So it begins... a final big push

A few items of note.

Arcane Arts: Dispatches from the Silver Key went out yesterday, covering heavy metal, sword-and-sorcery (including Karl Edward Wagner's Kane, a cool fanzine I'm a part of, and an academic panel on REH I'll be speaking on). 

Remember to sign up if you haven't already. It's a free email and covers stuff I don't cover here. 

It also included something I want to talk about in a bit more detail here: The heavy metal memoir.

The Silver Key went dormant from 2013-2019, not coincidentally the same time I went to work on Flame and Crimson.

The good news is: That's not going to happen with the latest WIP. It's fully written, reviewed by a couple close friends and my wife who all appear in it. I rewrote it until I couldn't look at it anyore.

But on Friday/Saturday it came back from a contracted line editor. And, I have some work to do.

I plan to have it done by July-early August. I need to have it done by then. I’m giving myself a little wiggle room, but not much.  I’m hosting a heavy metal party with a live band in mid-Septemer, at which I’m handing out a few free copies of the book.

It must be done by then. And so the big, difficult, final push is on.

Posting here will be less frequent and less substantive. 

Stephen King on REH

Stephen King had … things to say about Robert E. Howard and sword-and-sorcery.  He mostly liked the former … not so much the latter.

If you own a copy of the Del Reys and their pure Howard texts, you've probably seen this positive, forceful quote placed prominently on display:

“In his best work, Howard's writing seems so highly charged with energy that it nearly gives off sparks.”

This is an excerpt from King's1981 survey of horror and dark fantasy Danse Macabre. In it King references Howard with praise, though has no use for the subgenre he spawned. 

King calls sword-and-sorcery a mediocre branch of fantasy that catered tales of power and wish-fulfillment for the powerless, “stories of strong-thewed barbarians whose extraordinary prowess at fighting is only excelled by their extraordinary prowess at fucking.” Added King, “This sort of fiction, commonly called ‘sword and sorcery’ by its fans, is not fantasy at its lowest, but it still has a pretty tacky feel; mostly it’s the Hardy Boys dressed up in animal skins and rated R.”  King mentions no individual works or authors of sword-and-sorcery in his savage broadside, save Howard, who he also praises as “the only writer who really got away with this stuff. … Howard overcame the limitations of his puerile material by the force and fury of his writing and by his imagination.” 

You can find more King commentary on REH here on the blog of Gary Romeo, who examines a flawed piece from King that appeared in the Jan. 1978 issue of the men’s magazine Oui. Though I must say King’s “mama’s boy” commentary sounds suspiciously like something he would have picked up from a DeCamp intro. Romeo gives us the full Danse Macabre quote from King, which is decidedly more of a mixed opinion of Howard:

 “In his best work, Howard’s writing seems so highly charged with energy that it nearly gives off sparks. Stories such as “The People of the Black Circle” glow with the fierce and eldritch light of his frenzied intensity. At his best, Howard was the Thomas Wolfe of fantasy, and most of his Conan tales seem to almost fall over themselves in their need to get out. Yet his other work was either unremarkable or just abysmal….The word will hurt and anger his legion of fans, but I don’t believe any other word fits.”

All this comes up here because as I continue to work my way through the The Stand I’ve encountered another REH reference. Harold Lauder, a troubled Gollum-like figure who hovered on the edge of “good” and might still have become that way, is jilted by Frances Goldsmith, gives in to his worst adolescent impulses, and ultimately throws his lot in with Vegas and Flagg and the wicked West.

Pre-superflu Lauder was once a reader of adventure fiction … then gave it up for the (imagined) company of girls:

At age sixteen he had given up Burroughs and Stevenson and Robert Howard in favor of other fantasies, fantasies that were both well loved and much hated—not of rockets or pirates but of girls in silk see-through pajamas kneeling before him on satin pillows while Harold the Great lolled naked on his throne, ready to chastise them with small leather whips, with silver-headed canes. They were bitter fantasies through which every pretty girl at Ogunquit High School had strolled one time or another.

Ah Harold, you shouldn’t have read Frannie’s diary…no turning back from that.

King is a king of pop culture references. Howard-heads, are you aware of any other REH references?

Anyway, well past the halfway mark of The Stand.

Arcane Arts #11

Has just published. More thoughts on The Stand, and S&S, and Dokken. If you happen to like these things: https://brian-murphy.kit.com/posts/arcane-arts-dispatches-from-the-silver-key-8 

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Returning to The Stand, and its comforts

I find Stephen King’s The Stand to be comfort food. I’m not sure what that says about me … but there it is.

A devastating plague accidently leaks from a top-secret U.S. Department of Defense biological weapons laboratory located under the California Mojave Desert. Extremely contagious and extraordinarily deadly, the plague, nicknamed Captain Trips (also Tube Neck and the choking sickness) suffocates its hosts in pleurisy and mucous, eliminating most of the world’s population.

There are survivors but many suffer far worse fates.

Unimaginable horror … but comforting to me, nonetheless. Perhaps because there is something of The Lord of the Rings in it, a novel to which I also return to again and again for familiarity and relief. King has stated on a few occasions that he was attempting with The Stand to write an American Lord of the Rings, and all the broad strokes are there: troupe of heroes banding together, an epic quest of good vs. evil that stretches from coast-to-coast in which Boulder serves as Minas Tirith and Vegas, Mordor. Maine is a sort of Rivendell. 

Randall Flagg, the Walking Dude, an American dark lord.

