Gertrude Hemken, of Chicago, writes: "Comes my monthly gab-letter to aggervate and p'raps delight you. Fustest of all, I must express my complete and wholly satisfactory pleasure at The Abyss Under the World. Gracious me, I still feel as though I had been awakened from a strange and charming dream—particularly that tour along the spur with the chasm below—soundless and depthless—now I want to go back to sleep and continue that dream, only I know I must wait. Still there is a satisfaction that the story will be completed, whereas a real dream from which one awakens, seldomly is finished if an attempt is made to try that* (Gosh, that sounds garbled—but I trust you know what my object is.) Anyhow, I feel (Please turn to page 506)
.
COMING NEXT MONTH
THE rivet-studded oaken door crashed open, splintering from the assault of pike-butts whose thunderous echoes still rolled around the walls of the tiny stone room revealed beyond the wreck of the shattered door. Jirel, the warrior-maid of Joiry, leaped in through die splintered ruins, dashing the red hair from her eyes,' grinning with effort, gripping her two-edged sword. But in the ruin of the door she paused. The mail-clad men at her heels surged around her in the doorway like a wave of blue-bright steel, and then paused too, staring.
For Franga the warlock was kneeling in his chapel, and to see Franga on his knees was like watching the devil recite a paternoster. But ir was no holy altar before which the wizard bent. The black stone of it bulked huge in this tiny, bare room echoing still with the thunder of battle, and in the split-second between the door's fall and Jircl's crashing entry through its ruins Franga had crouched in a last desperate effort at—at what?
His bony shoulders beneath their rich black robe heaved with frantic motion as he fingered the small jet bosses that girdled the altar's block. A slab in the side of it fell open abruptly as the wizard, realizing that his enemy was almost within sword's reach, whirled and crouched like a feral tiling. Blazing light, cold and unearthly, streamed out from the gap in the altar.
"So that's where you've hidden it!" said Jirel with a savage softness.
Over his shoulder Franga snarled at her, pale lips writhing back from discolored teeth. Physically he was terrified of her, and his terror paralyzed him. She saw him hesitate, evidently torn between his desire to snatch into safety what was hidden in the altar and his panic fear of her sword that dripped blood upon the stones. . . .
You will not want to miss tin's utterly strange and thrilling novelette, in which Jirel and Northwest Smith join forces against the mighty evil powers of Franga the warlock. Two of the most popular writers of fantastic fiction have collaborated to make this story gripping and fascinating. It will be printed complete in next month's Weird Tales:
QUEST OF THE STARSTONE
By C. L. Moore and Henry Kuttner
Also
LIVING BUDDHESS THE VOYAGE OF THE NEUTRALIA
By Seabury Quinn By B. Wait is
A fascinating tale of a living female Buddha and An exciting story of weird adventures and a
the dreadful change lhat befell a lovely American strange voyage through space to other planets—
girl—a tale of Jules de Grandin, and a dire lama by the author of "The Abysmal Horror" and
from out of devil-ridden Asia. other fascinating thrill-tales.
DREAD SUMMONS THE SECRET OF SEBEK
By Paul Ernst By Robert Bloch
The old butler heard a scream, muffled by the What grisly horror, spawned in prehistoric ages
street noises from outside, and when he invest! in ancient Egypt, stalked through that weird
gated he found that a dread summons had been house in New Orleans? A tale of the Mardi
answered. Gras.
