The Hidden Masters of Pulp Fantasy

One of the regular series for which this blog was once known is Pulp Fantasy Library, in which I highlighted individual fantasy and science fiction stories I felt had been influential, directly or indirectly, on the development of the hobby of roleplaying. The series eventually grew to more than three hundred entries and taught me a great deal in the process of writing it. However, it also required considerable effort and often received little reader engagement, so I brought it to a quiet close in 2023. I sometimes consider reviving it in a modified form, but I’ve yet to find the right approach. Still, I keep thinking about these early works of fantasy, which is what led to this post.

From the vantage point of the first quarter (!) of the twenty-first century, it’s all too easy to forget just how strange fantasy and science fiction once were – not merely in their imaginative content but in the intellectual and spiritual traditions from which they drew. We tend to think of early speculative fiction as arising primarily from a matrix of adventure tales, scientific romances, and classical mythology. However, another powerful and often overlooked influence is the world of Spiritualism, Theosophy, and other esoteric traditions. These weren’t mere fads in the late 19th and early 20th centuries; they were serious systems of belief for many, including a surprising number of the authors who helped lay the foundations of what we now call genre fiction.

Even more fascinating is how many once-occult concepts have since become commonplaces of fantasy and science fiction, like astral projection, past lives, lost advanced civilizations, invisible planes of existence, and cosmic cycles of spiritual evolution, to name just a few obvious ones. These weren’t originally the products of scientific or rationalist speculation. They were occult doctrines, often articulated with the structure and certainty of any other religion. Early speculative fiction served as a powerful conduit for these ideas, transmitting them into the cultural imagination.

Take, for instance, astral projection, which recurs throughout pulp fantasy and science fiction. In Theosophy, this is the “etheric body” or “etheric double” leaving the physical body to traverse the astral plane. In fiction, this idea becomes John Carter’s unexplained voyage to Barsoom in A Princess of Mars, where his body remains behind on Earth while his spirit is transported to another world by sheer force of will. Burroughs never offers a scientific explanation for the phenomenon nor did he need to do so. His readers would likely have recognized the trope from already extant popular occult literature.

Similarly, reincarnation and karma, central tenets of Theosophy and many forms of Eastern-influenced Spiritualism, appear in the works of authors like Talbot Mundy, whose protagonists sometimes recall past lives in ancient empires. The same is true of many tales penned by Abraham Merritt. In The Star Rover, Jack London tells the story of a prisoner who escapes his unjust physical confinement by entering trance states that allow him to access a series of former incarnations. This isn’t merely a fictional conceit; it reflects a specific metaphysical worldview in which human identity unfolds across many lifetimes, a view that gained traction during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Even readers who didn’t share this worldview would nevertheless have been familiar with it.

William Hope Hodgson is another fascinating case. He blends arcane science with mystical speculation in his "Carnacki the Ghost-Finder" stories, which feature protective sigils, vibrational zones, and references to the "Outer Circle," a realm inhabited by malevolent entities existing just beyond human perception. All of these ideas draw heavily on contemporary occultism. His novel The Night Land, a work of science fantasy more than horror, is set on a dying Earth haunted by monstrous spiritual forces and saturated with the oppressive weight of cosmic time. It echoes Theosophical doctrines of vast evolutionary cycles and the occult preoccupation with psychic resistance to spiritual evil.

Marie Corelli (born Mary Mackay), once one of the most popular authors in the English-speaking world, is now rarely read. Her novel, A Romance of Two Worlds, for example, blends Spiritualist belief with melodrama and science fictional concepts, such as portraying electricity as a bridge between the material and spiritual realms. She directly influenced writers like H. Rider Haggard and even Arthur Machen, both of whom in turn shaped the subsequent development of fantasy. Even Edward Bulwer-Lytton, now best known for the infamous incipit “It was a dark and stormy night,” was a serious student of esoteric lore. His novel Zanoni depicts an immortal Chaldean adept who achieves transcendence through secret knowledge, an early example of the “hidden masters” who would later become a staple of Theosophy.

Which, of course, brings us to Theosophy itself, which had perhaps the most lasting and far-reaching impact on the development of both esoteric thought and fantasy. Founded in the 1870s by the Russian-born mystic, Helena Blavatsky, Theosophy combined elements of Hinduism, Buddhism, Neoplatonism, and esoteric Christianity into a vast occult cosmology. Through books, journals, and lectures, it promoted a view of the universe in which mankind was but one phase in an immense spiritual drama, involving lost continents, ascended masters, and ancient wisdom. These ideas found fertile ground in genre fiction. The controversial “Shaver Mystery” stories published in Amazing Stories in the mid to late 1940s and purportedly based on true events involve ancient subterranean races like the evil Deros (which itself served as an inspiration to Gary Gygax). Shaver's stories read like Theosophy blended with pulp sensationalism.

Even Clark Ashton Smith, whom regular readers will know is my favorite of the Weird Tales trio, drew on esoteric themes. Ideas like cyclical time, forgotten civilizations, and arcane knowledge recur throughout his work. His Zothique cycle, set on the last continent of a dying Earth, reflects the Theosophical notion of a future “seventh root race” and the eventual exhaustion of history.

Against this background, H.P. Lovecraft stands out, not because he rejected religion in general (though he did), but because he specifically targeted Spiritualism and occultism. He was deeply familiar with the claims of mediums, astrologers, and Theosophists and dismissed them with open contempt. In his correspondence, he regularly mocks the “credulous” who place faith in séances, reincarnation, and similar beliefs. At the behest of Harry Houdini, Lovecraft even collaborated on a book titled The Cancer of Superstition, intended as a wholesale debunking of Spiritualist claims. The book was never completed due to Houdini’s sudden death in 1926.

Despite this, Lovecraft’s stories are filled with forbidden books, lost knowledge, and ancient alien races whose truths are too terrible for the human mind to bear. In this way, Lovecraft doesn’t discard the tropes of occult literature – he inverts them. Where Theosophy promised spiritual enlightenment and cosmic unity, Lovecraft offers only madness, degeneration, and a universe that is not merely indifferent but actively hostile to notions of human significance. His “gods” are not hidden masters but incomprehensible and uncaring forces. Structurally, however, he preserves much of the occult worldview: a hidden reality lurks behind the surface of things, accessible only to initiates – scholars, madmen, and cultists. Lovecraft didn’t reject that structure; he twisted it and filled it with dread.

All of this makes it remarkable just how thoroughly modern fantasy and science fiction still bear the imprint of these early occult influences. Astral travel, alternate planes, soul transference, hidden masters, and cosmic cycles remain staples of the genres. They’re treated today as neutral, even secular, tropes of worldbuilding, even though their origins are anything but secular. They are spiritual, mystical, and often explicitly religious in intent.

