Tag Archives: Clark Ashton Smith

Videos

Pulp Crazy – The Dark Eidolon by Clark Ashton Smith

http://pulpcrazy.com/podcast/136.mp3

In this week’s episode, in honor of Clark Ashton Smith’s birthday (January 13, 1893), I’ll be discussing “The Dark Eidolon.” It first appeared in the January 1935 issue of Weird Tales, and is probably the Zothique story that carries the most name recognition.

It tells of Namirrha, a powerful sorcerer who returns to his home city in order to exact revenge on its ruler for a boyhood transgression.

Links:

Read “The Dark Eidolon” on the Eldritch Dark: http://www.eldritchdark.com/writings/short-stories/212/the-dark-eidolon

Purchase The Dark Eidolon and Other Stores: http://www.amazon.com/Eidolon-Other-Fantasies-Penguin-Classics/dp/0143107380/

Purchase The Maze of the Enchanter:  http://www.amazon.com/Enchanter-Collected-Fantasies-Clark-Ashton/dp/1597800317/

Purchase Tales of Zothique (Necronomicon Press): http://www.amazon.com/Tales-Zothique-Clark-Ashton-Smith/dp/0940884712 | http://www.abebooks.com/servlet/SearchResults?sts=t&tn=Tales+of+Zothique

Clark Ashton Smith at Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clark_Ashton_Smith

The Eldritch Dark Website: http://www.eldritchdark.com/

The Double Shadow Podcast: http://thedoubleshadow.com/

Videos

Pulp Crazy – The Charnel God by Clark Ashton Smith

 

http://pulpcrazy.com/podcast/126.mp3

 

In this week’s episode I discuss “The Charnel God” by Clark Ashton Smith. This short story is set in Smith’s Zothique Cycle, as well as the larger Cthulhu Mythos.

“The Charnel God” deals with Phariom, a nobleman who visits the city of Zul-Bha-Sair. This is a strange city where the citizens give their dead over to their local deity, Mordiggian, to feed upon without hesitation. Phariom’s love, Elaith falls into a death-like state after suffering a seizure while in the city. She’s pronounced dead by the local physician and the priests of the Charnel God collect her body. The story follows Phariom as he attempts to rescue her from Mordiggian’s temple.

Links:

Read “The Charnel God” at the Eldritch Dark: http://www.eldritchdark.com/writings/short-stories/22/the-charnel-god

“The Charnel God” at ISFDB: http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/title.cgi?62562

The Eldritch Dark Website: http://www.eldritchdark.com/
The Double Shadow – A Clark Ashton Smith Podcast: http://thedoubleshadow.com/

Zothique on Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zothique

 

 

Videos

PulpFest 2015 – Weird Editing at “The Unique Magazine”

 

 

http://pulpcrazy.com/podcast/weirdediting.MP3

 

Don Herron, Morgan Holmes, Tom Krabacher (moderator), Will Murray, and Garyn D. Roberts discuss the editorial policies of Weird Tales, with a focus on Farnsworth Wright.
From PulpFest.com: http://www.pulpfest.com/2015/06/weird-editing-at-the-unique-magazine/

Don Herron: http://www.donherron.com/

Morgan Holmes: http://www.castaliahouse.com/?s=Morgan&ssubmit=Submit

Tom Krabacher: http://www.csus.edu/geog/Geog-Faculty/TomKrabacher.html

Will Murray: http://www.adventuresinbronze.com/

Garyn D. Roberts: http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/59246.Garyn_G_Roberts
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http://facebook.com/pulpfest

http://twitter.com/pulpfest

 

Videos

PulpFest 2015 – The Call of Cthulhu and the Lovecraft Mythos

Panelists John D. Haefele, Don Herron, Rick Lai, Tom Krabacher (moderator), and Nathan Vernon Madison explore the inspirations and origins of the Cthulhu Mythos as opposed to the Lovecraft’s Mythos and the Mythos of his contemporaries, as well as the controversies and personalities involved with these ideas over the years.
From PulpFest.com: http://www.pulpfest.com/2015/07/the-call-of-cthulhu-and-the-lovecraft-mythos

John D. Haefele: http://www.amazon.com/John-D.-Haefele/e/B00J6EJRDM

Don Herron: http://www.donherron.com/

Rick Lai: http://www.amazon.com/Rick-Lai/e/B00328TOQS/

Tom Krabacher: http://www.csus.edu/geog/Geog-Faculty/TomKrabacher.html

Nathan Vernon Madison: http://argonotes.blogspot.com/
http://pulpfest.com

http://facebook.com/pulpfest

http://twitter.com/pulpfest

 

Videos

Pulp Crazy – The Ice-Demon by Clark Ashton Smith

http://pulpcrazy.com/podcast/118.mp3

In this weeks episode I’ll be discussing “The Ice-Demon” by Clark Ashton Smith. It first appeared in the April 1933 issue of Weird Tales. “The Ice-Demon” is a short story set in Smith’s Hyperborea Cycle.

