I want to write some short fantasy stories for fun. What are some races that are never used in fantasy novels or not used a whole lot? I have also been trying to google food. Anyone know of a website that would explain food that was used in taverns?
The gods of the ancient world, the Olympians, remained a potent force in European culture for centuries after the Graeco-Roman classical civilisation collapsed. They keep cropping up in literature and art right through to at least the early part of the 20th century.
But I can't think of too many fantasy novels in which they play a role. You'd think they'd be a natural for sword and sorcery. Are there any notable sword and sorcery stories dealing with the adventures and misadventures of the gods of Olympus?
When it comes to TV and movies there are of course plenty of examples, Xena being the obvious one. And there are quite a few 1950/1960s sword and sandal movies as well.
But I can't think of too many fantasy novels in which they play a role. You'd think they'd be a natural for sword and sorcery. Are there any notable sword and sorcery stories dealing with the adventures and misadventures of the gods of Olympus?
When it comes to TV and movies there are of course plenty of examples, Xena being the obvious one. And there are quite a few 1950/1960s sword and sandal movies as well.
http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/ne
Nothing terribly new, but he does give a status on the Elric movie plan, and as usual his opinions of other fantasy old and new. He refers to Solomon Kane as "Howard's most reflective character" in reference to the new movie by Michael Bassett. He also mentions which of his works he hopes will be respected in the future: Blood and The War Amongst The Angels are notable inclusions.
(via the Free SF Reader)
Nothing terribly new, but he does give a status on the Elric movie plan, and as usual his opinions of other fantasy old and new. He refers to Solomon Kane as "Howard's most reflective character" in reference to the new movie by Michael Bassett. He also mentions which of his works he hopes will be respected in the future: Blood and The War Amongst The Angels are notable inclusions.
(via the Free SF Reader)
Have we discussed anime and manga in relation to sword & sorcery? I suppose we have, but I've forgotten!
Do you have any favourite examples of anime or manga that you feel have an authentic sword & sorcery flavour?
Mu pick would be Ninja Scroll, but there are certainly others.
Do you have any favourite examples of anime or manga that you feel have an authentic sword & sorcery flavour?
Mu pick would be Ninja Scroll, but there are certainly others.
Hi everyone!
I speak English very bad. Excuse me for my English.
I am Russian. Our publishers seldom publish s&s fantasy. I search new works and new authors.
I was read many stories of Robert E. Howard, Karl Edward Wagner's Kane, Michael Moorcocks' cycles, Lin Carter's Thongor, Catherine Moore's Jirel, s&s stories of Clarke Ashton Smith and Henry Kuttner. I know works of David Gemmell, John Jakes, Charles Saunders (this author was not translated into Russian), Fritz Leiber.
Advise me new works and new authors, please.
I speak English very bad. Excuse me for my English.
I am Russian. Our publishers seldom publish s&s fantasy. I search new works and new authors.
I was read many stories of Robert E. Howard, Karl Edward Wagner's Kane, Michael Moorcocks' cycles, Lin Carter's Thongor, Catherine Moore's Jirel, s&s stories of Clarke Ashton Smith and Henry Kuttner. I know works of David Gemmell, John Jakes, Charles Saunders (this author was not translated into Russian), Fritz Leiber.
Advise me new works and new authors, please.
Has anyone here been doing any sword & sorcery reading lately? Or watching any sword & sorcery movies? TV shows? Anything related to sword & sorcery?
Let me tell you of the days of high adventure. . .
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defender75 on 2009.05.06 at 16:31
Current Mood:
accomplished
. . .specifically what happened to Atlantis in the distant future, long after the oceans drank it:
http://thecanadiandefender.blogspot.c
http://thecanadiandefender.blogspot.c
Flashing blades, flexing sinews. . .form-fitting spandex?
Posted bydefender75 on 2009.04.15 at 12:25
Current Mood:
accomplished
Hi there,
I've got some sword and sorcery-themed comics reviews up at my blog, The Canadian Defender, that might amuse. Check them out here: http://thecanadiandefender.blogspot.c
Thoughts and feedback welcome.
