What's So Special About Conan?

In today's USA Today, Mike Snider writes about Conan's reemergence as a relevant subject in popular culture (hat tip to SF Signal for the story). There are those of us who comment about poplar culture who think that Conan has never been an irrelevant figure in society. How can a character who codified an entire literary genre become truly irrelevant? Every story about a sword wielding barbarian, no matter how trite or bad, is at some level inspired by Robert E. Howard's creation. But it can't be denied that there is exciting news for Conan fans. Snider points to five recent developments that signal Conan's relevance:

1. The New PS3/XBOX 360 Video Game coming out next week
2. The new "Conan The Phenomenon" hardcover by Paul Sammon
3. The Savage Sword of Conan Trade Paperback Collection by Dark Horse
and
4. An upcoming movie by Millennium Films.

Those these are important, and wonderful, developments for the Conan fan, they are not new. One should not think that there has been some kind of sudden explosion in 2007 of Conan material.

Snider neglected to mention:

1. Conan: The Ultimate Guide by Roy Thomas which released in September 2006
2. The new Conan comic book series (first released in 2004) written by Kurt Busiek and illustrated by Cary Nord by Dark Horse
3. The Mongoose Publishing Conan Roleplaying Game
not to mention
4. The Age of Conan series of media tie-in novels published in 2005 and 2006
or
5. Del Rey's publishing of Howard's Original Conan Stories released in 2003

The Conan explosion isn't a new thing either, I could have pulled numerous examples from the 90s or the 80s of Conan releases. Conan is always lurking in the pop culture subconscious and I think that we do a disservice to Conan fans, both existent and emerging when we use Arnold Schwarzenegger as the archetypal Conan representation, as Snider appears to do in the article. Some like Arnold as archetype, but I find Conan to be one of the most underestimated characters in American literature (with Natty Bumpo being a close second) and the Governator's portrayal -- while fun -- lacks the depth the character actually has as a literary figure.

When it comes to depictions of unreflective low art, one need look no further than the commonly perceived opinions of Robert Howard's Conan stories. If you ask the average man on the street to describe a Conan narrative, you will likely be given a tale of lust and violence. In the tale Conan will rescue some half-naked maiden from some rampaging beast and the story will end with the woman becoming all naked as she swoons at the hero's feet. In fact, a great deal of Conan pastiche has been based on this very simple formula. The largest problem with such a vision is that it is not all that accurate. Are there tales of this sort in the Conan oeuvre?
Sure, but there are also tales of visionary wonder.



Like most authors, whether they write literature or Literature, Howard's writings reflect his own thoughts, experiences, and education. The writing reflects the aesthetic tastes of the author, or his/her understanding of a prospective audiences literary tastes. What makes something worth reading again and again is when an author satisfies those with "lower" tastes while providing them with some food for thought. Howard is no exception. In fact, I was surprised while I was rereading the first published Conan story, Howard's The Phoenix on the Sword to find that the author seemed to be hinting at a theory of the value of literature and its role in society.

Howard's Hyborean Age is a mythic world filled with magic and wonder, but it is also a world based on the history of the real world. Howard combined multiple eras of history so that societies whose "real world" existence is separated by centuries could co-exist narratively. Conan's own people, the Cimmerians, are based on a very real historical peoples. Both Herodotus, in his Histories, and Plutarch, in his Lives, mention the Cimmerian peoples (called Cimbri in Plutarch). In The Phoenix on the Sword, Howard appears to expect his audience to have at least a little understanding of the historical Cimmerians in his conversation of the role of literature in civilization. Conan, as protagonist, must hold ideas which the reader sympathizes with for the particular narrative of Phoenix to work.

So what kind of people were the Cimmerians? According to Plutarch they were a people who were pillagers and raiders, but not rulers.

For the Cimmerian attack upon Ionia, which was earlier than Croesus, was not a conquest of the cities, but only an inroad for plundering.
Herodotus, Histories, I, 6

What did they look like? According to Plutarch:

Their great height, their black eyes and their name, Cimbri, which the Germans use for brigands, led us merely to suppose that they were one of those races of Germania who lived on the shores of the Western Ocean. Others say that the huge expanse of Celtica stretches from the outer sea and the western regions to the Palus Maeotis and borders on Asian Scythia; that these two neighbouring nations joined forces and left their land... And although each people had a different name, their army was collectively called Celto-Scythian. According to others, some of the Cimmerians, who were the first-to be known to the ancient Greeks... took flight and were driven from their land by the Scythians. Plutarch, Life of Marius, XI

What was their temperament? According to Homer:

Thus she brought us to the deep-Rowing River of Ocean and the frontiers of the world, where the fog-bound Cimmerians live in the City of Perpetual Mist. When the bright Sun climbs the sky and puts the stars to flight, no ray from him can penetrate to them, nor can he see them as he drops from heaven and sinks once more to the earth. For dreadful night has spread her mantle over the heads of that unhappy folk. Homer, Odyssey, XI, 14