My purpose in this post isn't to diminish these genres or to reduce their works to a list of influences. Nor am I offering an invitation to embrace the esoteric as literal truth. Instead, I'm reminding everyone of just how permeable the boundary between belief and imagination has always been and how fantasy, in particular, has long served as a vessel for metaphysical speculation, even when dressed in the garb of swords and sorcery or rocket ships and ray guns. Perhaps this is one of the reasons these genres endure: they don’t merely entertain; they echo the ancient human desire to find meaning in a world that so often seems devoid of it.

sha-Arthan Appendix N (Part I)

Last week, I pointed out a "problem" with Gary Gygax's Appendix N, namely, it's just a list without any explanatory apparatus, unlike its counterpart in the original RuneQuest. As I explained in that post, this is far from a damning criticism – Appendix N remains an invaluable guide to excellent fantasy and science fiction stories – but it does limit its utility in trying to understand Gygax's own thought processes as he created both D&D and AD&D. 

That's why I decided I'd do things differently in Secrets of sha-Arthan. Rather than simply include a lengthy list of all the books (and games) that had had even the tiniest influence over my own work on SoS, I'd instead present a smaller, more focused list, along with commentary on precisely what I'd taken from each source. The goal is not merely to honor my inspirations, but also to aid anyone who picks up the game in understanding where I'm coming from. 

The list, like the game itself, is still in a state of low-level flux. I've purposefully narrowed the list to just four authors, each of which wrote a series of multiple stories within those series. By keeping the list focused on those whose influence is strongest and most clear, I hope that I'll do a better job than Gygax of "showing my cards," creatively speaking. Obviously, other authors and books have inspired me, too, but their inspiration has been more limited. Rather than muddy the waters, I've stuck only with whose influence is most clear.

Burroughs, Edgar Rice: The influence of Edgar Rice Burroughs over the subsequent history of fantasy cannot be underestimated. His Barsoom novels in particular have played a huge role in establishing the broad outlines of that genre and the stories and characters that inhabit it. Everything from building a unique setting, with its own history and geography to populating it with all manner of exotic cultures and beasts to even presenting an alien vocabulary, it's all there in A Princess of Mars, a book not much read today but that I have come to love more the older I get.

In creating sha-Arthan, I often looked to Barsoom and Amtor for inspiration, particularly in my conception of the creatures that dwell upon it. Furthermore, the Ironian language is intended to be reminiscent of the Martian tongue as invented by Burroughs. I also imagine adventures in the True World to be swashbuckling affairs, filled with perilous danger, narrow escapes, and feats of derring-do, just like the delightful novels of ERB.

Smith, Clark Ashton: Of all the writers whose work graced the pages of Weird Tales during the Golden Age of the Pulps, Clark Ashton Smith remains my favorite by far. His examination of the dangers of egotism and the ever-present risk of divine punishment combine with his black humor and imaginative dreamscapes to produce some of the most inventive – and often terrifying – fiction of the first half of the 20th century. Though I am fond of all his story cycles, it's those set in Zothique, Earth's last continent untold eons in the future, that I find most compelling.

There's more than a little of Zothique in sha-Arthan. Its ancient history, selfish sorcerers, and otherworldly daimons are all directly inspired by CAS. Smith's baroque and archaic vocabulary have likewise influenced the nomenclature and general tone of my writing about the setting. Though sha-Arthan is not as dark (or darkly humorous) as Zothique, it does possess some of the latter's world-weariness,

Tierney, Richard L.: Secrets of sha-Arthan takes a lot of inspiration from the late Hellenistic and early Roman eras. That's a period of history that's always fascinated me, so that's no surprise. It's also the time period covered by the Simon of Gitta historical fantasies of Richard L. Tierney, some of whose stories I've discussed in the past.   

Tierney's stories deftly combine real world history and beliefs, particularly those relating to Gnosticism, with an unusual interpretation of H.P. Lovecraft's Cthulhu Mythos and swashbuckling adventure. This combination of elements is both unique and appealing to someone of my interests, which is why I consider the Simon of Gitta tales to be among the most important influences on my development of sha-Arthan as a RPG setting. 

Vance, Jack: Rounding out this quartet of inspirational authors is Jack Vance, creator of The Dying Earth and its sequels, all of which have, to varying degrees, influenced sha-Arthan, though the original 1950 fix-up novel remains the most important. Like Smith's Zothique stories, I've looked to Vance for ideas about ancient, forgotten history, venal wizards, and cruel, otherworldly beings. However, the single most significant idea I've taken from Vance is that of secret science fiction, which is to say, an ostensibly fantasy setting that is, beneath the surface, based on scientific (or pseudo-scientific) principles. That's a big part of sha-Arthan and its eponymous secrets. 

In Part II, I'll talk about the other roleplaying games that have influenced the development of Secrets of sha-Arthan. For obvious historical reasons, this is something Gygax could never have done. However, I've played enough RPGs over the years that there's no question they've had as much of an impact on my thoughts about sha-Arthan as has fantasy literature. Revealing just what I've taken from them is, I think, every bit as important as revealing my literary inspirations.

Pulp Fantasy Gallery: A Princess of Mars

Since the real world continues to be demanding of late – my apologies for the lighter than normal posting –  I've decided to present another entry in the Pulp Fantasy Gallery series. This week, I've opted to go back more than a century, to one of the foundational works of fantasy and science fiction (not to mention roleplaying games), Edgar Rice Burroughs's A Princess of Mars. Long-time readers may recall that I had previously included this book in an early installment of Pulp Fantasy Gallery. In that post, I only highlighted an image of perhaps the most famous – and, in my opinion, best – cover illustration, that by Frank E. Schoonover. 

I'm apparently not alone in my appreciation for this cover, because it was used again and again throughout the ensuing decades. Indeed, it seems to have been the only cover illustration for US editions of A Princess of Mars until the early 1960s, nearly a half-century after its initial appearance. The first new cover illustration of which I am aware is this one by Roy Carnon, from the 1961 Four Square Books paperback edition:

A couple of years later, in January 1963, Ballantine releases this version, with a cover by Bob Abbett. I find it especially interesting, because it looks as if it takes many of its cues from the original Schoonover cover, albeit with the color schemes of John Carter and Dejah Thoris reversed.

In 1968, there's an abridged version of A Princess of Mars from Dragon, a publisher who specialized in children's versions of "classic" stories. The cover artist would seem to be unknown.

Bruce Pennington provides the very striking cover for the 1969 New English Library edition, which is the first not to depict John Carter.

The 1970 Nelson Doubleday/Science Fiction Book Club edition is understandably famous for its use of Frank Frazetta's iconic cover, my second favorite after Schoonover's original.

When Ballantine issued a new edition in 1973, it featured this cover by Gino D'Achille:

Finally, in 1979, we get the Del Rey edition with Michael Whelan's cover. Because this is the first edition of the novel I ever owned, I retain a certain fondness for it. Apparently, publishers feel similarly, because, like the Schoonover cover before, it's been used again and again since its initial appearance, with editions as recent as just a few years ago still making use of it.