The second way in which I find The Stand comforting is its nostalgia. It takes me back to a different time and place in my life, enveloping me like a warm blanket. I think I read the original 1978 version sometime in the late 80s, when my King obsession was in full swing. I used to own this version, and was a fan of the depiction of Flagg’s cold and menacing eyes. I’m saddened to learn that at some point I parted ways with it.

When The Stand was re-released in 1991 for the first time complete and uncut, I bought the first edition Signet paperback, which I still own, and read it voraciously. Here it is.

My cherished, first edition paperback.

I graduated high school in ’91 and at the time my buddies and I were all mainlining thrash metal. Anthrax’s “Among the Living” (song and album) was the ultimate complement to this re-released uncut version of The Stand, which several of us read and chatted about. It was a glorious time. The period in which the events of the original novel is set--the late 70s--is the time of my early youth.

It's a vibe man, one I dig.

Like LOTR The Stand is about loss and the Fall. King says in Danse Macabre that he was inspired to write the book after America’s early 1970s backslide—the disgrace and resignation of Richard Nixon, the divisive and fruitless Vietnam War, inflation, and the 1970s energy crisis. “The America I had grown up in seemed to be crumbling beneath my feet,” King said. “It began to seem like an elaborate castle of sand and unfortunately built well below the high tide line.”

The Stand is absolutely fantastic in its depiction of rapid societal collapse. If we had any doubt how quickly our own bindings could come undone the events of 2020 made that clear. We disintegrated pretty damned quick. Rather than rally together the pandemic and its response drove a wedge in this country.

The Stand is entirely reframed post-COVID-19. It no longer feels so fantastic. Though we don’t know (and may never know) its ultimate origins, Covid probably escaped from a Wuhan Lab; perhaps an infected Chinese scientist escaped quarantine and went on the run with his family before the outbreak could be contained. 

Let’s hope we’ve seen the worst and will be better prepared next time. Maybe we should all read The Stand and remember what is at stake.

Postapocalyptic novels offer clarity and simplification. Office politics and tax rates and school budgets are wiped away, replaced by simple survival. With fewer choices, our minds are unburdened. We imagine how we’d do in that situation.

We hope good people would still come together in the end. 

King is in a very small handful of the most recognizable and read authors of our generation, and not without cause. Re-reading The Stand (I’m on page 272 of this 1,141 page monster) I’m reminded why. 

He’s a creative genius.

I haven’t read The Stand in perhaps 20 years and as I revisit it now I'm finding the number of small strokes of imaginative detail staggering. The cold-blooded Elder, an icy-eyed assassin in a hazmat suit who at the last hour will make sure Stu Redman doesn't survive to tell the tale. The wild-eyed Monster Shouter, a mad prophet who roams a barren New York landscape declaring that the monsters are returning. He's right.

King’s second authorial gift is bringing characters to life. The Stand introduces us to an broad and diverse cast, yet King renders each uniquely memorable. At this point in the book I’ve been reacquainted with the deaf-mute Nick Andros, laconic, blue-collar Stu Redman, troubled, budding rock star Larry Underwood, pregnant and free-spirited Frannie Goldsmith, petty crook Lloyd Henreid, and the creepy and nerdily awkward Harold Lauder. Each time it’s like meeting an old friend.

And then there’s Randall Flagg, the Dark Man, a half-man, half-demon, charismatic, mad, and full of evil design. 

King’s third gift is his ability scare the shit out of you. You don’t forget Underwood’s crawl for freedom through the Lincoln Tunnel in a terrifying, pitch-black sequence. Or the cool hand that slides out and around Stu’s ankle in the dark stairwell in his final escape from a Vermont CDC lab. Come down and eat chicken with me, beautiful…

Imagination, characterization, fear… The Stand combines all this with an epic storyline and so is one of King’s best. I’m not sure if it’s his best book—take your pick of IT, The Shining, Pet Sematary, 11/22/63, Salem’s Lot, Misery, a few others—but The Stand is in that conversation.

The Stand has been adapted for television twice, as recently as 2021, which I haven't seen, and apparently is not very good.

I watched the 1994 miniseries at college when it debuted and enjoyed it for the most part, though it still fell far short of the high bar set by the book. The opening sequence remains effective; I can no longer hear Blue Oyster Cult’s “Don’t Fear the Reaper” without thinking of dead scientists in lab coats slumped over lunch tables.

I’m sure I’ll share a few more thoughts as I finish, but it’s a long way to Vegas. Better get on my walking boots.

Don't Break My Heart Again, Whitesnake

This is a great fucking song. 

Let's get that out of the way first. If you only know Whitesnake from "Still of the Night" or "Here I Go Again," here's one to broaden your horizons. It's a deep-ish cut, very early 80s, with a bit of 70s keyboard hangover clinging on. 

Which is great.

I am tired of conversations about genre. I shouldn't be I suppose, considering I wrote a book about one ... but I am. I just can't wade into anymore conversations about what is or isn't sword-and-sorcery.

This song is something of the reason why.

Is Whitesnake heavy metal? I mean, maybe? Maybe not?

It doesn't matter. 

What matters is, is the song good. Does it rock? Does it get your head nodding? 

Answer--yes. David Coverdale is killing it.

What matters about a story is, is the story good? Does it move you and keep the pages turning? Get that down first, let geeks like me sort out where it falls. 

Genre is a vague signpost. If someone is a Bon Jovi fan or a Scorpions fan, Whitesnake is pretty dialed in to that. Very safe referral. 

But even for Maiden and Priest fans like me, this is awesome.

Happy Metal and Hard Rock Friday.