It is Homer's description of the Cimmerians that Howard uses in Phoenix to describe the mood of the people and to separate Conan from his kin. When Conan is asked why the Cimmerians are such a brooding people, Conan responds:

“Perhaps it’s the land they live in,” answered the king. “A gloomier land never was – all of hills, darkly wooded, under skies nearly always gray, with winds moaning drearily down the valleys.” – Phoenix on the Sword

The average Cimmerian is a dour and towering barbarian who destroys civilization then returns to his gloomy homeland only to begin the process again later. Howard's typical Cimmerian is similar to that of the classical scholars, and presents a figure most unlikely to advance the literary arts. But this is where Conan differs from his kin. In The Phoenix on the Sword, Conan is an older man who has conquered on of the greatest nations of the Hyborean Age expressly to free them from tyrannical rule. He conquered to rule, and to liberate an oppressed nation. A far cry from the typical barbarian. By separating Conan from his kin, Howard simultaneously increases the audience's sympathy for the barbarian king while enabling the character to advance a theory of the value of literature.

The Phoenix on the Sword is the tale of a plot to assassinate King Conan, a plot organized my a Machiavellian figure named Ascalante who desires to assume the throne. Ascalante is the product of civilization, but he is the antagonist of the story and so Howard uses his opinions of the Arts as a way to separate him from the audience's sympathy. When he describes a poet who has been brought into his conspiracy he describes the poet in pejorative terms. These terms evolve as the narrative moves from unpublished draft to final published form. Ascalante originally expresses his disdain for Rinaldo (the poet) in a long description:

“Rinaldo – a mad poet full of hare-brained visions and out-worn chivalry. A prime favorite with the people because of his songs which tear out their heart-strings. He is our best bid for popularity.” – Ascalante in Phoenix on the Sword (unpublished First submitted draft)

By the time the story is published the description is changed to the very brief, "“…Rinaldo, the hair-brained minstrel.” [Ascalante in Phoenix on the Sword(published)]. In the published form, Howard leaves out the value of Rinaldo's participation in the plot because it is redundant with information presented later in the story. When Ascalante is asked what value Rinaldo has as a conspirator, Ascalante's response is similar in both the published and unpublished text, but his hatred of Rinaldo is made more clear in the draft than in the published text:

“Alone of us all, Rinaldo has no personal ambition. He sees in Conan a red-handed, rough-footed barbarian who came out of the north to plunder a civilized land. He idealizes the king whom Conan killed to get the crown, remembering only that he occasionally patronized the arts, and forgetting the evils of his reign, and he is making the people forget. Already they openly sing The Lament for the King in which Rinaldo lauds the sainted villain and denounces Conan as ‘that black-hearted savage from the abyss.’ Conan laughs, but the people snarl.” – Ascalante in Phoenix on the Sword (published)

“Rinaldo – bah! I despise the man and admire him at the same time. He is your true idealist. Alone of us all he has no personal ambition. He sees in Conan a red-handed, rough-footed barbarian who came out of the north to plunder a peaceful land. He thinks he sees barbarism triumphing over culture. He already idealizes the king Conan killed, forgetting the rogue’s real nature, remembering only that he occasionally patronized the arts, and forgetting the evils under which the land groaned during his reign, and he is making the people forget. Already they open sing ‘The Lament for the King’ in which Rinaldo lauds the saintly villain, and denounces Conan as ‘that black-hearted savage from the abyss.’ Conan laughs, but at the same time wonders why the people are turning against him.” – Ascalante in Phoenix on the Sword (unpublished First submitted draft)

In both descriptions the poet is shown to be a blind idealist. Rinaldo, it appears, cannot look beyond the Cimmerian stereotypes as presented by Plutarch and Herodotus. Howard doesn't require the reader to have those preconceptions, but for the reader who has read Herodotus and Plutarch the stereotype becomes even clearer. Also by editing down the prose the author, either willingly or at editorial command, displays an amount of trust that his audience can reach the proper conclusion that barbarism typically destroys the valuable within civilization. What is interesting is that while Rinaldo is a conspirator, the poet is an antagonist, he is not a villain. He is a blind a foolish idealist, not acting in his own self interest. Ascalante even goes on to describe Rinaldo's motivations:

“Poets always hate those in power. To them perfection is always just behind the last corner, or beyond the next. They escape the present in dreams of the past and future. Rinaldo is a flaming torch of idealism, rising, as he thinks, to overthrow a tyrant and liberate the people.” – Ascalante in Phoenix on the Sword (published)

“Because he is a poet. Poets always hate those in power. To them perfection is always just behind the last corner or beyond the next. They escape the present in dreams of the past and the future. Rinaldo is a flaming torch of idealism and he sees himself as a hero, a stainless knight – which after all he is! – rising to overthrow the tyrant and liberate the people.” – Ascalante in Phoenix on the Sword (unpublished First submitted draft)

Ascalante specifies what kind of idealists poets are. They seek an imagined perfect society, and will always look for it no matter how good the society they are currently in happens to be. But this is Ascalante, the Machiavellian civilized man, and his opinion about what the value of the poet is. For him the poet is an easily manipulable puppet. What about the barbarian turned king, the protagonist, and oft argued proxy for the author? (It should be noted that many argue that Conan often reflects Howard's own views, this is not an original assertion on my part.)