Pulp Fantasy Library: The Outlaws of Mars

Otis Adelbert Kline, despite having a very memorable name, is one of those authors of the Golden Age of the Pulps that almost no one remembers today. To some extent, that's understandable, since his most successful stories are often erroneously described as being little more than rip-offs of the works of Edgar Rice Burroughs. The most well regarded of these – the two novels set on Mars – probably also suffer from not sharing a protagonist, unlike, say, the tales of John Carter to which they are unfavorably compared (or, for that matter, Kline's own Venus stories, all three of which feature the character of Robert Grandon). 

I've previously written about the first of Kline's Martian novels, The Swordsman of Mars, and declared it better than its sequel, The Outlaws of Mars. Having just re-read the latter in preparation for today's post, I now wonder if my earlier judgment might have been mistaken. While both novels are breezily written and full of heroic exploits, Outlaw is notable in that its lead character, Jerry Morgan, is notably more fallible (and, therefore, more relatable) than Swordsman's Harry Thorne. Indeed, the initial action of Outlaws rests heavily upon the negative consequences of Morgan's leaping before he looked, as we shall see.

Like its predecessor, The Outlaws of Mars was originally serialized before being collected together under a single cover decades later. Also like its predecessor, the serial appeared in the pages of Argosy Weekly, starting with the November 25, 1933 issue and running for the next six issues. Though Kline was an assistant editor at Weird Tales (and had been since its premiere in 1922), none of his longer serials appeared in the Unique Magazine. I would imagine this was to avoid any appearance of favoritism, though several of his yarns did appear in WT's sister periodical, Oriental Stories.

The novel begins as Jerry Morgan, described as "a tall, broad-shouldered young man with steel-gray eyes and sandy hair," steps off a train at "the diminutive Pineville station." Morgan is in Pineville to visit his uncle (and former guardian), Dr. Richard Morgan, whom readers may remember as the eccentric scientist who enabled Harry Thorne to travel to the Red Planet in The Swordsman of Mars. Jerry believes his visit will be a surprise, but his uncle seems to be expecting him.

Jerry stared in amazement as he took his uncle's proffered hand. "Expecting me? Why, I told no one, and fully intended to surprise you. It sounds like thought-transference, or something."

"Perhaps you are nearer the truth than you imagine," replied the doctor, seating himself.

Setting aside his uncle's cryptic remark, Jerry admits that "I've disgraced the family – dragged the name of Morgan in the dirt." Again, Dr. Morgan claims to know this already and again Jerry boggles at this. Morgan then proceeds to prove that he knows why his nephew has come by recounting, in precise detail, the unfortunate circumstances that led him to his doorstep. The long and short of it is that Jerry had been framed by a romantic rival so as to not only lose the affections of his fiancée but also to be cashiered from the army regiment in which he had served proudly up to now. 

Needless to say, Jerry is astounded by how much his uncle knows.

"You have said, half in jest, that I appear to read your mind. Without realizing it, you have hit upon the truth. I do and have always read your mind, since the death of your parents placed you under my guardianship. I have never needed your letters or telegrams to inform me of your doings, because since the day when I first established telepathic rapport with you, I have been able at all times to tap the contents of your subliminal consciousness, which contains a record of all you have thought and done."

Rather than dwell on the uncomfortable – to modern readers anyway – implications of this secret telepathic rapport, Dr. Morgan instead reveals that he has recently, thanks to his telepathic contact with "the people of Olba, a nation on the planet Venus," constructed a spaceship that will enable humans to travel to Mars "in the flesh," in contrast to the more mystical means employed in the previous novel, The Swordsman of Mars. While he would like to go to Mars himself, the urgency of his other work has prevented this. Naturally, Jerry offers to go in his stead, to which his uncle readily agrees.

Though Jerry's primary purpose in traveling to Mars is as "a valuable scientific experiment" that will "increase the sum total of terrestrial knowledge," it has the added benefit of giving him "new scenes, new adventures, and forgetfulness – these and a chance to begin life over again." This theme of "starting over," being given the chance to leave behind a shattered past, is a common one in sword-and-planet stories, starting with A Princess of Mars. I suspect it plays a big part in the lasting appeal of the genre and may have held particular resonance with readers during the depths of the Great Depression.

Jerry's transit to Mars is far less interesting than what happens upon his arrival. He finds himself not far from a Martian city, whose inhabitants "did not show any marked difference from terrestrial peoples" beyond "their strange apparel and the fact that their chests were, on average, larger than those of Earth-men," this latter feature being a consequence of the thinner atmosphere of the Red Planet. Jerry observes that many of the city's buildings feature roof gardens. In one of these gardens, he sees an extremely beautiful woman – of course! – with "an ethereal beauty of face and form such as he had never seen on Earth, or even dreamed existed." 

I could not blame anyone for assuming at this point that the criticisms of Kline as a mere Burroughs imitator are correct. Thus far, The Outlaws of Mars is little different from the sword-and-planet material cranked out by the ream after the publication of A Princess of Mars and its sequels. However, that assessment of the novel would, in my opinion, be mistaken. When Jerry introduces himself to the young Martian beauty, she is frightened and looks ready to flee. Confused, the Earthman looks around for an explanation and seemingly finds it in the form of a strange Martian beast leapt from behind the shrubbery of the garden with "a terrific roar" and "a yawning, tooth-filled mouth as large as that of an alligator." 

In an act of chivalry befitting John Carter himself, Jerry slays the alien creature, believing he had saved her from danger.

At the sound of the shot the girl had sprung erect. For a moment she peered down at the fallen beast. Then, her eyes flashing like those of an enraged tigress, she turned on Jerry with a volley of words that were unmistakably scornful and scathing, despite the fact that he was unable to understand them.

Suddenly her hand flashed to her belt and came up with a jewel-hilted dagger. Jerry noticed that the blade straight and double-edged, with tiny, razor-sharp teeth. For a moment, he did not realize what she intended doing. But when she raised her weapon aloft and lunged straight for his breast, he caught her wrists just in time.

We soon learn that the animal Jerry had slain was, in fact, the beloved pet of Junia Sovil, daughter of the emperor of Kalsivar, the greatest kingdom of Mars. Worse still, the slaying of the dalf (as the animal is called) is a capital crime – and the people of Kalsivar believe in swift justice. Thus, our hero has barely stepped foot on Mars and he has already made an enemy of an imperial princess and found himself condemned to death. Jerry Morgan works fast!

Naturally, Jerry does not die only a few chapters into The Outlaws of Mars and indeed soon finds himself entangled in the vicious court politics of Kalsivar, but I was nonetheless charmed by the way that Kline kicked off his adventures on Mars. Jerry's ignorance of Mars and its customs and language cause him no end of headaches early on. Likewise, his headstrong nature and gentlemanly ideals lead him astray almost as often as they aid him. It's almost as Kline were playing with and commenting upon the conventions of the sword-and-planet genre, though I have no evidence that he did so intentionally. 

Regardless, The Outlaws of Mars is a fun, fast read, filled with plenty of pulpy action and dastardly deeds. To call it a classic would be overstating its simple virtues, but virtues they are nonetheless. I was very glad to have had the opportunity to re-read this and I recommend it to anyone who enjoys sword-and-planet stories.