Hyperborea is a lost continent located in the Arctic during the Pleistocene age. Much like Robert E. Howard’s Hyborian Age tales featuring Conan the Cimmerian, Smith’s Hyperborea is a fantasy setting.

The Ice-Demon takes place in Mhu Thulan, the icy northern region of the continent. Mhu Thulan is north of the kingdom of Iqqua, where two of the characters in The Ice-Demon are from.

Basically the story focuses on three characters, Quanga, the huntsman and two jewelers, Hoom Feethos and Eibur Tsanth both of Iqqua. It’s never said where Quanga hails from, but I would guess he was nomadic and lived off the land. He’s the main character of the story, he’s skilled in woodcraft and isn’t afraid of journeying to Mhu Thulan despite the superstitions surrounding the area. He’s also not above getting rich.

 

Links:

Read “The Ice-Demon” on the Eldritch Dark Website: http://www.eldritchdark.com/writings/short-stories/96/the-ice-demon

Read Deuce Richardson’s Essay, “The Sword-and-Sorcery Legacy of Clark Ashton Smith”: http://leogrin.com/CimmerianBlog/the-sword-and-sorcery-legacy-of-clark-ashton-smith/

“The Ice-Demon” at ISFDB: http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/title.cgi?69182

The Eldritch Dark Website: http://www.eldritchdark.com/

Clark Ashton Smith @ Wikipedia:  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clark_Ashton_Smith

Hyperborea Cycle @ Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyperborean_cycle

Robert E. Howard Forums: http://conan.com

 

Readings, Videos

The Kingdom of Shadows by Clark Ashton Smith

http://pulpcrazy.com/podcast/CAS.mp3

I am a few days late on this, but I wanted to do something in honor of Clark Ashton Smith’s birthday. CAS was born on January 13, 1893. He was a creative individual with many talents: writing, poetry, and artwork. He is also one of the Weird Tales Big Three along with H.P. Lovecraft and Robert E. Howard.

The text for this poem, as well as the background image was found on The Eldritch Dark, the premier CAS website.. When I came across “The Kingdom of Shadows” I knew I found what I was looking for.

In hindsight, a background image depicting Zothique, rather than Hyperborea may have been more appropriate, given the contents of the poem.

Links:

Eldritch Dark: http://www.eldritchdark.com/

The Double Shadow Clark Ashton Smith Podcast: http://thedoubleshadow.com/

Clark Ashton Smith @Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clark_Ashton_Smith

Clark Ashton Smith @ISFDB: http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/ea.cgi?819

Clark Ashton Smith @ Tellers of Weird Tales: http://tellersofweirdtales.blogspot.com/search?q=Clark+Ashton+Smith

The Kingdom of Shadows at Wikisource: http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/The_Kingdom_of_Shadows

Videos

Pulp Crazy – The Tale of Satampra Zeiros by Clark Ashton Smith

 

http://pulpcrazy.com/podcast/086.mp3

The supernatural theme continues this week with The Tale of Satampra Zeiros by Clark Ashton Smith. It first appeared in the November 1931 issue of Weird Tales. It’s the first published entry of Smith’s Hyperborean Cycle.

Links:

eText: http://www.eldritchdark.com/writings/short-stories/208/the-tale-of-satampra-zeiros

 

eBook: http://www.amazon.com/Ultimate-Weird-Tales-Collection-Trilogus-ebook/dp/B004JKNQ5I/

 

Audio File read by Jeffrey Gilleland@ The Eldritch Dark: http://www.eldritchdark.com/writings/spoken-word/36/the-tale-of-satampra-zeiros

 

Audio MP3(read by Jeffrey Gilleland: http://pulpcrazy.com/podcast/Tale.mp3

 

Clark Ashton Smith: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clark_Ashton_Smith

 

Hyperborea:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyperborean_cycle

 

