Cross Plains Chronicle: Less than eight weeks to Howard Days

The Robert E. Howard Days website is counting down the days, as am I. Less than eight weeks until I make the trek to central Texas and the Howard homestead for Howard Days 2023! Anticipation is building.

REH is not exactly selling me on the trip though. From his Collected Letters vol. 2: “I live in a section of the country not particularly stimulating to the imagination, unless the inhabitants continual struggle against starvation can be said to be a stimulant.”

Anyway…

I picked a good year to attend. 100 Years of Weird Tales is a theme which packs plenty of appeal for me. As you’d expect the panel sessions focus on the magazine that published its last pulp issue in 1954 but never really died. It soldiered on in fits and starts as a paperback and a magazine, all the way up through the present. Weird Tales played a critical role in the creation of sword-and-sorcery due to its permissive editorial policy which allowed for genre mixing and experimentation. And, as some scholars have noted, through its role as a "discourse community," which included a supportive but sometimes acerbic letters column called The Eyrie. Think message board and listserve pre-internet, and you're on the right track.

Let’s take a dive into the programming.

I fly into DFW just after 12:30 p.m. CST on Thursday April 27. We’re planning on heading into Cross Plains that afternoon and there are a couple events on schedule. Not sure if we’ll be hitting these or not, or just hang out informally at the pavilion. 

From the events page:

• 2-4 PM: The Robert E. Howard Museum is open to the public. There are no docents on duty. The Gift Shop is open and the grounds and Pavilion are available to all.
• 5-7 pm: Fish (and Chicken!) Fry at the Cross Plains Senior Center. Pending.

Friday April 28 is a full day. I definitely want to hit the bus tour of Cross Plains and surrounding areas (9-10:45 a.m.) and see the Cross Plains public library.

The first panel, 100 Years of Weird Tales, runs from 11-noon. Guest of honor John Betancourt, publisher at Wildside Press, is one of the panelists, as is Bobby Derie, whose “Deep Cuts in a Lovecraftian Vein” email newsletter I’ve been subscribed to for some time. Looks promising.

Here’s the rest of the official programming on the 28th:. 

• 1:30 - 2:30 pm: PANEL: The 3 Musketeers of Weird Tales: Panelists: Mark Finn, Bobby Derie, Jeff Shanks + others.
• 2:30 - 3:30 pm PANEL: The Glenn Lord Symposium. Jason Ray Carney, Moderator. Presenters: Dierk Guenther + two others. At Cross Plains Methodist Church
• 9 pm PANEL: Fists at the Ice House. Our perennial favorite presentation about Howard's most prolific writings, his boxing stories. Presented behind the Ice House on Main Street (next to Subway) on the concrete slab where Howard actually boxed! 

Beyond the content I’m looking forward to meeting the panelists. I’m a fan of Mark Finn’s biography of REH, Blood and Thunder, Jeff Shanks’ many essays, and Patrice Louinet’s work in the definitive Del Rey editions of Howard. I’ve corresponded with Jason Ray Carney and “met” him once via virtual seminar. Seeing and meeting all of these dudes in person will be something speical.

Saturday April 29th is also a full day:

• 11 am - Noon: PANEL: REH and Weird Tales. Panelists: Patrice Louinet, John Betancourt, Bobby Derie, Dennis McHaney.
• 1:30 - 2:30 pm: PANEL: The Art of Weird Tales. Panelists: Dennis McHaney, J. David Spurlock, Michael Tierney + others.
• 2:30 - 3:30 pm: PANEL: What's Up with REH? This is our wrap-up panel, devoted to the latest news of Howard publishing, entertainment and how his influence continues. Panelists: Paul Herman, Heroic Signatures + others. 

Of course, the tour of the museum grounds by Rusty Burke (4 p.m.), BBQ, and porchlight poetry readings to wrap up the 29th are a must. 

That’s a full three days and then I head back to DFW early Sunday morning.

Meliah Rage, "Beginning of the End"

Any other Headbangers Ball fans out there?

I remember staying up late one Saturday night to watch this MTV lifeline for metalheads. I was fading, half-in, half-out of a sleep state. Exhausted from either football practice or bagging groceries.

Ricky Rachtman (or was it Adam Curry?) teed up Meliah Rage and I came to, quick. Instant smelling salts.

