Getting into Conan, The Barbarian; have questions

[crossbones]

i always preferred Savage Sword of Conan over other titles... it was more graphic and violent. intended for mature readers as i recall. then again it's been years since i read that and even then didn't finish. a good chunk of it appears to be collected now.

Dark Horse Conan is great. especially the Busiek run (Conan) and the current run of Wood's Conan the Barbarian. Conan the Cimmerian might be worth it for the awesome art. Road of Kings is optional. still, you might wanna consider reading all of it in order, because like others have pointed out, it's the first time that an attempt at continuity has been made.

[Roquefort Raider]

So I have questions about where to go next:

1. Should I make some attempt to read these in order (I've seen minor points of continuity at this point, but nothing Earth-shattering)? I have scattered Savage Sword of Conan issues in my collection, as well as some Kull and some King Conan, and also volume #0 of Kurt Busiek's run. Can I read these in any order, or am I missing a lot by doing so? Are there any critical Conan issues or eras that I should be sure to read?

MRP and others pretty much answered that point, and I'd add that the only attempt at a chronology during Howard's days were made by two readers of Weird Tales, P. Schuyler Miller and John Clark. Robert Howard himself was flattered that his work would prompt two fans to such an exercise, but he himself talked about the Conan tales as
if they were tall tales told around a compfire by some larger than life figure who just picked events at random from his adventurous life. Modern attempts at chronology are, in my view, often far too involved and settle on trivial details (although they're kind of fun).

Regarding the Conan comics, Roy Thomas pretty much treated the character as a historical figure (albeit a fake historical figure). Events from Conan #1 to Conan #115 are pretty much in chronological order, and I would recommend reading them in that order if possible (Dark Horse reprinted them all). Savage sord of Conan, meanwhile, presents stories in no chronological order; they're usully adaptations of works by Robert Howard, so they're highly recommended.

After Roy departed the titles, all Conan mags became something of a generic product (brawny barbarian vs monster of the month). I would skip theme entirely, unless after reading all the Thomas material and all the Dark Horse Busiek and Truman stuff you crave more Conan comics).

Roy came back to Marvel's Conan after a decade-long hiatus. The latter books haven't been reprinted yet ad some are pretty expensive due to rarity, but I'd keep an eye out for them too.

So... Regarding Marvel's Conan, I'd read Conan the barbarian 1-115, then 241-275 in order
Savage Tales 1-5, Savage sword of Conan 1-60, 190-235 in any order.

and work my way from there.

2. I saw that the first Kull solo story was printed as part of Conan #10, but it was not reprinted in the Archive edition I was reading. When I start reading Kull, will I miss much by beginning with Kull #1?

No, the story in CtB is an illustrated poem that could fit anywhere.

3. Are there other essential Sword and Sorcery titles (Elric, Red Sonja, etc?). I'm not looking for a list of enjoyable reads, but more of a "if you don't read this, you're missing something just as good as, or even superior to, Conan."

I'm biased here, but I don't think anything tops "Red nails" (Savage Tales 2-3, Marvel treasury edition #4) or "The song of Red Sonja" (CtB #24) by Thomas and Smith. But if you're looking for spectacular S&S art, I recommend Conquering armies, by Gal and Dionnet. It may be a little hard to find, but is gorgeous.

[Rob Allen]

I'd advise you (and everyone else) to seek out the Kull stories that were illustrated by Marie and John Severin. Breathtakingly beautiful work, not to be missed.

[benday-dot]

that is the book i have. Its not exactly premium format but its a cheap compendium. I think you are right that it is unedited. Apparently the hardcore fans prefer the 3 volume Del Rey set, they do over at the Conan boards anyway.

there is also a sister volume to that cheap compendium you bought, called Conan's Brethren. This contains all the non-Conan REH stories about Kull, Solomon Kane, Bran Mak Morn etc.

The one thing about the Del Rey volumes to recommend them are the gorgeous and copious illustrations accomying them. The great Mark Schultz provides the illustrations on the first volume.

