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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Cadfan" data-source="post: 4870407" data-attributes="member: 40961">Ironically, its the fact that Robert E. Howard is so well regarded that allows me to dismiss him without reading a single page.  I know more about Robert E. Howard's writing than I do about, say, Jonathan L. Howard.  And I just finished a novel by the latter last night.  Quite enjoyed it, actually- kept imagining the main character as played by David Mitchell. Anyways, I give a hearty rasberry to these so called classics.  Labeling dime store pulp novels "classics" of the entire fantasy genre is like calling the Scoobie Doo a classic of the animation genre.  Even if technically true in the sense that many people would label it as such, so what?  Being first chronologically is great, and we owe a lot to the authors that established the tropes and foundations of a genre.  That doesn't mean that they were any good, or that their fame is deserved in anything other than a sense of historical obligation.  The real question is whether these authors have survived the test of time- whether now, with many more competitors than they once faced, they're still considered worth reading.  I'm pretty sure that Leiber and Howard have not passed this test.  Howard has at least created an archetype that everyone knows and loves, but they tend to know it and love it through the effects its had on other writing or on secondary materials based on his, rather than through his actual words on paper. Oh, and for the record, it is NOT surprising that a mystery fan might not have read any Sherlock Holmes.  Sherlock Holmes is only tangentially part of the modern mystery genre.  Go browse the shelves a little, and you'll see that Agatha Christie is the mystery genre's Darwin, and Arthur Conan Doyle is its Lamarck.  I like both authors, definitely, but can completely understand how a mystery reader might not have ever read the latter.  Not that this is really relevant to the conversation, because you could have selected Christie as your example instead of Doyle, but hey.  Just sayin'.</blockquote>

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