(September's meeting is the group's 8th anniversary and January's selection will be our 100th book! Visit the Dark Forces home page for a complete listing of previous selections.)
In the Sunday, July 20 New York Times, Dave Itzkoff latest Across the Universe column features Michael Moorcock's seminal creation Elric and the recent repackaging Elric: The Stealer of Souls (Chronicles of the Last Emperor of Melniboné, Volume I).
What is stranger still is that the world Elric was born into did not necessarily need him. Moorcock was 21 years old when he introduced the character in the June 1961 issue of a British periodical called Science Fantasy. Ray guns and rocket ships were rapidly overtaking swords and sorcery as the preferred pulp subjects of the day, and many of Moorcock’s lasting science fiction accomplishments — including his novella “Behold the Man”; his radical, satirical Jerry Cornelius novels; and his immensely influential editorship of the sci-fi magazine New Worlds — were several years away.
Three things leaped out at me from the piece.
1) Itzkoff clearly has done some reading about Moorcock and of his work. Knowing that, it's very shocking that he writes "also C. S. Lewis and J. R. R. Tolkien — titans of fantasy who seemed to be obvious influences on him." Moorcock was influenced by the works that originally influenced the two authors as well as the writings of Mervyn Peake and Robert E. Howard.
2) What the hell is that hideous image in the article?
Why would any one choose that objectively inferior piece over John Picacio's beautiful cover or incredible interior art? (Picacio is NOT mentioned in the article.)
3) The overall poor quality of Dave Itzkoff's writing in this piece.
I probably should stop there as both Michael Moorcock and Elric both deserve the attention and respect.
This is not one of the better James Cawthorn's covers. Elric looks like a Catholic priest. If it wasn't for the black sword, I'd never have know it was Moorcock's famed anti-hero. (Science Fantasy, vol. 19, no. 55, October 1962 Image courtesy of the Pulp of the Day)
Compare it to this far superior Cawthorn cover to the first edition of Stormbringer (Herbert Jenkins, 1965)
Even the inferior 1962 Cawthorn was a massive step up after Brian Lewis horrible cover to Elric's first appearance (Science Fantasy, vol. 16, no. 47, June 1961)
Elric looks like some dandy from an Errol Flynn movie not the fierce stealer of souls, agent of chaos and destroy of worlds, that we all know and love.
The New World Entropy - a conference on Michael Moorcock Liverpool John Moores University, UK - 5-6 July 2008
This conference hopes to explore the rich and varied writings of Michael Moorcock's fictions whilst providing a rounded picture of the writerly environments Moorcock has developed in by contextualising his work alongside his many other social involvements and his interactions with other writers. As such this conference is focused upon developing a critical appreciation of Moorcock's best known and most loved writings in combination with an appreciation of his historical development as a writer. To this end we welcome papers which tread across the boundaries of genre which Moorcock himself trod and also welcome papers which relate Moorcock to the circles of friends and associates whose writings and work connect to his own. We hope that this will provide a lively and multiplicitous series of discursive responses to Moorcock’s remarkable body of works.
Abstracts of 200-300 words should be submitted electronically by 31st March 2008 (new extended deadline) to (mark.williams _at_uea.ac.uk) and (Martyn.Colebrook_at_ english.hull.ac.uk). All correspondence should have the phrase MOORCOCK CONFERENCE in the subject line.
Topics for discussion include but are not limited to: The Multiverse, Pluralism, Metropolitan life, Moorcock's relationship with Modernism, Music and fiction, Jerry Cornelius, Order and Entropy, Moorcock's support of lesser known writers, The Holy Grail, Elric of Melniboné, Anti-Racism, Moorcock as Victorian Novelist, New Worlds, Feminism, Moorcock the editor, Anarchism, Myth-making, "Fiction" and "Autobiography", Psychogeography/ The London of the Mind, Moorcock’s trans-Atlantic, Political Activism, The avant-garde, Early Moorcock versus Late Moorcock, Friends on the Fringes, The 'Between the Wars' Quartet, Counter culture/ Counter literatures, Liberty and Freedom of Speech, Moorcock as Mentor, Moorcock as Student, The Reforgotten Writers, Character and Caricature in Moorcock.
WOW! What a potentially fascinating conference. I cannot think of a more deserving writer. Wonder how I can scrape together the pennies for the flight? (Thanks to Chris Nakashima-Brown.)
.......the Multiverse isn't a globe. Time isn't cyclic. There is no real linearity. The Multiverse is a tree root and branch, a living organism. A creature. Like me. Forever adapting and changing. Like us, made up of spheres, but it's not itself spherical. We've evolved beyond the merely spheroid, I hope...... — Jack Karaquazian, Michael Moorcock's Multiverse ("Moonbeams and Roses") #10, p.2, Aug. 98
Planet Stories, produced by Paizo Publishing, offers reprints of mostly classic pulp era science fiction and fantasy adventure stories from Robert E. Howard, C. L. Moore, Leigh Brackett, Henry Kuttner, and Otis Adelbert Kline. Michael Moorcock (his three part Kane of Old Mars series), three books by Dungeons & Dragons co-creator Gary Gygax, and an anthology of stories by "today's best (and best-selling) fantasists [who] got their start writing shared-world fiction supporting roleplaying games" represent the modern era contingent of the line's first fourteen publications. The volumes include introductions by Joe R. Lansdale, Michael Moorcock, Suzy McKee Charnas, C. J. Cherryh, Samuel Delaney, Ben Bova, Roy Thomas, Ed Greenwood, Erik Moha, and Kim Mohan.
Six of the titles are currently available with the remaining nine being released roughly one a month throughout '08.
As much as I love this idea, I have to wonder how well they are selling or are expected to sell. The books are handsomely packaged and affordable, which will certainly stack the deck more in their favor. I certainly hope they do well. There is a lot of quality pulp stuff that has seemingly been surrendered to obscurity.
We will select three names from that batch, and then you will have the classic heroic fantasy delivered right to your house. You don't even have to talk to another human. (Elric would prefer it that way.)
This collection reprints the ORIGINAL Elric stories as they first appeared (sans later edits and modifications) in the order in which they were published. The book also offers several interesting Elric tidbits such as magazine covers to some of the first appearances, an early map of Melnibone, the first lengthy review of Stormbringer, and a bunch more.
As if that weren't enough, the collection is lavishly illustrated by World Fantasy Award winning artist John Picacio (cover artist to Geek Confidential. Perhaps not his best known work, but I had to get a plug in somewhere).
If you'd rather not take your chances at RevolutionSF, Moorcock and Picacio will be signing Elric: Stealer of Souls at Austin Books (in Austin, TX *natch*) on Saturday, February 23, 4-7 PM.
