Carter wrote several CONAN novels along with L. Sprague Decamp ( Carter was his Protege ) and together they kept the world of CONAN’s Savage sword alive.
They created a son for CONAN by writing in a character by the name of CONN…the boys name was actually CONAN but to determine who was who and not to confuse the readers they came up with a nick name for him that Big Daddy CONAN affectionately used to refer to his offspring by.
Lin Carter in his endeavor to pay homage to his LITERARY heroes created a hero by the name of “THONGOR : Warrior of lost Lemuria” This character was a cross between REH’s CONAN and pseudo John Carter/David Innes Edgar Rice Burroughs creations.
In fact THONGOR (according to a recent issue of ALTER EGO magazine) was actually supposed to be the original comic book to launch Marvels new sword and sorcery titles not CONAN as it turned out. That is a story for another time. There were also plans for a Thongor movie back 1980 but that alas never came to fruition. In a near future article I will share that with the readers of CROM. It was a sad way for Mr. Carter to pass on but he contributed to the legacy of the most enduring and savage adventure characters of all time , CONAN the barbarian. I have provided an illustration by BRUCE TIMM the famed artist and animator. It is a recreation to CREATURES ON THE LOOSE number 28 featuring THONGOR.
Great Bruce Timm piece. The unfilmed Thongor movie, which would have been called Thongor in the Valley of Demons, made it to the preproduction phase but no further. I own a booklet of production drawings that were made to drum up interest for the film and I've seen a few photos of a stop motion Lemurian lizard hawk.
ReplyDeleteI will point out that it was Carter who was protege to de Camp and not the other way around. de camp read the first Thongor novel in manuscript and it was this that later caused him to offer Carter the job of collaborating on the writing of new Conan stories.
Thank you Charles....I will make that correction later today. :)
ReplyDeleteThose production drawings are more than likely the same ones I saw in Starburst magazine from where I learned about the film.
btw I did know that...but it slipped my mind while preparing the post. Anyone who's anyone and knows CONAN...would also know this.
ReplyDeleteI apologize people for my slip up. :) ...I will watch myself to be sure I don't do that again.
Its a cruel thing for anyone to go the way he did. Especially some one with as much enthusiasm for genre books as Carter displayed.
ReplyDeleteI honestly do not believe that the modern "Fantasy" genre would be the same without him. He was simply too instrumental in the early days of establishing it as a genre. I suppose yes, he cannot be held blameless for the Conan Pastiches.. but I wish that he'd been alone to write them. As the few that he did on his own were considerably better than the ones with DeCamp.
Without the Ballantine Adult Fantasy line, There likely would be no Del Rey Books, without Del Rey Books, there would be no Terry Brooks, no Stephen Donaldson, Anne Mccaffrey or more than I can name either. Without them the whole miasma of epic fantasy would likely have taken a totally different path. Some might say that would be a better thing.. but I know my life would be considerably more boring.
Maybe one of these days, we will get all the Thongor stories in a single volume.. rather than spread out over 6 books and half a dozen anthologies. I seem to remember that Robert M. Price had looked into it.. but nothing has come of it for whatever reason.
its very good comic or a story
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non voice projects