Latest issue of Arcane Arts is out

Issue no. 10 of Arcane Arts hit inboxes this AM. I've been nailing this every week, like clockwork on Wednesday morning, though as noted in this week's issue next week might end my streak (I have to travel to Chicago on business).

This week we covered:

• The holy grail
• Robert Plant
• My new author page on Facebook
• L. Sprague de Camp controversy
• Poul Anderson's The Last Viking

If you haven't signed up yet, throw your email in the widget at right. My subscribers are ticking up but its slow; if you know someone who might like what I cover in the newsletter forward them an email or send them here to sign up.

The great quest continues: Joseph Campbell's Romance of the Grail

I’m probably not going to find the holy grail—the cup Joseph of Arimathea used to gather the blood of Christ, and later brought to Glastonbury—in the wooded trail behind my house.

But then again, perhaps I might.

The search for the holy grail is not a search for physical relic, but a spiritual awakening within.

This second, deeper layer is why it and its associated myths endure. These comprise the heart of Joseph Campbell’s Romance of the Grail: The Magic and Mystery of Arthurian Myth.

I find myself needing a daily walk through the woods behind my home to reset from a world that is increasingly online and artificial and ugly. I recently made the mistake of following a thread over to Twitter/X and was confronted with a digital manifestation of The Wasteland, damaged 30-year-old dudebros cursing at one another and asking Grok to confirm the veracity of a series of AI generated text and images that would have made the editors of The Inquirer or Weekly World News blanch, and turn away.

And I turn again to nature, and physical books, for healing. And to those who have sought the path of wisdom.

The Middle Way... an old railroad bed behind my house.

Joseph Campbell examined myths across cultures, looking for patterns and similarities. These patterns led him inexorably back to the human heart. Many researchers err by trying to tie myths to history or prove or disprove them by sifting through physical artifacts, rather than their psychological truths, which are found within. In his words:

“It is one of the prime mistakes of many interpreters of mythological symbols to read them as references, not to mysteries of the human spirit, but to earthly or unearthly scenes and to actual or imagined historical events—the Promised Land as Canaan, for example, and heaven as a district of the sky—or to see the Israelites passage of the Red Sea as an event such as newspaper reporter might have witnessed. It is one of the glories, on the other hand, of the Celtic tradition that in its handling even of religious themes it retranslates them from the languages of imagined fact into a mythological idiom, so that they may be experienced not as time-conditioned but as timeless, telling not of miracles long past but of miracles potential within ourselves, here, now, and forever.”

This truth can be understood by examining the early mythological sources of the grail. The grail resists a definitive single physical instantiation. For example, in its earliest depictions from Welsh and Celtic sources it took the form not of a cup, but a cauldron. The cauldron of Rebirth/Pair Dadeni, from the central Welsh myth featuring a vessel that can revive dead warriors, which plays a major role in the Mabinogion (and much later, the Prydain Chronicles). The Dagda’s Cauldron, one of the Four Treasures of the Tuatha Dé Danann, an inexhaustible vessel out of deep Irish lore from which "no company ever went away hungry." And Ceridwen’s Cauldron, of Poetic Inspiration and Knowledge, which bestowed wisdom and transformation on its user. 

Multiplication of food/unlimited sustenance, wisdom and transformation, resurrection. 

These ancient Celtic sources were almost certainly the basis for the grail myth, which became transmogrified by the likes of Wolfram von Eschenbach (who depicted the grail as a stone from heaven), and the unfinished romance Perceval le Gallois by Chrétien de Troyes. You can find a good article on that process here. And of course, in this book.

Campbell’s first mythological obsession was the Grail. We get in this book his master’s thesis, “A Study of the Dolorous Stroke,” which he submitted to the Department of English and Comparative Literature at Columbia University in 1927, when he was just 22 years old. It’s a deep examination of the myth of the Fisher King, the story of the wounding of a king by a lance through the thigh or groin (sometimes burning of a hand). The king is left in agony, unable to find relief save through fishing. 

The wound is also spiritual. Fishing is equated to going down into unconscious waters to pull souls, or beings, out of the unconscious state into the light, Campbell says. We’ve all been hurt, deeply. We need someone to, without expectation of reciprocity or mercenary motive, ask the question: what ails you, friend? 

After asking the question, a draught from the grail brings healing, to the king and the land.

Peace is all around us, but our monkey minds won’t permit it to be seen. One path is the search for the grail, through examining its symbolic importance as a vessel of wisdom and rebirth. 

In its stories you might find what it has to teach about your own plight, friend. 

The best chapter is probably Campbell’s examination of Wolfram von Eschenbach’s Parzival, which I do need to read, one of these days. Here Campbell’s does his unique magic of convincingly tying Buddhism to Arthurian Romance. Both are concerned with the search for a path to liberation known as the Middle Way. “The Middle Way between heaven and hell is earned through exercise of the three virtues, plus a fourth: 1) disengagement from the fury of the passions, 2) fearlessness in the face of death, 3) indifference to the opinion of the world, and 4) compassion.” In von Eschenbach’s tale a Muslim knight confronts Anfortas, the Fisher King, on the jousting field; Anfortas kills his foe but receives a wound through his thighs. Campbell interprets this wounding not as a simple battle, but as a symbolic disaster representing "the dissociation within Christendom of spirit from nature". The Christian king (Anfortas) is wounded by a representative of nature (the "oriental" or pagan warrior). These two opposing forces, nature and spirit, can only be resolved through access to a middle way.