November Issue Weird Tales.. Out October 1
WEIRD TALES
THE EYRIE
(Continued from page 504) that Mr. Suter is just dandy—the sample is fine. Nextest, I orcer do something about the finis of The Last Pharaoh— 'twam't bad atall atall—somehow I tcally didn't feel bad that lovely Carol and her dear brother were not restored to their original bodies, but, muh goo'ness sakes, warn't thet princess Atma the hungry gal ? She had a bad bad case of the 'gimmies'—wuss then some of our gold diggers. Nope, 'twarn't a bad story at that—I was wholly satisfied with it from the start. After all, the villain was defeated and that should be enough for any reader, sez I. Thank you, Mr. Kelley, for some mighty entertaining reading. ... A very queer tale was this Thing of Darkness —I never heerd tell of quite such a ghost before. He really was a rotter, 1 must say. I liked the unusual note of the old Mrs. Burden's sacrificing herself that a ghost might be laid. Rather unusual form of exorcism—isn't it ? The Mandarin's Ear was rather refreshing in its lightness—almost humorous in that the ear of another could hear all about its former possessor. Quite an idea that! Finlay's illustration is nice, too, although I can't say the beauty looks very Chinese. Eurasian more or less, with a strong inclination to the Russian. Loretta Burrough has something there. The Will of the Dead is a fine example of what some mothers would like to do to their sons' wives. Some mothers are intensely jealous of their sons. Don't say me nay—I know! This mother in the tale was a tyrant, no less. . . . And so Henry Kuttner tells us Dis is a city of iron! Sounds like bad pronunciation to me. Tsk tsk—HK. Yes sir, live and learn, live and learn, sez I—the old alchemists never learned to make ptecious metals of baser products, and those who succeeded—well, look at Droom Avista—as also King Midas. I just wonder if Mr. Wellrmn believes that his 'Necronomicon story to end all N stories' will really end them. Somehow I wish ic would—I could never get myself to pronounce the word correctly and I'd have it wandering in my brain, popping into my thoughts at the most unweird limes. Shall we wait and see if it really is the end of all N stories, Mr. W.? Now to the Eyrie—it's high time I start
stepping on a few toes, and giving boosts to others. First an orchid to J. Z. Thompson who wrote from Glendale, California—I liked his catchy phrase—'pulse-pepping.' Mrs. H. L. Phillips of Quincy, Illinois, seems so very prosaic in her statement of the magazine being 'in general very interesting/ Mrs. P.—that sounds much too polite—why don't you whack down a real statement and say: '1 think it's just the bestest of all the bestest, and—well, it's just the nuts, no less.* Or don't you understand my language? I agree with Robert J. Hoyer of my own fair and windy city that Doctor Lamontaine is a fine character for a yarn—one of those rip-roaring topers—yet a he-man—and entirely lovable. We will have more of him, won't we? T. O. Mabbott is going to get a toe-trodding—perhaps ir would be better for him to reread Clicking Red Heels —the young millionaire did have more than one pair of shoes, and the story ends that 'in every pair of his shoes were found these strange clicking devices'—the question I raised in regard to that was how the dooce anyone could get hold of all his shoes and insert those clickers. As for the question of the hollow appearing on the seat beside the young man in his roadsrer—well, don't you, my friend, have an imagination? Don't you know that when a person wants to and yet fears to, he will see what is not there? Such was the case with the young millionaire. Or perhaps Mr. Ernst can explain it better than I. That will be all this time—I am happy to see Seabury Quinn again for next month. 1 am also awaiting the meeting of Jfrel and NWSmith quite anxiously."
A Threadbare Theme
Clifton Hall, of Los Angeles, writes: "Srrangely enough, the thing that has caused me to break the ice and pen my first letter to the Eyrie is rhe fact that I find that your August issue falls short, in my estimation, of your usual high standard of excellence. The cover itself was the first thing to give me this impression. It seemed rather carelessly done. Then, too, where are all the pretty nudes that once made WT so attractive and readable ? All of my WT-fan friends here in Los Angeles agree with me that the WT of two years ago was made far more entertaining by the well-done nudes that featured the cover and stories. There is certainly nothing pornographic about it; all
WEIRD TALES
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&
nbsp; artists agree that a well-done nude is the highest form of artistic expression. And Finlay and Brundage—especially the former —seem capable of doing them well. But back to the magazine itself: I don't think I'm unfair to Thing of Darkness, the featured story, when I say that it has the oldest spooky-story plot on the face of the globe. Since the time of Charles Dickens— and where he got it I can't say—it has been used so many times in books, plays, short-Stories, movies, radio dramas, etc., etc., that you could get out a magazine of twice the thickness of WT every week from now to 2000 A. D., and still not reprint more than half of them. This is the only one that really got my ire up, but there were several others that I thought rather mediocre. The Abyss Under the World seemed to be written more in the style of a pulp detective thriller than a real weird story; and perhaps I'm being a bit hasty, inasmuch as there is another installment to be printed, but isn't it a bit strange that the Egyptians under the ground should speak nothing but English? I thought World of the Dark Dwellers was pretty good, although the idea of mechanical
masters who had once been men living underground and preying on the dwellers' is strangely like H. G. Wells' The Time Machine. I enjoyed The Mandarin's Ear, The Last Pharaoh, 'and the Love-craft reprint, though, and according to the 'trailer' of next month's issue, WT seems destined to return to its former high level. Here's hoping."
