Part 1 (1/2)

Conan the Wanderer

by Robert E Howard, L Sprague DeCamp, and Lin Cater

Introduction

Robert E Howard (1906-36), the creator of Conan, was born in Peaster, Texas, and spent most of his life in Cross Plains, in the center of Texas During his short life (which ended in suicide at the age of thirty) Howard turned out a large volume of popular fiction: sport, detective, Western, historical, adventure, science fiction, weird, and ghost stories, besides his verse and his many fantasies Of his several series of heroic fantasies, the hteen of these were published in Howard's lifetiments and outlines to co his papers since 1950 The incoue Lin Carter and myself

In addition, in the early 1950s, I rewrote four unpublished Howard manuscripts of Oriental adventure, with s, to convert the anachronis a supernatural element This did not prove hard, since Howard's heroes are prettystories are still about three-quarters or four-fifths Howard

Of these, the story The Flainally wrote it in 1934 as a 42,000-word novella of adventure in hanistan, called ”Three-Bladed Dooe fictional fa Irish adventurers and the hero of several published stories of Oriental adventure In ”Three-Bladed Doom,” the cult exposed by the hero is a inal version failed to sell, Howard in 1935 rewrote it to a length of 24,000 words; but that version likewise failed to find a market The story showed the influence of Harold Lamb and Talbot Mundy The present collaborative version, with 31,000 words, is interinal versions

Carter and I have also written several pastiches, based upon hints in Howard's notes and letters, to fill up gaps in the saga ”Black Tears,”

in the present voluenre of iinative fiction that connoisseurs call ”heroic fantasy,” or, sometimes, ”swordplay-and-sorcery fiction” Such a story is laid in an i-perhaps this world as it is supposed to have been long ago, or as it will be in the remote future, or on another planet, or in another diy has not yet been discovered Exaenre-outside the Conan stories-are E R Eddison's The Wory The Lord of the Rings, Fletcher Pratt's The Well of the Unicorn, and Fritz Leiber's stories of Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser

When well done, stories of this kind provide the purest fun of fiction of any kind

Of the several larger-than-life characters who stride through Howard's pages, Conan the Cimmerian is his hero of heroes Conan lived, loved, and e, about twelve thousand years ago, between the sinking of Atlantis and the beginnings of recorded history A gigantic barbarian adventurer from the bleak, backward northern land of Cimmeria,

Conan brawled and battled his way across half the world of his ti foes both natural and supernatural to becodo, lawless youth in the kingdom of Zamora (see thethere and in the neighboring lands as a thief Tiring of this starveling existence, he enlisted as a mercenary in the armies of Turan For the next two years he traveled widely and refined his knowledge of archery and horsemanshi+p

As a result of a quarrel over a woman with a superior officer, Conan fled fro in Zamora and a brief visit to his Cimmerian homeland, he embarked upon the career of do the coasts of Kush, with a Shemitish she-pirate, Belit, as his partner and a crew of bloodthirsty black corsairs After Belit was slain, he became the chief of a black tribe, then served as athe most southerly Hyborian nations

Later still, Conan appeared as a leader a the kozaki, a horde of outlaho roamed the steppes between the Hyborian lands and Turan He captained a pirate craft on the great inland Sea of Vilayet

While serving as captain of the royal guard of Queen Taramis of Khauran, Conan was captured by the queen's enemies, who crucified him

When a vulture flen to try to peck his eyes out, Conan bit the bird's head off (You can't have a tougher hero than that) Olgerd Vladislav, Zaporoskan leader of a band of Zuagirs, the no eastern Shemites, happened upon Conan at this juncture and rescued him-for his own purposes-froerd, the hard-bitten Cierd fro the ene her to her throne-he led off eastward to plunder the Turanians At that point, the present story begins

Because of legal complications, it was not possible to publish the books of Lancer Books' present Conan series in chronological order A total of eleven or twelve books are planned, of which more than half have already been published When the series is co Conan the Freebooter and preceding Conan the Adventurer A list of the volue before the title page of this volume

Readers ish to know eneral are referred to two periodicals and one book One periodical is Ao, 111, 60690; this is the organ of the Hyborian Legion, a loose group of admirers of heroic fantasy and of the Conan stories in particular The other periodical is The Howard Collector published by Glenn Lord, literary agent for the Howard estate, Box 775, Pasadena, Texas, 77501; this is devoted to articles, stories, and poems by and about Howard The book is The Conan Reader, by the present writer, published by Jack L

Chalker, 5111 Liberty Heights Ave, Baltimore, Md, 21207; this consists of articles on Howard, Conan, and heroic fantasy previously published in Amra, I also listed many works by Howard and sword-and-sorcery stories by other writers in my introduction to the voluue de Camp

After the events narrated in ”A Witch Shall Be Born” (in Conan the Freebooter), Conan leads his band of Zuagirs eastward to raid the cities and caravans of the Turanians He is about thirty-one years old at his tiether, nearly two years with the desert Sheerd lieutenant and then as their sole chieftain But the fierce and energetic King Yezdigerd reacts swiftly to Conan's pinpricks; he sends out a strong force to entrap him

Black Tears

1 The Jaws of the Trap