Sunday 6 March 2011

On Tributes to Howard


I wasn't actually aware that Roy Thomas had written a comic tribute to Howard (inked by Sandy Plunkett) that depicts his suicide.  Frankly, I wish I didn't.



Thomas' comic, "Death of a Legend" ( portrays what was generally considered the facts of Howard's last moments: REH leaves his father to the paperwork, the nurse tells him Hester isn't expected to regain consciousness, and he goes out into the driveway.  REH, with tears in his eyes, is accompanied by a series of tableaus depicting his stories: a scimitar-swinging warrior, a rapier-wielding swashbuckler, a hide-clad barbarian, an axe-bearing king... and in a two-page spread, we see the images of his heroes and villains surrounding him, as the bullet goes through his skull - in fairly graphic detail. Then the funeral notice, and the famous "All Fled" couplet.

I'm really not sure how to feel about it.  Howard's suicide - anyone's suicide - is a sensitive topic.  Howard's is especially sensitive because it's so widely misunderstood, from those thinking it was a result of him being an emotionally retarded man-child incapable of living without his mother looking after him, to those thinking he drove into "the desert," to yet others who seem to think he used a shotgun.  Thus, when Howard's suicide comes up, it's almost always a very tense affair with much sucking air into teeth and wincing.

At the same time, well, nothing is really sacred in art.  Art should be challenging, and confront matters that might be controversial, painful or difficult head on.  Some of the greatest works are based on tragic moments. Yet every time somebody tries to do a tribute to Howard that involves his death in some matter, I just find it somehow unpalateable.


Take Kurt Busiek's tribute in Dark Horse's Conan #28, "Storyteller," concurrent with the Robert E. Howard centennial.  I really didn't care for it.  At all.  It recast REH as Rovann, a chubby, dorky young Aquilonian teller of tall tales, who is misunderstood by the people of the town, considered a "Mama's Boy" for having the gall to stay at home to look after his sick father.  All through the story, he comes across as a complete loser.  Nobody respects him, he's clumsy, he's thick, and even in his heroic death, nobody even knows about his final moment of bravery.  As tributes go, it came across as remarkably backhanded: far from the slim, energetic teenager the real REH was, Rovann was more like the popular depiction of Howard as a "terribly unhappy, mother-obsessed, fattish bodybuilder" than the real REH.  Even though I can recognize this was Busiek's last regular issue, the inclusion of Black Kalanthes and Janissa felt incredibly self-indulgent.

Yet it was clear this was Busiek doing his best.  He really felt that this story was a fitting, heartfelt tribute to the man.  It's full of references to other Howard tales, bits and pieces of his life, and Busiek has always maintained deference to REH, even when he takes liberties that (in my opinion) make no sense.  It wasn't intended to be character assassination or parody, it was truly meant to be a tip of the glass to the man who started it all.

The Whole Wide World didn't depict Howard's suicide directly - and I consider that a very wise decision. The film already invents a few colourful embellishments (like Howard rushing into the long grass, whacking his sabre, tears streaming down his face), but it's remarkably tactful and sensitive in its treatment of the suicide.  Indeed, introducing it to the audience via Novalyne's reaction is arguably the best was I could think of.  It's relevant to the story, since it was naturally the way Novalyne discovered it - but it managed to be a bitterly sad moment, conveying the emotional power of the incident with subtlety.

I don't know whether I'm alone or not in my assessment of "Storyteller," nor of "Death of a Legend," but both leave the sourest of tastes in my mouth - yet should they?  By disliking them, somehow I feel like I'm being churlish, finding fault even in something as laudable as a tribute.  That I'm personally attacking Busiek and Thomas for not showing their respect and appreciation "correctly," or some such.  Then I wonder, what is the "correct" way to tribute Howard?  I haven't the foggiest - but I can say that depicting him as a dumpy little nerd, or illustrating his violent death, doesn't exactly seem the best way to go about it.

Perhaps I'm being over-sensitive.  But then, in a world where we've had to put up with Dark Valley Destiny, "Gilgamesh in the Outhouse," "Conan Unchained," that article by that Huffington Post alumnus, Norman E. Bates, and all manner of ridiculous balderdash, perhaps I'm just a bit instinctual hostile, even to works claiming to be tributes.  I suppose I'll just have to appreciate the sentiment, as opposed to the expression of that sentiment.

8 comments:

  1. Two years ago, I took the tour of the Howard house. Roy Thomas had been there previously. So had actor Bruce Boxleitner. There was an autographed photo of Arnold Schwarzenegger on the wall of the small room that served as a gift shop.
    I recommend that, if you can, you visit the house in Cross Plains, Texas and take the tour. There are a few locals who are imminently better versed in Howard's life and death than many who have written about him.
    The tour brings flesh to the bones that is the Robert E. Howard (Our guide referred to him as 'Bob') and if you fancy yourself a fan, you will think that the trip,however far off the beaten path, was worth the cost.

