more than sword-play on a large scale. You draw his guard, then – stab, slash! And either his head is off, or yours.”
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| Conan arrives to save Yasmela at the conclusion of "Black Colossus," as featured in a collection by Dark Horse Comics. Illustration by Frank Frazetta from https://comicvine.gamespot.com/conan-the-frazetta-cover-series-7-black-colossus/4000-268748/ |
“Black Colossus” unfolds in a vivid, dynamic way, with Howard’s cinematic qualities as a yarnspinner very much at the fore. Humor is also utilized, often and well, as when Conan is introduced as the new commander to Yasmela’s generals. Another winner, very much like “Scarlet Citadel,” but more earthbound.
“Iron Shadows On The Moon” – The last survivor of a band of Kozaks he led, Conan surprises the man who killed his comrades menacing a female fugitive, Olivia. Conan makes short work of the brute, but discovers with Olivia a more challenging situation on a deserted island where strange black statutes stand sentinel in a dark temple.
By this time, Howard had settled into a formula dictated by Farnsworth Wright, his editor at the pulp magazine Weird Tales. Wright wanted naked women and action, apparently in that order. Howard obliges him here by giving us Olivia in various states of undress between battles.
A lot of Conan fans say this is the beginning of Howard’s descent into formula. I totally agree, and yet this is my all-time favorite Conan story. It has a slam-bang opening, then drifts into a highly atmospheric exploration of this odd, forgotten island on an inland sea which grows more unsettling as the moon fills the sky and sweeps the waters on the horizon. It is a masterpiece of mood.
Olivia is one of the best of Conan’s female companions, fearful but with abundant scrappiness and a sixth sense for things. She explains how even old gods are subject to the ephemerality of existence:
“They have gone back into the still waters of the lakes, the quiet hearts of the hills, the gulfs beyond the stars. Gods are no more stable than men.”
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| Olivia and Conan make their way outside the eerie temple. She tells him: “You are a barbarian, and I am an outcast, denied by my people. We are
both pariahs, wanderers of the earth. Oh, take me with you!” Illustration by Mark Schultz from https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Literature/IronShadowsInTheMoon |
“Xuthal Of The Dusk” – Wandering the desert with his lover Natala, sole survivors of a rebel army, Conan comes across the ancient city Xuthal, whose inhabitants live a twilight existence as feed mice for an otherworldly being, one Thog. Conan wants out, but a woman named Thalis decides she will make him her mate, once she gets Natala out of the way.
“Xuthal” as a concept is fairly rote, old city haunted by fearsome monster, but Howard’s by-the-numbers treatment makes this more of a drag. The theme of an ancient city with a half-dead population would prove an enduring theme for Howard, and the stuff of better work to come.
This is the first poor Conan story in the collection, worse than “God In The Bowl” which tried something different. Here, you see Howard marking down his checklist for Weird Tales, including a whipping scene involving Thalis and Natala that was a shameless bid at a lurid cover. It worked, though!
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| Natala and Thalis discuss their Conan problem like two grown women on the cover of the September 1933 issue of Weird Tales, where "Xuthal" was published as "The Slithering Shadow." Illustration by Margaret Brundage from https://www.pinterest.com/pin/169448004710652519/ |
“The Pool Of The Black One” – He hesitated, and in doing so, lost his ship, his command, his girl, and his life.
That description of Zaporavo, a pirate captain who unwisely takes Conan aboard his vessel, offers a taste of the fatalism and grim hardness of life found in Conan’s world. Here, Conan understands what Zaporavo, distracted by his quest for legendary treasure, forgets; that life is for the strong and hungry.
“Pool” is mostly a horror story, and a decent one, if a bit one-note. The view of Conan we get is more savage than usual, and we are given a chance to see the Hyborian world’s outer reaches as Zaporavo’s vessel sails far away from the known world. I wish Howard did more with the Zaporavo part of the story, as the pirate business is fresher and more fleshed-out than the otherworldly element that provides its title.
“Rogues In The House” – Young thief Conan is given a chance to escape his jail cell in exchange for killing a powerful priest in the city. After avenging a comrade, Conan shows up at the priest’s estate to discover an intelligent ape has taken over the premises.
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| Conan gets physical with a two-faced lover and avenges a fallen comrade in "Rogues In The House," as illustrated for the January 1934 issue of Weird Tales by Hugh Rankin. Image from https://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks06/0600781h.html |
The formula gets a rest here, as Howard puts Conan in a different kind of peril. Yes, he is up against a creature named Thak this time, versus Thog in “Xuthal,” but the set-up here is unique, and the intrigue between Conan and the other human parties well developed. As one Murillo puts it: “This Cimmerian is the most honest man of the three of us, because he steals and murders openly.”
