History Creator / RobertEHoward

* {{Kull}}, exile of Atlantis and king of Valusia.

* CanonWelding: Howard did this a lot with his historical, horror and fantasy stories. Just to name a few examples: {{Kull}} was explicitly tied with ConanTheBarbarian in the essay "The Hyborian Age". Both was tied with the historical-fantasy character BranMakMorn through the Kull-Bran crossover "Kings of the Night". The ring of Thoth-Amon, from the Conan stories, and worshipers of Bran are featured in Howard's modern horror stories, while both Bran and Kull are mentioned in one of his Turlogh Dubh O'Brien stories set in 1200's. It wouldn't be unreasonable to consider all of Howard's speculative fiction to be part of [[TheVerse the same verse]], even if Howard [[AuthorExistenceFailure never lived]] to point it out himself. And of course Howard and HPLovecraft making references to each-others in their works was the foundation of the CthulhuMythos.

* WalkingTheEarth: SolomonKane. Constantly.

'''Robert E. Howard''' (January 22, 1906 - June 11, 1936) was a writer and poet from Texas, USA. He wrote short stories and poems spanning several genres, including HeroicFantasy, {{Western}}, CosmicHorror and historical fiction. He was the TropeMaker for the genres LowFantasy, DarkFantasy and SwordAndSorcery -- which, in fact, received its name from a discussion of what the genre that a Howard story was should be called. Along with Creator/JRRTolkien, he is one of the most influential writers in modern fantasy. His life was the subject of the 1996 film ''TheWholeWideWorld''.

* ProudWarriorRaceGuy: Conan and several others.

* KarlEdwardWagner, who can be considered a SpiritualSuccessor of sorts to Howard.

* {{Bal-Sagoth}}, whose name is derived from the Howard short story ''The Gods of Bal-Sagoth''.

* AuthorExistenceFailure: Many of Howard's incomplete drafts were picked up by other writers such as Creator/LSpragueDeCamp and turned into complete stories. See also {{Macekre}} below.

[[ThereIsNoSuchThingAsNotability Notable]] characters created by Howard include (sorted by approximate internal chronology):

* AntiHero: Pretty much every main chracter in anything he wrote.

* FairForItsDay: Although, usually under pressure from his publishers, Howard had many DistressedDamsel types, he also wrote several strong, intelligent female characters including Belit and Valeria from his Conan stories, and Red Sonya of Rogatino from his historical fiction. Unfortunately the same can't be said of his racial views [[ValuesDissonance which were pretty typical for the time and place he grew up in.]]
** Howard occasionally wrote stories that weren't screamingly racist, or at least had some non-racist plot elements. In the Solomon Kane stories set in Africa, most of them have something along these lines. In ''The Hills of the Dead'', N'Longa the shaman can actually be read as the hero, since he does all the major work necessary to put down the vampires, while Kane just keeps the vampires off N'Longa's back during the process. N'Longa also speaks eruditely when he's using his own language...he just can't speak English well. The Bogondan villagers of ''Wings in the Night'' are presented as basically good people trapped in a '''horrible''' situation. During the ''The Footfalls Within'', Kane attacks a band of Arabs who've been enslaving Africans, and is (temporarily) captured. A minor Arab character, who had only been traveling with the slavers' caravan for protection, is sympathetic to Kane's plight. In ''The Moon of Skulls'', Howard makes the following point about the villainous African culture of the piece: "These savages are '''not like the other natives of the region.''' A latent insanity lurks in the brain of each and every one." (Mind you, ''Moon'' is still jaw-droppingly racist, but at least Howard managed to slightly ameliorate his attitude.)
*** Other non-racist moments show up from time to time. In Howard's historical short story ''The Road of Azrael'' (not public domain, but recently reprinted in ''Lord of Samarcand and Other Tales of the Old Orient''), the viewpoint character is an Arab. Several of his horror/supernatural works feature sympathetic characters of color: The viewpoint character in ''The Thunder-Rider'' is Native American, while In ''The Spirit of Tom Molyneaux'' (aka ''Apparition in the Prize Ring'') the hero (but not the viewpoint character) is an African-American, whom Howard actually describes as possessing "great nobility." In ''The Noseless Horror'', Ganra Singh (a Sikh) saves the day at the end. Meanwhile, ''The Horror from the Mound'' features a Mexican who's got a damn sight more common sense than the story's white viewpoint character. Finally, ''The Dead Slaver's Tale'' and ''The Dead Remember'' feature black victims getting ghostly revenge on the whites who murdered them.
*** Also in his defense, he wrote some stories that showed plenty of racism existing between conflicting clans and tribes that were either [[FantasticRacism purely imaginative]], or ''all'' ultimately Indo-European, at least in name. Picts? Northern Britain. Atlanteans? Supposed "Aryan" progenitors. In other words, Howard's fiction contains racism, itself, as an common accepted fact.
** The racist setting in Howard's stories set in the modern age also tends to make a difference between Black characters - darker skinned "true" Blacks are usually brutal warriors, while [[ButNotTooBlack lighter-skinned characters]] are either sympathetic or towards the more [[WickedCultured mysterious and intellectual]] end of the villains' spectrum:
*** SolomonKane story ''The Moon Of Skulls'': the savage warriors are true Blacks. Evil Queen Nakari is brown-skinned and very beautiful by comparison.
*** SolomonKane story ''Hills Of The Dead'': [[DamselInDistress the girl saved by Kane from a lion]] is brown-skinned and delicate.
*** SolomonKane story ''Red Shadows'': Gulka [[NamesToRunAwayFromReallyFast the Gorilla-Slayer]] is the strongest, most brutal hunter and warrior and also one of the blackest.
*** Old South story ''Black Canaan'': [[HotWitch the mysterious witch]] is a very beautiful quadroon (1/4 Black) and light skinned.

