Howard, Robert E[rvin]

Howard, Robert E[rvin]
   (19061936)
   pulp writer from Cross Plains, Tex., best known as the author ofsword and sorcerytales of Conan, King Kull, Bran Mak Morn, and Solomon Kane, in which the supernatural, historical fiction, and adventure are mingled. When HPLsThe Rats in the Wallswas reprinted in WT(June 1930), Howard detected in the story what he believed to be an unconventional theory regarding the early settlement of Britain; he accordingly wrote to editor Farnsworth Wright, who passed the letter on to HPL. Their correspondence lasted until the end of Howards life and was tremendously voluminous (an estimated 430,000 words279,000 by Howardsurvive). Much of it was devoted to lengthy, even acrimonious, disputes over the relative merits of civilization and barbarism (Howard, scion of one of the pioneer settlers of Texas, Dr. I.M.Howard, saw in barbarism a freedom and vigor lacking in modern life), and the relative merits of intellectual and physical activity. Howards side survives largely intact, but HPLs letters were inadvertently destroyed by Dr. Howard some years after Howards death; they now exist, only partially, in extensive transcripts prepared by Arkham House. Howards Selected Letters(Necronomicon Press, 198991; 2 vols.) includes many of his letters to HPL.
   Some of Howards horror stories are indebted to HPL; notable among them areThe Black Stone” ( WT,November 1931), “Worms of the Earth” ( WT,November 1932), andThe Fire of Asshurbanipal” ( WT,December 1936). Various items of Lovecraftian lore are mentioned in several stories. Most of Howards Lovecraftian tales are collected in Cthulhu(1987). HPL mentioned the serpentmen of Valusia (from HowardsThe Shadow Kingdom” [ WT,August 1929]) and one of Conans forebears, the Cimmerian chieftain Crom-Ya, inThe Shadow out of Time” (193435). Howard invented an analogue to the Necronomicon: Nameless Cults (or the Black Book) by von Juntz (HPL supplied the authors first names, Friedrich Wilhelm). August Derleth then coined the putative German title, Unaussprechlichen Kulten.Howard is one of the central characters in the spoofThe Battle That Ended the Century” (1934). HPL was shaken by Howards suicide in June 1936, and he wrote a poignant tribute, “In Memoriam: Robert Ervin Howard” ( Fantasy Magazine,September 1936); a shorter version, “Robert Ervin Howard: 19061936,” appeared in the Phantagraph,August 1936.
   See Glenn Lord, The Last Celt: A Bio-bibliography of Robert Ervin Howard (1976); L.Sprague de Camp, Catherine Crook de Camp, and Jane Whittington Griffin, Dark Valley Destiny: The Life of Robert E.Howard (1983); Don Herron, ed., The Dark Barbarian: The Writings of Robert E.Howard: A Critical Anthology (Greenwood Press, 1984); Marc A.Cerasini and Charles Hoffman, Robert E.Howard (1987); Robert M.Price, “Robert E.Howard and the Cthulhu Mythos,” LSNo. 18 (Spring 1989): 1013, 29

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