The Dead Masters
Reginald A. Pryke, of Kent, England, writes: "Since way back in 1925 we (that means three of us) have been your loyal followers and admirers. In the days of Senf's covers, monthly Jules de Grandins, Henry S. Whitehead and Dunwich Horrors, into Rankin's era with his clouded, evil, misty illustrations, bursting into Howard's pulsating epics, Depression days and bimonthly issues—terrible time of famine— and so into the present day. Per or, astral You have a record to be proud of, a future to encourage you to even greater efforts, and a spirit to take the sad blows Fate has dealt you unflinchingly. A moment to think of The Fallen. Whitehead: Who
BACK COPIES
Because of the many requests for back issues of Weird Tales, the publishers do their best to keep a sufficient supply on hand to meet all demand* This magazine was established early in 1923 and there has been a steady drain on the supply of back copies ever since. At present, we have the following back numbers on hand for sale:
1933 1933
Jan. ....
Feb.
June
Aug.
These back numbers c»ntain many fascinating stories. If you are interested in obtaining any of the back copies on this list please hurry your order because we can not guarantee that the list will be as complete as it now is within the next 30 days. The price on all back issues is 25c per copy. Mail all orders to:
WEIRD
840 N. Michigan Ave.
TALES
Chicago, Illinois, U. S. A.
WEIRD TALES
writes obi stories as he used to do? West Indies, Haiti, voodooism, witchcraft—nobody can match his flawless literary style and tingling terms. Arlton Eadie: The teller of ghost stones, par excellence. Howard: Howard the great, the incomparable, the master. Howard, whose tales were breathless sagas snatched vibrant with life from the mouths of the scalds of old. Howard, who lifted his characters out of the dust and decay of times long forgotten, breathed eager, lusting, laughing, fighting life into them, clapped swords in their fists, and sent them tramping the witch-haunted, battle-strewn roads; men, every one, revelling in life and its joys, wine, women and the mad exhilaration of combat. Howard is dead. Solomon Kane, King Kull, Conan the Barbarian who set a crown upon his black head and defied all this world and the next to deprive him of it. Three real literary achievements, three who will live now that he is gone and the hand writes no more. . . . Revive Conan? Never, never, never! No, the sagas are finished. There was a hint of finality about Howard's last Conan story, Red Nails; a knitting-up of loose strands, a rounding-off as if he somehow knew he was completing a task. In that story I thought Conan found at last his mate, his long-sought-for companion. Together they left that evil place; together (but only in our imaginations) let them travel on towards whatever lies ahead. Let each true lover of the great barbarian dream his own tales of battle, love and brooding witchcraft. Any other course savors of sacrilege. Read and read again what has been written, but let no other man try and wield that pen or gird on that sword. Bury them with him. He will sleep the quieter. And Lovecraft; Let the men who knew and loved him as a friend pen his obituary. I, who only knew him through his matchless pen, bid farewell to an artist who knew how to play upon man's sense of fear as Kreisler plays upon his violin. Those long, brooding, almost somnolent opening paragraphs of his, almost devoid of conversation—somehow, Love-craft's pen seemed to falter when he attempted to put his words into a personal mouth— impersonality was his keynote. With a sense of nightmare, barely glimpsed, the reader's eye fled from paragraph to paragraph, almost chased or driven, until the grotesque climax was attained, the spell broken, the pursuit lifted, leaving him weakened yet
strangely exhilarated. Fear, like fire, is cleansing. Whitehead, Eadie, Howard, Lovecraft. Each in his own field such an undisputed master that the loss seems unbearable. Each, of course, has his disciples. Robert Bloch, for instance, seems a fit proselyte of Lovecraft, who, with experience, may yet equal his master, but no disciple can fill the place of his teacher in the mind and heart of any who knew that teacher's genius. I'm afraid this letter has spun itself out to an immoderate length. I can only plead my faithful service of years as an excuse and draw it to a conclusion. . . . As to your authors, I have already spoken of Robert Bloch. His tales are real gems and should get even better as he gains experience. Good old Seabury Quinn, almost the last of the old brigade, wrote a real winner, The Globe of Memories I believe it was called. Jack Williamson usually shows perfect taste, but his last was downright pitiable. I never thought to read such a hodgepodge of vile villainy and putty make-up, 'orrible plotting and dastardly scheming in your magazine. That stuff does not belong in the aristocratic Weird Tales. Repeat not the offense. The Last Pharaoh reads well, is exceedingly and fluently written and promises a fine climax. And who is this Clifford Ball? His Duar the Accursed was a neat piece of craftsmanship, and should develop into a first-class series."