Conan adores the poet, and understands the criticisms. He is aware that the poet's plays are leading many among the people to despise him, but he too is persuaded of the need for justice. When his chief adviser, Prospero, discusses disdain for Rinaldo, Conan comes to the poet's (and poetry in general) defense. The text is near identical in the published and unpublished format.

“Rinaldo is largely responsible,” answered Prospero, drawing up his sword-belt another notch. “He sings songs that make men mad. Hang him in his jester’s garb to the highest tower in the city. Let him make rhymes for the vultures.”
“No, Prospero, he’s beyond my reach. A great poet is greater than any king. His songs are mightier than my scepter, for he has hear ripped the heart from my breast when he chose to sing for me. I will die and be forgotten, but Rinaldo’s songs will live forever.” – Phoenix on the Sword (unpublished first submitted draft)

“Rinaldo is largely responsible,” answered Prospero, drawing up his sword-belt another notch. “He sings songs that make men mad. Hang him in his jester’s garb to the highest tower in the city. Let him make rimes for the vultures.”
“No, Prospero, he’s beyond my reach. A great poet is greater than any king. His songs are mightier than my scepter; for he has near ripped the heart from my breast when he chose to sing for me. I shall die and be forgotten, but Rinaldo’s songs will live for ever.” – Phoenix on the Sword (published)

For Conan, the atypical Cimmerian, poems and the arts have more power than weapons or royal authority. Not only that, but it is right and just that this is the case. Conan, the barbarian, is the defender of the value of literature, while Ascalante, the civilized man, sees literature as only a tool used to manipulate the foolish. Conan would seek to discuss the past and future, the ideal ones, with the poet, while Ascalante would merely use Rinaldo to destroy what he opposes. Conan's conflict between desiring a free press and swift justice, and the eventual melee that will result because of his favoring of the press, are made clear in the poetic prologue to the final chapter of the narrative.

What do I know of cultured ways, the gilt, the craft and the lie?
I, who was born in a naked land and bred in the open sky.
The subtle tongue, the sophist guile, they fail when the broadswords sing;
Rush in and die, dogs – I was a man before I was a king. – The Road of Kings – Phoenix on the Sword (published)

Surprisingly, Conan's love of literature and the arts, and his defense of them, is so deeply rooted that he initially refuses to kill Rinaldo when Rinaldo attacks him. He still believes he can reason with the poet, it is only when he is left no other alternative that he kills the poet (the text is identical in both published and unpublished forms).

“He rushed in, hacking madly, but Conan, recognizing him, shattered his sword with a short terrific chop and with a powerful push of his open hand sent him reeling to the floor.” – Phoenix on the Sword (published)

“He straightened to meet the maddened rush of Rinaldo, who charged in wild and wide open, armed only with a dagger. Conan leaped back, lifting his ax.

‘Rinaldo!’ his voice was strident with desperate urgency. ‘Back! I would not slay you ..’

‘Die, tyrant!’ screamed the mad minstrel, hurling himself headlong on the king. Conan delayed the blow he was loth to deliver, until it was too late. Only when he felt the bite of the steel in his unprotected side did he strike, in a frenzy of blind desperation.

Rinaldo dropped with his skull shattered and Conan reeled back against the wall, blood spurting from between the fingers which gripped his wound.” – Phoenix on the Sword (published)

What is interesting in the narrative is that of all the conspirators, there are twenty in all, none are able to injure Conan with the success of the poet. The poet has both damaged Conan's regime and his body and yet Conan was ever reluctant to, though in the end capable of, slay his greatest enemy.

“’See first to the dagger-wound in my side,’ he bade the court physicians. ‘Rinaldo wrote me a deathly song there, and keen was the stylus.’

‘We should have hanged him long ago,’ gibbered Publius. ‘No good can come of poets..’” – Phoenix on the Sword (published)

What does this tell us of Howard's thoughts regarding the arts? We know that Conan loves them, but we also know how they were used to manipulate the populace and how his own love for them almost cost him his life. Is Howard trying to discuss how Plato's critique of the poets is a good one, while at the same time defending the possible nobility of the poet (as Aristotle does in his Rhetoric)? I think these are questions intentionally posed in the narrative (I know...never guess at intentionality), and make it clear why Conan's first story The Phoenix on the Sword was so compelling to readers when they first read it.

It should be noted that the story was originally submitted as a Kull tale, though I have yet to analyze that draft like I have these two subsequent writings. The Kull version was rejected by Weird Tales and the final (rather than the first) Conan version was the first appearance of what has become a culturally iconic figure.