Prince Hal suggests it, and I will too. Fans of REH ought not ignore his non Conan and Kull work. Howard did fantastic work in several areas of the pulps... western, humour, horror, boxing, historical, adventure. If you are looking for gripping and kinetic stories check them out. Howard was the master of describing physicality, action and violence in prose. A couple of the better known tales and favourites of mine are "Vultures of Wahpeton" and "Pigeons from Hell" (sounds like a Monty Python sketch, but its a real ripper)

[MRP]

The one thing about the Del Rey volumes to recommend them are the gorgeous and copious illustrations accomying them. The great Mark Schultz provides the illustrations on the first volume.

Prince Hal suggests it, and I will too. Fans of REH ought not ignore his non Conan and Kull work. Howard did fantastic work in several areas of the pulps... western, humour, horror, boxing, historical, adventure. If you are looking for gripping and kinetic stories check them out. Howard was the master of describing physicality, action and violence in prose. A couple of the better known tales and favourites of mine are "Vultures of Wahpeton" and "Pigeons from Hell" (sounds like a Monty Python sketch, but its a real ripper)

My personal favorite of the Del Rey Collections is The Horror Stories of Robert E. Howard, collecting Pigeons and other stories.

A great way to sample the various stories of REH is the Weird Works of Robert E. Howard series that collects his Weird Tales stories and poems in publication order. There are also collections of his works by themes by Bison Books (an imprint of the University of Nebraska Press). The Del Rey series also features 2 volumes of the "Best of..." that are good samplers as well. There are older collections, such as The Book of Robert E. Howard, but these are sometimes edited versions rather than the originals.

If you use an e-reader of some sort, I have noticed Amazon has a few cheap collections for the kindle as well.

Some of my favorite stuff of his is his Mythos stuff using Lovecraft's Cthulhu cycle as a backdrop, his horror tales set in Arkansas and east Texas, and his Bran Mak Morn stuff.

Conan was the gateway, but I have found I like a lot of his other stuff even more than I enjoy Conan. So yeah, if you like the Conan stuff, dig a little deeper in the REH oeuvre.

-M

[shaxper]

Conan was the gateway, but I have found I like a lot of his other stuff even more than I enjoy Conan. So yeah, if you like the Conan stuff, dig a little deeper in the REH oeuvre.

I'll certainly consider this once the Conan volume arrives (can't wait). I'll go with the Conan's Brethren volume next and then keep reading REH if it continues to impress me.

[pakehafulla]

I have to wholeheartedly agree with our esteemed coleagues above, the Thomas issues with Windsor-Smith and the Belit sequence were my favourites too, along with Black Colossus(you rule John Buscema, I always saw this as near to his best work). Conan The Barbarian #85 was one of my first when I started collecting, soon followed by everything I could find, including about 20 paperbacks with those beautiful Frank Frazetta covers(I was already a fan due to Black Jack Tarr buying a print of a Frazetta painting in the pages of MOKF).

The only thing I can add is that you will be better served reading them in arcs, interspersed with other books, because they can become generic and maybe even tedious after a while if they are all that you read. Feeling jealous now thinking of all the great Buscema, Chan and possibly Alcala art you are soon to discover.

[CromagnonMan]

Is it just me then, who thinks the Conan the Barbarian series went off the boil with the appearance of Belit (#58?). This is when it starts becoming tedious and generic to me.

love the Smith and Buscema issues up until then though.

[Roquefort Raider]

Is it just me then, who thinks the Conan the Barbarian series went off the boil with the appearance of Belit (#58?). This is when it starts becoming tedious and generic to me.

Really? The tone changed, that is true, but those issues are among many readers' favorites. I agree that the sense of novelty was gone, since the mag had a few years under its belt; kind of like Spider-man in the middle of the Romita years. Plus, the setting had changed: Conan was on a boat most of the time, and in the Black kingdoms, from issue 58 to issue 100. But to me, the tediousness only started after issue #100, and the truly bad stuff began with the Bruce Jones and Michael Fleisher era. (The "sheer torture" period was the "Conan: year one" series within a series that Roy Thomas put an end to when he came back to the book in the 90s).