My Top 10 Favorite Imaginary Settings (Part I)

My recent retrospectives of both Dragonlance Adventures and Greyhawk Adventures got me thinking about my favorite settings for roleplaying games, which, in turn, got me to thinking about my favorite imaginary settings in general. Before long, I realized that I had the makings of a couple of posts in which I listed, in order, my favorite imaginary settings, along with some thoughts on how I first encountered them and why I still like them. Like all my previous lists of this sort, this one is intentionally personal. It's not intended to pass judgment on these or any other imaginary settings in any absolute sense. If your favorite isn't to be found here, that only means that you and I have different tastes, nothing. I doubt there will be many surprises here for long-time readers, except perhaps the order in which I rank the various settings I've chosen. 

10. Middle-earth

Growing up in the 1970s, J.R.R. Tolkien's Middle-earth was probably the most well-known example of literary fantasy in popular culture. The Rankin-Bass cartoon of The Hobbit was released in 1977, with Ralph Bakshi's The Lord of the Rings coming out the following year. This is also the decade of the Brothers Hildebrandt Tolkien calendars and the Ballantine paperbacks with covers featuring Tolkien's own artwork. Consequently, it would have been nigh impossible for me not to have been pulled into the orbit of one of greatest fantasy settings of all time. 

Tolkien invested Middle-earth with a richness of detail that has, I think, become a model for every creator who's followed in his wake, even those who explicitly reject his particular take on fantasy. I know that's true in my own case, which is why I include the setting in this list. However, my fondness for Middle-earth is a distant and somewhat cold one – respect might be a better word to describe it. There's much I admire about Tolkien's creation, but very little I've directly emulated in my own (admittedly paltry) efforts, hence why I rank it lower than every other setting I'll discuss.

9. Barsoom

Mars, as envisioned by Edgar Rice Burroughs, is one of the oldest science fiction – or fantasy; take your pick – settings of lasting significance, inspiring innumerable writers (and scientists) to consider what life might be like on planets other than our own. I can't quite recall when I was first exposed to Barsoom, but it's been a setting I've loved for almost as long as I can remember. In my younger days, I simply thrilled to the exploits of John Carter, as he struggled mightily against a wide variety of nefarious antagonists, none of whom possessed an ounce of his courage or honor. Nowadays, I'm much more interested in Burroughs's worldbuilding, which is surprisingly rich and deep.

Barsoom is a great example of an adventuresome setting, by which I mean one where almost every detail exists to provide fodder for tales of derring-do. That undoubtedly limits the scope of Barsoom somewhat, but I can't say that bothers me much. Sometimes, all you want out of an imaginary setting is a fun environment for exciting stories and Barsoom provides that in spades. Considering the importance of the Red Planet to the creation of the hobby, I'm not the only person who thinks so.

8. The Known Worlds of Fading Suns

This is the first (but not the last) roleplaying game setting to appear on this list and with good reason. Since its appearance in 1996, I've enjoyed the 51st century of this "futuristic passion play," both as a referee and as a writer. Much like Barsoom, the Known Worlds are an adventuresome setting, perhaps even more explicitly so, since it was created for use in roleplaying game campaigns. This means that (also like Barsoom), the setting doesn't stand up to close scientific scrutiny, despite the fact that it's supposed to take place thousands of years from now in our world. It's closer to a fantasy setting in many ways and I have found that most objections to one or another aspect of it are best met by explaining that.

On the other hand, the Known Worlds are almost unique among futuristic settings in the pride of place they give to philosophy, religion, and spiritual matters. This is a setting, like Frank Herbert's Dune, that recognizes that mankind will bring religion with him as it travels the stars and, if anything, will only become more influential because of it. That's catnip for people like myself, who take great interest in questions of this kind, especially since the setting isn't interested in providing answers to those questions but rather occasions to ask more of them against a back of interstellar adventure.

7. The Hyborian Age

The 1970s was also the decade in which the works of Robert E. Howard managed to break into popular culture, thanks in no small part to Marvel's Conan the Barbarian comic book series. Though I of course read the comics, I was even more devoted to the short stories and novellas that I found on a spinner rack in my local library. Through them I became acquainted with the prehistoric Hyborian Age in which the Cimmerian lived. A heady mix of real world history and Howard's own flights of fancy, the Hyborian Age was simultaneously familiar and alien to me, which made it all the easier for my youthful self to fall in love with it. 

My appreciation for the setting only grew with age. I read REH's own essay about the Hyborian Age and his thoughts on its creation and immediately understood what I had only dimly grasped previously, namely, that real world history and cultures could be used to create something that nevertheless felt fresh and exciting. There is no need to create entire worlds from whole cloth, nor is there any shame in borrowing from the examples of the past. The trick is in using these raw materials imaginatively, as Howard had done, to present something that was a compelling back drop for adventure.

6. The Dying Earth

I've often said that science fiction is my natural medium. Despite that, I've spent more time roleplaying in fantasy worlds than in science fiction ones. Given that, I suppose it was inevitable that I'd fall in love with Jack Vance's Dying Earth. Set untold eons in the future, the Dying Earth is a setting in which science has become indistinguishable from magic and has changed the face of the planet – and its inhabitants – forever. In some ways, it's an ideal setting for someone with my conflicting interests and experiences, allowing me to have my cake and eat it too, so to speak. (I'm sure the fact that D&D's magic system is based on that of the setting endeared it to me as well.)

The other thing I adore about the Dying Earth is its overall feel: cynical, exhausted, and mysterious. You never know what you're going to find over the next hill or whether the traveler with an extra-broad smile you meet on the road is a friend or a foe. It's a place that keeps you guessing, sometimes until it's too late to extricate yourself from the trouble in which you've now found yourself. It's the stuff of enjoyable stories and captivating adventures.

Remembering Norman Bean

On this day in 1875, Edgar Rice Burroughs was born in Chicago, Illinois. Much like H.P. Lovecraft, whose birthday was less than two weeks ago, Burroughs is one of the oft-forgotten founders of contemporary fantasy and science fiction. His tales of John Carter of Mars, in particular, have exercised an enormous influence on subsequent portrayals not only of the Red Planet but of interplanetary adventure more generally. Carter and the abilities he possesses while on Barsoom was one of the models for the creation of Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster's Superman. And, as I never tire of telling anyone will listen, Barsoom was also a key inspiration for the creation of Dungeons & Dragons. Between Superman and D&D, there can be little question that the lasting impact of Burroughs's stories and ideas on contemporary popular culture is immense – not a bad legacy!

Many later creators have expressed their admiration for Burroughs and the debt they owed to him, starting with Ray Bradbury, himself the author of many influential stories, who once said that "Burroughs … probably changed more destinies than any other writer in American history." George Lucas claimed that "my entire world changed when I was given the Warlord of Mars at the age of 8. I got onto Edgar Rice Burroughs … and the curtain went up. . . There was the universe and stars and comets and what-not, and I was never the same afterwards.” Lucas was far from the only one to feel that way and we have the imagination of Edgar Rice Burroughs to thank for that.