Ursula K LeGuin, Cory Doctorow, and Copyright

I have been wondering for some time now just how long the SF/Fantasy community will allow themselves to be swindled by Cory Doctorow's attempts to undermine copyright protections for writers. He's been incredibly crafty in his arguments. He has adeptly, and accurately, demonstrated how corporations often claim the copyright instead of the authors who created a product, but he uses this to shift the issue away from "creator ownership" issue into an "us vs. the corporate overlords" argument. Doing so he simultaneously points out a genuine injustice while misdirecting our ire toward the concept of copyright, which in fact protects creators (at least when corporate overlords don't hijack the rights). He has also pointed out that SF/Fantasy fans tend to both download and purchase hard copies of the things they like. In essence, the SF/Fantasy fan steals a peek, then buys the product, thus doing no "real" damage to the right holder.

I have never found Mr. Doctorow's arguments, and he has others, all that convincing. They seem to be overly concerned with "audience" rights and not with creator rights, which are necessary if people want to be able to make a living from this stuff. Certainly, there is some pretty wacky copyright legislation out there (lifetime plus how many years?), but that doesn't mean that the creator of a product doesn't have the right to profit from his or her creation. They should, and do, and current laws protect such rights.

In the past, the majority of the people I've read who seem to have any agreement with me have been corporate shills, and I don't want to just hang out with corporate shills -- or just them and Harlan Ellison (registered trademark) for that matter. So you can imagine my joy at finding that Ursula K. LeGuin also finds Mr. Doctorow's crusade a little too aggressive. It appears that Mr. Doctorow printed "in its entirety, a one-paragraph story that Ms Le Guin sent to the fanzine Ansible." LeGuin took issue and Mr. Doctorow eventually took action and apologized. You can read the original story at LeGuin's website.

LeGuin has accepted Mr. Doctorow's apology, but I'd like you to look at a couple of key phrases in Doctorow's apology which hint that he is also practicing more than a little self-righteous self-justification.

Andrew Burt, the person whom Ms Le Guin chose to communicate the matter to me, is someone with whom I had put in a killfile following an altercation. I delete all emails from him unread, and if he sent me a message, I did not see it.

Unless Andrew Burt (you can read a copy of a letter he wrote Jerry Pournelle here) and Mr. Doctorow engaged in a serious brawl, it seems a bit petty for Mr. Doctorow to have put his emails in a "killfile." I don't believe that Judd Apatow put Mark Brazill in his killfile, even after being told to "Get cancer." But I don't know the nature of the "altercation," I just know that Mr. Doctorow has used a word which has some heavy implications. Though given his frequent use of rhetorical techniques which might make Gorgias blush, I think it might be little more than a heated email/comment section/message board flame war.

In fact, it seems that Burt's major sin (according to the Doctorow piece) is that Burt believes in copyright protection, "Burt is the Science Fiction Writers of America VP who had previously sent a fraudulent takedown notice that resulted in my novel being removed from an Internet document server." So Burt tries to protect Doctorow's copyright, making an error that forces a takedown notice, something LeGuin describes as "An overworked committee mistakenly identified a few works, among many, as infringing copyright; the mistakes were promptly admitted and redressed, with apologies." That appears to be our "altercation." Which makes me think that Mr. Doctorow is a bit like Mark Brazill in all of this, even his apology seems snide and canned. This is implied by his assertion that, "My understanding is that she is unsatisfied and remains upset with me." When LeGuin is on the record as writing, "It may be a bit clouded with arguments and self-justification, but apologising is hard, and apologies are rare and valuable. I accept his in all good faith." Who seems to be the one most in need of justification here?

As for me, I agree with LeGuin's hope that, "In my view, the best thing that could come out of my brush with the Doctorow Doctrine would be this: the honorable reinstatement of the SFWA e-piracy committee, with an expression of appreciation from SFWA officers and members of the honest and effective work they have done for us for so long."

Does DEXTER IN THE DARK Spell Lights Out for the Franchise?

Dexter is back -- or most of him is back—in DEXTER IN THE DARK: A Novel(those of you who support independent bookstores can buy it at Mysterious Galaxy), Jeff Lindsay’s latest installment detailing the brutal exploits of his charmingly witty and only half-heartless serial killer, preying and slaying by his uniquely strict if lethal Harry Code of Conduct. This newest book finds Dexter in crisis – not of conscience, of course. He doesn’t have one. But in a crisis of identity, for Dexter’s mysterious inner fiend -- that giddy playmate that guides his death-dealing and leaves him elated after bouts of marvelous moonlit mayhem –- Dexter’s Dark Passenger is absent without leave.