Sincerely,
Stac
I've got some sword and sorcery-themed comics reviews up at my blog, The Canadian Defender, that might amuse. Check them out here: http://thecanadiandefender.blogspot.c
Thoughts and feedback welcome.
Sincerely,
Stac
If you had to select the perfect sword & sorcery story, what would it be? When I say perfect, I mean that everything just comes together seamlessly and you can’t think of any element at all that the author could have improved. It has to be both intelligent and entertaining. And it has to have all the essential ingredients that make the sword & sorcery genre interesting in the first place.
Free Episode of SPELLFURY! Druinia fights a FFFED up Demon!
Posted byspellfury on 2009.03.18 at 11:33
Hi,
If you enjoy the Fantasy Genre check out our latest episode of SPELLFURY, Druinia goes up against a Mist Demon named Straos with a magic sword!
Cheers,
Travis Gordon
Good evening everyone,
I'm new to the group, just wanted to say hullo. My name is Cat and I currently live in RI. I am really enjoying short stories these days and I was wondering if anyone knew of some good S&S short story magazines. Print or electronic is fine, I like both kinds. I'm a big fan of Robert E. Howard's stories, Xena, things like that. Mostly I am looking for stuff that has got a Conan or pulp vibe. Also if anyone has some good short story anthologies that they'd recommend, I'd appreciate that also. I read a "Warrior Princess" anthology that came about about 10 years ago and loved it.
Thanks for your help!
Cheers,
Cat
I'm new to the group, just wanted to say hullo. My name is Cat and I currently live in RI. I am really enjoying short stories these days and I was wondering if anyone knew of some good S&S short story magazines. Print or electronic is fine, I like both kinds. I'm a big fan of Robert E. Howard's stories, Xena, things like that. Mostly I am looking for stuff that has got a Conan or pulp vibe. Also if anyone has some good short story anthologies that they'd recommend, I'd appreciate that also. I read a "Warrior Princess" anthology that came about about 10 years ago and loved it.
Thanks for your help!
Cheers,
Cat
I'm pretty new to this community and although I'm sure you've had these discussions before, I wanted to start a new one to find some good reading. One of my favorites is Glen Cook's The Swordbearer. This book hooks me every time I pick it up. Written along the lines of a Micheal Moorecock saga this book sucks me in more than Elric ever did. Whether it was Gathrid's gigantic battle with his sister or the final battle with Nieroda at the Imperial Palace, the imagery just works for me. I've always thought this would make a great movie, either animated or CGI, and often thought about trying to turn it into a script.
What about you? What other S&S books are out there that you think are script worthy?
What about you? What other S&S books are out there that you think are script worthy?
Do you your sword & sorcery to be strictly fantasy based, or do you like stories that combine fantasy and science fiction elements?
I'm thinking here of stuff like much of Michael Moorcock's output, rather than sword & planet stories that simply replace the fantasy background with a science fictional one. Where it's not just a matter of science fictional trappings.
I'm thinking here of stuff like much of Michael Moorcock's output, rather than sword & planet stories that simply replace the fantasy background with a science fictional one. Where it's not just a matter of science fictional trappings.
I just posted a screed on Joanna Russ' Alyx, a sword&sorcery-ish hero, on my LiveJournal. I'd be interested in what other people think about her.
While no-one would claim that the various Tarzan stories and movies are sword and sorcery, the fact that the character was a creation of Edgar Rice Burroughs does give Tarzan at least a very vague affinity with sword and sorcery. And the theme of the clash between civilisation and barbarism is another element common to both types of tales.
In fact the jungle adventure genre as a whole, a genre that enjoyed enormous popularity in print, TV and movies right up to the end of the 1950s, often overlaps quite a bit with sword and sorcery. Especially when elements like voodoo ad black magic are present, as they often are.
Anyway, it’s been very quiet here, so I thought I’d throw that observation into the ring in the hope of generating some sort of discussion!
In fact the jungle adventure genre as a whole, a genre that enjoyed enormous popularity in print, TV and movies right up to the end of the 1950s, often overlaps quite a bit with sword and sorcery. Especially when elements like voodoo ad black magic are present, as they often are.