Writes Campbell, “The first birth of man, as a physical culture motivated by the animal energies of the body, is biological. Man’s second, properly human birth, is spiritual, of the heart and mind.” 

Or as one of his great inspirations, Carl Jung, said, “your vision will become clear only when you can look into your own heart, who looks outside, dreams; who looks inside awakes.” 

There are many curious parallels between tales of the Crucifixion and of the dolorous stroke. Both point to a similar lesson:

Nor will people say, ‘Here it is,’ or ‘There it is,’ because the kingdom of God is in your midst.”

Romance of the Grail is studded with insights like this. It will lead you on a merry chase, for example to this terrific video. If you can bear the terrible tinny 80s music and production, a fantastic watch.

Recommended.

***

The path behind my house is a Middle Way. A railroad once ran on it, iron and coal combustion driving freight across the country. Now it’s given way to trucking, the rails and ties torn out. But the bed remains, a path that now accommodates foot traffic into nature.

Probably some type of symbol there. Maybe I’ll find a cauldron out in these woods.

Darkside of Aquarius, Bruce Dickinson

Intelligence has become fetishized.

CEOs of major tech companies with a very high IQ… and zero sense, and zero empathy.  Sam Altman defending AI’s energy toll by saying it also takes a lot to ‘train a human.’ “It takes about 20 years of life – and all the food you consume during that time – before you become smart,” he says.

Chilling.

Being “smart” is the top of his hierarchy of values. And because of the theoretical unlimited computing power of a machine, we know where this leads.

Machine over man.

Intelligence ≠ wisdom.

Bruce Dickinson sang about this eloquently in “Darkside of Aquarius.” Powerfully too, but we expect that. It is Bruce, the human Air Raid Siren.

Peaceful existence and love of fellow man, as symbolized by the wheel of Dharma, is under assault from four apocalyptic hellriders. We've got 5 in the real world but close enough. I don’t put a lot of confidence in the soothsaying accuracy of astrological signs, but the Dark Side of Aquarius is a helpful heuristic here. It’s a psychological state characterized by extreme emotional detachment, stubbornness, and a tendency to be aloof or unpredictable. Intellect is prioritized over emotion.  It celebrates "progress" over human flourishing.

When unbalanced, Aquarians can act coldly and ruthlessly, frequently using their intelligence to justify any action. A God complex. 

The second hellrider came, from flaming seas and molten sands

Pipers playing Hell's commands

Poured out his poison, with his promises of promised lands

Blackened tongues of lying leaders

We need a silver surfer to save us from Galactus about now. This bit is in the song too. 

I’ve also heard that it is a reference to Shakespeare’s “Macbeth,” but it’s too long since I’ve read that to comment. And I have to run to a brewery.

… ANYWAY, grim stuff but a great song. That transition at 4:38 … chills.

I have said before Bruce’s solo stuff is criminally underrated. Accident of Birth is an incredible album for which I need to do a deeper dive at some point. I've covered "Man of Sorrows" before and there is a lot more to mine from this album.

Happy Metal Friday.

Arcane Arts #9

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https://brian-murphy.kit.com/posts/arcane-arts-dispatches-from-the-silver-key-6

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Ten things I’ve learned after 1000 blog posts

I said this was coming after The Super, Super-Secret History of Sword-and-Sorcery. And here it is. This isn’t a summarization of everything I’ve learned since starting The Silver Key, because since I first pressed publish in September 2007 I’ve read +/- 1,000 books, changed careers, raised children, witnessed deaths and births, seen the world, grown grayer and balder, and hosted a Judas Priest tribute band in my living room. I want to talk instead about what a regular, consistent, and now I have to add—human—writing habit did for me, and could do for you. Blog post by blog post, from one to 1,000.

Having written 1,000 blog posts, if you do the same:

1. You will become a better writer. Over time your posts will read better, they will take better structure and their argumentation, stronger. It will occur slowly but inevitably and inexorably. When you work out with weights you don’t build strength in a week or a few months but over years, one workout after the next. Until suddenly you realize you’ve become a better writer. In my oldest posts my style is there and recognizable, but is abrupt, crabbed, less thoughtful, less ambitious. I am a better writer now and still making incremental improvements.

2. You will become a more rigorous thinker. Reading books is one of the best things a human being can do; writing down your thoughts and impressions as you read and publishing them is the next level. On many occasions I thought I knew what a book was about ... until I began writing about it. And realized I had more thinking to do. I’ve made revelations by committing my clouded, half-baked thoughts to the page, and edited and revised until I understood. As a clear thinker you will start to be seen as an authority, whether you want to or not. 

3.You will build a repository of content that you can turn into books or articles. You can write a book this way; many have done this. Flame and Crimson was built on dozens of sword-and-sorcery book reviews gradually expanding to broader thoughts on genre. My heavy metal memoir is in production and while it’s not precisely what I do with Metal Friday, it is inspired by my memories here, of how I grew up with the greatest genre of music ever conceived for pale teenage boys. 

4. Your interests will change, you will change, and so will your output. I started this blog in the midst of a 10-year D&D campaign and that was the subject of many of my early posts. I no longer play D&D and so my writing on roleplaying has fallen away. These days I am reading a lot less fiction, I find myself more interested in the world, and my psychology. So I write about those topics. I don’t know how others have the will to narrow their focus to say, roleplaying only. Focus is almost certainly better way to build an audience, but that’s not what I’m doing here. And not everyone will like the change to your blog, which leads me to point 5.