As if prepping for a wedding and fatherhood aren’t enough to put Dexter off his game, a peculiar crime scene with macabre theological overtones sends Dexter’s Dark Passenger scurrying away, with troubling results for Dexter and his readers. Being out of communion dulls Dexter’s normally razor instincts, humor, and murderous talents when he, and we, need them most. Once again, he attracts the attention of a very dangerous intelligence, this time with a taste for children, but don’t expect the usual combination of chase, wit, twist, and surprise. Dexter is not only in the dark, he’s down right depressed. Jeff Lindsay takes a daring departure from the optimistic mayhem of America’s favorite avenging monster, but it’s a sad, fumbling new path.

Unlike DARKLY DREAMING DEXTER(at Mysterious Galaxy) and DEARLY DEVOTED DEXTER (at Mysterious Galaxy), DEXTER IN THE DARK leaves the complex realm of psychological vagary and broken psyches to dabble in something entirely outside Dexter’s universe: theology. Sans Dark Passenger, Dexter is befuddled, frustrated, and at risk of becoming normal, with all the emotions and vulnerabilities of any normal person, yet his world turns suddenly (and unjustifiably, despite ample narrative exposition) supernatural. Just when Dexter has no powers (not insight, not humor, and the boy can’t even seem to kill), Miami is overrun with them. The sum effect is a kind of amorphous melancholy, both for Dexter and his dear readers. Little help comes from the other characters made so vibrant in previous pages – the few times Dexter isn’t shuffling around in his own empty head, he’s avoiding conversations or being himself avoided. If you crave the slay-and-play criminology twice before scribed so ingeniously by Jeff Lindsay’s pen, brace yourself for page after unfunny, derivative, ill-conceived, if-it-had-to-be-supernatural-why-couldn’t-it-be-Lovecraftian-good page.

Spoiled until now navigating two books of vicious, psychotic violence on the shoulders of a fantastically entertaining monster, this clumsy foray into Anne Rice/DaVinci Code-esque old-god theology and conspiracy is by comparison plodding, simplistic, and dull. Lindsay abandons his established finesse of raising questions without answers, of suggestion and nuance, of abrasive yet oddly loveable and infinitely entertaining characters, and instead offers an obtuse, paint-by-numbers explanation for evil which abdicates Dexter from all moral responsibility for who and what he is, for his adherence to or abandonment of the Harry Code, and ultimately advocates an incoherent pseudo-loyalty to controlled evil. If Harry had read this book, he would have killed Dexter on sight. I found myself by the end rooting for the kids to get run over, shot, or drowned. Poor Rita.

For those who enjoy the Cthulhu mythos or tales with supernatural explanations, DEXTER IN THE DARK might be a fun romp, but this reader prays, to whatever Dark Gods will listen, that Lindsay returns to the world he tells so well –- Dexter’s Miami: wickedly funny, refreshingly mortal, splendidly violent, and mildly-sociopathic.

A History of Pulp Role Playing Games Part 1: The Dawn of Roleplaying Games

Those who wonder how old the connection between "The Pulps" and Roleplaying Games is need look no further than the introduction to the original (three book) Dungeons and Dragons boxed set. In this introduction, Gary Gygax describes who might be interested in playing his new creation:

These rules are strictly fantasy. Those wargamers who lack imagination, those who don't care for Burroughs' Martian adventures where John Carter is groping
through black pits, who feel no thrill upon reading Howard's Conan saga, who do
not enjoy the de Camp & Pratt fantasies or Fritz Leiber's Fafhrd and the Gray
Mouser pitting their swords against evil sorceries will not be likely to find
DUNGEONS and DRAGONS to their taste.

The introduction is filled with names near and dear to the pulp aficionado. Edgar Rice Burrough's character John Carter first appeared in the February through July issues of The All-Story in 1912. TSR also designed an early miniatures wargame on the adventures of John Carter, it was called Warriors of Mars.



Robert E. Howard's famous barbarian Conan debuted at the height of his power in Weird Tales December 1932 issue in "The Phoenix on the Sword," a rewrite of a rejected Kull story titled "By This Axe I Rule." In the tale, Conan is already a mature man and king of Aquilonia and deals swift justice to a band of would be assassins. If you look carefully at the cover of the issue, you will notice that the advertised story, "Buccaneers of Venus," is a John Carter pastiche by Otis Adelbert Kline. Kline eventually became Howard's literary agent. As a gamer, I can't help but speculate that the amphibious antagonist on the cover is an inspiration behind the Kuo-Toa in the D&D game (H.P. Lovecraft's Deep Ones are another obvious influence.)



L. Sprague deCamp and Fletcher Pratt's everyman hero psychologist/enchanter Harold Shea wandered into his first fantastic landscape in the May 1940 issue of Unknown.



To be fair, most fantasy of the pre-Tolkien era was published in the pulps and as influential as these early fantasy tales were to the Dungeons and Dragons game (and are to the current D&D Eberron setting), they are not what most people mean when they are referring to "Pulp Roleplaying Games." Which is a shame since the pulps were filled with dynamic, original, and action packed tales that many modern Game Masters should look to for inspiration. Not every adventure need be a macguffin quest inspired by Tolkien's Lord of the Rings.