Stress

When it comes to words in fictional languages, how do you feel about stress markers? Do they make a word easier to pronounce or do they make it seem more intimidating, especially if your native tongue does not make much use of them, as is the case in English? 

The words of some fictional languages, like those of Edgar Rice Burroughs's Barsoomian, include no stress markers. Others, like those of M.A.R. Barker's Tsolyáni, are riddled with them by comparison. Because I have become familiar with the pronunciation of Tsolyáni, I don't find its use of stress markers to be off-putting. However, I've heard from many people that, rather than aiding pronunciation, they contribute to the sense that Tsolyáni is difficult to pronounce, which in turn alienates people potentially interested in Tékumel.

I'm currently working on a project that includes names, words, and even occasionally whole phrases from a couple of fictional languages. I ask again: would you find the use of stress markers or other types of notations ("accent marks") helpful or simply discouraging? Do you prefer, for example, "sha-Artan" or "sha-Artán?" 

Pulp Fantasy Library: The Moon Maid

Edgar Rice Burroughs is easily one of the most successful and influential creators of fantasy and science fiction of all time. His works, from the stories of Tarzan to the adventures of John Carter, have inspired generations of writers, including Robert E. Howard, whose personal library possessed more books by ERB than any other author. Despite this, neither he nor his literary creations are especially well known nowadays. I think that's a great shame for many reasons, not least of which being that he told fun and engaging adventure stories that still hold up decades after their first publication.

A case in point is The Moon Maid, which almost no one remembers anymore, especially when compared to the Barsoom or Amtor series. Originally serialized in the pages of Argosy All-Story Weekly, starting with the May 5, 1923 issue, all of its constituent parts were eventually collected into novel form and published in 1926. The story The Moon Maid tells of its protagonist, Julian, is, in some ways, quite similar to the story of John Carter or Carson Napier: an Earthman travels to another world, faces innumerable alien threats, and wins the heart of a princess. In other ways, though, it is unique and it is that uniqueness that makes it well worth reading.

Unlike the Barsoom or Amtor stories, which are set, more or less, in "modern" times, The Moon Maid is set in the future – two futures, as it turns out – of when it was published. The first future is the year 1967, a few years after the conclusion of a decades-long Great War that began in 1914. The conclusion of that war established peace and world government, just in time for "that historic day," June 10, 1967 when 

Earth received her first message from Mars, since which the two planets have remained in constant friendly communication, carrying on a commerce of reciprocal enlightenment. In some branches of the arts and sciences the Martians, or Barsoomians, as they call themselves, were far in advance of us, while in others we had progressed more rapidly than they. Knowledge was thus freely exchanged to the advantage of both worlds. We learned of their history and customs and they of ours, though they had for ages already known much more of us than we of them. Martian news held always a prominent place in our daily papers from the first.

 As you can see, The Moon Maid takes place in the same universe as the adventures of John Carter, who still lives on the Red Planet. This information is related to the reader by an unnamed narrator who meets the story's true protagonist, the aforementioned Julian, while traveling on a transoceanic liner. Julian is "a fine looking chap, lean and bronzed" and serves as an officer of the Air Corps of the International Peace Fleet. He is also, or so he claims, an immortal being who is continually reincarnated as his own descendants, a process that also leaves him with knowledge of the future, which is to say, the second future depicted in the novel. This second future is 2024, when Earth's first interplanetary vessel is preparing to travel to Mars.

Julian then recounts to the narrator the story of this voyage, which he "remembers" even though it takes place in the future and involves his own grandson, also named Julian. The bulk of The Moon Maid consists of Julian's memories of what happened when the Earth ship, named the Barsoom in honor of its ultimate destination. Accompanying Julian aboard the Barsoom was an officer named Lieutenant Commander Orthis, whom he described as "one of the most brilliant men I have ever known, and at the same time one of the most unscrupulous, and, to me at least, the most obnoxious." Orthis is responsible for the scientific breakthrough that enables the Barsoom to travel successfully between planets, but he is noted for having "married a nice girl and abandon[ing] her," as well as being rumored to be "affiliated with a secret order that sought to overthrow the government." This, of course, is in contrast to Julian, who is courageous, upstanding, and honest, as are all Burroughs's heroes.

Shortly after the Barsoom has traveled past the Moon, Orthis comes to dinner in the messroom "noticeably under the influence of liquor." Julian, as his superior officer, sends him back to his quarters, which Orthis resents. He grows angry and rants at Julian, claiming that it was his labor and intellect who made this journey possible and he would not be upstaged by anyone. This scene allows Burroughs to talk briefly about the inefficacy of Prohibition – remember this was published in 1923, when the Eighteenth Amendment was still in force – and how it had been repealed. In any case, Orthis takes perverse revenge on Julian by destroying the Barsoom's engines, sending the vessel careening toward the Moon. 

Needless to say, the Barsoom and its crew, including Orthis, survive the crash into the Moon, where the main action of The Moon Maid takes place. I say into, not onto, because Julian and his comrades discover that the Moon is in fact hollow. Its interior is quite habitable, filled with plants and animals, and illuminated by the glow of radiocative rocks. There are also two intelligent species. The first are the savage Va-ga, cannibalistic centaur-like people, who are an early foe of Julian and his shipmates. The second are the U-ga, who look very similar to Earthmen and whose princess, Nah-ee-lah, Julian considers alluringly beautiful. As one might expect, Nah-ee-lah, as the titular Moon Maid, figures prominently; the travails of her people at the hands of a revolutionary group known as the Kalkars is the central conflict of The Moon Maid.

Reading through this, what most impressed me was not any individual element of the tale Burroughs tells but rather the way that he is able to mix and match elements from his previous stories to create something that is somehow distinctive. One might reasonably expect The Moon Maid simply to be a retelling of A Princess of Mars with elements of At the Earth's Core. That it isn't is, I think, a testament to Burroughs's storytelling ability. The "futuristic" setting, the element of reincarnation, and the French/Russian revolution plotline (with the Kalkars standing in for the Jacobins/Communists) all work together to create an action-packed escapade that doesn't read like just another chapter in the adventures of John Carter or Carson Napier. The Moon Maid is a fun story; I wish I'd read it sooner.

Elementary Particles

I can't quite recall when I first encountered the notion of the four elements. I suspect it was quite early, probably through my reading of classical mythological stories, though it's possible I learned about it from some other source. However, I vividly recall that, when I cracked open the Monster Manual for the first time in early 1980, I was almost instantly enamored of elementals. There was something powerfully, if you'll forgive the term, primal about beings composed solely of a single substance. Also, the existence of elementals and indeed the entire conception of the four elements served as a useful reminder that I wasn't in Kansas anymore. Dungeons & Dragons takes place in a pre-modern world, one not merely operating according to different laws than our own but one whose inhabitants conceive of it in a different way than we do ours.

