Clark Ashton Smith’s Hyperborea
Aug09

Clark Ashton Smith’s Hyperborea

Clark Ashton Smith’s Hyperborea by Bill Ward “[I]n the harbour there towered an iceberg such as no vessel had yet sighted in all its sea-faring to the north, and no legend had told of among the dim Hyperborean isles. It filled the broad haven from shore to shore, and sheered up to a height immeasurable with piled escarpments and tiered precipices; and its pinnacles hung like towers in the zenith above the house of Evagh. It was...

Read More
Words Weird and Wonderful: Clark Ashton Smith’s Hyperborea
Jun15

Words Weird and Wonderful: Clark Ashton Smith’s Hyperborea

Words Weird and Wonderful: Clark Ashton Smith’s Hyperborea by Bill Ward One of the defining characteristics of the work of Clark Ashton Smith is his rich vocabulary. From the antique to the allusive to the oddly conjugated, Smith’s polymathic mastery of the English language is a key aspect of his distinctive authorial voice. Smith’s thorough understanding of words also means that they are more than mere...

Read More
Where to Start With American Fantasy Series
May11

Where to Start With American Fantasy Series

Where to Start With American Fantasy Series by Bill Ward While J.R.R. Tolkien may be the most famous and ubiquitous of fantasy writers, introducing generations of readers the world over to fantasy fiction through The Hobbit and influencing the way such stories are forever told with his masterwork, The Lord of the Rings, American letters has perhaps contributed more profoundly to the development of the modern secondary world fantasy...

Read More
Clark Ashton Smith: The Necromantic Poet of Weird Tales
Apr30

Clark Ashton Smith: The Necromantic Poet of Weird Tales

Clark Ashton Smith: The Necromantic Poet of Weird Tales by Ryan Harvey During the halcyon days of Weird Tales in the 1920s and ‘30s, three writers became so closely linked with the magazine, and so closely linked to each other through their exchange of letters and ideas, that they’re known today as the “Weird Tales Triumvirate”: H. P. Lovecraft, Robert E. Howard, and Clark Ashton Smith. Lovecraft and Howard have achieved posthumous...

Read More
Appendix N Archaeology: The Ballantine Adult Fantasy Series
Apr18

Appendix N Archaeology: The Ballantine Adult Fantasy Series

Our Appendix N Archaeology and Adventures in Fiction series are meant to take a look at the writers and creators behind the genre(s) that helped to forge not only our favorite hobby but our lives. We invite you to explore the entirety of the series on our Adventures In Fiction home page. Appendix N Archaeology: The Ballantine Adult Fantasy Series by Michael Curtis More than a decade before Gary Gygax assembled...

Read More
Short Sorcery: Clark Ashton Smith’s “The Last Incantation”
Dec18

Short Sorcery: Clark Ashton Smith’s “The Last Incantation”

Short Sorcery: Clark Ashton Smith’s “The Last Incantation” by Bill Ward Clark Ashton Smith’s first great literary love, his calling even, was poetry. His artistic inclinations, the themes and images that fired his blood, were for the fantastical, the mythic, and the wildly imaginative.   But fever dreams of baroque lands and sinister sorcery were fast becoming passe among the literary mainstream of his time, and so...

Read More