The lack of familiarity with, and I mean familiarity with and not awareness of, the underlying pulp inspirations that influenced the creation of role playing games is one of the largest failings of some of today's game designers. When I read Jesse Decker and David Noonan's discussion regarding why modern Dungeons and Dragons avoids explicit attempts at humor in its rulebooks, I near wept.

At no time was there a discussion about why the early rulebooks had humor in them, as opposed to the central reason they gave why there isn't humor any longer. They write, "In short, we worry that it isn't necessarily part of the shared D&D experience, and we don't want to mess up the flow of the game at the table." And in writing that one sentence, they ignore one of the major literary influences on the development of the Dungeons and Dragons game, the stories of Harold Shea by deCamp and Pratt. How can stories, and the tone they inspired, be not "necessarily part of the shared D&D experience?" Without these stories, you might not even have the game itself, particularly considering the deCamp/Pratt stories.

I am not saying this because I believe Gary Gygax to have been intimately familiar with Fletcher Pratt's Naval War Game, though he may have been. I am saying this because of two things. First, the underlying conceit of the Harold Shea stories themselves was probably inspirational to the creation of the "proto role playing game." Second, the humor that continually reared its head in early D&D books was the same kind of humor one found in the deCamp/Pratt stories.

To fully understand the above statement, you must understand the central conceit of the Harold Shea stories. Essentially, the central conceit is that Harold Shea (and his mentor) are able to travel to other dimensions -- many of which contain magic -- if they can alter their perceptions through the analysis of particular equations and logical proofs. When Harold Shea studies his first proof, which sends him to Ragnarök, a gamer can easily see the parallel between Shea looking at the pages upon pages of logic problems and their own experience looking at pages upon pages of rules. When roleplayers study the rules of a game, it is so they can fluidly experience the milieu the game is offering. This is exactly what Shea does in the stories. It should be noted that J. Eric Holmes, the editor of the first Dungeons and Dragons Basic Set, wrote in his book Fantasy Roleplaying Games (Hippocrene Books, 1981 pp. 209-210):

"Years before Dungeons and Dragons was invented, L. Sprague de Camp wrote a story called "Solomon's Stone," published in 1942 in the magazine Unknown Worlds...The story was a fantasy in which the hero exchanges personalities with his alter-ego in the astral world. Here he discovers that the astral self of each living person on earth is the self he imagines or fantasies himself to be in his most private dreams...I am always reminded of "Solomon's Stone," though, when I see the bizarre and wonderful characters created by my friends for the game."

Holmes, who was an adapter and not a creator of the rules, saw the connection between one of de Camp's stories and the underlying concept of role playing games. It isn't hard to imagine Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson being inspired by a character who even more explicitly used a "rules set" to experience fantasy adventure.

Decker and Noonan are fine designers, and they have developed some of my favorite products, but they seem to have lost the connection between the pulps and the game they are working on. Dungeons and Dragons is the scion of pulp literature and we do the game a disservice when we don't acknowledge this fact. And we do the players of the game a disservice when we don't point them in the direction of the things that inspired their hobby. Early editions of the game included bibliographies of inspirational materials, many other roleplaying games still do, but the three core books of the Dungeons and Dragons game lack such references (the Eberron sourcebook does contain some). Decker and Noonan may be aware that roleplaying was influenced by pulps, but they aren't familiar with what those pulps had to offer and it shows in their reticence to include humor in the D&D experience.

Listen to the Geekerati Episode on Popular Medievalism

Last night we had a wonderful chat with Professor Richard Scott Nokes of Troy University about Popular Medievalism. We talked about what it is and where it is, and it's everywhere. We also talked about the connection between playing Dungeons and Dragons and studying Medieval History, and we got a little hint that the reason we call the Middle Ages the Dark Ages is due to bad press from certain people during the Renaissance.

We discussed a lot of different topics, but we spent a great deal of time discussing some of our favorite Popular Medieval movies. Some of the movies we mentioned were: Excalibur, The Lion in Winter, A Knight's Tale, Henry V, The Last Valley, The Lord of the Rings Trilogy, The Sword and the Sorcerer, Krull, and Ladyhawke.

What are some of your favorite Popular Medieval films? Books? Comics? Television Shows?

Listen to the episode and let us know.

Some Thoughts Before We Return to Posts About Popular Culture

When I put up my post regarding my mom's death, it is a very personal action in more ways than one. It is personal in that I am revealing a little bit of my life to the world, but it is also personal in that I am only writing about how I feel (or felt) about the event. In a way, this is very unfair to a number of people that I care deeply about who were also affected by my mom's death.

I am not writing about how they felt, or even about how we dealt with the situation together. I am writing just from my perspective. But I am do this because it is the only point of view I really have. I have no real way of knowing what these other people are experiencing, nor what they experienced, because I have had different experiences. My dad knew my mom years before I did, and I knew her for years before my sister did. Each of us, in a very real way, came to know a very different woman. That said, I would like to try to share what I think some of those differences are.