[Roquefort Raider]

I'll certainly consider this once the Conan volume arrives (can't wait). I'll go with the Conan's Brethren volume next and then keep reading REH if it continues to impress me.

Shaxper, I hope you'll have a great time with Howard's oeuvre. I would also recommend his humor stories, if you come across them, because they show an important and often unheralded facet of the writer's character. Although his heroic tales are the most famous, they're not all that Howard would write, and he once told Lovecraft (in a letter) that he would like nothing better than to write historical fiction about the American west, if he managed to find a solid enough market. Among the "funny" stories by REH are his Breckenridge Elkins tales, tall tales in the Paul Bunyan vein, and his boxing stories (Steve Costigan, Dennis Dorgan) in which kind-hearted boxers with little brains and a heart of gold always managed to be led into deep trouble by a pretty face. All of these are available from Bison books.

Many Howard stories (and all his Conan tales, I believe) are also available online thanks to the Gutenberg project. That's a boon to fans and scholars alike.

[CromagnonMan]

if i were you Shaxper id read the original REH stories first, before the comics. I did it the other way around and felt i wasnt ever able to properly experience REH's writing on its own merits. Just a thought.

[berk]

Really? The tone changed, that is true, but those issues are among many readers' favorites. I agree that the sense of novelty was gone, since the mag had a few years under its belt; kind of like Spider-man in the middle of the Romita years. Plus, the setting had changed: Conan was on a boat most of the time, and in the Black kingdoms, from issue 58 to issue 100. But to me, the tediousness only started after issue #100, and the truly bad stuff began with the Bruce Jones and Michael Fleisher era. (The "sheer torture" period was the "Conan: year one" series within a series that Roy Thomas put an end to when he came back to the book in the 90s).

Yeah, this is pretty much how I remember it too. I thought the art in first big Belit story, the one that ended with Amra or maybe a little after that, suffered from Steve Gan's inks, which I never really liked much. But once Ernie Chan came on, the series climbed back up to one of its highest peaks with the long journey into Stygia and all that. Then it sort of plateaued for a bit and gradually fell off, with the stories starting to feel a bit repetitive and the Buscema/Chan art a little too slick.

Refreshing my memory with the aid of the GCD gallery, I think I stopped with the big double issue #115, which was a good one, except for Thomas making a point of Conan defeating Red Sonja, which I didn't like any more than when he had Conan get the better of Kull in an early "crossover". Never have liked this Superman/Hulk-style insistence on showing that the hero is "the strongest (or smartest/nicest/etc) one there is" by having him beat down another character also known for being at or near the top of the pool. It always weakens the effectiveness of both the characters involved, to my eyes.

[Roquefort Raider]

Yeah, this is pretty much how I remember it too. I thought the art in first big Belit story, the one that ended with Amra or maybe a little after that, suffered from Steve Gan's inks, which I never really liked much. But once Ernie Chan came on, the series climbed back up to one of its highest peaks with the long journey into Stygia and all that. Then it sort of plateaued for a bit and gradually fell off, with the stories starting to feel a bit repetitive and the Buscema/Chan art a little too slick.

Agreed on the art. Gan was a favorite of Buscema's, who really liked what Steve did on his Tarzan pencils, but even if I enjoyed the somewhat gritty texture he gave to John's pencils (which suited the jungle context well) I fely it was a bit rough at times. (I must say that I liked it better than the Buscema-Palmer duo that preceded the Buscema-Gan period, though, because I'm one of the five persons on this Earth who doesn't much care for the Buscema-Palmer pairing!)

Refreshing my memory with the aid of the GCD gallery, I think I stopped with the big double issue #115, which was a good one, except for Thomas making a point of Conan defeating Red Sonja, which I didn't like any more than when he had Conan get the better of Kull in an early "crossover". Never have liked this Superman/Hulk-style insistence on showing that the hero is "the strongest (or smartest/nicest/etc) one there is" by having him beat down another character also known for being at or near the top of the pool. It always weakens the effectiveness of both the characters involved, to my eyes.

