In this week’s Dispatches from The Secret Library, Dr Oliver Tearle reads about one of Conan the Barbarian’s literary offspring
When I was a teenager devouring every fantasy book I could find, one of my favourite writers was Robert E. Howard. His Conan Chronicles – reprinted by Gollancz in a glorious two-volume edition as part of their Fantasy Masterworks series – sound rather crude and even unpromising when you try to explain to people what happens in a Conan story.
In this week’s Dispatches from The Secret Library, Dr Oliver Tearle enjoys the adventures of the Puritan swordsman, Solomon Kane
Some writers have just one great character in them. Conan Doyle created a range of memorable characters, from Professor Challenger to Sir Nigel Loring of the Hundred Years’ War, but his name is now linked to one of his creations above all others. Mary Shelley wrote the first post-apocalyptic novel among other works of fiction, but her name now means ‘Frankenstein’. And for many, the name Robert E. Howard, if it conjures a fictional character at all, summons ‘Conan the Barbarian’ or ‘Conan of Cimmeria’.