I am 9 years 8 month and 8 days older than my sister Krista. I was born on "Elvis' Birthday" and she was born on the anniversary of his death, January 8th and August 16th for those of you wondering. Which means that I have 9-plus years of memories about my mom that Krista will never have. It also means, because like many 20-somethings I was very independent of my family for a time, that Krista has some memories that I will never have. And a lot of the memories that my sister has are of my mom's struggle with, and loss to, addiction.

I have no personal experience of what it is like to live in the same apartment as a heroin addict, for which I am grateful. Moreover, I have no experience of what it is like to be a teenager living in the same apartment as a heroin addict. In the grand scheme of life, it is probably one of the last things I would ever want to experience. But my sister did just that, the combination of love and frustration must have been near unbearable. I don't know how I would have dealt with the situation, I hope I would do alright. My sister did much better than I imagine the average person in her circumstances would have.

It is one of the many things I admire about my sister, that she was able to survive that situation. I actually don't think my sister understands how much I admire her period, let alone for her strength in this situation. I think she sometimes thinks that I look down on her for not making some of the same choice that I have made, but that isn't true at all. Being almost 10 years older than my sister meant that I spent a lot of time babysitting her, taking her to the park, or even to concerts I wouldn't have otherwise attended. I changed her diapers on many occasions and must seem, in some way, to be a bit of a parental figure to her and, given my stodginess and geekdom, not even the "cool" parent. So I can see why my opinion is important to her, and how my own life experiences might make her think that I believe the choices I made are the only way to happiness. But I don't believe that at all.

In fact, if people knew a formula to happiness, there wouldn't be philosophy and a lot of life would be a lot easier.

Nine Years Ago Today.

Those of you who have been long time readers will have to forgive me for a "repeat" post, but today is a day that on an annual basis I don't feel like posting about popular culture. Today is the ninth anniversary of my mother's death, and I always feel a need to share on this day. I thought about writing something entirely original, but then I reread what I wrote in 2004 and it captures most of what I want to say. So instead of trying to reinvent the wheel, I will post last year's entry.

This is a picture of my mom in 1971, that blob on her lap is me.

A Day to Listen to the Velvet Underground

I am only 34 years old, but today marks the end of my first seven years without a mom. That is an awkward sentence, but it best captures my sentiments. I am not an orphan, I still have a father. In fact, he should be receiving his Halloween card shortly. Yet a part of me is still very much missing, a large part. October 7th, 1998...10,7,98...those numbers loom large and ominous in my heart and this is the first year I am not completely overwhelmed by them.

My wife and I have intimate conversations often, it is one of the joys of marriage, and she and I were discussing death the other day. Her grandmother had just died at the age of 92. My wife explained it this way, "When someone dies, the world feels a little less complete. Bird songs aren't as joyful, and sunrises are slightly less beautiful." Displaying, as she often does, the magnificence of unedited, awkward, and spontaneous verbal poetry. She was also correct. C.S. Lewis opens his book A Grief Observed with another observation about death:

No one ever told me that grief felt so like fear. I am not afraid, but the sensation is like being afraid. The same fluttering in the stomach, the same restlessness, the yawning. I keep on swallowing.

I still feel this way, not everyday...today.

There are two things that are still difficult for me to do seven years after my mom died when I was 27 (she was 46).

I have a hard time remembering truly happy moments with her...on command. Happy moments enter my consciousness at random moments and seldom on the anniversary of her death. Glimpses of her nymph-like smile...brief auditory illusions of her laughter enter my mind. But the majority of my memories are neither happy nor sad, they are the memories of everyday activities, evening dinners and the question which ever looms over the head of a teenager, "Have you finished your homework?" I remember watching videotapes with her on many occassions, though none as awkward as the time we watched The Hunger, just the two of us and an erotic vampire film. I remember feeling both uncomfortable being aroused by the film, in my mom's presence, while at the same time finding the situation hilarious. This moment just came to mind. There are many more like it, I just can't remember them on demand. In all honesty, I remember my mom as a happy person, a person who added joy to the world. Which is why I have my other difficulty.

I can't understand my mom's addiction, and eventual death due to how it ravaged her body, to heroin. I try, by reading/watching/listening to and about other addicts. I know the narrative of my mom's addictive cycle, I can see each step of her hopeless journey. That's not what I can't understand. I know the things that led to her addiction. What I can't understand is the overwhelming power of it, how addiction stole my mom from me...day by day. Oddly, some really shallow things help. They are a poor substitute for true knowledge, and seem trite when I think hard on them, but they help. These things include the music of the Velvet Underground (in particular, you guessed it, Heroin) and Iggy Pop, the films Permanent Midnight (which I saw just after her death) and Trainspotting, the book and film versions of Razor's Edge, and the writings of C.S. Lewis among other things.