Anyway, it’s been very quiet here, so I thought I’d throw that observation into the ring in the hope of generating some sort of discussion!
I’ve been watching George Pal’s 1961 movie Atlantis, the Lost Continent. OK, it’s not really sword & sorcery, but it raises the question of Atlantis. What sword & sorcery stories or novels have used Atlantis as a setting, or simply as an inspiration?
On the broader subject of lost worlds in general, my own favourite such book is Abraham Merritt’s The Face in the Abyss, written in 1931. OK, it’s not about Atlantis and it’s not sword & sorcery, but it’s enormous fun and I can’t imagine a sword & sorcery fan not enjoying it.
On the broader subject of lost worlds in general, my own favourite such book is Abraham Merritt’s The Face in the Abyss, written in 1931. OK, it’s not about Atlantis and it’s not sword & sorcery, but it’s enormous fun and I can’t imagine a sword & sorcery fan not enjoying it.
The Italian-French co-production Hercules and the Captive Women is a fairly typical example of the classic peplum (or sword & sandal) genre of the 50s and 60s. Hercules and his friend Androcles set off on a ship to save Greece from a mysterious invading force. They are shipwrecked, and Hercules finds himself on a small island where a young woman is being held captive by the evil Proteus. She is in fact the only captive woman in the movie, but I guess they thought Hercules and the Captive Woman would have been a less impressive title.
( more fun with Herc behind cut )
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cult_movie
( more fun with Herc behind cut )
x-posted to
cult_movie
Swords of the Round Table
I'm overdue posting a link that should be of interest to sword-and-sorcery fans. Below is a passport to a lengthy discussion of sword-and-sorcery, its weaknesses and strengths, and its possible future, a roundtable helmed by David C. Smith. It resides on YouTube in six installments, starting here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1WX1iiISU
If sword-and-sorcery's your thang, I hope you'll watch and then post here with your thoughts!
If you’re looking for something different, try Turkish sword & sorcery movies! Tarkan versus the Vikings (Tarkan Viking kani) is the second movie included on Mondo Macabro’s Turkish Pop Cinema Double Bill DVD (the first being The Deathless Devil which I reviewed here a while back). Made in 1971, Tarkan versus the Vikingsis if anything even more fun.
Really this movie has everything you could possibly want. It has a beautiful warrior princess (she’s Attila the Hun’s daughter, no less), a bad guy with very impressive moustache, a giant killer octopus and lots of cute female Viking warriors. You probably didn’t know the Vikings had cute female warriors either, but you live and learn. It also has a hero, Tarkan, who possesses the main qualifications for an adventure film hero - he’s very brave and exceedingly stupid. Luckily he has his faithful wolf companion Kurt with him, an even more fortunately it turns out that Kurt is considerably smarter than Tarkan. The movie also has a glamorous but evil Chinese female villain, accompanied by blowgun-armed henchmen.
If all that’s not enough, it has loads of nudity and quite a bit of sex. And great costumes. The Vikings wear mostly furs, and for the cute female Viking warriors the furs come in bright orange and a rather pretty shade of pink. Just because you’re a female Viking warrior doesn’t mean you can’t be feminine. The make Viking chieftain favours a rather fetching shade of powder blue for his fur outfits. Yes, it’s pink for girls and blue for boys in the world of the Vikings.
The plot has something to do with both the Vikings and the wicked Chinese lady trying to kidnap Attila’s daughter. It might not make too much sense, but it doesn’t let up. The action is non-stop (in spite of which there’s still time for a spot of romance).
The settings are fairly impressive, and the action sequences are executed with considerable enthusiasm. People are constantly being captured and tied up and subjected to hideous tortures. At one stage a young Turkish woman is subjected to that most feared of all Viking tortures. Yes, the Trampoline of Death. The scene where a Turkish captive is suspended by her pigtails over a pit filled with venomous snakes is also memorable. This movie is positively bursting with energy. And there’s an actual Viking longship, in the traditional Viking colours of canary yellow with bright blue trim and fire-engine red oars. These are very colourful Vikings.