5. You will constantly struggle with what to leave out as much to put in. I’ve debated whether I should address some hot social issue of the day. I brush up to politics and religion. And usually leave it out. I am cautious with what I commit to writing, but not overly so; if you round the edges off something enough it becomes shapeless. Some things you write will offend people; I’ve had people leave nasty, insulting comments on my posts for some perceived sleight or for not sharing their same passion for their pearl of a book or movie. I would say I’m sorry but I’m mostly not; I’m a harmless 52-year-old blogger with a point of view. These days I try to lean into positivity, and saying nothing instead of going critical. But if you feel strongly about something, say it. The point is not to antagonize or troll, but if you write clearly and truthfully you will offend someone, somewhere. In fact if no one ever is aroused by something you’ve written, you’re probably playing it too cautious. 

6. You will learn the secret formula: Discipline married to inspiration. Forget about trying to be divinely inspired or profound, just write, regularly. Not every post is going to move mountains. In fact you can’t predict what will land; sometimes you’ll press publish thinking you’ve just written the next “Self-Reliance” and it lands without a sound in the digital void. What’s not important is what you write but that you keep doing it. You don’t have to write every day but if pressed I would say, never let a week go by without a post. In the long run you will need to find what you are passionate about or you will lose steam. Write about what you must. It doesn’t matter if it’s been said before, once or a hundred times; you haven’t said it in your own, unique way. But at some point even your passion will wane, if only temporarily, when that occurs a weekly discipline comes back in.

7. No one else does this so you’ve got superpowers, man! Most websites or blogs go dormant; the number of people who start a blog or a Substack or a website only to have it collect dust in 2 weeks or 6 months is by far and away the norm. If you can do 1000 posts over years you are abnormal, you might even be Batman. You have accomplished something most mortals will not. 

8. You will come to understand that blogs aren’t a popular medium—and that’s OK. Reading is in decline. That’s not my opinion, that is a highly studied and well-surveyed fact. Most people will go to YouTube to watch a video on Conan or the Normandy landings than seek out an article on these topics. The heyday of blogs was probably 2005-2011, which is starting to sound like a long time ago. If your goal is views, or building an audience, you should probably go the YouTube route. I’ve got a face for radio and I’m far more comfortable writing than speaking, and as noted I think writing is transformative for the individual in a way pressing record and speaking is not. If you’re of the same bent just know this medium is considerably less popular.

9. Your ego will never vanish, but your need for approval will weaken its grip. I still sometimes judge whether posts are successful based on views/shares/comments, when I know a much better metric is, is this something I’m proud of, entertained by, or find important? I do appreciate every comment I’ve ever received, every post anyone has ever shared. But ultimately extrinsic rewards are a trap; you can’t control what others think. Basing your happiness or judging your success on these metrics is folly. Write for you.

10. You will come to appreciate the act of writing for its intrinsic, human value. Writing is a beautiful, human act. It’s been with us for thousands of years for a reason. It encodes knowledge. Communication keeps us from wars. Storytelling gives our lives meaning. It has value so the AI companies crawl my blog and the entirety of the internet in ever increasing numbers. An authentic human voice is a finite resource to be mined for their parasitic, dehumanizing tech. Have at it; they’ll never be me. This is my act of rebellion, a bone middle finger encased in flesh aimed at Sam Altman. His machines are dependent on me; they crawl my blog because both he and his product are not creative; they copy. Using AI to write is not writing; you cede the craft and your very thought to a machine. AI writing has nothing to do with writing 1,000 posts, it is “content creation” suited at best for commercial objectives (SEO, advertisement, etc.). And even if you do you use AI, you should be doing your creative writing yourself, for all the reasons listed above. Embrace your unique humanity. Embrace writing for its own sake.

And a bonus observation:

11. It is worth it. 

Thanks for reading.

Defender, Manowar

"More emphasis on 'ride' here, Ross?

This morning while working out under heavy-ish iron I found myself able to recite every line of Orson Welles dramatic lead-in to “Defender.” Before he said it, in my best Wells impression. 

I hadn’t heard this monologue in years. Yet I could speak it aloud without error. How? It was burned into my brain when I was 15 and ready to run through a brick wall for Manowar. I had to go to war against false metal, you see.

This has something to teach us about oral culture.

Imagine dudes hearing Njal’s Saga, or the Iliad, in some smoky Icelandic 14th century feasting hall on the eve of some great real battle, where on the morn they’d be standing in the shield-wall with spear and axe.

Imagine their emotional state, their focus, as they channeled the bard’s song. They’d remember every word. And pass it down to the next generation, without error.

Warrior stuff, that Welles channels here. Oral cultures remembered epic poetry through a system of formulaic phrasing, rhythmic structure, and thematic repetition rather than rote memorization. There is a rhythm to Welles’ phrasing that makes it stick, IMO.

Manowar isn’t known for subtlety, but it was a masterstroke to hire the legendary actor and filmmaker. Read more about how that unfolded here. I love this detail from Ross the Boss/Ross Friedman’s recounting of the story. Welles stepping out of his chariot and walking in the studio was like the coming of Odin:

“Let me tell you something, this man was a big man, Orson Welles, a huge guy in latter days,” Friedman recalled. “When he got out of the limousine … on 57th Street in Manhattan by the Carnegie – y’know, that neighborhood has some hot shit over there. When he stepped out into that neighborhood, women in mink coats were throwing themselves on him. It was just like ‘Oh, Orson, oh.’ It was like Frank Sinatra in the 40s. Seriously, I saw it with my own eyes. People were in awe of this man because he was so incredible.”

“He was a legendary guy, legendary maverick.”