I am the only member of my immediate family I know of who attends church. I was raised secularly. Strange as it sounds my mom found comfort, though she was baffled by it, in my belief. She once asked if I believed, expecting me (the first college student in my family) to laugh at the absurdity of the question. I told her I did and her response lingers with me to this day, "Really?" Her eyes looked at me...proud, confused, unbelieving, yet hopeful. I never was able to tell her that hope was what faith was all about ("Faith is the realization of what is hoped for and evidence of things not seen" Hebrews 11:1). It isn't about "knowledge," little of life is about actual knowledge. This is why Socrates asked us to know ourselves, that is a difficult enough task. Let alone the ability to acquire actual knowledge of something else.

I was notified of my mom's death by answering machine. I was in classes all day and didn't have a cell phone. A series of messages of an ever-worsening condition. Siezures...followed by emergency medical action, my wife and I later read the medical records to piece together a timeline, to see if there was an heroic effort to save my mom. There was. It is not the best way to be notified of death, answering machine, I think it is the worst. I also wish that my mom had been buried not cremated, I would have liked to have had the chance to speak, to say my own words. Instead, I will share the two poems I think best capture the way I feel. One is gender confused (for my situation not its own) and the other is written from an older generation to a younger one, but they will have to do. In addition I would like to add a part of Philip K. Dick's author's note from A Scanner Darkly.

The first poem is by W.H. Auden (and yes it's the poem from Four Weddings and a Funeral but that is such a lovely scene.

Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone,
Prevent the dog from barking with a juicy bone,
Silence the pianos and with muffled drum
Bring out the coffin, let the mourners come.

Let aeroplanes circle moaning overhead
Scribbling on the sky the message He Is Dead,
Put crepe bows round the white necks of the public doves,
Let the traffic policemen wear black cotton gloves.

He was my North, my South, my East and West,
My working week and my Sunday rest,
My noon, my midnight, my talk, my song;
I thought that love would last for ever: I was wrong.

The stars are not wanted now: put out every one;
Pack up the moon and dismantle the sun;
Pour away the ocean and sweep up the wood.
For nothing now can ever come to any good.

The second poem is by Wordsworth:

SURPRISED by joy--impatient as the Wind
I turned to share the transport--Oh! with whom
But Thee, deep buried in the silent tomb,
That spot which no vicissitude can find?
Love, faithful love, recalled thee to my mind--
But how could I forget thee? Through what power,
Even for the least division of an hour,
Have I been so beguiled as to be blind
To my most grievous loss?--That thought's return
Was the worst pang that sorrow ever bore,
Save one, one only, when I stood forlorn,
Knowing my heart's best treasure was no more;
That neither present time, nor years unborn
Could to my sight that heavenly face restore.

Wordsworth wrote Suprised by Joy (C.S. Lewis titled one of his autobiographies after this poem), for his daughter Catherine who had died at the age of four. This poem masterfully captures the grief I feel over the loss of my mom. Everytime I have wonderful event in my life, I want to call her and share the news. That can never happen and it brings the event of her death immediately to mind and my sorrow and feeling of loss are renewed. Every time...without fail. My mom missed my graduation, my wife's master's, my acceptance to graduate school, my wife completing her MFA in film at USC. She will not be there to see her first grandchild, or any of the joy that her grandchildren will bring into the world.

As I stated before, I have continually looked to fiction and biographical narrative to understand my mom's addiction and that is why I am including the following by Philip K. Dick.

This has been a novel about some people who were punished entirely too much for what they did. They wanted to have a good time, but they were like children playing in the street; they could see one another of them being killed --run over, maimed, destroyed -- but they continued to play anyhow...

Drug misuse is not a disease, it is a decision, like the decision to step out in front of a moving care. You would call that not a disease but an error in judgement. When a bunch of people begin to do it, it is a social error, a life-style. In this particular life-style the motto is "Be happy now because tomorrow you are dying," but the dying begins almost at once, and the happiness is a memory..."Take the cash and let the credit go," as Villon said in 1460. But that is a mistake ifthe cash is a penny and the credit is a whole lifetime...

If there was any "sin" t was that these people wanted to keep on having a good time forever, and were punished for that, but, as I say, I feel that, if so, the punishment was far to great...

When my mom first told me of her addiction to heroin she expected me to be angry. A lot of my family was, I think the thought of my mother using heroin was too alien to them to even imagine. I think they viewed her use as somehow a failure on their part. I didn't, I only wanted to know if she was okay. By which I meant was she okay at the time she told me. My mom thought that heroin could make life more pleasant, for her it wasn't a selfish desire for more fun than anyone else was having, because she felt empty and sad on a regular basis. Heroin made her feel happy, like she could live life. But in making her think she could live life, heroin took life from her.

I don't "forgive" my mom for dying, I have never thought there was anything to forgive. I miss my mom and wish she were here. I love her and knowing that makes the missing part not so bad, because (as Lewis might say) the pain we feel now is a part of the love we have.