Over the years, my interest in the elements and elementals has endured. I remember when I first read about other elemental systems, like those of the great civilizations of Asia. What particularly struck me about the latter was that many of them included a fifth element, a concept not unknown in ancient and medieval European thought but less well known in popular presentations of them. I was likewise struck by the fact that many of these non-European elemental systems included different elements, like wood or metal. As a younger person, this was eye-opening and helped me to realize that there was room for variation within the broader notion of fundamental elements.

Lately, I've been working on a science fantasy setting rooted in Burroughs, Kirby, Wolfe, Zothique, and The Dying Earth – a formerly high-tech setting brought low to the point it appears to be a weird and/or exotic fantasy world. Think Jorune or Tékumel but more immediately accessible than either. As I began to work in earnest, one of my earliest thoughts was its elemental system, which I wanted to be unique and interesting but also intelligible. The result of my cogitations is depicted in the crude image above. While I need to give it some additional thought, I'm quite pleased with the results, especially the way it interacts with the psychic powers and sorcery of the setting. If nothing else, it's different from the usual fantasy presentation of the elements and their relationships, which pleases me. 

Pulp Fantasy Library: Warrior of Llarn

For various reasons, I've been on something of a sword-and-planet kick. As a sub-genre of fantasy, it's one of my favorites, due in no small part to my encountering the Barsoom novels of Edgar Rice Burroughs at an impressionable age. Invariably such stories feature ancient, dying worlds dotted with decadent civilizations, bizarre monsters, and science so advanced that it is indistinguishable from sorcery. That's a heady mix of ingredients for exciting tales of adventure – little wonder, then, that the text of the three little brown books of Dungeons & Dragons frequently refers to Barsoom and the exploits of John Carter there.

Warrior of Llarn is Gardner F. Fox's entry into the field of sword-and-planet fiction, first published in 1964. This initial release boasts a terrific cover by none other than Frank Frazetta. This is several years prior to his moody paintings gracing the covers of the Lancer Conan paperbacks that would soon be found on spinner racks everywhere. Heresy though this probably is, I actually like this cover better than some of his Conan efforts. I think it's the red-tinted nighttime sky that does it for me, I'm not sure.

Warrior of Llarn begins portentously, as the protagonist, who later identifies himself as Alan Morgan, is awakened by "an alien voice," saying, "Come to me, man of Earth! I call! I call!" Morgan tells the reader that 

This was not the first time I had heard it, not even the hundredth. It had come to me ever since I can remember, first as a small child, then as a youth and now – as a man. It was an old friend.

Morgan ponders the mystery of this voice.

What did this voice want of me? What mission was I to go on for this being whose mind was so incredibly powerful it could bypass the barriers of the space-time continuum to find and summon me? I lay there and tried to think, to go over what part the voice played in my life, its meaning and its inexorable hold on my body and my mind.

All my life I have heard the voice.

Morgan then describes to the reader – through first-person narration, like John Carter before him – that he was the "youngest son of a prosperous Middle West lawyer" and that he had gone to the "right schools," played the "right sports," and had even spent time in a military school, where he learned to shoot and duel. He enjoyed fishing and hunting and had learned survive in the wilds on his own. Morgan suspects that the voice had been guiding him in his choices, as if preparing him for something. Furthermore, it contributed to his natural restlessness, his sense that he "belonged to another place and another time." 

While out hunting "in the Goose Island country," where his family owns a cabin, Morgan encounters a wolf that had been terrorizing the region. Though he had intended to put it down, the beast gets the drop on him and leaps at him, biting his arm. Morgan falls backward and suddenly finds himself "lay[ing] on my back under a huge, hot sun." Beneath him was sand and there was no sign of his rifle – or his clothes – though he bore a wound on his arm from where the wolf had bitten him. 

Rather than being shocked or frightened by his circumstances, Morgan quickly assumes he must be on some other world. He waits for the voice he'd since childhood to address him, but it does not. Not wasting time, he gets up and assesses his circumstances. He notices that "my body seemed to be stronger, my step lighter," which leads him to conclude that the world on which he found himself must be smaller than Earth and with a lower gravity. If this all sounds familiar, it should.

Morgan walks until his feet are sore. He notices "a mighty band of glistening matter" in the sky and concludes that this planet had rings about it, though it is clearly not Saturn. After more walking, he encounters a group of blue men "mounted on some sort of four-legged beat like a horse." The blue men have horns on their heads and a "beast-like appearance." Nearby is a "long dark altar of bright black stone" upon which rests a metal ball, no bigger than a marble that somehow he knew "was infinitely important." Through his actions, one of the blue men is slain and the others flee. With the metal ball in hand, he takes the blue man's clothing and weapons and then mounts the weird horse-like animal to explore this alien planet to which he has been brought for reasons still unknown.

Would you believe that Morgan eventually finds and rescues a local princess, Tuarra, from a larger group of blue men – Azunn, we later learn they are called – after her flier crashes in the desert? Her skin is golden rather than red and, though she is certainly lovely, she's never once described as "incomparable," but astute readers know the score. Warrior of Llarn continues like this throughout. It's a (no pun intended) naked pastiche of E.R. Burroughs's Barsoom novels, though, to his credit, Fox does throw a few wrinkles into the formula. Despite this, I liked it well enough. Its brevity (about 150 pages) is a huge point in its favor and Fox's prose is similarly brisk. Whether that's enough for anyone else I leave to readers to decide for themselves.

Pulp Fantasy Library: She

One might be tempted, when looking at the authors of Appendix N, to notice seeming gaps – writers one would have expected to have inspired Gary Gygax in his personal conception of fantasy. Clark Ashton Smith is probably the most common example of such an author, since so many people, myself included, have mistakenly assumed that the works of CAS appeared in that famed list. Another "missing" author is H. Rider Haggard, the 19th century English writer whose extremely popular adventure fiction contributed greatly to the "lost world" genre and influenced countless writers of the early 20th century, like Edgar Rice Burroughs and Abraham Merritt. 

While both Burroughs and Merritt figure prominently in Appendix N, Haggard is nowhere to be seen. I probably shouldn't be surprised. Like many authors, Haggard looms so large in the imagination of the first half of the 20th century that one sees his presumed presence everywhere. Robert E. Howard, for example, was an admirer of Haggard, and took up his theme of civilizational devolution with gusto. Thus, it's quite possible Gygax never read Haggard (or didn't think him significant enough to mention) and only came into contact with his ideas through intermediaries like Howard or Merritt. 