“Defender” has likewise passed into metal legendry. 

If you can’t get fired up for this song you might need to have your pulse checked by a professional. At the 1:50 mark I’m ready for battle. And ready to fight again at 4:12, after Ross’ ripping guitar solo, when Welles comes back in to echo Eric Adams’ powerhouse chorus.

If you haven’t heard it, fix that now.

Defender

Ride like the wind

Fight proud, my son

You’re the defender, God has sent

Manowar is still on my mind after the loss of Ross the Boss (how’s that for rhyme)? This picture of these two men, no longer with us at least on this material plane, moves me on this Metal Friday.

Raise a goblet to Ross and Welles and heavy metal and Manowar and oral poetry.

This pic can get none more epic...

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Some notes on Crime and Punishment

I just finished Crime and Punishment (Bantam Books 1958 edition, translated by Constance Garnett), and its story of Raskolnikov, an idealistic, poverty-stricken young man wracked with guilt after murdering a pawnbroker for what he believes to be a justified, if selfish, cause.

Here’s a few impressions/notes.

***

Among its lessons: Mere theory cannot survive life, and we cannot live by philosophy alone. 

Utilitarianism (permitting acts however terrible if they lead to a greater good, under the rubric that ends justify the means) is seductive but pernicious; placing one’s own ego at the center of your existence (I’m more important/smarter/ideologically pure than my fellow man, and therefore my actions justified) is an error. Our attempts to try to implement constructed, top-down, logically sound societies like communism fail because they cannot account for human irrationality. Humans will be filed off to fit, or marched to the pit for the greater good.

People who set out to be Napoleon and stop at nothing to achieve greatness are not to be admired. When you view those who don’t share your grand visions as lice or vermin, you’ve erred.

We are romantic and irrational creatures; ignore human nature at your peril. It will push up through your theory and crack its very foundations.

Nihilism is seductive but ultimately an error. Life has incredible riches to offer, but we must surrender to it. Commit to this life, and to a higher power. Which even if you don’t believe in God means you must surrender to something beyond you. To love, of another being. To seeing another person for who they are, not as a means to an end.

When you turn the last page on this book you will be shaken … and uplifted. The suffering of the protagonist and his agonizing path to confession is like the interminable wait of the condemned man of Iron Maiden’s “Hallowed be thy Name.” It’s a story of claustrophobia and suffering but with great relief only expiation can bring, and the beginnings of renewal.

Crime and Punishment is a reminder that redemption is possible, even from the most grievous of sins. 

We’ve all made terrible mistakes. I am sorry to those against whom I’ve sinned or been unjust. I accept the unjustness inflicted on me. Through suffering we can reach higher levels of consciousness.

***

I read outside of fantasy and this book gets added to my list of recent recommendations. But you certainly don’t need me to tell you to read what is acknowledged as one of the greatest novels of all time.

The super, super-secret history of sword-and-sorcery is hidden in plain sight

The super, super- secret history of sword-and-sorcery is that there isn’t a secret at all.

Sword-and-sorcery, like all genres, was created with a series of small steps and missteps, right in public view.

It wasn’t heralded in 1929 with "The Shadow Kingdom" like Athena from the head of Zeus. It wasn’t conjured into being in 1961 in the pages of Amra/Ancalagon. It wasn’t animated with L. Sprague de Camp’s Swords & Sorcery anthology, or Lin Carter’s Flashing Swords.

It was assembled, slowly, over decades. 

When I say in public, there is something interesting about the subgenre, hidden right in plain view.

More than any other genre of which I’m aware, sword-and-sorcery is defined by a visual aesthetic as much as literary. Art, particularly the work of Frank Frazetta, helped to define what we think of it today. In fact, if you want the easiest way to define S&S to someone brand-new to the genre, your best bet might be showing them a picture of Death Dealer or Conan the Adventurer. Its fans love the comics for a reason. The art of sword-and-sorcery takes a backseat to no other genre, save perhaps horror.

The term “sword-and-sorcery” was coined in the 60s, but the real work began in the 70s/80s/90s/00s, when fans began sifting through piles of pop culture detritus. Zebra paperbacks, Warren magazines, pinball machines, van art, RPGs, cartoons, and music. 

It was kicked around in genre histories, specialty journals, websites, forums, YouTube videos and podcasts. 

And eventually given form, of a sort.

Sword-and-sorcery is malleable and its boundaries, permeable. That doesn’t make it not a thing; that makes it an amorphous thing (or Thog). Just like every other genre. Even older, seemingly more defined and mined genres like horror or mystery begin to lose shape and fall apart or morph once you begin to probe at them too much. 

Try to categorize Cormac McCarthy’s The Road or Stephen King’s The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon … I dare you.

The term sword-and-sorcery is a helpful signpost pointing not to a destination, but a vicinity. 

This is OK, really. Sometimes there are no easy answers—or any answers at all. We all like a good internet debate/fight once in a while, but in the end (as Kurt Vonnegut once said) we’re putting on armor to attack a hot fudge sundae or banana split. Be wary of those who shout the loudest.

Uncertainty and permeable borders are OK. This is art, not engineering. I think this uncertainty is a feature, not a bug. It helps the genre grow and remain vital. Borders give form and structure, no borders is shapeless void. Malleable borders give form and structure while leaving room for expansion. 

This is the healthiest type of genre. It keeps the conversation going instead of closing it off.

And I think sword-and-sorcery is healthier now than it has been in a long time. Just as sword-and-sorcery was growing in new directions in the 60s and 70s it continues to grow today. Verses and chapters continue to be added, edge cases debated. 

