1977 Sword and Sorcery stories by R Campbell, M W Wellman and A J Offutt

On my current road trip I stopped at The Book Rack in the Quad Cities and bought three paperbacks that I thought looked worthwhile.  Let's crack open one of them today, 1977's Swords Against Darkness II, edited by Andrew J. Offutt, an anthology of eight "original novelets."  Offutt pens intros to the book and to individual stories; the book intro is cheerful and enthusiastic about fantasy fiction of the Conan style, which he wants to call "heroic fantasy" and abbreviate as "hf."  I don't think "hf" caught on; I find people are much more likely to say "sword and sorcery."  

We've already read Tanith Lee's contribution to Swords Against Darkness II, "Odds Against the Gods" in a different book.  Let's check out the stories in the volume by famous British horror writer Ramsey Campbell, Weird Tales stalwart and scholar of the Old South Manly Wade Wellman, and Offutt himself.

"The Changer of Names" by Ramsey Campbell

"The Changer of Names" is one of Campbell's stories of Ryre, a mercenary swordsman.  Our friend tarbandu praised the Ryre stories in a late 2021 blogpost and suggested "The Changer of Names" was one of the best horror tales of the Me Decade, so let's check it out and see if tarbandu and I are on the same page.

Ryre lives in a world in which people have a passionate and superstitious attachment to names and reputations.

In his youth, like most men, he'd [Ryre] roamed seeking others whom fate and their parents had given his name, to challenge them to fight for it.  But now he and his name were one, secure in the deeds they'd shared; he had no need to defend it.

In this story, Ryre arrives at a depressed port town (its economy is going downhill due to competition from a newer port) and a maniac appears who claims his name is Ryre and even takes credit for some of Ryre's heroic exploits, killing a famous pirate, for example.  This loonie assaults Ryre, and is quickly slain.  Ryre learns that a "name-changer" called Lith is in this port town selling the names of heroes like Ryre himself, and Ryre goes out to deal with this Lith.  There follow good horror images and decent fight scenes, elevated by Campbell's name theme--men who steal another man's name via Lith's sorcery gain some of that man's strength, at the expense of the original of that name; similarly, if the reputation of a name is blackened with lies, the bearers of the name are weakened.

This whole name-changing business feels fresh and original, and Campbell does a good job with various metaphors (e. g., unhappy tavern patrons "seemed pinned to the benches by a lifetime of burdens") and other literary tactics, presenting striking images and effectively building a bleak and depressing atmosphere, so this is a good dark sword and sorcery story.  Thumbs up!

"The Changer of Names" has been reprinted in several anthologies like Lin Carter's The Year's Best Fantasy Stories:4 and E. L. de Marigny and Jaime Martijn's Nirwana.  The Ryre stories were collected in a book of Campbell's sword and sorcery (or as perhaps you have taken to calling it, hf) tales called Far Away and Never that was first published by Necronomicon Press in 1996; DMR Books reissued Far Away and Never in a expanded form in 2021--it was this recent edition tarbandu reviewed at the link above.

"The Dweller in the Temple" by Manly Wade Wellman

"The Dweller in the Temple" is one of Wellman's tales of Kardios, a man whose name sounds like that of a superhero heart surgeon but who is in fact a swordsman and musician and probably the sole survivor of the sinking of Atlantis.  The story has been reprinted in one of those Isaac Asimov, Martin H. Greenberg and Charles Waugh anthologies, the one in question called Atlantis, and in a 2019 DMR Books anthology, Heroes of Atlantis and Lemuria that reprints four Kardios tales, as well as stories by one of our faves Leigh Brackett and a guy I know nothing about, Frederic Arnold Kummer, Jr.

For his story, Ramsey Campbell developed a grim and oppressive sort of atmosphere, but Wellman's tale is light-hearted, jocular and jovial.  Wellman's most famous character is probably John the Balladeer, a guy who wanders about the 20th century American South playing a guitar, and like John, Kardios is an enthusiastic singer and "The Dweller in the Temple" is full of Kardios's sunny and optimistic lyrics.  There are little anachronistic jokes, like a reference to the Shakespearean saw about brevity being the soul of wit--the brevity under consideration being that of the attire of harem girls.

Kardios arrives at a city where they have a curious custom--they choose their king from among strangers who happen by, and Kardios is duly crowned and given a feast and access to a harem of gorgeous girls.  Instead of sporting with the harem girls, Kardios charms and has sex with--and even composes and performs love songs about!--a servant girl.  She reveals the thing we all have been expecting, that the town chooses its king from among strangers because it must regularly appease the local monster god by feeding a king to it.  Kardios slays the god with his sword and installs the servant girl on the throne and then leaves.       

A pleasant sort of diversion that lacks chills and thrills but is entertaining none the less.