"Beginning of the End" has a great hook of a riff, a nice guitar solo around the 1:35 mark. Simple, powerful lyrics. Basic structure, no frills, all power. No subtlety; it needs none.

Old school thrash, gotta love it.

Viking and dark age art, Tom Barber

Some cool images by the great Tom Barber, posted here with his permission.

All painted and sold in the dim past, I am told.

Says Tom, It was Cornwell who introduced me to the shield wall. I painted the warriors long before I encountered him, and the painting became part of the Frank Collection.

The Rhyme of the Viking Path, Robert E. Howard

Art by Tom Barber.

Reading the Collected Letters of Robert E. Howard, vol. 2 (1930-1932), and encountered this poem Howard fired off in a letter to his friend Tevis Clyde Smith, circa May 1930.

Wow.

I followed Asgrim Snorri's son

Around the world and half-way back,

And 'scaped the hate of Galdarthrun

Who sunk our ship off Skagerack.

I lent my sword to Hrothgar then,

His ears were ice, his heart was hard;

He fell with half his weapon-men

To our own kin at Mikligard.

And then for many a weary moon

I labored at the galley's oar

Where men grow maddened by the rune

Of row-locks clacking evermore.

But I survived the reeking rack,

The toil, the whips that burned and gashed,

The spiteful Greeks who scarred my back

And trembled even while they lashed.

They sold me on an Eastern block,

In silver coins their price was paid,

They girt me with a chain and lock -- 

I laughed and they were sore afraid.

I toiled among the olive trees

Until a night of hot desire

Brought sharp the breath of outer seas

And filled my veins with curious fire.

Then I arose and broke my chain, 

And laughed to know that I was free,

And battered out my master's brain

And fled and gained the open sea.

Beneath a copper sun a-drift

I fled the ketch and slaver's dhow, 

Until I saw a sail up-lift

And saw and knew the dragon-prow.

Oh, East of sands and moon-lit gulf,

Your blood is thin, your gods are few; 

You could not break the Northern wolf

And now the wolf has turned on you.

Now fires that light the coast of Spain

Fling shadows on the Moorish strand; 

Masters, your slave has come again, 

With torch and axe in his red hand!

You could not break the Northern wolf, And now the wolf has turned on you might top the list of badass things I've ever read. 

Can't wait to hear the porchlight poetry readings at REH Days.

Sword-and-sorcery updates: Howard Days, Flame and Crimson review

Headed to the hallowed homestead of REH...

A few items of note on the sword-and-sorcery front.

I’m headed to Howard Days! Yesterday I “locked in” with a non-refundable plane ticket and car rental. 

No turning back now. It’s official. Boston Logan to Dallas Fort Worth, April 27-30.

I’ve even got lodging lined up: I’ll be staying at an air BnB in Cisco with a couple dudes whom I’ve corresponded with, but never met in person: Deuce Richardson and Ken Lizzi. My wife is making me download a tracking app on my phone in case I wind up gagged and bound in the trunk of a car. 

Kidding, of course. I’ve spoken with Deuce on the phone and collaborated with him at The Cimmerian and now on the blog of DMR Books. He seems like a trustworthy fellow. Ken is an author with a website of his own who secured lodging for the three of us.

But I suppose if you don’t hear from me after April just assume I’m buried in the desert somewhere in the immediate radius of Cross Plains.

I plan to document the trip here on the blog, as this might prove to be a once-in-a-lifetime trip (or not). I’ve very much wanted to attend Howard Days for years, since I first heard about it via The Cimmerian. But cost and time commitments are formidable obstacles. 

I dropped $580 on airfare and another $335 on the car rental. Fortunately I was able to apply a lot of points to remove some of the sting. Three nights at the BnB split three ways looks to be another $160. 

That puts me over $1,000 and I have yet to buy beer, food, and books and other mementos. I figure I'll wind up $1,500-$2K in the hole.

But I imagine it will all be worth it when I set foot in the Howard homestead, which some have described as a near religious experience. I get to meet many of the personalities that I’ve only ever read accounts from, or seen in clips on YouTube. And see the place where it all started.

The theme for this year is 100 years of Weird Tales (first issue March 1923) so I look forward to the panels and programming, too. Weird Tales was the medium which published the majority of Howard’s stories and allowed him to earn a respectable income that outstripped his unsuspecting neighbors (until the fickle Depression Era checks ran late and unpaid obligations accumulated).