* {{Macekre}}: In addition to some of his stories being completed upon his death, many of his less-popular stories were rewritten, often to create [[DolledUpInstallment dolled-up installments]] in his more popular franchises ([[http://www.barbariankeep.com/fake.html source]]), and many of his actual stories were [[BowdlerIzation bowdlerized]] in paperback printings ([[http://www.barbariankeep.com/edited.html source]], and [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_E._Howard#L._Sprague_de_Camp_and_the_Howard_Boom see also]]). In addition Creator/LSpragueDeCamp and Lin Carter wrote several published fanfics ''[[RunningTheAsylum which they declared canon]].'' The fanbase [[FanonDisContinuity refused to go along with this]], however, and all these bad decisions have long since been reversed.

* OurZombiesAreDifferent: "Pigeons From Hell" featured a [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zuvembie "zuvembie"]], which name was later used by MarvelComics for its voodoo-based zombie-like creatures (who couldn't be called such due to UsefulNotes/TheComicsCode.)

[[caption-width-right:248:Money and muscle, that’s what I want; to be able to do any damned thing I want and get away with it. Money won’t do that altogether, because if a man is a weakling, all the money in the world won’t enable him to soak an enemy himself; on the other hand, unless he has money he may not be able to get away with it. ]]

* OurZombiesAreDifferent: "Pigeons From Hell" featured a [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zuvembie "zuvembie"]], which name was later used by MarvelComics for its voodoo-based zombie-like creatures (who couldn't be called such due to the ComicsCode.)

'''Robert E. Howard''' (January 22, 1906 - June 11, 1936) was a writer and poet from Texas, USA. He wrote short stories and poems spanning several genres, including HeroicFantasy, {{Western}}, CosmicHorror and historical fiction. He was the TropeMaker for the genre SwordAndSorcery -- which, in fact, received its name from a discussion of what the genre that a Howard story was should be called. Along with Creator/JRRTolkien, he is one of the most influential writers in modern fantasy. His life was the subject of the 1996 film ''TheWholeWideWorld''.

* BranMakMorn, king of the Picts.

* Turlogh Dubh [=O'Brien=], a Gaelish outlaw.

His most well-known creation is ConanTheBarbarian, a character that has greatly overshadowed his creator.