“Rogues” is one of the best-regarded Conan stories, and deservedly. It is smart, stylish, and very well-paced. I actually would recommend it as a starting point for reading Conan stories; it does happen early in his adventuring career and delivers thrills and deepens characters in the right places.
“The Vale Of Lost Women” – As war chief of a fierce tribe of Bamulas, Conan dispatches the leader of a rival band before collecting that chief’s white female captive. She escapes him by fleeing to a strange valley where mute women worship a large moth. A battle ensues between Conan and moth.
“Vale” is infamous for its overt racism (“I have looked at black sluts until I am sick at the guts”) but every bit as troubling for Conan fans like me is its unvarnished depiction of Conan’s cruelty. We look on with Livia as Conan and his Bamulas obliterate an entire village, slaying its warriors under a false truce and then throwing captured women and children into burning huts. Most of Howard’s stories only hint at this side of the Cimmerian. Here, Howard rubs our noses in it.
Add to all this the tacked-on story about the women and their moth, which is barely explained at all and then dispatched in two graphs, and you have the worst story not only in this book but in Howard’s entire Conan series. Hardcore Conan enthusiasts seldom defend this one; I hate it.
“The Devil In Iron” – A lost ancient city comes back to life when a fisherman unintentionally removes the enchantment which had cast the city into oblivion centuries before. This is all happening on the same island where Conan the Kozak hetman walks into a trap.
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| Conan confronts Khosatral Khal, the formidable overlord of the lost city of Dagon, in the conclusion of "Devil In Iron" as depicted by Boris Vallejo. Image from https://www.blackgate.com/2019/03/18/hither-came-conan-scott-oden-on-the-devil-in-iron/ |
Formula again dominates this story, though what felt shallow in “Xuthal” (lost city under spell) is detailed effectively here. There are even fun moments, as when one of the female inhabitants begins to make love to Conan, only to fall asleep in mid-act.
The fascinating premise of the story is that the city’s inhabitants were slaughtered centuries ago, then resurrected as drowsy copies of their old selves. They remember their centuries-old slaughter only as a dream.
Conan is left to ponder this freak accident of an uncaring universe:
The wild hetman stood like a statue for a space, dimly grasping something of the cosmic tragedy of the fitful ephemera called mankind and the hooded shapes of darkness which prey upon it.
In addition to these stories, The Coming Of Conan The Cimmerian contains several synopses and drafts, including a much-different earlier version of “Phoenix On The Sword” and an unfinished but detailed story treatment which was later completed and titled “The Snout In The Dark.”
The latter is a story I wish Howard had developed as it showed promise and is set in the Black Kingdoms, which otherwise produced only the weakest Conan stories. More important, but less fun for me to read, was Howard’s lengthy synopsis of Conan’s world, “The Hyborian Age.”
More a rundown of the countries and races at play than anything connected to Conan, this essay illuminates Howard’s considerable care and craft.
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| Author Robert E. Howard, with and without shirt. While he struggled to earn money with Conan stories during the Great Depression, Howard found more success with his boxing and western stories, which he also enjoyed and which brought out more of his humorous side. Image from https://amazingstories.com/2014/02/robert-e-howard-many-faces-conan/ |
So does a long and well-researched essay by Patrice Louinet on this early phase of Howard’s Conan output, which spotlights the author’s dealings with Weird Tales. Louinet also makes clear how Howard’s writing drew from influences as wide-ranging as Greek myth and the folklore of Howard’s native Texas.
A Howard-penned poem, “Cimmeria” opens this collection. While it does not mention Conan, its depiction of “slope beyond slope, each hooded like its brothers” suggests a connection to Louinet.
...one is struck by the strong resonance between the descriptions of Cimmeria in the poem and those found in Howard’s reminiscences of the land of his birth, Dark Valley, in Palo Pinto County, Texas.
For newcomers to Conan who enjoy quality action
fiction, Del Ray’s later Conan volumes may offer better starting points, being
as they offer more fully formed and accessible stories. But the sturdy
roots for this fantastic fantasy character lie here.
If you want a more detailed breakdown of the tales found in this and later Del-Ray volumes of Howard’s stories, visit Howard Andrew Jones and Bill Ward’s delightfully exhaustive rundown at Jones blogsite, the start of which can be found by clicking here.
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