"Last Quest" by Andrew J. Offutt

In his introduction to his own story, editor Offutt describes his life and career in a sort of self-deprecating woe-is-me imposter-syndrome tone.  He also tells us that he worked harder on "Last Quest" than any of his previous productions; unfortunately, his industry seems not to have been rewarded, as this story is pretty lame.  The style is bad, with odd word choices and many characters having irritating accents and pseudo-medieval vocabulary.  The pacing and structure are bad, with long expository digressions about the past exploits of the many characters, who all have needlessly complicated relationships.  It is as if Offutt outlined a large cast of characters, each with complexly interwoven life histories, for an epic novel of three or four hundred pages, and then, for whatever reason, crammed them all into this story, which is less than 35 pages long, so way too much of the text is just background stuff.  As for the actual action scenes, they feel slow because Offutt overexplains and overdescribes instead of conveying excitement or tension.  

As for plot and theme, the plot is pretty conventional, and the pervasive motif (not surprising when we recall that much of Offutt's career output consists of pornography) is difficult or coercive sexual relationships, often with the woman being the villain (women in the story suffer as well as men, and there are brave women as well as brave men, but it would be easy to argue that this story is essentially misogynistic.)  Offutt's ostensible theme is how Love and Chance rule our lives, driving us hither and yon to unescapable fates; in particular, love will lead you to a terrible doom.  Offutt's chosen plot and themes could certainly serve as the basis of a successful story, but in his execution he fails to make them entertaining or interesting.

Twenty or so years ago the Emperor married the daughter of a wizard--this woman dominates him and is the real power in the Empire.  The wizard has just kidnapped his granddaughter, Shariya, and taken the girl to his keep in a hideous swamp inhabited by monsters.  The Emperor and Empress want their daughter Shariya back, as does Shariya's fiancé, an adventurer named Haj.  Haj, it seems, has rescued Shariya from various perils in the past, including an attempted rape by some king.  The Empress, who in the past tried to seduce Haj, gives Haj a whistle with which to enlist the aid of monsters and half-humans, and Haj and his friends go off to rescue Shariya.  These friends include a Prince to whom Shariya was betrothed before she was affianced to Haj--this prince fell in love with an amazon on an earlier adventure and had no objections to breaking off his engagement to Shariya; on this same adventure Haj was held captive and forced to have sex with many amazons, and then captured by a tribe of "lovemen," whom it is hinted are homosexual rapists.    

On the way to the swamp our heroes fight some giant lizards.  Then Haj uses the whistle to summon some winged men to fly himself and two friends--another adventurer and the adventurer's girlfriend, who insisted on going on the mission despite being told many times it was too dangerous--the rest of the way to the swamp.  The Prince stays behind, making the reader wonder why the Prince is in the story at all.  The bird men fly the three warriors to the swamp, and then at the edge of the swamp Haj uses the whistle to summon some giant spiders to carry the heroes through the trees to the wizard's keep.  

On the way the three spider-riders encounter a female giant spider.  This creature has an hypnotic sexuality that makes it irresistible to male spider and male human alike!  Haj's friend and his girlfriend are killed in the fracas that ensues; the she-spider mates with and paralyzes one of the he-spiders--she will soon lay her eggs in the still-living but motionless body.  The she-spider then turns off her allure magic, allowing Haj and his mount to proceed.  

At the keep Haj finds the old wizard dead; Shariya has taken his place.  Haj implores her to join him and return to civilization, but she explains that a wizard (or wizardress!) must reign in the swamp keep, or the various monsters and beast men that inhabit the Empire--giant spiders, flying men, giant lizards, et al--will be totally unrestrained and exterminate the human race.  When Haj persists in trying to win her back anyway, it turns out that she now has the same magic as the female spiders, and we are lead to believe she kills or imprisons Haj forever in the keep. 

I am a fan of the traditional quest theme and of femme fatale stories in which guys make dumb decisions because of lust or love and get destroyed, but Offutt fails to cultivate anything valuable out of this fertile ground.  Thumbs down!  

Unsurprisingly, it looks like "Last Quest" has never been reprinted.

**********

There are four pages of ads at the back of Swords Against Darkness II.  The first page is for Zebra's editions of books of Robert E. Howard stories and pastiches.  I have seen some of these in real life and they are pretty awesome; The Sowers of the Thunder, for example, has a Jeff Jones cover and interior illustrations by Roy Krenkel.   I'm a thousand miles from my bookshelves and my scanner, but I am pretty sure I own The Sword of the Gael, written by Offutt and with a wraparound Jones cover.  

The next page is an ad for books about the occult and paranormal, like one on the Bermuda Triangle, one about the Loch Ness Monster, and one about the secret powers of pyramids.  A page of ads for sensationalist books about the murder of JFK, the finances of John D. Rockefeller, and the trial of Charles Manson follows.  The fourth and final page touts two more Kennedy assassination books, but if that's not your kind of meat it starts out with an ad for a book of peanut recipes.  Who wouldn't want to try Peanut Baked Flounder?  My research on ebay indicates this book is actually shaped like a peanut and has as its subtitle "From Carver to Carter," which is pretty hilarious.