What do you think?
Rate this book
Informal Guides to Robert E. Howard
Ar-I-E’ch and the Spell of Cthulhu: An Informal Guide to Robert E. Howard's Lovecraftian Fiction
What Lurks in Realms BeyondRobert E. Howard's correspondence with H.P. Lovecraft inspired the two-fisted creator of Conan the Barbarian to pit his square-jawed modern heroes against cosmic horrors, colossal beasts, and cannibalistic children of the night, in a short-lived effort to open new markets for his fiction.
In this book, the first in the "Informal Guide to Robert E. Howard" series, Howard scholar Fred Blosser analyzes each of REH's Cthulhu Mythos stories, unpacking their plots, their themes, and their unexpected linkages to Howard's other works.
Along with his stories set in the Cthulhu Mythos, REH also wrote tales inspired by Lovecraftian themes, but not part of the Mythos itself. Blosser looks at each of these stories as well.
Though Howard couldn't match Lovecraft's dreamy, sinuous prose, nor did he much care for the timid Lovecraftian "hero", his small canon of Cthulhu fiction expanded the Mythos and gave us men (and sometimes women) not afraid to challenge the cosmic terrors that threatened their sanity and their souls.
With Blosser as your guide, you'll shake loose from Conan and experience an important but often overlooked facet of Robert E. Howard's storytelling genius.
The book includes a selected reading list, a study of elder horrors in the Kull stories, and an examination of a trio of tales that REH set in a most unlikely locale (for him): the haunted seaport.
In this book, the first in the "Informal Guide to Robert E. Howard" series, Howard scholar Fred Blosser analyzes each of REH's Cthulhu Mythos stories, unpacking their plots, their themes, and their unexpected linkages to Howard's other works.
Along with his stories set in the Cthulhu Mythos, REH also wrote tales inspired by Lovecraftian themes, but not part of the Mythos itself. Blosser looks at each of these stories as well.
Though Howard couldn't match Lovecraft's dreamy, sinuous prose, nor did he much care for the timid Lovecraftian "hero", his small canon of Cthulhu fiction expanded the Mythos and gave us men (and sometimes women) not afraid to challenge the cosmic terrors that threatened their sanity and their souls.
With Blosser as your guide, you'll shake loose from Conan and experience an important but often overlooked facet of Robert E. Howard's storytelling genius.
The book includes a selected reading list, a study of elder horrors in the Kull stories, and an examination of a trio of tales that REH set in a most unlikely locale (for him): the haunted seaport.
Kindle Edition
Published May 17, 2018
4 people are currently reading
10 people want to read
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 of 1 review
April 8, 2018
This book was nominated for REHF Award and as part of the voting fairly, I wanted to read all the nominations. On seeing the title, this one was the most interesting to me because of the C'thulhu mythos connection. Having recently read all the Weird Works of Howard, I found that I really enjoyed this book because Blosser does a great job weaving through various stories and picking up threads that interconnect with the works of Lovecraft, Derleth and the general mythos. The recent readings probably made it even more fascinating.
Blosser gives a very detailed set of references through all the works, interweaving uses of Von Junst's Nameless Cults, the Necronomicon, Gol Goroth, and other common terms in Howard's published and unpublished works, as well of Howard's terms in other works, up through the late 1930's.
I appreciated the random reference to "what could have been" if Howard had lived into the 1950's to write Audie Murphy Westerns, which I certainly appreciated. He also observed that while C'thulhu is a well known mythos, most of those who are familiar with it have never actually read a Lovecraft story. (My experience as well).
The discussion of the impact on Conan stories was very well put together. Clearly the C'thulhu pastiche played into Howard's Conan tales even when it was never explicitly mentioned and I believe it remains integral to the hard core sword and sorcery genre.
I would suggest that this book would have been better with some stronger editing to refine the flow and that I would have liked to get more feel for how the overall mythos was impacted by Howard and others, which could be another book.
Blosser gives a very detailed set of references through all the works, interweaving uses of Von Junst's Nameless Cults, the Necronomicon, Gol Goroth, and other common terms in Howard's published and unpublished works, as well of Howard's terms in other works, up through the late 1930's.
I appreciated the random reference to "what could have been" if Howard had lived into the 1950's to write Audie Murphy Westerns, which I certainly appreciated. He also observed that while C'thulhu is a well known mythos, most of those who are familiar with it have never actually read a Lovecraft story. (My experience as well).
The discussion of the impact on Conan stories was very well put together. Clearly the C'thulhu pastiche played into Howard's Conan tales even when it was never explicitly mentioned and I believe it remains integral to the hard core sword and sorcery genre.
I would suggest that this book would have been better with some stronger editing to refine the flow and that I would have liked to get more feel for how the overall mythos was impacted by Howard and others, which could be another book.
Displaying 1 of 1 review