David Gentzel wrote: > > [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: > >Ill bet REH would have liked to read and have enjoyed many of the stories > >written in his honor. > "written in his honor"? I question that. Fan fiction, sure. Some (very > few) of the pastiches read like homages. Most read like vultures picking > a carcass.
I doubt very much REH would have liked some idiot messing with his stuff. Read what he says about editors screwing with his work when he was not informed of changes. > >I believe that Howard wrote some Cthulu stories in honor of Lovecraft. > >Should we berate him for this? I think not. > > Not at all. And I respect all pastiches written during REH's lifetime > (as all his pastiches of Lovecraft were written, and with HPL's consent). The thing is I don't consider the Mythos tales Howard wrote as pastiche. They used the background, but they were original tales with REH's imprint. A pastiche is basically "in the style of". Howard did not write in HPL's style, and that is the distinguishing point, and he created new Mythos tales. he just didn't base it on previous work by HPL. > >To show honor to a great > >writer by attempting to give people who cant get enough of the world he/she > >created more to read seems fine to me, > > I don't care about worlds. I care about great writing. I'd rather read a > great boxing story by REH than a tepid Conan pastiche by de Camp. With all of > the great writing gathering dust on library shelves, I just find it odd that > some people (not necessarily you) will buy any old garbage just because it has > CONAN(tm) printed in big letters on the cover. I thought a lot like you, when the first pastiches after the original 12 books de Camp put out started coming out. I said great! I love Conan and I'd love to read more of him. Problem is, after a few books by Jordan, Anderson, de Camp, Offutt, etc., it became blaringly obvious that these stories were not Conan in terms of Howard. No one has really come close to capturing Howard's prose style, and that is part of what makes his Conan tales so great. If you don't see the difference.........? I gave up, it wasn't worth the effort. Scotty Henderson