* [[ConanTheBarbarian Conan]], a barbarian from Cimmeria who would become king of Aquilonia. Many other works have been written about him, but the complete, canonical stories are:

** {{Conan}} is a loner a lot of the time too.

* RedSonja was not actually created by Howard, but she inhabits the [[HyborianAge Hyborian]] {{Verse}} together with Conan and is inspired by a "Red Sonya" who hailed from Russia in Howard's story ''The Shadow of the Vulture''.

* {{Conan}}, a barbarian from Cimmeria who would become king of Aquilonia. Many other works have been written about him, but the complete, canonical stories are:

* Creator/TerryPratchett who created the famous Cohen the Barbarian for {{Discworld}}

* AuthorExistenceFailure: Many of Howard's incomplete drafts were picked up by other writers such as Creator/LSpragueDeCamp and turned into complete stories. See also [[{{Macekre}} Macekre]] below.

* PlanetaryRomance: ''Almuric''. An EdgarRiceBurroughs-style adventure, but with a Howard hero.

Howard was a friend and correspondent of Creator/HPLovecraft and one of the contributors to the original CthulhuMythos.

His most well-known creation is {{Conan the Barbarian}}, a character that has greatly overshadowed his creator.

Howard committed suicide with a gun at the age of 30, after his ailing mother fell into an irrecoverable coma.

* {{Kull}}, exile of Atlantis and king of Valusia.

** "Literature/TheTowerOfTheElephant".

* BranMakMorn, king of the Picts.

* Turlogh Dubh [=O'Brien=], a Gaelish outlaw.

* Black Terrence Vulmea, an Irish pirate.

* FritzLeiber in the description of lush, sensuous oriental civilizations which he employed to great effect in his Lankhmar stories.
* KarlEdwardWagner, who can be considered a SpiritualSuccessor of sorts to Howard.

* BornInTheWrongCentury: Esau Cairn of ''Almuric'' is a Conan-like figure who is described by Howard as being born out of his epoch, a man of great strength and intelligence who was nevertheless ill-fitted to life in a "machine-made civilization."

*** Other non-racist moments show up from time to time. In Howard's historical short story ''The Road of Azrael'' (not public domain, but recently reprinted in ''Lord of Samarcand and Other Tales of the Old Orient''), the viewpoint character is an Arab. Several of his horror/supernatural works feature sympathetic characters of color: The viewpoint character in ''The Thunder-Rider'' is Native American, while In ''The Spirit of Tom Molyneaux'' (aka ''Apparition in the Prize Ring'') the hero (but not the viewpoint character) is an African-American, whom Howard actually describes as possessing "great nobility." In ''The Noseless Horror'', Ganra Singh (a Sikh) saves the day at the end. Meanwhile, ''The Horror from the Mound'' features a Mexican who's got a damn sight more common sense than the story's white viewpoint character. Finally, ''The Dead Slaver's Tale'' and ''The Dead Remember'' feature black victims getting ghostly revenge on the whites who murdered them.

* OurZombiesAreDifferent: "Pigeons From Hell" featured a [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zuvembie "zuvembie"]], which name was later used by MarvelComics for its voodoo-based zombie-like creatures (who couldn't be called such due to the ComicsCode.)

* ProudWarriorRaceGuy: Conan and several others.

* AuthorExistenceFailure: Many of Howard's incomplete drafts were picked up by other writers such as L. Sprague de Camp and turned into complete stories. See also [[{{Macekre}} Macekre]] below.

* {{Macekre}}: In addition to some of his stories being completed upon his death, many of his less-popular stories were rewritten, often to create [[DolledUpInstallment dolled-up installments]] in his more popular franchises ([[http://www.barbariankeep.com/fake.html source]]), and many of his actual stories were [[BowdlerIzation bowdlerized]] in paperback printings ([[http://www.barbariankeep.com/edited.html source]], and [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_E._Howard#L._Sprague_de_Camp_and_the_Howard_Boom see also]]). In addition L. Sprague de Camp and Lin Carter wrote several publish fanfics ''[[RunningTheAsylum which they declared canon.]]'' The fanbase [[FanonDisContinuity refused to go along with this]], however, and all these bad decisions have long since been reversed.