The Coming of Conan Re-Read: "The God in the Basin"

comingofconanBill Ward and I are working our way through the Del Rey Robert East. Howard droveThe Coming of Conan. This week nosotros're discussing story three, "The God in the Bowl." We hope you'll join in!

Howard: While I understand it's a different kind of story for Conan, and that it's interesting to look at through the lens of understanding how Howard'south writing adult, I'm evaluating each of these tales with a fairly uncomplicated agenda foremost: Do I enjoy them as stories, and do they accomplish what they're designed to do?

conan god in bowlIn this case I think both answers are no. The reasons I don't enjoy it are closely tied to my feelings about its failure as both a mystery and a horror story. The solution  is pretty well telegraphed to the reader early, leaving information technology not much of a mystery. And while there is exquisitely drawn horror present, I think the story lacks the requisite tension for a horror story (every bit opposed to a story WITH horror).

At that place'due south as well defoliation well-nigh who the protagonist is — the charismatic barbarian who stands effectually glowering and making absurd threats, and clever Demetrio, whose cleverness is and then belabored it becomes irritating. Demetrio'southward the only one moving the plot forward (slowly) until the stunning action scenes when Conan takes over and the story becomes interesting again, too belatedly.

Midway through, Robert Eastward. Howard writes of Demetrio that: "He found these scenes wearily monotonous." And, unfortunately, that'southward how I feel about about of "The God in the Bowl." That's not to say information technology's completely without merit, for information technology has finely realized horror and some not bad action moments, only those moments don't make information technology a success. They're like hearing 1 really tricky song while having to sit through a long dreary musical at your kid'south high schoolhouse.

conan - god in bowl 2Bill: The commencement, virtually play-similar half or two-thirds of the story has Conan standing on the sidelines while other characters talk. And and then yet more characters show upwardly. I think it's the strong final moments of "The God in the Basin," though, that leave readers with a better overall impression of the story.

Howard: You're probably right. Let me highlight what I Practise like. I call back it starts with stiff momentum before quickly coming to a dead stop. By itself, the conclusion, beginning with the entry of the aristocrat who denies hiring Conan for the robbery, is wonderful. With his appearance we get some really snappy dialogue, then the explosion of violence betwixt Conan and the guards, and finally the confrontation with the monster, which goes to 11 on the atmospheric and eerie scale. And Conan himself seems fully gelled — this is the unstoppable powerhouse of destruction nosotros know and love. I've studied Howard fragments, rough drafts that are worth reading solely considering of an amazing activity sequence delivered with pulse-pounding vigor and inventiveness. You can always count on Robert E. Howard for action scenes.

conan - god in bowl 3Bill: Yep, great stuff. The combat is quick and brutal and vivid — Conan even plucks a baby-sit'south middle out for Crom'southward sake — and about welcome after we've been standing around listening to all the talk. The Stygian Snake God, a souvenir from our old friend Thoth-Amon to a rival priest (I like how Conan and Thoth-Amon'south destinies seem intertwined at this point, every bit this encounter was only at the start of Conan's career) is actually excellent, reminding me of how a smart film managing director keeps his monster hidden and mysterious from the audience. Those are all my favorite moments likewise, that and, equally you say, a fully fleshed Conan responding to the questions and bullying of the civilized interrogators with feature ballsy aplomb.

Also, another bespeak, this story is Conan's beginning appearance in what would become the all-time barbarian standard of wearing apparel in fantasy fiction — sandals and a loincloth!

conan - god in bowl 4Howard: Hah! Score one for the loincloth and sandals.

It may seem I'chiliad pretty harsh about a story written past one of my favorite writers starring one of my favorite characters, merely it lacks elements of what I most love nearly Robert E. Howard'due south writing. I retrieve the flow is off. Ordinarily you can count on Howard for pacing only this tale'southward and so fatigued out that rather than feeling tension I start wondering how long it will accept for the characters to get on with it.

Tension is further diluted considering Conan doesn't have much invested in the solution to the mystery — the guards are going to effort to booty him away regardless. We can only picket as the man of activeness stands and listens to all the noise, noise, noise, noise. Demetrio thinks out loud and various bit players run in to report things that add data to what other bit players relayed. As y'all intimated, it'south a picayune similar watching a wearisome phase play.

Y'all could argue that I'm judging work from another time by pacing standards of our fourth dimension, a error a lot of modern readers make when reading former adventure fiction. Simply this isn't at all typical of Robert E. Howard's way. I of the things I love near his work is that wonderful cinematic pacing, and then unlike many of his predecessors and even contemporaries. If he was deliberately experimenting with a different storytelling style he inadvertently sidelined i of his greatest strengths when he did so.

conan - god in bowl 5Peradventure if I'd read this for the first time when I was a teenager I wouldn't accept seen that conclusion coming. I can't know — I can just react to what I first read in my 20s, so it was articulate to me from Howard'due south own clues that the monster was some kind of huge-ass serpent, the simply (and truly creepy) surprise being its chilling face up. If I focus on the horror attribute I imagine I'one thousand supposed to feel nail-biting dread for understanding the danger that the characters do not and wondering how they tin possibly survive… simply that would have required me to intendance about more than one of them.

Deplorable, REH. I still think you're awesome, I swear. I understand why Farnsworth Wright rejected this. And maybe you did as well, because different yous did with other unsold tales, yous seem never to take tried revising it or sending it on to another market.

Neb: "The God in the Basin" is similar to "The Phoenix on the Sword" in that other characters are the ones moving the plot forward, and Conan reacts to them. In both cases these are Conan vs. Civilization stories, whereas "The Frost-Behemothic'south Daughter" is Conan out in his own element. In none of these stories has Conan, I think, fully grown into his role equally protagonist and driving force simply yet — after all in "Frost-Giant" Conan is essentially bugged. He certainly isn't making choices. Looking at just "God" and "Phoenix," it nigh seems to me that REH needed to focus on the civilized players and their plots as a way of finding out who Conan was in dissimilarity. Later on these offset three tales, though, Conan is firmly in the driver'southward seat for much of the rest of his stories.

conan - god in bowl 6Howard: In later stories Howard sets events in motion by showing us what's under manner earlier Conan wanders in and upsets the apple cart. I suppose that kind of happens hither, just not in an especially interesting manner. I wish he had rewritten it to trim it downwards, lengthwise, because the conclusion rocks, and there are several nice touches throughout — the cable that we readers are rightly suspicious of, various pocket-sized character-revealing asides, and so on. Yes, at that place are skillful character moments, merely I withal didn't detect these other players compelling enough to watch them take center stage for so long.

Nib: I think we tin can both pretty easily imagine a meliorate version of this story, no reason not to betoken out its flaws. I remember the pacing issue becomes fifty-fifty more telling upon rereading, because there isn't even the marvel well-nigh the ending to supply involvement. But from this signal forward things change, Conan and REH hit their stride, and some immortal sword-and-sorcery stories beginning flying off the Underwood — adjacent week's "The Tower of the Elephant" shall be the first of many!