Agreed, but in the case of Sonja it can be argued that the fight wasn't fair: she slipped in a puddle of wine! I call a foul! I was more annoyed, in that issue, by Zukala's complete and sudden reversal of attitude toward Conan, and by the revelation that the Thoth-Amon dream in issue 74 had been engineered by Karanthes. Too much continuity inbreeding, there, something that would plague the second Thomas run in the 90s.

I always hated the way Sonja evolved after CtB 24. For her first two issues she was a substitute for Valeria (who couldn't appear before Conan was in his mid to late 30s): a strong character who wanted all the freedoms taken for granted by men and refused to women in a patriarchal society. The thing about "no man's lips shall taste mine unless he's defeated me in battle first" was something of a boast, a challenge to any guy foolish enough to take liberties with her. That was cool, as was her unwillingness to just swoon in Conan's mighty thews. (She was smarter than he was, too)!

But then she was essentially destroyed as a character. She was given an origin in which yet another girl gets raped (why didn't Conan get raped in his origin story? Why not Wolverine? Why not the Punisher?), and in which all her strength... is actually a %$# magical gift from some goddess. And her boast, full of fire and independence, is actually a stupid magical condition set by said goddess. Bleccch. (Add to that that she started dressing in a ridiculous outfit that was made fun of in both Cerebus and in Karl Edward Wagner's the road of kings). I think Roy tried to back-pedal a little in later years, as in Marvel Super Special #9 (in which Sonja smashes the statue of the goddess and essentially tells her to get lost) and in her leather armor era, but there's just no going back.

[Paulie]

I strongly concur with the 'everything up until Roy Thomas left the first" tract. The first 115 issues of CtB have only two or three stinkers in the lot and the Barry Smith issues are as good as everyone says they are.

If you want to dig a little deeper I'm actually quite a fan of the Conan the King Series, the first 27 issues being especially good. You have two great Roy Thomas-John Buscema adapations in the first 8 issues, and then Doug Moench does six issues which do suffer from some sub-standard art but have continuity and a suspenseful ongoing story. Starting with 17 Alan Zelentz takes over and his Conan features all sorts of political intrigue, two nice fill-in issues by Rudy Nebres and some nascent work from Marc Silverstri and Geoff Isherwood. These are not A+ comics by any stretch but they are solid Bs I think and miles better than the terrible Jones-Fleischer stories appearing in CtB at the time. I thought they deserved a mention.

[SteveGus]

Just got back from a great family vacation on which I brought the Barry Windsor-Smith Archives of Conan vol. 1 along for the ride. I'd been meaning to get into Conan based upon several emphatic recommendations, and I really enjoyed it. So I have questions about where to go next:

1. Should I make some attempt to read these in order (I've seen minor points of continuity at this point, but nothing Earth-shattering)? I have scattered Savage Sword of Conan issues in my collection, as well as some Kull and some King Conan, and also volume #0 of Kurt Busiek's run. Can I read these in any order, or am I missing a lot by doing so? Are there any critical Conan issues or eras that I should be sure to read?

2. I saw that the first Kull solo story was printed as part of Conan #10, but it was not reprinted in the Archive edition I was reading. When I start reading Kull, will I miss much by beginning with Kull #1?

3. Are there other essential Sword and Sorcery titles (Elric, Red Sonja, etc?). I'm not looking for a list of enjoyable reads, but more of a "if you don't read this, you're missing something just as good as, or even superior to, Conan."

Thanks in advance!

My understanding is that Howard never really intended the Conan stories to be read in a particular order. I'd accept the L. Sprague de Camp timeline as a general outline, but the details are not really that important. Gutenberg has Howard in the order they were published: http://gutenberg.net.au/plusfifty-a-m.html#letterH

I've always thought Solomon Kane was an equally compelling character. Some of his stories are set in pulp-fiction Africa, which people get itchy about, and so modern adaptations are not that frequent.

Do not miss this masterpiece either.

My introduction to Conan was through the Seventies Marvel series, and I'd cheerfully recommend the first hundred issues to anyone who's a fan of the character. They aren't faithful, but they are familiar. I'd even say I like 'em better than the newer Dark Horse series, but they too have their moments.