The Sword & Sorcery Anthology

505 Pages·2012·2.07 MB·English

by  Hartwell David G

T S & S A
HE WORD ORCERY N THOLOGY
© 2012 by Tachyon Publications
This is a work of collected fiction. All events portrayed in this book are fictitious and
any resemblance to real people or events is purely coincidental. All rights reserved,
including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form without
the express permission of the editors and the publisher.
Introduction © 2012 by David Drake
Interior and cover design by Elizabeth Story
Cover art by Jean-Sébastien Rossbach
Tachyon Publications
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San Francisco, CA 94107
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[email protected] Series Editor: Jacob Weisman
Project Editor: Jill Roberts
Book ISBN 13: 978-1-61696-069-8; ISBN 10: 1-61696-069-8
First Edition: 2012
“The Tower of the Elephant” copyright © 1933 by Robert E. Howard. First appeared
in Weird Tales, March 1933.
“Black God’s Kiss” copyright © 1934 by C. L. Moore. First appeared in Weird Tales,
October 1934.

“The Unholy Grail” copyright © 1962 by Fritz Leiber. First appeared in Fan tastic
Stories of the Imagination, October 1962.
“The Tale of Hauk” copyright © 1977 by Poul Anderson. First appeared in Swords
Against Darkness, Vol. 1, edited by Andrew J. Offutt (Zebra Books: New York).
“The Caravan of Forgotten Dreams” copyright © 1962 by Michael and Linda
Moorcock. First appeared as “The Flame Bringers” in Science Fantasy, Issue #55,
October/October 1962.

“The Adventuress” copyright © 1967 by Joanna Russ. First appeared in Orbit 2,
edited by Damon Knight (Putnam: New York).
“Gimmile’s Songs” copyright © 1984 by Charles R. Saunders. First appeared in

Sword and Sorceress #1, edited by Marion Zimmer Bradley (DAW Books: New
York).
“Undertow” copyright © 1977 by Karl Edward Wagner. First appeared in Whispers
#10, August 1977.
“The Stages of the God” copyright © 1974 by Ramsey Campbell (writing as
Montgomery Comfort). First appeared in Whispers #5, November 1974.
“The Barrow Troll” copyright © 1975 by David Drake. First appeared in Whispers
#8, December 1975.
“Soldier of an Empire Unacquainted with Defeat” copyright © 1980 by Glen Cook.
First appeared in Berkley Showcase, Volume 2, edited by Victoria Schochet and John
Silbersack (Berkley Books: New York).
“Epistle from Lebanoi” copyright © 2012 by Michael Shea. Original appearance in
this anthology.
“Become a Warrior” copyright © 1998 by Jane Yolen. First appeared in Warrior
Princess, edited by Elizabeth Ann Scarborough and Martin H. Greenberg (DAW:
New York). Reprinted by permission of Curtis Brown, Ltd.
“The Red Guild” copyright © 1985 by Rachel Pollack. First appeared in Sword and
Sorceress #2, edited by Marion Zimmer Bradley (DAW: New York).
“Six from Atlantis” copyright © 2006 by Gene Wolfe. First appeared in Cross Plains
Universe: Texans Celebrate Robert E. Howard, edited by Scott A. Cupp and Joe R.
Lansdale (MonkeyBrain Books & Fandom Association of Central Texas: Austin,
Texas). Reprinted by permission of the author and the author’s agent, the Virginia
Kidd Agency, Inc.
“The Sea Troll’s Daughter” copyright © 2010 by Caitlín R. Kiernan. First appeared
Swords & Dark Magic: The New Sword and Sorcery, edited by Jonathan Strahan and
Lou Anders (EOS: New York).
“The Coral Heart” copyright © 2009 by Jeffrey Ford. First appeared in Eclipse

Three, edited by Jonathan Strahan (Night Shade Books: San Francisco).
“Path of the Dragon” copyright © 2000 by George R. R. Martin. First appeared in