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  2. unfortunately , there is no right way to address the issue, especially one that has built so many myths around it that unfortunately certain individuals profited off of. one can only really present the known facts as clearly as possible and i believe the best tribute you can pay is simply by enjoying the work he did leave and recommending it to those interested.=mario

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  3. Right on Mario.

    To me Robert E. Howard's legacy IS his work-that is immortal.

    Focusing on the end of his life itself does seem in bad taste to me-though I won't argue any ones intentions.

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  6. Actually, "Death of a legend" is a quite interesting story. In the other hand, "Storyteller" is really pathetic.

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  7. I can only offer my own experiences, here.

    When I first read the Plunkett story, it was not advertised as a tribute to REH. It was just Sandy By-God Plunkett doing what he does best, drawing the crap out of a story. And while there was something naggingly familiar in the tableaus presented as the protag is raising the gun to his head, it wasn't until the last page that I "got it," and let me tell you, it was a gut punch. I suspect it was the same for a lot of fans of REH and Conan who hadn't ever considered Howard's early demise.

    I don't think there's anything so wrong with the plunkett story, particularly if it is not telegraphed. It does manage to sort of address that common fan's lament of how much good stuff Howard left on the table when he chacked out.

    As for storyteller...

    Sheesh. Okay, bottom line is this--I like Busiek's work. I like it alot, and he did right by Howard in his work on Conan. There, I said it. And I would like to think that the above statement includes storyteller. Here's why. You have to remember and at least acknowlege that aside from a handful of friends and a small circle of admirers like Jack Scott at the paper, the bulk of the general citizenry of CP didn't know what REH was doing, or they knew and didn't care, or they knew and didn't understand it. And the gossips were quick to call him a "Tristan" and other such terms. I don't think it's disrespectful at all to Howard's own biography. In "Storyteller" the protag dies a hero's death. He gets to save the town, even if they don't know it.

    I am confident that if REH had a way to get out of his town and see the world, knowing that his mother would have been cared for, he would have broken his arm trying to pack a suitcase in his haste. But he didn't, because he couldn't. He made the best of his bad situation. I think that's a big part of "Storyteller" too.

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  8. I recommend that, if you can, you visit the house in Cross Plains, Texas and take the tour.

    I definitely agree, Claude, having done so myself last year. I'll be doing it again. If you only do one thing at Cross Plains, visit The House.

    i believe the best tribute you can pay is simply by enjoying the work he did leave and recommending it to those interested.

    To me Robert E. Howard's legacy IS his work-that is immortal.

    That's a good way of looking at it.

    Actually, "Death of a legend" is a quite interesting story. In the other hand, "Storyteller" is really pathetic.

    I dunno, I find both of them a bit squirmy.

    I don't think there's anything so wrong with the plunkett story, particularly if it is not telegraphed. It does manage to sort of address that common fan's lament of how much good stuff Howard left on the table when he chacked out.

    I didn't realise DoaL wasn't advertised or promoted as "The Death of REH," as such. That does put things in a slightly different perspective.

    As for storyteller...

    Sheesh. Okay, bottom line is this--I like Busiek's work. I like it alot, and he did right by Howard in his work on Conan. There, I said it.


    Blasphemer! Heretic! Apostate! Renegade! Schismatist! *does the 1978 Body Snatchers point-and-scream*

    I jest, of course! To me, the problem with Busiek is that because he gets so much right, the things he gets wrong are telescoped and intensified as a result. Hence how I can love his adaptation "The God in the Bowl" *except* for the damned Tiki-Head, for example. On the whole, I think his desire to be faithful to REH is indeed genuine: I just don't agree on how successful he was at that, from my own point-of-view on the stories and comics.

    But then, you don't like "Queen of the Black Coast," so your opinion is automatically invalid. Nyeh. *blows raspberry*

    You have to remember and at least acknowlege that aside from a handful of friends and a small circle of admirers like Jack Scott at the paper, the bulk of the general citizenry of CP didn't know what REH was doing, or they knew and didn't care, or they knew and didn't understand it. And the gossips were quick to call him a "Tristan" and other such terms. I don't think it's disrespectful at all to Howard's own biography. In "Storyteller" the protag dies a hero's death. He gets to save the town, even if they don't know it.

    Oh, I'm well aware of that, and I'm sure that's exactly where Busiek was coming from: my problem is that he pretty much just transplanted an early 20th Century Oil Boom town into the Hyborian Age. The early twentieth century was very different from the Middle Ages/Colonial period of Aquilonia. There are some constants, I agree, and the idea of a sensitive, poetic soul being misunderstood and denigrated by insular townsmen is universal. I just didn't care for the way Busiek went about it.

    Over on another message board, some idiot claimed to finally understand why Howard's work was "juvenile" to him when he discovered he died at the age of 30. Apparently, no great work of fiction has been written before the age of 35. Kurt was straight in there like a shot, citing a number of classics written before that age. This was after he departed the title. While I still have my problems with his work on Conan, I'll always appreciate that.

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