Conan or Elric?

[Larcen]

I voted Elric. I don't find Conan to be remotely interesting.

When you say Conan, what medium/stories do you mean? I ask because I can't believe someone would not be interested in REH's original stories. tell me you are referring to the movies or the comics at least.

 

[danzig138]

If I am in a mood for brooding, well, there's also Kull.

Beat me to it. Before Conan, before Elric, and cooler than both...

 

[MonsterMash]

I voted for Conan, but this is a real chalk and cheese comparison. Very different characters and milleus, both good, but ultimately I went for the pulp end. Now if you made it Fafhard and the Gray Mouser vs Conan it'd be a tougher choice.

 

[S'mon]

I voted Elric - partly it's that Elric is a British anti-hero, Conan is an American hero*, and I find Elric easier to relate to. Both REH and Moorcock created great worlds and characters (although Moorcock seems to have lost the knack recently). I guess Fahfrd & Mouser just beat them both, though.

*not in the firefighter sense.

 

[Desdichado]

Conan, without a doubt. I very much disliked the Elric books (although maybe it's partly because I didn't read them until I was older.) He's whiny, you can't really identify with him, the books are poorly written, and the setting is too oddball and arbitrary for my tastes.

 

[The_Gneech]

I voted for Conan, but this is a real chalk and cheese comparison. Very different characters and milleus, both good, but ultimately I went for the pulp end. Now if you made it Fafhard and the Gray Mouser vs Conan it'd be a tougher choice.

Yes, that would be tougher. But then you'd have to break it further down to "sword-and-sorcery adventure F&GM, or random strangeness and weird sex F&GM"...

-The Gneech

 

[mmadsen]

That said, I can't find a definitive website pointing all this out. Does anyone know where one is, or is the above just internet-folklore?

I vaguely recall reading that somewhere "before the Internet" -- I can't recall where though.

Wizards of the Coast's books page has a series of excellent "classics of fantasy" articles. The Fafhrd and Gray Mouser article discusses the birth and evolution of swords & sorcery fiction, including Howard and Moorcock:

Howard had many imitators, most of whom aped his style and lacked both his imagination and his sincerity, like modern-day musicians engineering pops and crackles into their songs to make them sound more like bygone artists they admire. One follower who avoided this trap was Michael Moorcock, who in the early 1960s attempted to re-invent the genre by inverting its conventions with Stormbringer (1963), the first (and best) of the Elric of Melniboné series. Instead of an uncivilized barbarian, Moorcock gives us an overcivilized decadent; instead of rising from adventurer to king, Elric declines from emperor to peopleless wanderer; instead of the straightforward Conan's loyalty and occasional gallantry, the subtle Elric betrays and brings about the death of every friend, subject, relative, or subordinate who puts their trust in him. In fact, Elric is just the sort of treacherous wizard whom Conan specializes in lopping the heads off of. Unfortunately, instead of stopping after the impressive feat of writing the epic tale of Elric's death, Moorcock proceeded to churn out a flood of prequels, all essentially retellings of the same story, diluting the impact of the original with every regurgitation.

 

[Soul]

You don't know who Col_Pladoh is, do you? (Gary Gygax) D&D is the game, FR is just a setting.

Just one hand among many who has made D&D what it is today.

 

[Col_Pladoh]

So, does then not bring us to: Cugel or Elric?

Also, has anyone here ever read the "Kyric" series written by Gardenr Fox? Granted they are "inspired" by the Conan tales, Gar did a very good job of imitating the originals, I think, better work than the pastiches by aithors other that REH in the Conan series.

Cheers,
Gary

 

[Desdichado]

That article you posted, mmadsen, is interesting. Although I do enjoy Fritz Leiber immensely, the writer of that article seems to want to deify him beyond what he deserves. Also, to call one of the most influential writers of the genre an "innocent hack?" Ouch!