Asimov’s SF, December 2000.
“The Year of the Three Monarchs” copyright © 2012 by Michael Swanwick. Original
appearance in this anthology.
CONTENTS
Introduction: Storytellers:
A Guided Ramble into Sword and Sorcery Fiction
by David Drake
The Tower of the Elephant
by Robert E. Howard
Black God’s Kiss
by C. L. Moore
The Unholy Grail
by Fritz Leiber
The Tale of Hauk
by Poul Anderson
The Caravan of Forgotten Dreams
by Michael Moorcock
The Adventuress
by Joanna Russ
Gimmile’s Songs
by Charles R. Saunders<
Undertow
by Karl Edward Wagner
The Stages of the God
by Ramsey Campbell (writing as Montgomery Comfort)
The Barrow Troll
by David Drake
Soldier of an Empire Unacquainted with Defeat
by Glen Cook
Epistle from Lebanoi
by Michael Shea
Become a Warrior
by Jane Yolen
The Red Guild
by Rachel Pollack
Six from Atlantis
by Gene Wolfe
The Sea Troll’s Daughter
by Caitlín R. Kiernan
The Coral Heart
by Jeffrey Ford
Path of the Dragon
by George R. R. Martin
The Year of the Three Monarchs
by Michael Swanwick
Storytellers:
A Guided Ramble into Sword and Sorcery Fiction
DAVID DRAKE
1.
M W W , one of the finest pure storytellers I’ve
ANLY ADE ELLMAN
ever known, was born in 1903 in Kamundongo, Angola; Manly’s
father ran the clinic there for a medical charity. Except for
Manly and his family, there were no white residents within fifty
miles.
At the time, the local villagers hammered blades for their
spears and knives from scrap iron which they bought from the
Portuguese. In all other respects Kamundongo was a Stone Age
society, culturally more similar to the first agricultural villages
of Mesopotamia than to the towns of the Iron Age Greeks
where Homer sang the Iliad.
Manly’s most vivid childhood memory was of the day a ten-
year-old herdboy faced the leopard that was stalking his goats
and killed it with his spear. That night there was a banquet in
the boy’s honor. He was seated on the high stool with the
leopard’s skin, fresh and reeking, draped over his shoulders.
From his place of honor the boy doled out a piece of the cat’s
flesh to every adult male. When they had eaten the meat that
would strengthen their spirits as well as their bodies, the men
each in turn chanted a song of praise to the enthroned hero,
recounting and embellishing his accomplishment. He has
vanquished the monster which threatened our lives and our
livelihoods!
Behold the hero! Hear his mighty deeds!
This is storytelling as the Cro-Magnons practiced it, and this
is the essence of sword and sorcery fiction.
2.
Some people argue the definition of sword and sorcery, just as
they argue the definition of Conservatism, or Christianity, or
the color blue.
The editors of this anthology have chosen to start S&S with
Robert E. Howard and C. L. Moore in the early ’30s and to go
on from there with works which share kinship with Howard and
Moore. I consider this a perfectly reasonable structure.
Robert E. Howard had been appearing regularly in Weird
Tales since July 1925, but it was Conan’s December 1932
appearance in “The Phoenix on the Sword” which made
Howard a fantasy superstar. This irritated a number of people,
at the time as well as since. Comments have ranged from
“Howard isn’t very good,” through “One of Howard’s other
series is much better than Conan,” to “I, not Howard, am
responsible for Conan’s success!”
Personally, some of the Solomon Kane stories are my Howard
favorites; and most readers would agree that some of Howard’s
Conan stories are better than others. As for the “I’m
responsible!” claims—arrogant stupidity will always be with us.
I won’t try to explain the phenomenon, but I will state that to
the best of my knowledge and belief, Conan created S&S as a
publishing category as surely as Stephen King created horror
as a publishing category. There have been Conan knockoffs and
Conan pastiches (which are generally worse than the
knockoffs) and Anti-Conans, but virtually all of the S&S which
appeared after December 1932 was written in some degree
with reference to Conan.
My first contact with S&S came when I read Conan the
Conqueror as half of an Ace double when I was fourteen. I read
more Howard and more S&S when I found it, but neither was
readily available in Clinton, Iowa, during the early ’60s.
That initial taste had made a huge impact on me, though.
Howard understood the basics of story the way the men of
Kamundongo did, and he communicated his enthusiasm to me
as well as to many thousands of his other readers.
3.
The book on the reverse side of Conan the Conqueror was The
Sword of Rhiannon by Leigh Brackett. Technically Brackett’s
short novel was space opera rather than fantasy, but there was
little philosophical difference between the two genres—a fact
underscored by the title, which pairs “sword” with the name of
a goddess/queen from Celtic mythology.
And this brings us directly to C. L. Moore, the second starting
point for the present anthology. Catherine Moore’s first story, “Shambleau,”
appeared in Weird Tales in January 1933—the month after Conan.
It was every bit as remarkable as “The Phoenix on the Sword,”
but it was a space opera.
Moore wrote several stories in her interplanetary milieu
before beginning to alternate stories about a male spaceman,
Northwest Smith, with stories about a female swordswoman,
Jirel of Joiry, who lived in a version of Medieval France as
fantastic as the Mars of “Shambleau.” The two series are
identical in tone and were intermingled in the volumes of their
initial book publication.
Smith and Jirel are a development parallel to Conan rather
than Conan’s direct offspring. Much of later S&S owes a great
deal to Moore—and to space opera, in particular to Leigh
Brackett.
4.
For a period in the ’60s and ’70s, Conan was as big a thing in
publishing as zombies are today. This had the genuinely good
result of making room on the fringes for historical/fantasy
adventures which weren’t trying to rehash Conan but which
wouldn’t have been (re)published if Conan hadn’t created a
category. (This includes quite a lot of Howard’s own non-Conan