Much more to come here.

Flame and Crimson received a nice review on the website of the Grumpy Wizard. 

The review was kind and generous (and, not without thoughtful critique). There was a lot more in it than a typical Amazon or Goodreads review—both which I still deeply appreciate, but longer form essays are where I live.

Head over and read it. I particularly liked this observation:

I consider Flame and Crimson a case study in how the creation of a new forms distribution can cause massive change in an artform. It’s a lesson we should pay attention to in an age of rapid change in distribution and creation of media.

S&S was born in the pulps and I believe it is at its best when it bears some of the hallmarks that heritage (i.e., shortish, pulse-pounding action, and the weird). Unfortunately, today there is no comparable market to Weird Tales, though many are trying. WT not only paid its top authors a livable wage, but was permissive and experimental with form, and served as sounding board and ideas exchange between authors and fans. Genres not only grew, but were born in its pages. Today it still seems like most authors are writing multi-book epic fantasy, which holds little appeal for me.

Also this:

Always there is tension between the stasis of too much Law and the formlessness of Chaos! Too much of either is damaging and destructive. It is difficult but ideal to find the balance between a narrow and restrictive vision and one that is overly expansive. The best work within a genre is created by artists who explore the boundaries of its universe without straying into shapeless dimensions.

There is a tension of form in genre fiction. When you write for a commercial market you are faced with the pressure of reader expectations vs. authentic expression. Like the Grumpy Wizard, I enjoy fiction that pushes edges, but remains something recognizable…

… Along with stuff that is unrepentantly S&S. 

In the end, what matters most is not the boxes you check, the genre you work in, or the boundaries you cross, but the quality of the writing. 

Anyway, thanks Grumpy Wizard, for the non-grumpy, thoughtful discussion of F&C.

"Let it Go," Def Leppard

Sometimes you just need hair metal. Or the equivalent. Def Leppard is close enough. 

I'm a fan of Leppard up through and including Hysteria; after that they lose me. But you have to respect their ongoing commitment to musicianship and good performances, even at this point in their career. I saw them in concert last summer in a monster quadruple bill that included Motley Crue, Poison, and Joan Jett. 

Leppard was by far the tightest, best-sounding band of the four. They rocked.

"Let it Go" is a fine example of their early work, before they went ballad-heavy. This one is a fun little rocker, with lyrics that leave absolutely zero to the imagination, unless you can't fill in the "C."

Cool woman, cool eyes, you got me hypnotized
So head down, get a rhythm
Stop your stalling and your bitching
I'm rock steady, I'm still shaking
I'm ready for the taking
So make your move, yeah, make me
And get ready for the big "C"

Dullness on the edge of rage

I used to rant a lot more here on the blog, and elsewhere. But today I find that most things in my small corner of pulp culture aren’t worth getting angry over.

These days I just can’t summon the rage anymore.

I still get angry. Very recently I’ve had my keyboard poised to write about that something that irritated me— Roald Dahl book alterations, ChatGPT-authored manuscripts spamming magazine publishers—but wound up saying, eh, fuck it. 

It’s probably because I’m getting older. I turn 50 in June, and I’m not taking testosterone injections. I’ve seen a lot, enough to know that the small stuff is not worth getting worked up over. The venom I once spat at overzealous J.R.R. Tolkien or Robert E. Howard critics has largely dried up. I’ve heard the critiques, the spats, the righteous anger; both artists remain beloved and always will be.

I think this recent change possibly limits my writing prospects. The easiest essays I’ve ever written were done in a blind heat of righteous anger and fury. Thoughtful writing is harder. And on some level I fear that maybe what I do produce will prove dull, milquetoast.

But, in general I think this is a good development. Certainly for my blood pressure, but also because I enjoy the calm that comes with a relative certainty that the world isn’t caving in. People aren’t actually coming for your old books. AI not only can’t hold a candle to good human writing, but in all likelihood the next evolution of the technology will be authentication systems that reign in the current chaos.

I also know there’s nothing I can actually do about these things, nor do I know all sides of these issues, and screaming about it with digital ink certainly won’t help. 

I can’t promise I won’t unleash a good rant now and then, but I’m going to continue to lean into positivity. If you want that stuff, Twitter serves it up 24-7.

Edit: OK, I am kind of pissed about Roald Dahl.