/lit/ - Literature

No it isn't. But it is definitely amazing and on the shortlist.

>>22959587
What is the best?

>>22959479
nearly all fantasy is in fact sword and sorcery. only stuff like tolkien and maybe grrrrm stands out but people arent copying tolkien epics, they are making s&s stories

>>22959479
Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser

There is also The Eye Of Argon.

>>22959479
Yes. But I still prefer Leiber.

>>22959611
I fucking wish

>>22959479
The Broken Sword

>>22959479
sometimes you just get things right the first time

i honestly dont even understand what sword and sorcery is.

>>22959722
Exquisite.

>>22959722
>"This book was written by an anti-genius, who has produced something so mind-bogglingly dreadful that it provokes actual tears of laughter. Never before in the annals of human literature were so many adjectives deployed so artlessly, so inappropriately and so jaw-droppingly. There's a rumour that The Eye of Argon is a hoax. The evidence suggests that it isn't, but even so it is a pure unalloyed joy to read - and especially to read out loud to an unsuspecting audience."
Why would someone write such a review? Is it true?

>>22960133
Read it for yourself and judge.

>>22960133
>Be 16 year old sword and sorcery enthusiast
>Write short story and send it into fanzine without any editing
>Random sci-fi author picks it up and thinks it's the funniest shit ever
>Entire convention comprised of sci-fi and fantasy authors of the time make a tradition of trying to read through your story without laughing
>Get so discouraged that you give up on writing forever

To be fair, having almost every writer in the genre at the time laugh at your work is pretty demoralizing.

>>22960258
He wasn't 16 years old but Theis was still a teen when he wrote the story.

>>22960133
It's bad and amateurish but not really that hilarious. A lot of modern books have worse writing, particulary ones with female and/or ethnic authors.

>>22960133
no it's just a teenage boy's amateur attempt at writing a Conan story. It has some funny passages but its reputation is so exagerrated.

>>22960331
>You dare blaspheme me!
>the entire rat dagger scene
>the eye of argon, slime monster
>slipper wearing cultists
It has all the elements of a classic Conan story except for the savages

>>22960312
>>22960331
How many people have had their first story published at 16 even if it is in a fanzine or a clubzine? How many writers have written a complete story at so early an age?

>>22959928
Just really really manly fantasy?

>>22959671
>author's name is Fritz
No thanks

>>22959928
>>22960938
First understand that science fiction, fantasy, and horror were not always distinct genres. Then understand that there were other genres such as "sword and planet" or "sword and sandal." These are shorthand descriptions of these genres by listing a couple of tropes that communicate what you'll get when you read them.

Sword and sorcery amounts to adventures about warriors and rogues and other such types of characters who get into danger, fights, and encounter magic and the supernatural, of not world it themselves.

>>22960954
It strikes me that a lot of that stuff that came out of American pulp magazines is derived from Westerns in some way. It's always the cowboy hero, with a different backdrop.

>>22959479

Probably, the writing is absolutely god tier

Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser, Lyonesse, Zothique, Throne of Bones, Book of the New Sun, Dying Earth all come to mind as equal-or-superior books that use similar genre tropes

>>22960133
A pre-internet meme. People didn't have access to terrabytes of Sonic the Hedegehog fanfiction back then, so it was a humorous oddity.

Another example is a bad Portuguese-English phrasebook written in 1855 called "English as She Is Spoke". It was so mangled that it became a comic legend. But to people who have seen bad machine translations or who grew up playing Japenese video games, it's not really that funny.

>>22959479
No.

>>22961544
Such a cozy book. I need to wait a few years before reading it again.

>>22960980
In many ways, yes. The pulps evolved out of the western dime novels of the 19th century.

>>22960940
You're shallow

>>22959479
Conan isn’t even Howard best serie that would be Solomon Kane

>>22961043
>Lyonesse
I heard the 2nd and 3rd books suck so I haven't started it yet. Is this true?

>>22962237
Wrong

>>22959671
This, also Karl Edward Wagner's Kane

>>22959594
Fritz Leiber

>>22962889
nta but the second and third books are great
third one goes off on a bit of a tangent about finding the holy grail but it's great

>>22963031
Glad someone rec'd it.

>>22962237
>>22963009
What about Kull?

>>22959928
>Lin Carter's definition of 'Sword & Sorcery'
From the introduction to Flashing Swords! (1973) an anthology of original Swords & Sorcery novelettes, edited by Carter:
>We call a story Sword & Sorcery when it is an action tale, derived from the traditions of the pulp magazine adventure story, set in a land, age or world of the author's invention - a milieu in which magic actually works and the gods are real - a story, moreover, which pits a stalwart warrior in direct conflict with the forces of supernatural evil.
>Carter goes on to say that, although the term was coined by Fritz Leiber, Robert E. Howard should get credit for founding the genre.

>>22964571
and the credit should actually go to The Fortress Unvanquishable, Save for Sacnoth by Dunsany.