The acting is pure B-movie, but it gets the job done. Director Mehmet Aslan understands that the secret to a good adventure/exploitation movie is to keep things moving, and his sense of pacing is admirable. It’s pleasing to note that the heroines are brave and feisty, abs frequently they’re the ones getting Tarkan out of a jam. Lotus (the evil Chinese lady) is a classic movie villain - diabolically clever, beautiful, and possessed of equal measures of cruelty and sexual perversity. When she has Tarkan strung up over a bottomless pit and is slowly cutting the ropes holding him up by throwing knives at them, she decides this game would be even more fun if she took her clothes off so she could taunt poor old Tarkan with her evil beauty. This movie is just so much fun!
Mondo Macabro include an apology for the poor quality of the source materials used for this DVD. I have no idea why. Tarkan versus the Vikings looks absolutely splendid - the picture is quite crisp, the colours are vivid, the audio is perfectly acceptable. Given that the other movie included in the set is every bit as entertaining as this one, and there are the usual great Mondo Macabro extras giving us a potted history of Turkish pop cinema, this set is insanely good value and is an absolute must-buy for every self-respecting cult movie fan.
x-posted tocult_movie
Really this movie has everything you could possibly want. It has a beautiful warrior princess (she’s Attila the Hun’s daughter, no less), a bad guy with very impressive moustache, a giant killer octopus and lots of cute female Viking warriors. You probably didn’t know the Vikings had cute female warriors either, but you live and learn. It also has a hero, Tarkan, who possesses the main qualifications for an adventure film hero - he’s very brave and exceedingly stupid. Luckily he has his faithful wolf companion Kurt with him, an even more fortunately it turns out that Kurt is considerably smarter than Tarkan. The movie also has a glamorous but evil Chinese female villain, accompanied by blowgun-armed henchmen.
If all that’s not enough, it has loads of nudity and quite a bit of sex. And great costumes. The Vikings wear mostly furs, and for the cute female Viking warriors the furs come in bright orange and a rather pretty shade of pink. Just because you’re a female Viking warrior doesn’t mean you can’t be feminine. The make Viking chieftain favours a rather fetching shade of powder blue for his fur outfits. Yes, it’s pink for girls and blue for boys in the world of the Vikings.
The plot has something to do with both the Vikings and the wicked Chinese lady trying to kidnap Attila’s daughter. It might not make too much sense, but it doesn’t let up. The action is non-stop (in spite of which there’s still time for a spot of romance).
The settings are fairly impressive, and the action sequences are executed with considerable enthusiasm. People are constantly being captured and tied up and subjected to hideous tortures. At one stage a young Turkish woman is subjected to that most feared of all Viking tortures. Yes, the Trampoline of Death. The scene where a Turkish captive is suspended by her pigtails over a pit filled with venomous snakes is also memorable. This movie is positively bursting with energy. And there’s an actual Viking longship, in the traditional Viking colours of canary yellow with bright blue trim and fire-engine red oars. These are very colourful Vikings.
The acting is pure B-movie, but it gets the job done. Director Mehmet Aslan understands that the secret to a good adventure/exploitation movie is to keep things moving, and his sense of pacing is admirable. It’s pleasing to note that the heroines are brave and feisty, abs frequently they’re the ones getting Tarkan out of a jam. Lotus (the evil Chinese lady) is a classic movie villain - diabolically clever, beautiful, and possessed of equal measures of cruelty and sexual perversity. When she has Tarkan strung up over a bottomless pit and is slowly cutting the ropes holding him up by throwing knives at them, she decides this game would be even more fun if she took her clothes off so she could taunt poor old Tarkan with her evil beauty. This movie is just so much fun!
Mondo Macabro include an apology for the poor quality of the source materials used for this DVD. I have no idea why. Tarkan versus the Vikings looks absolutely splendid - the picture is quite crisp, the colours are vivid, the audio is perfectly acceptable. Given that the other movie included in the set is every bit as entertaining as this one, and there are the usual great Mondo Macabro extras giving us a potted history of Turkish pop cinema, this set is insanely good value and is an absolute must-buy for every self-respecting cult movie fan.
x-posted to
cult_movie