Among Haggard most well known and influential novels is She, first published in 1887, after being serialized between October 1886 and January 1887 in the pages of the illustrated newspaper, The Graphic. Like so many adventure novels of the time – and those later inspired by it, such as A Princess of Mars, among innumerable others – She is presented as a first-person account that has been edited by a third party for publication. The first-person account is that of Ludwig Horace Holly, a young professor at the University of Cambridge. Early in the novel, he describes himself as follows:

Most men of twenty-two are endowed at any rate with some share of the comeliness of youth, but to me even this was denied. Short, thick-set, and deep-chested almost to deformity, with long sinewy arms, heavy features, deep-set grey eyes, a low brow half overgrown with a mop of thick black hair, like a deserted clearing on which the forest had once more begun to encroach; such was my appearance nearly a quarter of a century ago, and such, with some modification, it is to this day. Like Cain, I was branded—branded by Nature with the stamp of abnormal ugliness, as I was gifted by Nature with iron and abnormal strength and considerable intellectual powers. So ugly was I that the spruce young men of my College, though they were proud enough of my feats of endurance and physical prowess, did not even care to be seen walking with me. Was it wonderful that I was misanthropic and sullen? Was it wonderful that I brooded and worked alone, and had no friends—at least, only one? I was set apart by Nature to live alone, and draw comfort from her breast, and hers only. Women hated the sight of me. 

The full passage goes at some length about Holly's ugliness, isolation, and misanthropy, which sets him apart not just from his fellow man but also from the caricatured expectations of fictional Victorian adventure novel protagonists. Far from being an ideal human specimen, he is, in his own words, a monster. 

One day, a colleague by the name of Vincey calls on Holly. Unlike Holly, Vincey is a very handsome man, but he is also dying and asks Holly to become the legal guardian of his five year-old son, Leo. Vincey has "never been able to bear to look upon," as his birth had cost him that of his wife. Vincey explains that he chosen Holly for this role because, after observing him for two years, has concluded that Holly is "hard and sound at core." He then explains that Leo is the

only representative of one of the most ancient families in the world, that is, so far as families can be traced. You will laugh at me when I say it, but one day it will be proved to you beyond a doubt, that my sixty-fifth or sixty-sixth lineal ancestor was an Egyptian priest of Isis, though he was himself of Grecian extraction, and was called Kallikrates. His father was one of the Greek mercenaries raised by Hak-Hor, a Mendesian Pharaoh of the twenty-ninth dynasty, and his grandfather or great-grandfather, I believe, was that very Kallikrates mentioned by Herodotus.

Holly accepts the task and is given a locked iron box that he is told not to open until Leo has reached the age of 25. Vincey also asks that Holly not send the boy to school but to instruct him at home. A day later, Vncey is found dead and Holly takes Leo into his home. For the next twenty years, Holly raises him and the two develop a fondness for one another akin to uncle and nephew. Leo grows into a handsome man looking like "a statue of the youthful Apollo." 

Upon his twenty-fifth birthday, Holly opens the box for Leo and finds inside a note from Vincey to his son, explaining more about his ancestry and his travels in the Middle East and Africa seeking "the Pillar of Life," a source of immortality. Also included is a series of ancient inscriptions that, when translated, tell the story of a sorceress in Africa who has discovered the Pillar and, thanks to it, has ruled in secret for millennia. Enraptured by what he has read, Leo vows to follow in his father's footsteps, asking Holly and Holly's servant, Job, to join him. Albeit reluctantly, Holly and Job agree to join him and they set off for Africa. 

Needless to say, their adventures are fraught with peril, starting with a shipwreck on the coast of east Africa. The trio survive, along with the Arab who captained their ill-fated vessel, and make their way on foot into the interior of the continent. There, they are captured by people called the Amhagger. whose ruler is a fearsome queen known simply as "She-who-must-be-obeyed." Perhaps unsurprisingly, in a novel filled with coincidence and happenstance, the queen turns out to be the legendary sorceress they were seeking – Ayesha, the titular She and perhaps the most fascinating character in the entire novel.

She is an immense, rambling work, but it benefits enormously from Haggard's energetic prose. The story it tells is preposterous on the face of it, but Haggard tells it with such straight-faced gusto that, like the best tall tales, it nevertheless has a ring of truth to it. More than that, it's one of the fountainheads from which so many later pulp fantasy stories flow. Familiarizing oneself with it and Haggard's other works is important, I think, for anyone who wants to understand the origins of the genre that gave birth to Dungeons & Dragons and roleplaying games more broadly. She's influence, though unacknowledged, remains powerful more than a century later.

John Carter in Comics (Part III)

In the mid-60s, Gold Key reprinted the Dell Barsoom Comics of the previous decade. John Carter's next appearance after that was in February 1972, as a back up feature in DC's Tarzan of the Apes issue #207.

The feature is an adaptation of A Princess of Mars and appears over the course of three issues, starting with this one. Plotted by Marv Wolfman and scripted by Joe Kubert, it's penciled and inked by Murphy Anderson in issues #207 and #209 (with Gray Morrow handling #208). 

This particular adaptation is notable for its rather weird interpretation of the Tharks, as seen on this page:

I'd love to know what they were thinking by giving the Green Martians double torsos like this. I find it incredibly off-putting, not to mention having no basis in the text of Burroughs. Interestingly, issue #208, whose artwork is done by a different penciler depicts the Tharks in a more traditional fashion. However, the double-torsoed Tharks return in issue #209, when Anderson resumes his penciling duties. He's also the first artist responsible for drawing DC's interpretation of the incomparable Dejah Thoris.

After these three issues, the adaptation continues in September 1972 in a new comic, Weird Worlds, before concluding in its seventh issue in October 1973. As adaptations go, it's noteworthy only for the fact that, since it was published in the 1970s, the attire of Carter and the Martians is closer to that described by Burroughs in his original stories, something that would have been less likely in earlier decades. Otherwise, I find it merely adequate, despite the involvement of several comics legends.

Pulp Fantasy Library: The Warlord of Mars

The Barsoom tales of Edgar Rice Burroughs hold a special place in my heart and, as I hope I've demonstrated, in the heart of Gary Gygax as well. More than either Robert E. Howard or J.R.R. Tolkien, I'd argue forcefully that it was Burroughs who invented the literary genre of fantasy as we know it today. So influential were these stories that not only were their general outlines imitated by later writers but so too were their specifics, with a fantastical version of Mars, filled with bizarre lifeforms and peril in equal measure, becoming a common setting of pulp fantasies. (It's also quite likely that John Carter, with his increased strength and leaping ability was an influence on the creation of Siegel and Shuster's Superman – but that's a topic for another occasion).

Another way in which Burroughs's Barsoom stories exercised an influence on later writers is by being a continuous narrative, with each tale building upon those that came before. Over the course of three decades, Burroughs penned almost a dozen stories of Barsoom (not all of which focus on John Carter). The third of these is The Warlord of Mars, published in novel form in 1919, but having first appeared as a four-part serial in the pages of All-Story Magazine from December 1913 to March 1914. The story picks up after the events of The Gods of Mars, which ended on a cliffhanger – a literary device that Burroughs by no means invented but that he used to good effect in order to hold his audience's attention.