The Double Shadow Episode: http://thedoubleshadow.com/episode-21-the-tale-of-satampra-zeiros/

 

The Eldritch Dark: http://www.eldritchdark.com/

 

The Double Shadow Podcast: http://thedoubleshadow.com/

Videos

Pulp Crazy – A Night in Malneant by Clark Ashton Smith

In this weeks episode I will be discussing A Night in Malnéant by Clark Ashton Smith. It’s a short story that was first published in June 1933, in a collection titled “The Double Shadow and Other Fantasties”, which Smith published himself. The story would later be reprinted in the September 1939 issue of Weird Tales. This is not part of any particular cycle within Smith’s body of work, it is a stand alone Weird Fantasy story. It deals with a nameless narrator who wanders into the gothic city of Malneant and spends an unusual mist shrouded night there as his past appears to catch up with him.

It’s a pretty interesting story and is wonderfully told. Thanks to the generosity of Will Hart, aka CtulhuWho1, I have included a recording of noted fantasy writer Fritz Leiber reading the story from the 3rd World Fantasy Convention on October 29, 1977 in Los Angeles, California, where Clark Ashton Smith was the theme. Will was in attendance for the reading and thanks to him it will last forever. Be sure to check out Will’s site and Flickr page for a ton of great audio and visual goodness when it comes to classic dark fantasy tales. His site is located at cthulhuwho1.com. I’ll put links to both his site and flickr page in the show notes.

 

Read A Night in Malneant eText: http://www.eldritchdark.com/writings/short-stories/155/a-night-in-maln%C3%A9ant

 

CthulhuWho1: http://cthulhuwho1.com/

 

CthulhuWho1 Flickr: https://www.flickr.com/photos/cthulhuwho1/

 

Eldritch Dark, Clark Ashton Smith Fansite: http://www.eldritchdark.com/

 

The Double Shadow, Clark Ashton Smith Podcast: http://thedoubleshadow.com/

 

Clark Ashton Smith: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clark_Ashton_Smith

 

Fritz Leiber: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fritz_Leiber

Videos

Pulp Crazy – The Black Stone by Robert E. Howard

 

In this episode I discuss The Black Stone by Robert E. Howard. This is one of Howard’s Cthulhu Mythos style tales about the investigation of a black monolith in a rural Hungarian village.

Links:

The Black Stone eText: http://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks06/0601711.txt

The Black Stone Audio Books @SFFAudio:  http://www.sffaudio.com/?p=30829

The Horror Stories of Robert E. Howard: http://tinyurl.com/nqgrxg4

Crimson Shadows the Best of Robert E. Howard: http://tinyurl.com/klf22qe

Conan Vs Tsathoggua by Rick Lai @Lovecraft E-Zine: http://lovecraftzine.com/2013/09/17/conan-versus-tsathoggua-by-rick-lai/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unaussprechlichen_Kulten

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Necronomicon

The Robert E. Howard Foundation: http://www.rehfoundation.org/

Robert E. Howard Forums: http://conan.com

Jim and Ruth Keegan’s Two Gun Blog: http://twogunblog.blogspot.com/

Cromcast: http://thecromcast.blogspot.com/

 

Videos

Pulp Crazy – the Return of the Sorcerer by Clark Ashton Smith

 

In this episode I discuss “the Return of the Sorcerer” by Clark Ashton Smith. It originally appeared in the September 1931 issue of Strange Tales of Mystery and Terror”. It features the main character, Mr. Ogden being hired to translate a copy of the Necronomicon from its original Arabic text to English.

Links:

The Return of the Sorcerer: The Best of Clark Ashton Smith Paperback: http://tinyurl.com/k4nwxsp

The Return of the Sorcerer: The Best of Clark Ashton Smith Kindle: http://tinyurl.com/mzn8sq7

The Return of the Sorcerer etext: http://www.eldritchdark.com/writings/short-stories/183/the-return-of-the-sorcerer

Suspense #3 The Return of the Sorcerer Audio Drama: http://www.prx.org/playlists/302186/floating_playlist   (Scroll Down the page and click on the episode)

Clark Ashton Smith Tribute Site: http://www.eldritchdark.com/

The Double Shadow Clark Ashton Smith Podcast: http://thedoubleshadow.com/

Clark Ashton Smith on Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clark_Ashton_Smith

Strange Tales Thread: http://vaultofevil.proboards.com/thread/75/strange-tales-mystery-terror