A First-rate Job Donald A. Wollheim, of New York City, writes: "May I offer congratulations on your August issue which is a first-rate job? Lovecraft's yarn was one I had never read before; Kuttner's was a superb little fable; Frank Owen is a true master in his own right; The Last Pharaoh is thoroughly intriguing and worth while. Wellman's Necronomiconic is a honey. But it won't end Necronomicon tales. I, for one, want to see the Necro grow bigger and bigger. It was one of the factors contributing to the making of WT's vivid and unique personality."
The Terrible Parchment
Joseph Allen Ryan, of Cambridge, Maryland, writes: "Wellman's short, The Terrible Parchment, was especially interesting to me; for I believe I was on hand when the idea for the tale was born. Otto Binder, Julius Schwartz, Mort Weisinger and I (as usual, I was the small frog in the big
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pond) were standing at the corner of West 48th Street and Broadway in New York City last summer, chewing the rag a bit before departing on our various ways. The conversation drifted to Weird Tales, and to H. P. Lovecraft and the Necronomicon in particular. Mort glanced at the near-by news stand and remarked: 'Suppose you went over to that stand and asked for a copy of the Necronomicon, and the fellow handed it to you. What would you do?' None of us knew exactly what course he would follow under the unusual circumstances. Otto remarked: 'Pay for it, I guess.' Mort digested this for a moment or so, then continued: 'That would make a good plot for a story— for some fan magazine, that is. You could explain diat Lovetraft's readers had Uiought so much about the mythical Necronomicon that their combined thought-force materialized it.' As Weisinger knows Manly Wade Wcllman quite well, it may be that the idea got around to the latter,
who developed it into a short for WT. How about it, Manly?"
Cornish Scenery
I. O. Evans writes from Tadworth, in Surrey: "As one of your many British readers, I have greatly enjoyed the stories that appear in your excellent magazine, and I look forward to reading many more of them. I was, however, surprized to find a rather startling error in a story which appeared in a recent issue—1 forget its name and that of the author, but it dealt with the worship of an Egyptian beast-god in a Cornish mine. [The story was The Brood of Bubastis, by Robert Bloch, in our March issue.— The Ed.] In this the author speaks of the 'Cornish countryside' as 'a region of mystic mountains, and purple peaks that towered above wild forest glens and green-grottoed swamplands.' 1 don't think any description could be less accurate! The highest hill in the duchy is Brown Willy, of only 1,368 feet; rhere are no forests—the bulk of the country is moorland; and rhe only 'peaks' are those of the hills of spoil from the numerous mine-workings, which can hardly be said to 'tower.' Later your author mentions local faith in leprechauns,' which are Irish fairies, and kelpies,* which are Scottish! The joke is that the'scenery of Cornwall has eery qualities, and the people faith in spirits, which would have suited your author's story admirably had he got them right. What he
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Weird Tales volume 30 number 04 Page 21