In The Gods of Mars, John Carter had overthrown the religion of the goddess Issus, "the false deity of Mars," after he had revealed her as "naught more than a wicked old woman." In the aftermath, the society of the First Born, who had worshiped and served Issus, was thrown into chaos and they turned first to Carter, asking him to become their new ruler. He refuses and instead suggests that his friend and ally, Xodar, become Jeddak of the First Born. More significantly, Carter's wife, Dejah Thoris, is still missing, having been captured, along with two others, and trapped within the Temple of the Sun, a rotating prison whose individual chambers can only be entered on a single day each year. 

Carter hopes that there is some alternate means of entering the prison and indeed there is. Matai Shang, Hekkador (leader) of the Holy Therns, the priesthood of the false goddess Issus, knows such a means and uses it to rescue his own daughter, Phaidor, who had wound up imprisoned, along with Dejah Thoris and Thuvia, princess of Ptarth. In this, he is aided by Thurid, a First Born whose position was undermined by Carter's actions in The Gods of Mars. When Matai Shang frees Phaidor, Thurid convinces him to take Dejah Thoris and Thuvia too, as a means of revenge against the meddlesome Earthman. They then flee to the city-state of Kaol, whose ruler remains a believer in the religion of Issus. 

If this all sounds confusing, it is – one must read the story very carefully to keep the details of its narrative straight and, even then, it's not always easy going. If I have a complaint about the Barsoom stories, it's that they can sometimes become a confused welter of names and events of which it's hard to keep track. Fortunately, Burroughs's prose is generally straightforward and that helps somewhat, but there's no denying that untangling the plot threads is no simple affair, especially three novels in. Though all the novels are short by modern standards, Burroughs packs a lot of detail into them; one cannot simply skim them and hope to comprehend its events.

All that said, The Warlord of Mars is engaging. It's filled with memorable moments of heroism and derring-do, such as Carter's disguising himself to enter Kaol unseen; the Pit of Plenty, a horrible prison to which Carter is sentenced; the discovery of the Yellow Martians; and more. Personally, I was particularly struck by the moment when the Jeddak of Kaol, Kulan Tith, renounces his faith in Issus after he realizes he has been duped by Matai Shang.

"With my own hands would I have wrung the neck of Matai Shang had I guessed what was in his foul heart. Last night my life-long faith was weakened–this morning it has been shattered; but too late, too late.

It's fun – a rambling, occasionally moving yarn of John Carter's sojourn across Barsoom on a quest to save his wife. While it definitely lack the punch of either A Princess of Mars or The Gods of Mars, The Warlord of Mars brings its own kind of pleasure, the kind anyone who's participated in a long campaign would recognize. That might not be the stuff of high literature, but it's plenty diverting and sometimes that's enough.

Lessons from Tolkien

I've always been very interested in foreign languages and writing systems. My household had a giant Random House dictionary whose inside covers had charts depicting the evolution of the Latin alphabet from its Etruscan, Greek, and Phoenician alphabet. I pored over those charts for untold hours as a kid, copying them, learning the names of the letters, and, in time, using them as the basis for creating my own alphabets (which I originally used as "codes," since I was really into espionage, too, as a kid). When I discovered Tolkien, I was probably more entranced by appendices E and F, which discussed the languages of Middle-earth than by the story of The Lord of the Rings (The Silmarillion was, in this respect, even more impressive). Then came several articles in Dragon that offered advice on the creation of languages for one's campaign setting and I disappeared down a philological rabbit hole from which I never emerged (thanks, in no small part, to learning Latin, French, and Classical Greek in school).

In my mind, creating languages – and alphabets! – are forever intertwined with the creation of a fantasy setting. That probably explains my fondness for Tékumel, which, like Middle-earth, boasts several of its own. It's also why I found this comic so funny: I was reminded of my younger self, who would have agreed with the notion that the first thing a referee must do when beginning his setting is construct an entire language from scratch. Nowadays, I'm both too lazy and too wedded to a "just in time" style of setting design to consider attempting such a thing. I'm still very fond of constructed languages, though, and respect anyone who has the determination and enthusiasm to make them for RPG use. It's a time-tested way to lend depth and texture to a setting, going back at least as far as Edgar Rice Burroughs's Barsoom novels. 

Burroughs and Tolkien; that's certainly a worthy pedigree!

The Warlord

Of all the sword-and-sorcery comics that DC Comics introduced in the 1970s, by far the most successful was The Warlord. Introduced in issue #8 of 1st Issue Special (November 1975) before getting his own title in February 1976, the Warlord appeared in 133 issues before the comic concluded in 1988. That's a respectable run for any comic, let alone a fantasy comic. 

Mike Grell created, wrote, and drew The Warlord after having worked at DC Comics for a couple of years on titles as varied as Aquaman, Batman, and Green Arrow. He would later produce a newspaper comic chronicling the adventures of Edgar Rice Burroughs's Tarzan. I find this intriguing, given how much The Warlord mines from the rich veins of one of the seminal works of pulp fantasy, At the Earth's Core. Perhaps this explains the comics' longevity compared to DC's other fantasy efforts – or perhaps I'm letting my own preferences get in the way of an objective analysis again.

Regardless, The Warlord tells the story US Air Force pilot, Travis Morgan who, while flying a covert reconnaissance mission over the Soviet Union, is attacked by missiles. He escapes but his plane is damaged and leaking fuel. To make it back to base safely, he has to plot a new course, one that takes him straight over the North Pole. His hasty course correction proves flawed and Morgan has no option to parachute, despite the inhospitable nature of the Arctic. 

Instead, of snow and ice, he lands in a jungle – as well as a larger, warmer sun in the wrong position for the time of day and a strange horizon. Confused, Morgan tries to gain a better sense of where he is and what has befallen him. What he soon sees is stranger than he had expected.

Red-blooded American soldier that he is, Morgan attempts to save the woman, only to discover that she is well in command of the situation on her own. Not long after she slays the dinosaur, Morgan and the woman are captured and taken to the city of Thera, for an audience with its king. The king's advisor is a sinister man named Deimos, who immediately recognizes Morgan as a threat to his position. Deimos starts to use a magical globe to try to kill Morgan, but he pulls out his sidearm and shatters it with his last bullet. 

The king is suitably impressed and treats Morgan as an honored guest. Needless to say, Deimos doesn't feel quite the same way, nor does the young woman, whose name we learn is Tara. 

Time passes, during which Morgan learns the local language, grows a beard, and begins to understand more of what has happened to him and where he is. 

Tara stays with Morgan and, together, they begin a series of adventures that last for more than a decade, during which time Morgan rises to a position of prominence within the world of Skartaris (as does Tara). The Warlord is enjoyable, if you're a fan of hollow earth pulp fantasies after the fashion of Burroughs. Clearly, DC's readership must have included a fair number of such fans, since, as I said above, the comic continued until 1988. I was never a regular reader, but I caught an issue here or there over the years, thanks to a friend who had an immense collection of these and other comics, and always enjoyed it. It's my understanding that, like many "lesser" DC characters, Travis Morgan has made cameos in other comics in the years since The Warlord ended. If anyone knows more about his subsequent history, I'd loved to know.