Secretly, right in public.

If you want more of my musings on the genre see here.

"Mountains," Manowar. RIP Ross the Boss

RIP Ross the Boss/Ross Friedman, co-founder and ex-guitarist of the mighty Manowar. Ross played on Manowar's classic first six albums, Battle Hymns through Kings of Metal.

The news hit today that he has passed into Valhalla, age 72. He was diagnosed with ALS last month.

In honor of his mighty legacy, "Mountains," from Sign of the Hammer.

The lyrics for this one are particularly on point.

Like a man is a mountainside

Greatness waits for those who try

None can teach you, it's all inside

Just climb

I am in the ground, I am in the air

I am all, I live in the hearts of men

I am the call to greatness, not all can hear

I awaken the creator in those who dare

And the day will come when we all must die

And enter the mountainside

Ross climbed the mountain and experienced life at its very peak.

He is where eagles fly, and will live on in the hearts of men.

The votes have been cast. The 1000th post shall be...

And the 1000th post on The Silver Key shall be (actually the 1001st, as this post is technically no. 1000):

The Super, Super-Secret History of Sword-and-Sorcery

By a landslide. Here’s the voting by percentage.

The super, super-secret history of sword-and-sorcery:     60%

What I’ve learned after 1,000 posts:             17%

Another unhinged rant against grunge:             7%

A return guest post by Scott:                     7%

Something about Iron Maiden:             7%

Other:                     3%

An overdue farewell and then delete the blog:     0% (I live another day)

Given how most find their way here this is no surprise. Readers of this blog like S&S. Good thing I do too.

Sorry Scott, you’ll have to wait the full 16 years for the next guest post. And I’ve probably said plenty about Iron Maiden and grunge. For now…

Only one “other” vote” was a surprise, but it led to a pretty good suggestion: Thoughts on what you consider the best yet most obscure S&S film - can be animated or live action.

The other mild surprise was receiving more votes for “what I’ve learned after 1,000 posts” than anticipated. I think I will tackle that topic, and the “other” suggestion, after writing the super, super-secret history of sword-and-sorcery. 

The only problem is, there isn’t one, and I was being a bit cheeky with that option… but hey there’s always more to say about S&S. I’m a man of my word.

This is my 999th post on The Silver Key …

What should I write about for post number 1000?

To make it more fun I’ve added a poll. Click here to take it. Screenshot at right so you can see what options you have to choose from. But your original ideas are welcome below ... the weirder the better.

I’ll try to accommodate the top request.

Deathstalker 2025: Unfortunately not my cuppa

One of the best and certainly the most fun podcasts I’ve ever been a part of is a Rogues in the House episode in which we tackle Deathstalker 2. If the first Deathstalker (1983) is rather trash I unabashedly love its 1987 sequel, and we laughed as the microphones started rolling and never stopped.

When I heard the Deathstalker franchise was being revived for a 2025 release, I was in.

This film should have landed squarely with me, its target audience. It did not, sadly. I don’t consider it a bust, just off the mark, it pains me to say. Mildly entertaining when I was hoping for another Deathstalker 2 or perhaps another Army of Darkness. The Dreadites-- blood-red, spiky, skeletal warriors serving the evil sorcerer Nekromemnon—echo the Deadites of the latter film, but Deathstalker isn’t close to Army of Darkness or Evil Dead 2 for comedic value. 

In the end I think Deathstalker fails because it lacks a comedic lead to pull it off. Daniel Bernhardt is very serviceable, certainly better than a lot of the thuddingly poor S&S leads of the 80s, but he’s not believable in the role of humorous hero, and not a John Terlesky or a Bruce Campbell.

So Deathstalker 2025 is in the end a semi-serious, semi-slapstick blend. If it doesn’t fail at both it doesn’t succeed at either, creating an uneven viewing experience—never rousing, never laugh out loud funny.

It’s far from the worst film I’ve seen. Entertaining in places, certainly better than a lot of the 80s S&S schlock I’ve watched over the years. It’s heart was in the right place… but I should have enjoyed this more than I did. It was not as good as I hoped. But of course YMMV.

What I did like:

• The genre self-awareness. A dude unironically named Deathstalker doesn’t belong in a  serious film. Deathstalker 2025 is entirely tongue-in-cheek which is refreshing. I mean, it has a four-bladed sword, because it just had to beat The Sword and the Sorcerer’s three-bladed sword.
• The real props. No AI slop or clunky CGI, mostly what appears to be physical props and rubber suits and masks. Loved this aspect of the film.
• Old school practical special effects including stop motion skeletons like something out of the old Sinbad movies. Clunky but charming and it adds to the overall 80s vibe.
• The ridiculous bloodshed. Buckets of blood, heads split in half, limbs lopped off. Fun.
• Callbacks to the original. The use of the original theme song, the melodrama, the cheesy entrances, are all there.
• The soundtrack. As I note repeatedly heavy metal and S&S are bedfellows and there is some solid metal backing here including guitar solos from GNR’s Slash.

