Robert E. Howard Page 7

Howard Ferp, portrayed by Clarke in the short film ‘Hole In The Paper Sky’ written by Howard Kingkade and directed by Bill Purple, is initially shown as an arrogant and self-centered man. However, his life undergoes a profound change when he crosses paths with an unexpected character called ‘Thirty Nine’. Thirty Nine happens to be…

In December of 1932, readers of Weird Tales got a little something extra in their stockings for Christmas, namely a Cimmerian named Conan. That first Conan story, “The Phoenix on the Sword,” was followed by 16 additional Conan adventures that were published through October 1936 in the pages of The Unique Magazine. Four additional yarns and…

With “The Black Stranger,” Howard and Conan return to the forests, rivers and forts of the Pictish Wilderness, which serves as a Hyborian version of the American frontier. The story might have been intended as a  sequel to “Beyond the Black River.”  However, Weird Tales editor Farnsworth Wright rejected the story; perhaps a bit peeved at…

The Robert E. Howard story “Marchers of Valhalla,” the first in his cycle of stories featuring the often-reincarnated James Allison, was recently published as a bonus for members of the Robert E. Howard Foundation, containing the existing typewritten manuscript drafts of the tale. “Marchers” is of interest as an example of the way Howard’s pioneering…

With the jack-o-lantern rotting on the front porch and a half-finished list of items needed for Thanksgiving dinner in a kitchen drawer, the bombardment of Christmas sales and advertisements that unmercifully pound our senses has begun. In this tempest of holiday commercialism, where there is much wailing and gnashing of teeth, there is solace within the pages of…

Like most of us, Robert E. Howard was a fan of the movies and like many people who lived through the Great Depression, movies were more than entertainment to him; they were a form of escapism. The movies were also a source of inspiration for his fertile imagination.  Indeed, some scenes from movies he saw even…

Introduction In recent years, television programming, along with publishing ventures, have presented a number of projects looking at the concept of catastrophism, along with diffusionism. One of the best of these books is Brad Steiger’s Worlds Before Our Own, a work that initially earned that writer a great deal of ridicule and personal attacks. Yet…

 Part III: A Different Kind of Strength  We’ve seen what strong women can accomplish in both Howard’s fiction and in the modern world. But, what of those women who because of the circumstances of their lives, do not have any control over their life or safety—those who are not “born to rule” and are unable…

Robert E. Howard was born and raised in Texas during the early 1900s, a time not too far removed from the days of the Old Frontier.  While growing up, Howard talked to many old timers who still recalled the days when Indians were a threat to the frontiersmen and danger lurked at every turn of…

Robert E. Howard’s hatred of the slave trade was unequivocal. His poems in this subject area are so vivid they could almost be used as part of the history of the slaves taken from Africa. It is one of the few subject areas in which REH shows no conflicting point of view in his poetry….