What I didn’t like

• Jokes that largely fell flat. As noted it felt like it wanted to be Deathstalker 2 but it didn’t come close. Clunky and cheesy humor, nothing memorable.
• An irritating sidekick. Doodad (that is its name) is a friendly impish spellcasting demon-thing that looks like an extra out of Tom Cruise’s Legend. He largely stands around shouting from the sidelines or gets carried around on Deathstalker’s back from place to place, and his incompetence evokes echoes of Malek, though mercifully not as annoying.
• No nudity. Strangely and incongruously conservative in this regard. S&S is a subgenre that isn’t afraid to show a little skin but you won’t find any in Deathstalker 2025.
• Too epic in feel. It has grit and the action never stops, but the ubiquitous magic swords and demons and amulets and healing rocks, main characters dying and brought back to life, destinies fulfilled and never-ending reigns of darkness averted, etc. don’t feel very S&S to me. The plot itself is clunky and rather needlessly convoluted.
• The acting is not particularly great. I did not expect a whole here and it was fine, workmanlike, but many of the lines were rushed or delivered flat.

TL;DR

Deathstalker 2025 has its charms and is probably something hardcore S&S fans and genre completionists will seek out regardless. Many seem to like it. There are certainly worse ways to pass a Saturday afternoon. For me it was a disappointing “meh” and a missed opportunity. 

The Mirrors of Tuzun Thune, Arkham Witch

There comes, even to kings, the time of great weariness. Then the gold of the throne is brass, the silk of the palace becomes drab. The gems in the diadem and upon the fingers of the women sparkle drearily like the ice of the white seas; the speech of men is as the empty rattle of a jester’s bell and the feel comes of things unreal; even the sun is copper in the sky and the breath of the green ocean is no longer fresh.

–Robert E. Howard, "The Mirrors of Tuzun Thune”

I love that quote (who doesn't?) from Robert E. Howard's Kull ... and I really dig this obscure but fun metal take from Arkham Witch.

Not exactly an artistic marvel of a song as the main riff overindulges in repetition ... but damn if I don't love it anyway. Great groove, gets the head banging. A boozy, dreamy, loose vibe to the whole thing that pairs well with the original hallucinogenic tale and its examination of philosophical questions regarding reality, identity, and existence.

Am I Kull?

This awesome little band wears its Weird Tales influences proudly. With songs like "The Lord of R'lyeh," "Dagon's Bell," "Crom's Mountain," and "Kult of Kutulu" you know what you're getting here. 

Are these guys still a band? Last album, Demos from the Deep, seems to be from 2014 but let's hope so.

Happy Metal Friday.

What the phantom that stands before

A formless substance I claim no more

O shadowed soul, O ghost of me

I repent this philosophy

Am I Kull? Or his reflection dim

A shadow cast of that distant king

A strange whim of lesser form

A far flung dream on moonbeams born

We write to be understood

Note: I use the plural “we” in this essay even though motivations for why anyone writes vary widely. I suppose I could just say “I” … but I strongly suspect others feel the same way. “We” facilitates connection and understanding.

If I go more than a day, maybe two, without writing, I start to feel ghostly. Incomplete, absent something vital I need to function as a human.

Writing infuses me with vitality. When I hit publish I am flush with spirit. My day is instantly better.

Pressing publish is key. Writing for an audience is qualitatively different than writing for yourself, for example a gratitude journal or a private essay that will never be read by anyone other than yourself. I do that kind of writing, and it’s important. But it’s ultimately not why I write.

The writing I enjoy combines subject matter mastery, self-discovery, and personal expression. I want people to experience the passion I feel for weird art, heavy metal, reading, and pop culture—the arcane arts that interest me. I hope my readers might learn something along the way, the distillation of my research and insight. And, ultimately (and maybe somewhat pretentiously, though I don’t really think so) I hope something I write might transform something in you. The way you understand the world, perhaps even yourself.

I don’t write fiction, but in my reading of fiction and biography of fiction writers I’ve come to see fiction as a window into the soul by writers who wish to be understood. Charles Saunders wrote blood-and-thunder stories of sword-and-sorcery adventure, but the character of Imaro said something about the author. Even writing “merely” to entertain says something of the writer, perhaps of the dissatisfying mundane world he or she inhabits or that entertainment and story provides something vital we need as humans. 

For 99.9% of us, writing is not a vocation to pursue if you want to get rich. You can make a living off of it, though it won’t be the aesthete in a well-furnished Victorian garret romanticism sort of writing perpetrated by the Hallmark channel. Businesses need people who can write (or did, pre-LLMs. Now they need people who can prompt). I have a good job that is +/- 50% writing full time. It pays the bills, and sometimes I can even put a little something of myself into otherwise dry and technical pieces of the healthcare mid-revenue cycle.

I wish I could write creatively, like I do here, full-time. But it’s not happening. If I had to survive on what I do in the creative side of my life I’d be living under a bridge. I’m very fortunate that I don’t need income from Flame and Crimson or freelance S&S pieces to pay my mortgage. 

But I do need to be understood. So I’m taking that a step farther with a very personal new book.

I’ve got a heavy metal-infused memoir in the edit/cover design stages. It will be published this year. I expect it to sell +/- 50 copies, though I plan to promote the heck out of it wherever I’m able. Not because I’m in it to make money. If it was about making money I’d be writing freelance blog posts and white papers for some healthcare website.

I want people to understand the life I’ve lived, the music I loved, the struggles I’ve endured, and still have, from time-to-time. I grew up with social anxiety and painful introversion. Being labelled as an introvert was once (and in some corners, still) used a pejorative. These traits harmed my relationships and put a few limits on my career. 

But today I accept this part of me, perhaps even cherish it. If I were not an introvert I might not have ever felt the need to set pen to paper. I can say things in writing that I have a hard time saying out loud. Writing about my experiences helped me heal, and I hope perhaps the act of reading them might help others as well.

That’s the power of writing.

So yes, I write to be understood. Maybe you do too. 

Keep writing.